Imperfectly Beautiful (Jordan Knight Fanfic, Liadan #3)

Daughters

-MARIA-

I let out a long, slow breath as I lay on my side, practically in a fetal position with my head tilted towards the end of the bed and tried my best not to scream my head off in pain.

I was pretty sure yelling would only give me a headache and the last thing I wanted was to pile on to the already overwhelming feeling of trying to bare my way through an unplanned natural homebirth of two babies.

Katherine had assured me that her entire home staff were all trained in basic first aid and CPR and the doctor Tony had called to attend me, Dr. Lisa something had rattled off a who's who list of the babies of the rich and famous she'd helped deliver at home in the mansions surrounding the beach. Still, I'd had one ob/gyn my entire life, the same doctor who'd delivered me and my brother—Dr. Montgomery and to not have her here was scary to say the least.

"You're doing so good, Marisa, I'm so proud of you, baby," Tony ran his fingers in slow circles along the ache in my back with one hand while the other dabbed a cool, wet cloth over my forehead. "I love you."

"I love you too," I sniffled and gripped the sheets into little fists as I rode out the remainder of a contraction and squeezed my eyes shut. "I'll love you even more if you hurry these babies out of me."

"How can I do that?"

"Same way you put them in there."

Tony chuckled and I opened one eye to look at him, "Wait, seriously?"

"I don't know," I whined. "I read somewhere once that sperm can help speed things along and I figure if anybody's sperm could do that, your super swimmers could."

"Super swimmers?" Tony looked amused and offered me a drink of water through a pink curly straw that had served as a fun nostalgic amusement at first, but now was just another necessity in all the things I had to do for this labor.

I took a small sip. "Yeah, I mean we made Grace my very first time and then we got twins while I had an IUD, what's the chances of that?"

"Probably slim."

"Exactly," I pressed my head against the bed a little flatter while he sat the water bottle aside. "Hence the super swimmers."

Tony's musical laugh echoed around me in a way that was comforting as he massaged my back with both hands, "It's an interesting theory, but don't you think you've got enough going on down there? I don't think you want me in the mix too, baby."

"I'll try just about anything at this point," I sighed and adjusted the towel on my head.

"Faith and Hope, try not to give Mommy too much pain, okay?" Tony whispered and leaned down to talk to my stomach before placing a gentle kiss.

"I don't think they have any control over that," I shook my head.

"Well, just in case," he offered me a smile as his pretty blue eyes twinkled in the way they had consistently throughout the pregnancy.

The past four months had been particularly sweet with the court case behind us and our focus solely on our family. With Uncle Jon's help, we'd started the process of building a home that was all our own in a custom build gated neighborhood that was at a halfway point between his mom's house and my parents' house—just around a seven minutes' drive both ways, no more than twenty minutes walking distance.

Tony had also recruited his best friend, Colton, and a few other old college classmates from M.I.T. to join him at his brand new startup, GFH, Inc. Spelled out, GFH, Inc. stood for Gadgets for Humanity, Incorporated to signify that the company not only innovated fancy tech that was similar to what he'd worked on at his father's company, but they also had a focus on humanitarian solutions. Specifically, GFH, Inc. helped underserved populations use technology to solve problems related to global health issues such as a lack of clean water, safe housing, and efficient agricultural processes. A portion of all sales on the technologies sold in developed countries went to help fund the humanitarian projects in undeveloped nations so that no one was ever denied help because they couldn't afford it. Not so coincidentally, GFH was also the initials of our three daughters and Tony smiled about that "side note" more than just about anything else he mentioned in the pitch he always made to potential investors.