Page 87 of Code Violation

Her eyes flick to the screen, where our baby will appear for the first time. “I’m scared, Si. Up until this moment, I’ve been apprehensive about being a mom and excited about starting a family. But right now … I’m scared. What if the baby isn’t okay? What if we’ve come this far and there isn’t a heartbeat?”

Briefly glancing at the sonographer, who looks to be in her mid-fifties and very experienced at her job, I squeeze Vesper’s hand tighter.

“And what if I said that it would all be okay? No matter what happens in life, today, tomorrow, next week, even years from now, Ves, it will all be okay.”

She presses her lips together when the sonographer applies the probe to her stomach. I know that jelly shit is cold—the article I read last night mentioned it would be.

“Is that because you won’t let anything go wrong?”

I lean down so my lips coast the shell of her ear. “Well, that part is definitely true. But in the end, good things happen to good people. And you’re the best person I know.”

She doesn’t respond, our eyes doing all the talking. I can see the way my words have relaxed her shoulders and smoothed out the lines in her forehead.

“And there we have our heartbeat.” The sonographer’s voice cuts through our moment with the best fucking news I’ve ever heard.

She pauses the screen on the smallest dot, and a tiny heartbeat fills the room.

I push a hand through my hair, trying my best to hold it together. “Is, uh … is that our baby?”

The sonographer just smiles at me. “Yes, Dad, that’s your baby. Also, based on the images I’m seeing today, I would estimate you to be around a week earlier along than your OB-GYN initially confirmed. Your new due date is August 4.”

Overwhelmed, I rise to my feet and hover my lips over Vesper’s, totally ignoring the fact that we have company. “You hear that, Knockout? Everything is going to be okay.”

A bubble of laughter bursts from her throat, and I seal my mouth over hers, swallowing down her happiness.

“Fuck, this is all I’ve ever wanted, right here in this room,” I declare between kisses. “And I want to scream about it to the whole world.”

“Are we taking a different route back to your place?” Vesper asks from the passenger seat in my truck as I take a left away from town.

“We aren’t going back home just yet,” I reply, glancing down at the baby scans in my lap.

With a confirmed due date of August 4, it feels borderline torturous, waiting so fucking long to meet them, and these images will live in my wallet to help me get through it.

“Give me a small clue about where we’re going,” Vesper pleads as I continue driving and take the ramp onto a freeway.

I smile over at her as the winter sun shines through the windshield. She’s wearing the cutest red-framed sunglasses and a sweater dress with black ankle boots.

“Okay …” I tease, switching lanes before I loop my hand through hers and rest them in her lap. “Your current outfit won’t be suitable for where we’re going.”

She pulls off her glasses and glares at me. “You do realize that what you just said is every woman’s worst nightmare?”

I burst out laughing, remembering the way my mom would always stress over what she was wearing. Whether she was too overdressed or wouldn’t be warm enough.

“I do, yeah, and that’s why I have everything you will need in the back seat.”

Turning over her shoulder, she narrows her eyes in question, and I can’t help it when I slide my hand from hers and rest it over her stomach.

Vesper’s eyes fall to where I’m holding her.

My thumb moves in small circles over her dress. “I think I’m starting to feel a little bump.”

“Or maybe I just ate too much for lunch. I’m way too early to be showing, and the sonographer just set our due date back a week,” she counters.

I shake my head, convinced she’s talking bullshit. “Nah, our baby is already popping up to say hi.”

Taking a right, we travel down a gravel track for half a mile before I pull into a parking lot outside a large white building and kill the engine.

Vesper stares out of her window and then at me. “A spa? You brought me to a spa?”