Still gesturing toward the screen, the doctor counted. “One, two, three, four.”
Now that she pointed to each of them, he could see them. Four. Four babies. Quadruplets.
“I have PCOS. They…” Abby choked on a sob. “They said I couldn’t have babies, and we… This wasn’t supposed to happen.”
“Well,” the doctor said with a cheerful smile, “there’s no question you’re carrying four babies, which is why you’re showing so early. Sometimes people with PCOS will suddenly drop a bunch of mature eggs. So it can happen. We’ll get the ultrasound to your OB so you can figure out a plan going forward. Congratulations, Mom and Dad—times four.”
The doctor and tech stepped out of the room, leaving the stunned parents alone.
“Adam,” Abby said, gasping. “What did she just say?”
Adam was still trying to process the news himself but forced himself to rally for her sake. “It seems we’re expecting quadruplets.”
“H-how is that possible? They said we couldn’t.”
“I know, sweetheart.” Still holding Liam, he leaned in to kiss the tears off her face. “It’s a miracle.”
“No, Adam, it’s not a miracle! Four babies! What will we do? How will we—”
He kissed her until she stopped talking. “We’ll figure it out the same way we have everything else. Now let’s get you up and dressed and off to the next appointment so we can ask all our questions.”
“I can’t remember my own name right now. How am I supposed to ask questions?”
“Your name is Abigail Callahan McCarthy, and you’re the strongest person I know. Whatever they tell us, we’ll handle it. I don’t want you to worry about anything.” He helped her sit up and steadied her when she seemed like she might topple right off the exam table.
“I can’t be pregnant with four babies. That doesn’t just happen.”
He smiled at the adorably confused expression on her face. “Apparently, it does.”
“You’re not allowed to find this in any way amusing, do you hear me?”
“I hear you, but I just want you to remember there’re a lot of really awful things we could’ve heard today. This doesn’t really count as awful.”
“Spoken by the one who doesn’t have to turn into a beached whale while having four babies!”
He couldn’t help it. He laughed.
She punched him in the gut, making him gasp from the surprisingly hard hit.
“Ow.”
“Do not laugh, Adam McCarthy, or I swear to God I might actually stab you for doing this to me.”
“How is this my fault? I thought I was your hero for getting you pregnant in the first place when they told us that couldn’t happen.”
“You were my hero until I found out you’re firing some sort of super sperm.”
Adam’s smile turned smug. “My boys are rather super.”
“Still not funny.”
“It’s a little funny. Come on, you have to admit it.”
“I have to do no such thing, and if you’re wise, you’ll keep your laughter to yourself. I don’t think it’s funny at all.” She broke down again, her entire body shaking with the force of her emotions. “What is wrong with me? All I wanted was to be pregnant, and now I’m freaking out because it’s not happening the way I thought it would.”
Adam had to bite his lip not to laugh again. He sat next to her on the exam table and put his arm around her. “You’re freaking out because we just got the most unexpected news we could’ve gotten. But we have to be thankful it was an overabundance of good news and not tragic news.”
She nodded and wiped her face. “I know. It’s just going to take me a minute to wrap my head around it.”
“Me, too, sweetheart.”
“We’re going to have five babies, Adam.”
“Yes, I heard about that.”
“Five babies under the age of two, Adam.”
“I got that memo.”
She elbowed him in the ribs. “You still think this is funny.”
“I figure it’s better to laugh than cry.”
“How are we going to do this?” she asked in a frantic tone.
He took her hand and held on tightly. “We’re going to meet with the OB and find out what we need to do to keep you and the football team healthy. Then we’ll figure out a birth plan that has you right here when you have them, and we’ll recruit grandparents, aunts, uncles and friends to help us survive the first couple of months, and we’ll make it work. Somehow.”
“You’re so rational. How can you be rational at a time like this?”
“One of us has to be.”
She elbowed him again. “I can hear you laughing.”
“I’m not laughing. Not much, anyway.” He brought her closer to him and nuzzled her hair. “It’s really your fault, you know.”
“I can’t wait to hear how it’s my fault.”
“You prayed so hard for a baby that you got four of them.”
“I see what you’re trying to do, and it’s not going to work. It’s one hundred percent your fault. Clearly, something is going on with you McCarthy boys knocking up your wives with multiples.”
Adam puffed out his chest and received another elbow to the gut that promptly deflated him.
“Let’s get moving to the OB appointment so they can tell me how in the hell I’m supposed to carry four babies.”
Adam got up and used his free hand to help her down from the table. When she wobbled, he put his arm around her until she was steady. “Just hold on to me, sweet girl. I’ve got you.”
“It’s a very good thing I love you so much.”
“It’s a very good thing indeed.”
Chapter 4
In Los Angeles, Stephanie McCarthy had been up since four in the morning, sitting in front of a huge window that overlooked the Pacific Ocean. Grant’s Malibu house, the one thing he’d held on to from his previous life in LA, was one of her favorite places in the world. But even here, she couldn’t seem to relax. She couldn’t eat or breathe or do anything other than worry about how she would possibly sit through the premiere of the film he’d been working on for the better part of two years.
He’d written her story. Hers and Charlie’s, and from all accounts, he’d done a masterful job of bringing their story to life on-screen.
But after having spent fourteen years desperately trying to free her beloved stepfather from prison, she and Charlie were now so far removed from that nightmare that it almost seemed as if it had happened to other people.
Almost…
Some scars couldn’t be ignored no matter how well the wound had healed.
She rested a hand over the small bump of her abdomen where her baby was growing bigger by the day, even if she wasn’t showing much yet. Victoria Stevens, the nurse practitioner-midwife on Gansett, had told her that was perfectly normal for someone of her slender build. She was right where she should be, or so Vic said, with her baby due in late December.
In truth, she never had shaken the feeling that she had no business having a child after being raised by a woman who thought nothing of beating the hell out of her own daughter. Her mother had been both wonderful and monstrous, and Stephanie had grown up navigating her mother’s ever-changing moods.