Page 235 of Say My Name

Dominic leans forward. “Are you all right?”

“I gave birth today. Stop asking that like there's a reasonable answer.”

He settles back, chastened for approximately two seconds.

The baby makes a soft noise. Dominic lowers his head immediately, whispering something I can't hear.

“What did you say?”

“That daddy’s here.”

My eyes burn.

I hold my hand out to him.

He rises carefully and comes to the bed. Once he sits beside me, I shift to settle our baby between us and curl my fingers into the front of his wrinkled shirt.

Dominic's arm closes around my shoulders.

“I love you,” he says against my hair.

“I love you too.”

Our child stretches, then settles when Dominic places his hand over that tiny back.

I cover his hand with mine and lean into him.

He kisses my temple.

“Elena.”

“Mm?”

“We haven't named her.”

I go still.

He feels it. “What?”

“A name.” My voice comes out too high. “Dominic, we don't have a name. I had a spreadsheet. I had a system. There were categories and weighted scores and I was going to decide by week thirty-two, and then the Weller situation happened, and the merger, and you, and I just—” I look down at our daughter, her face squashed against his chest, completely unconcerned.

“Okay.”

“Okay? I forgot to name our child. That's not okay. That's a catastrophic planning failure.”

“Elena.” He catches my chin, turns my face toward his. “She's three hours old. I think we have time.”

“What if I pick wrong? What if I give her a name that doesn't fit, and she's stuck with it because I was too distracted by—” I gesture vaguely at him, at us, at everything. “This.”

Dominic looks at me for a long moment. Then he shifts our daughter in his arms, supporting her head the way the nurse showed him, and touches one fingertip to her palm. Her fingers curl around it.

“She's going to be fierce,” he says quietly. “Independent. The kind of person who doesn't apologize for wanting things.”

“Like her mother.”

“Like her mother.” He traces the line of her cheek. “She's going to argue with us. She's going to make decisions we don't agree with. She's going to fall in love with someone who complicates her entire life, and she's going to fight for it anyway because that's what Rowe women do.”

My throat tightens. “Dominic.”