“I think we need to go to the hospital,” I tell her.

  Holy shit. Holy shit. Holy shit.

  “We’re moving today!” she cries. “This is—it’s August! It’s too early!”

  “We…um, where’s your phone?” I ask, putting my arms around her shoulders and shepherding her inside the house. “Let’s—um…let’s call your doctor’s office and ask them what we should do, okay?”

  “That’s good,” she says, her voice scared and breathless. “Yeah. That’s good. Let’s do that.”

  Inside the house, one of the movers asks if we’re okay.

  “I think her water just broke,” I tell him as Addy calls her doctor.

  “Dude, you gotta go to the hospital.” He takes his phone out of his back pocket. “Want me to call an ambulance?”

  An ambulance? Shit! An ambulance?

  “Do we need an ambulance?” I ask him.

  “My water just broke,” Addy is saying to someone at her MD’s office. “Uh-huh. Yeah. I’m sure. I was sitting with my—uh-huh.” She touches the stream on her thigh. “It’s still trickling. Okay. Yeah. A pad. Okay.” She’s nodding at the phone, her brown eyes wide as she listens to the doctor. “But it’s too early!” She bites her lower lip. “Okay. Okay. I know. Okay. Yes. We’ll call one now. We’ll meet you there. Yep. Okay. Bye.”

  “What did they say?”

  “We need to call an ambulance. We have to get to the hospital now.”

  “I’m on it!” says the mover, dialing 911 and asking for an ambulance to be sent to our house right away. “They’ll be here in twenty minutes!”

  Addy sways slightly on her feet. “The doctor said to wear a pad, but I…I don’t have any. I didn’t shop for the baby yet. The nursery isn’t set up. Your mom needs to come. Gideon, I’m scared! It’s too early! She still has six weeks.”

  “No, babe,” I say, ushering her over to a kitchen chair and helping her sit down. Inside, I’m a mess, but the most important thing I can do right now is to be calm for her. “She’s coming today. What can I get you? What do you need?”

  “Maybe, um…some underwear? And some pajama pants or something? Something dry? And a washcloth? For in the underwear?”

  I nod at her. “Yep. Yep. I’m on it. I’m going to go upstairs, and I’ll be back down in five minutes.”

  She grabs my hands and holds them, forcing me to look into her frightened eyes. “It’s too early, Gideon. She can’t come yet.”

  “Yes, she can.” I squat down in front of her. “Twins come this early. You were born at thirty-four weeks too. She’s coming today, Addy. She’s going to be a little early, but she’s coming today.”

  “She’s coming today,” she says, the glimmer of a smile on her lips before she suddenly doubles over with a deep cry of pain. “Gideon, she’s coming todayyyyyyyyyy!”

  Fuck! What is going on? Is she coming now? Like, right now?

  “Dude, you better hustle,” says the mover. “Go upstairs and get what you need. I’ll stay with her.”

  He kneels in front of Addison, taking her hands and telling her to “pant it out” as she screams in pain again. And I’m split, because I don’t want to leave her, but the ambulance is going to arrive any second, and she needs a few things for the hospital, doesn’t she?

  As I book it up the stairs, I hear her screaming again, and for the first time, I wonder if maybe all of this—preterm labor and the suddenness of it—are a sign of distress. A chill slides down my back as I wonder if one or both of my precious girls could be in danger.

  Don’t think like that! I tell myself. Stay positive.

  I throw some maternity jeans and the pajamas she wore last night into a duffel bag, then grab a washcloth and some underwear and add them too. Racing back downstairs, I’m beside Addy when another contraction starts, making her cry, her screams mingling with the sirens of the approaching ambulance.

  Everything happens so fast: the EMTs enter our house, put an oxygen mask over Addy’s nose and mouth, and strap her to a gurney. They wheel her out, and I follow behind, the mover who called the ambulance promising to lock the front door once they’re done and wishing us both good luck.

  And just like that, we’re headed to the hospital for Ella’s birthday. Addy’s hand grips mine in the back of the ambulance as yet another contraction takes over, making her scream with the kind of gut-wrenching pain I can’t even imagine, and all I can think is:

  Please let everything be okay.

  Please, please, please, God, let everything be okay.

  ***

  Addison

  Your baby’s still in a breech position.

  We need to do a cesarean section.

  Addison, we need you to count back from ten.

  It takes effort to open my eyes, and when I do, the first words circling in my head are the last words I heard as I was rushed into a hospital examination room. The obstetrician on call came in. And then…and then…

  “Gid…Gideon?”

  My throat is scratchy, and my voice croaks a little as I try to speak.

  “Gideon?” I try again.

  Breech position. Decelerating heartbeat. Count back from ten.

  “Gideon!” I cry, the sound terrible and desperate.

  “Ms. DeWitt? You’re awake. Hello, there.”

  I turn my head from the curtain I’m facing and find a nurse standing by the side of my bed.

  Emergency C-section. Prep for surgery. Breech. Preterm.

  “Where’s my baby? Where’s Gideon?”

  “Can you take a deep breath, Ms. DeWitt?” she asks, placing a blood pressure cuff on my wrist. “Let’s just make sure you’re okay.”

  Tears stream from the corners of my eyes. “Please. Where’s my baby?”

  Complications. Alert the neonatal unit. Get the pediatrician on call.

  “Mr. Grigoriev will be here in just a second. Another deep breath?”

  The breath I take is painful, and I wince, moaning softly as I exhale.

  “Are you in pain?”

  My body feels like I was hit by a bus, but it’s nothing compared to my fear and confusion.

  “Gideon,” I sob. “Where’s Gideon? Where’s Ella?”

  The nurse is speaking to someone else. “She’s asking for her baby. Can you go find her partner?”

  “You’re going to be just fine, Ms. DeWitt. I’m going to find the doctor for you too.”

  My eyes flutter closed—they’re so heavy—but I force them open in time to see the curtain whip open. Gideon stands at the foot of my bed.

  “Addy! Addy, I’m here. Are you okay? How do you feel?”

  He rushes to my side, sitting down in the curve of my body and taking my hand. His lips land on my forehead.

  Is she dead? Is Ella dead?

  She’s dead. I know it. I can’t say it, but I know it.

  “What happened?” I ask.

  He leans away. “It all happened so fast. We got here. They checked you out. Do you remember? She was in breech position—”

  Actually, I don’t want to hear all of this. I can’t bear it. Let’s just skip to the end, to the part where he tells me that she was too little to make it. She came too early, too fast, and there was nothing they could do, no way for them to save her.

  “She’s…gone,” I say, blinking my eyes as more tears blur my vision.

  “Gone?”

  “Here we are, all checked out, cleaned up, and ready to meet mama!”

  Another nurse enters the room, holding a tiny bundle in her arms. Gideon reaches up and gently takes the bundle, lowering her to me, and that’s when I understand, for the first time, that Ella is alive. That somehow, someway, we both made it through the unexpected terrors of preterm delivery.

  “Addy, meet Ella,” says Gideon, smiling down at our daughter before sliding his glistening eyes to me. “Ella Orange, this is your mom.”

  I reach for her, the IV tube in my wrist limiting my movement as Gideon lays her in the crook of my arm.

  “Let me help you,” he says, taking the bed-control console and pressing a button that helps me sit up just a little.

  I look down at her—at the little one who’s been with me since Elliot died, who led me back to the love of my life, who has, with her very existence, created the sort of family I never even dreamed of having.

  “Ella,” I say, choking softly over tears. “Hi, baby. Hi, sweetheart.”

  I stare at her face—at the cleft on the right side of her upper lip and the breathing tube inserted into her left nostril. The hair on her head is black like her daddy’s, but there’s a light layer of blonde hair all over her body. I remember from the baby books I read that it’s called lanugo and common in premature babies. Her eyes are firmly closed, but she opens her mouth and yawns, and it’s the most gorgeous thing I’ve ever seen a human being do.

  “Is she okay?” I ask Gideon.

  He nods, smiling at her with so much love, it makes my heart squeeze. “She’s okay. She was breech and six weeks early, so they did an emergency C-section. But she’s strong. Five pounds and one ounce, and her lungs are working well. The breathing tube is more of a precaution. You’ll both be here for four or five nights, just to be sure you’re both okay.”

  “There’s nothing else wrong with her?” I ask again, staring down at our little miracle.

  “She’s perfect,” says Gideon, bending his head so that his forehead touches mine. He whispers softly so he doesn’t disturb her. “But she has to go back to the NICU in a second. They need to monitor her for the next few days. We can visit her there as much as we want. Around the clock.”

  On one hand, I don’t want to let her go. I don’t want to let her out of my sight. On the other, I’m so grateful she’s alive, if she needs a bit of special care down the hall from me, so be it.

  “Hey,” he says. “Right now, while we’re all together for the first time, I want to ask you something.”

  I shift my eyes from her sleeping face to his. “What?”

  “I had this all planned for today. After the movers left, I was going to draw you a bath with flowers and candles and pour you some sparkling cider, and then I was going to kneel down next to the tub, and I was going to—”

  He opens a ring box, holding it just over our sleeping baby.

  “Gideon!” I gasp as fresh tears crowd my eyes.

  “I was going to tell you that I’ve never met anyone like you—who loves as hard as you do, who’d, literally, go to the ends of the earth to find someone she loved. I was going to say that I admire your spirit—the spirit that moved you to Alaska when you had a posh, comfortable life in LA. I was going to tell you that I’m in awe of your courage and bravery, that you make me a better man, a better person, just by being around me. I was going to tell you that you make me whole, and I never want to know—ever again—what it feels like to live my life without you beside me. I was going to say that I love you madly and deeply and forever, and I know we did things out of order, but I don’t care, because look at us now.” He takes a deep breath, his gaze lingering on our daughter for a moment before he slides those mesmerizing blue eyes to me. “I was going to ask you to be my wife.”

  Ella yawns again, making us both giggle as tears of joy slide down our cheeks.

  “And now?” I ask.

  “Marry me, Addison,” he says. “Marry me, aa’icagaq.”

  “Yes,” I say through tears, letting him put the diamond ring on my finger.

  We kiss over the head of our sleeping daughter.

  We are Addison, Gideon, and Ella.

  We are a family.

  Epilogue

  Valentine’s Day

  Addison

  “I’m home!”

  This is my favorite part of the day.

  I hang up my briefcase and overcoat on the brass stand beside the front door and brace my hand on the wall as I unzip and pull off my snow boots.

  “Did you hear Mommy? I think Mommy’s home!”

  From where I’m standing in the front hallway of our Anchorage house, I can hear Gideon talking to Ella upstairs. His question is answered with an excited squeal, which makes me smile from ear to ear.

  When I step into the living room, turn around, and look up, there they are, my two angels, father and daughter, standing at the upstairs railing, waving hello.

  “It’s Mommy!” says Gideon, beaming at me from his perch.

  Ella, who has started recognizing people from a distance, grins at me, babbling a mile a minute.

  “Hey, beautiful girl!” I cry, smiling back at her.

  Last month she had the surgery to repair the unilateral cleft on her lip, and it’s almost all healed now. She’ll go back next year to fix the cleft in her palate, and it’s possible she won’t need further surgeries after these two. Our fingers are crossed.

  “Let’s tell Mommy all about the party at school,” says Gideon, who takes her to a parent-child music class at St. Innocent Russian Orthodox Cathedral twice a week and calls it “school.”

  I listen to his footsteps down the stairs, watching for them under the arch that separates the front hall from the living room. And then, suddenly, as though they’ve fallen from heaven, here they are, my family, the two people I love most in the whole world, standing before me.

  They’re both wearing red T-shirts, though Ella’s sports tiny white hearts, and Gideon’s reads, “My heart belongs to Ella” with an orange underneath. I gave it to him this morning as a Valentine’s Day present from our little girl. I’ll give him his other present later, when our baby’s asleep down the hall and it’s just us, naked in bed together.

  We meet for a family hug, with Gideon holding Ella with one arm and wrapping the other around my waist. He leans down and kisses me senseless while Ella giggles and squeals between us. When I press my lips to the soft, wispy, black hair on her head, she smells of talcum powder and warm milk. It’s a smell I’ve committed to memory over and over again—I never want to forget these precious days.

  “Tell me about school,” I say.

  “Ella-Orange has a new boyfriend.”

  “My goodness! Do we like his family?”

  “His parents are mushers.”

  “Dog lovers, huh? Livia will approve.”

  He chuckles. “How was work?”

  “Fine. But I’ll be glad to get the bar exam over with next week so I can stop ‘advising’ and start ‘practicing.’”

  Even though I hadn’t yet passed the bar, I was hired in January by Folsom, Hoyt & West Attorneys at Law. To my great surprise, I didn’t have to take much of a salary cut either, which has made our life in Anchorage quite comfortable and allowed us to hire only the very best specialists to fix Ella’s lip and mouth.

  “You know what today is?” asks Gideon, handing me Ella as he heads into the kitchen.

  I press my forehead to hers. “Daddy’s so silly! It’s Valentine’s Day, isn’t it? It’s Valentine’s Day, Ella-Orange. Oh, yes, it is!”

  “It’s also our two-month anniversary,” he reminds me before popping the cork off of a champagne bottle. Ella jumps from the noise, and I hold her closer, nuzzling her head as Gideon pours us each a glass of bubbly.

  We were married quietly in the church at Tatitlek on December 14 with Gideon’s family in attendance. His mother stood behind us holding Ella as we took our vows, first in English and then in Alutiiq. I’m positive my pronunciation was awful, but Gideon and his family were so touched by my efforts, they said it sounded just fine.

  He holds out the glass to me, and I look at it but don’t take it.

  Hm. I guess he’ll get his Valentine’s Day gift now instead of later.

  “I can’t,” I say, trying not to smile.

  He tilts his head to the side, his eyes uncertain. “Why not?”

  “Because I’m a woman who learns from her mistakes…which means I will never again touch a drop of alcohol while I’m pregnant.”

  His eyes widen, and for a second, I think he’s going to let the flutes slip from his hand and shatter on the floor. But then he smiles, and it lights up his whole face with realization and happiness.

  “Are you…Oh, my God, Addy…are we having another baby?”

  I beam at him. “Think you can handle another?”

  “I can handle as many as you’ll give me,” he cries, placing the glasses back on the counter, then cradling my face in his hands and kissing me soundly.

  Ella fusses between us, so I put her in her favorite swing and give my husband my undivided attention for another kiss. Once we’re both liquid and breathless, he slides his lips along my jaw and whispers into my ear: “I love you so much, aa’icagaq. Thank you for the best Valentine’s gift ever.”

  “I love you too,” I tell him, pulling him as close to me as possible while our daughter swings back and forth to the sounds of her parents’ deep and great happiness. “Thank you for the best life ever, my Valdez Valentine.”

  THE END

  (Excerpt from KODIAK LUMBERJACK, an Odds-Are-Good Stand-Alone Romance by Katy Regnery. All rights reserved.)

  Chapter 1

  I WANT A WIFE

  Lumberjack, thirty, blond, blue-eyed, six foot two, and

  extremely fit seeks a healthy woman, 25–35,

  who is interested in marriage and children.

  I don’t care what you look like.

  In fact, I’d prefer it if you are plain/homely

  with strong values. As long as you are loyal,

  honest, hardworking, and kind, I am confident

  we can build something good together.

  PREORDER KODIAK LUMBERJACK NOW!

  Odds-Are-Good Stand-Alone Romances

  SINGLE IN SITKA – Available on Amazon, Apple, B&N, Kobo

  When Seattle journalist Amanda heads north to Sitka to research a story, she answers the Odds Are Good personal ad of single dad Luke, hoping for some no-strings-attached fun. But could the sweet, widowed father of three—who just happens to be a smokin’-hot state trooper—turn out to be the man of her dreams?