Tom Billionaire Ch. 08

Cassandra glanced back, that smirk on her face once again. "Oh, that?" She grinned evilly, watching me squirm. "Come with me."

Just this morning, Cassandra had shown me her positive home pregnancy test. The girls had immediately made an appointment to see their OB-GYN that afternoon, and although their doctor usually made house calls, for this they would need the ultrasound equipment at the medical building. And for the first time since she'd shown me the test, I started to relax.

"It's true. You're pregnant, aren't you?" I asked excitedly. "You wouldn't tease me like this if you weren't pregnant."

"Wouldn't I?" she asked mysteriously with a Cheshire grin.

Cassandra led me to the main stairs and up onto the residential floor. We went straight for the Master Suite, where Taylor was sitting on the couch in the Lounge, staring off with a dreamy look on her face. Cassandra looked over and asked, "You have the disc?"

Taylor looked over, smiled, and then nodded as Cassandra and I sat down beside her. She pushed a button and the massive TV blared to life. My wife manipulated the remote and then there was a video of a little gray lima bean pulsing within a black oval, with more gray haze filling up the rest of the screen. In the upper left corner was the name "Cooper, Cassandra".

"Oh my gawd..." I breathed, feeling my stomach fluttering as if full of butterflies. I hadn't seen one of these since JJ's last ultrasound. And all of a sudden, my eyes felt moist.

Cassandra moved in closer beside me, wrapping her arm around my back and dropping her chin onto my shoulder. "Ready for a surprise?"

I glanced at her, seeing that teasing sparkle in her sky blue eyes as fresh anxiety rose up my chest. "Surprise?"

"Show him the next video."

Taylor nodded and worked the control. This one was a 3D ultrasound video, with the camera rotating relative right. I saw the little lima bean that would soon become my child. But then a moment later, it moved out of the way... and a _second_ lima bean came into view.

"Holy shit!" I gasped.

"I'm having twins," Cassandra confirmed.

"Holy shit!" I repeated.

Now Taylor moved in beside me, wrapping her arm around my waist and pillowing _her_ head against my shoulder. "Are you ready for one more surprise?" she asked softly.

"Don't tell me Cassandra's having triplets."

Both ladies laughed and picked their heads off my shoulder. Taylor looked straight into my eyes and shook her head. "No, no."

I took a deep breath. "Give it to me."

Taylor hit a button and then a new video appeared on screen. There was the single lima bean again, pulsing rapidly. I heard the heartbeat over the surround sound speakers. And I smiled to see it.

But I'd already seen this. And curious, I asked, "What's the surprise?"

Taylor looked at me with wide, glittering blue eyes. Her gaze was entirely on me, ignoring the screen and watching me intently as if she wanted to memorize the look on my face. And in a quiet voice, she said, "Look at the name in the corner."

Immediately, my eyes darted to the upper left. And there it was: "Brynn, Taylor".

My tongue dropped into the bottom of my stomach. My jaw landed somewhere on the floor. And with a gaping mouth, I turned back and stared at my wife. "Seriously?"

Still with those sparkling eyes, she nodded slowly.

"You got your own ultrasound?"

"I was late, too. Didn't take a home pregnancy test, since my periods are all irregular anyways. But since we were there, I asked them to scan me as well."

"But... but... I thought the doctors said you would never have another child," I breathed in disbelief.

My beautiful wife cracked a wide smile. "Actually, they said it was 'highly improbable', but not 'statistically impossible'."

"Congratulations!" Cassandra squealed from behind me, wrapping me up in a bear hug. "You're going to be a father again. Three times over!"

"Ohmigod..." I breathed as that moisture in my eyes turned into full blown tears. Taylor hugged me up from the other side before reaching her arm out and pulling Cassandra in as well. The three of us huddled together on the couch, all of us crying now, crying happily at where our lives had brought us, despite all of our recent turmoil.

We'd gone through near-bankruptcy, breakups, and even death. But through it all, we'd come back together. And now my family was beginning again.

All was as it should be.

****

THE END