Come A Little Bit Closer (The Sullivans #7)(76)

With another kiss to her cheek, Smith said, “I love you, Soph. And I can’t wait to meet your babies.” He silently passed on his trust, and faith, to Jake, who accepted it with a nod.

Smith slipped his fingers from hers and left his sister with the two people he trusted with her life. Sophie had found the forever love that she’d been looking for.

And so had he.

Chapter Twenty-seven

Valentina was sitting with Lori in the waiting room when Smith emerged from Sophie’s room. Both of them immediately jumped up as Lori asked, “How is she?”

Smith smiled. “She’s great. Better than great. The contractions are pretty rough,” he said as he flexed his hand to try to get the bones back in the right position, “but I don’t think it will be long now.”

Chase’s wife Chloe was holding onto her baby daughter in the waiting room, clearly close enough to her own birth experience to sympathize. “God, I swear I can feel her pain even from here.”

Baby Emma chose that moment to reach out and grab Heather’s ponytail with a happy giggle. Everyone laughed along with the baby, who looked around at her big family with glee.

Zach’s fiancée took the baby when Emma reached out for her and together Heather and Zach pressed kisses to each of her soft cheeks so that she giggled even louder as she really got a good hold on Heather’s ponytail.

But even though Smith absolutely adored his little niece, he couldn’t take his eyes off Valentina. Every moment he’d been with Sophie and Jake, he’d been thinking of her. Now, even with his entire family surrounding them, it was as if they were the only two people in the room.

For the first time in his entire life, he was so overcome with love he simply couldn’t get any other part of his body to work, save his heart, which beat only for her.

“Do you feel better now?”

“Yes,” he said, both for the knowledge that Sophie was in good hands...and for the very, very sweet knowledge that Valentina loved him.

Conversation flowed around them, but Smith was happy just holding Valentina in his arms. She was quiet and warm against him. A short while later, his mother burst out of the double doors with the biggest smile he’d ever seen on her face.

“She did it!” Her eyes overflowed with happy tears. “Oh, they’re so beautiful. Sophie and Jake can’t wait for all of you to meet their little girl and boy.”

Mary Sullivan was one of the most even-keeled women on the planet. She’d had to be to deal with eight rambunctious children, but for the first time ever she almost seemed unable to pull herself back together.

Marcus and Lori were the closest and they flanked her on either side as she said, “They named their daughter Jackie, after Jack.”

Smith felt his own eyes go damp at the tribute to his father, and was glad when Valentina moved even closer to him. This moment wouldn’t be nearly as good—or anywhere near complete—without her there to share it with him.

“And they named their son...” Mary looked at Smith and smiled through her happy tears. “They named him after you, Smith.”

Jesus. He’d never thought how much something like that would mean to him, but now he knew.

It meant the world.

“Oh, Smith,” Valentina said as she looked up at him with eyes that were so soft and warm they took his breath away just as much as hearing his sister had named her son for him. “That’s so sweet.”

Their mother wasn’t the only one sniffling now and when Marnie, the obstetrician who had also delivered Chase and Chloe’s daughter Emma earlier in the year, came out, she graciously accepted their thanks for another delivery gone well.

“Sophie and Jake were the ones doing all the work, but I’d be lying if I said a bottle of bubbly would be refused,” she said with a wink in Marcus’s direction. As everyone laughed, she said, “They’re all cleaned up and ready to meet their aunts and uncles now, although two or three at a time should be more than enough chaos for our nursing staff back here.”

Marcus, the oldest Sullivan, took a silent vote from his siblings before turning to Smith and saying, “Go meet Smith Junior and Jackie. But remember, the rest of us are waiting.”

Smith pulled Valentina through the double doors before she could protest that she wasn’t family. Of course, he’d also been banking on the fact that she clearly had a thing for babies.

There were scrubs and hand sanitizer waiting for them both outside Sophie’s room and he had to press a kiss to the back of Valentina’s neck when she automatically turned to have him tie the cotton strings together in the back. He loved the little shivers that moved through her as she leaned back into his arms for a moment.

But neither of them could wait another second to meet the two new additions to the family, so they quickly broke apart and stepped into Sophie and Jake’s room.

A soft sound of wonder fell from Valentina’s lips as she got her first look at the newborns. It shouldn’t have been easy to tell the little baby girl from the boy, but there was something undoubtedly male about Smith and sweetly female about Jackie.

Smith’s hands were already outstretched by the time he made it across the room to his sister’s side. She didn’t hesitate to place her son into his hands.

“He’s perfect, Sophie.”

Valentina was still standing by the doorway when Jake said, “Would you like to hold Jackie, Valentina?”