Page 24 of A Roommate for Ronny

Throughout the pregnancy, our healer, Juan, had been a bright light. He was always encouraging and contributed to my omega’s cheerful demeanor. Anytime we had a concern, we could call or stop by, and each time, he’d left us feeling good and never as if we’d overreacted.

“I see you got the bed all ready as we discussed.” He pulled a stool from the corner over to the bed and folded the sheet down. “And you have everything else all ready. Nice work, both of you.”

My omega glowed under the praise. “Thank you.”

“Now, let’s see. Want to bend your knees for me, Brach. Good job.” He completed his exam then covered Brach with the sheet again. “How far apart are the pains?”

“I think about six minutes, maybe seven,” I said, although I hadn’t done a great job in timing them. “Too soon to call you?”

“No, let’s time a few now because this baby is going to be here, if I had to guess, within an hour or two.”

Turned out, that while I had been timing early on, since I got busy preparing everything, things had gotten a lot closer together. The pains were about three minutes apart and growing more intense by the moment.

It was getting real awfully fast.

We’d planned for Brach to do a lot of walking to help things move along, but there was no time for that now. I stood by the head of the bed, letting my omega hold my hand while he rested between pains.

His nails were digging into my hands, but I swore I’d never say a word about it because he was bringing our child into the world, and I couldn’t do anything more for him than this.

“Good job,” Juan said. “Now, on the next contraction, I want you to try to push.”

“Thank heavens,” he growled. “I was going to do it anyway.”

My mate lifted the top of his body off the bed and bore down.

“Again.”

On the third try, the baby slid out into the healer’s hands and we were dads.

“It’s a girl,” the healer said. “Do you have a name?”

“Yes.” Brach looked at me, and I nodded.

“Go ahead, omega.”

“We’re naming her Rebecca after our friend’s late wife.”

The healer handed her to me, all wrapped up in a soft, rainbow-striped blanket. She was red and wrinkled and wailing and the most gorgeous thing I’d ever seen. “Hi, Rebecca,” I said. “Welcome to the world. I hope you’ll be very happy here.”

“She should be.” Brach offered me the softest smile. “With a daddy like you.”

“And you, omega mine.” I kissed our daughter’s forehead and my mate’s lips. “This little girl is going to have the happiest life we can give her.”

Epilogue

Brach

“Remind me. Why are we all going to sit in Jones’ backyard in the middle of the day on a Wednesday?” Ronny asked.

Rebecca had just had her least favorite time of day, tummy time, and we were having tea next door. But it wasn’t just tea, it was an intel mission, and my mate didn’t understand why Jones and I were so excited about it.

“Because we’re nosy.” I picked Rebecca up off the changing table. “Right, sweet girl? We’re nosy, nosy, nosy.”

She was already starting to fall asleep. We were on borrowed time if she was going to eat first, which was the only way she’d have a decent nap.

“Let’s get out there quickly, though, so I can start feeding her before she gets fussy. I don’t want to miss a moment of the action because I’m pacing with our sweet girl to console her for my own failings.”

Parent guilt was no joke. She cried—I questioned what I did wrong. She was fussy? I wasn’t attentive enough. The healer assured me it was postpartum hormones and would even out. Please let that be true.