“I’m not doing this without you!” Quinn huffed and puffed and grabbed onto Quinn’s hand with superhuman force, threatening bones and ligaments. “I’m sorry. I know I’m yelling but I can’t stop! Mick, get down there with the doctor to catch this baby because she’s coming in hot!”
Tilly brought Quinn’s hand to her chest and squeezed. “You’re okay?”
“Hell, no, I’m not okay. I’m about to push a bowling ball out my hoo-ha!” she yelled, and then she began pushing.
Chapter 10
Dear Heart, please stop getting involved in everything. Your job is to pump blood, that’s it.
—from “The Mixed-Up Files of Tilly Adams’s Journal”
An hour later Tilly was sitting in the chair beside Quinn’s bed, holding the newborn with marvel and more emotion that she wanted to admit to. “Baby Ashlyn,” she whispered. “Wow. I can’t believe you’re here.”
And then she burst into tears.
Quinn looked at Mick, who was on the bed with his wife, holding her against him.
Mick got out of the bed, bent to kiss his wife, and left them alone.
“What’s up?” Quinn asked.
“She’s just so beautiful,” Tilly sobbed.
“She’s patchy and blotchy and bald,” Quinn said. “Now tell me what’s wrong.”
Tilly laughed in horror at Quinn’s description. “She’s your baby.”
“And I love her more than I can say, but she’s not why you’re crying like your heart’s broken.”
“I think I blew it with Dylan,” she managed.
“You couldn’t possibly. He loves you, ridiculously.”
“I misread some cues.” Tilly drew a deep breath and tried to get ahold of herself. “I assumed he was going to take off again, only it was the opposite.”
“Are you speaking in English?” Quinn asked. “I was in labor for twelve hours and haven’t slept in over twenty-four. I’m also starving and sitting on a blown-up doughnut. So you’ve got to cut right to the chase for me.”
“She’s trying to tell you that I’d planned a proposal, which she somehow took for me dumping her,” Dylan said from the doorway.
Tilly’s heart stopped at the sight of him. So far today, she’d panicked on him, assumed the worst, let him get her here, and then ditched him without a backward glance.
He didn’t look mad though.
He glanced at Quinn in question and was nodded in. He moved straight to Tilly and looked down at the baby with a warm, genuine smile that softened the features of his face.
“Do you want to hold her?” Tilly asked and when Dylan nodded, she rose and gently set the baby into his very capable arms.
Dylan bent low and said something soft and inaudible to the baby and then gently handed her back to Quinn. “I need to borrow your sister a moment, do you mind?”
“Does it have anything to do with the ten proposals we’ve had in town since you put up the billboard?” Mick asked, coming back into the room, slipping his phone into his pocket.
“What?” Tilly asked in shock.
“Yeah.” Mick sent Dylan a head shake and a low laugh. “Do you have any idea how many T’s live in Wildstone?”
Dylan stared at him for a beat and then laughed. “Sorry. I didn’t expect it to go down like that.”
Mick glanced over at Tilly. “I’m guessing no one did.”
“Someone needs to tell me what the hell’s going on,” Quinn said. “Because I can go back to yelling. Don’t think I won’t!”
“I’ve got this,” Mick said to Dylan, referring to Quinn and the baby. “If you want some privacy—”
“No privacy!” Quinn yelled, her voice a little hoarse. “I just pushed this baby out my hoo-ha—”
“Please,” Tilly said, slapping her hands to her ears. “I’m begging you, stop saying that!”
“I’ll stop saying it when you and Dylan stand right here at my bedside and figure your shit out.”
Tilly started to shake her head but Dylan came close and took her hand. “I’m willing,” he said.
“You’re my favorite,” Quinn told him. “Keep talking.”
Dylan drew a deep breath and met Tilly’s gaze. “I had plans for today. Plans that went awry.”
There were a lot of words about to escape her, but she felt a little too fragile and exposed so she squeezed her lips together and nodded.
He nodded back and paused, clearly thinking she’d want to speak. When she didn’t, he let out a low, mirthless laugh. “Still me. Okay.” He drew a breath. “You thought it was over?”
“I . . .” She broke off and bit her lower lip.
“You did,” he said, clearly shocked. “You really thought it was over, that I’d changed my mind about you, but that I’d still take you up in the air to what . . . be a dick?”
She bit her lower lip.
He gave a disbelieving head shake. “You did. You actually believed that in the hours since I’d worshipped every single inch of your body that I’d somehow decided to walk away, that it was over.”
She closed her eyes. “In my defense, that is what happened last time.”
“Tilly,” Quinn whispered, horrified.
Dylan just inhaled a deep breath and let it out slow and controlled. “It is what happened last time. But it was a long time ago,” he said with quiet steel. “I was a stupid, reckless kid who had no idea how to hold on to what had turned out to be the very best thing in his entire life.”
“Oh,” Quinn breathed and used Mick’s shirt to blot her tears. “Don’t mind me. It’s baby hormones.”
Tilly’s eyes had filled too and she didn’t have baby hormones to blame.
Dylan pulled her into him. “Let me start over,” he said. “This is long haul stuff. Clearly, I’m not perfect. I’m going to mess up—”
“Well, you’re not alone there,” she managed.
A very small smile curved his lips. “Good to know. But I’m never going to leave you again. Ever.”
As he said it, she felt her heart click back into place as the reality washed over her. He was real, they were real, and neither of them were going anywhere.
Dylan dropped to a knee in front of her.
Quinn gasped and burst into tears. “I’m sorry! Ignore me! Carry on!”
There was a small smile on Dylan’s mouth as he looked up at Tilly. “We were supposed to be hovering in front of the billboard for this, but life with you is never going to be that predictable, is it?”
She gave a shake of her head. “I don’t think it will be,” she whispered. “Are you really asking me to marry you?”
“I’m trying.” He pulled a little black box from his pocket.
Before she could say another word, she dropped to her knees too. Mostly because hers didn’t want to hold her up anymore. “Yes.”
“But he didn’t ask yet!” Quinn said.
“Shh,” Mick told Quinn very gently and then kissed her, probably to ensure she’d stay zipped.