“Of course we can.”
Shit, he’s been here a couple of hours and I haven’t even asked how his daughter is, I assumed if there was any change he would have told me and he hasn’t said a word.
We arrive back at the hospital half an hour later and my stomach flips over as we walk into her room and I see Nina sitting at her bedside, Gabe squeezes my hand tight for reassurance.
“What’s she doing here?”
“She’s come to see Ava and give her some news, you can either stay or you can go, it’s up to you.”
“No. I’ll stay, I want to hear whatever shit she has to say.”
“Please yourself.”
We both approach Ava’s bed, she is off of all the breathing equipment I notice and she just looks like she’s sleeping, “Ava baby, Laurens come back to see you and we have some news, we wanted you to be the first to know…”
I motion for Gabe to shush so I can speak, “Ava, I need you to wake up and get better, because baby girl, I need you to be my bridesmaid when I marry your Dad, and if you don’t wake up, well then Stella will just take over and I need you so bad to be on team Lauren.”
“Dya hear that Bub, she finally said yes, you told me to just keep asking and she would say yes and finally, finally Lauren said it.”
“You are joking right?”
Nina is standing behind us, sneering, “You aren’t really going to marry him are you? Only he doesn’t really have a great track record on that front and FYI… if you are stupid enough to go ahead with it…don’t be expecting sex on your wedding night, or any night after for that matter.”
“What is your problem sweetheart?”
Gabe shakes his head at me, “No, no Gabe, I kept quiet the other day so there wouldn’t be a scene but not today, she’s not going to spoil the beautiful love we just made or the amazing proposal speech you just gave, so I’m just curious Nina, what is your problem, is it me? Are you jealous of me, of me being with Gabe, or my relationship with Ava? You stand there making all of these assumptions about what our marriage will be like when really and truly, you barely know Gabe and you most certainly don’t know me but just to make things nice and clear I need you to know that Gabe and I will be getting married, Ava will be part of our wedding and will remain part of our lives, not because she is Gabe’s daughter but because we love her and want her to be part of our lives, she won’t ever be used as a pawn by us, we will never threaten to take her away from you, she will come and stay with us of her own choosing and FYI, we, me and him, Gabe and I, we fuck like rabbits, we will fuck like rabbits on our wedding night and we will spend the rest of our married lives working our way through the Karma Sutra and every other sex manual you care to mention – while fucking like rabbits, and you know why that is? Because he loves me, he wants to marry me and be with me, because he loves me, not because I’m knocked up and threatening to take his child away from him.”
I stand and stare at the sour faced bitch, shaking from head to toe, suddenly aware of the grip Gabe has on my shoulder, “You can let go babe, I won’t hit her. Not in here anyway.”
I turn and look at him over my shoulder and I can see he’s trying not to laugh or even smile; he pulls me around and kisses me full on the mouth, “I fucking love you. Future Mrs Wilde.”
“Is this how you usually carry on in front of my daughter? Kissing and fucking in front of…”
“Can you all please stop shouting and talking about sex? It’s gross and making my head hurt.”
CHAPTER 17