The Unwanted Wife and Her Secret Twins (Mia and Kyle) novel Chapter 510

Mia's POV

I find the cabinet under the sink. Pull out the stack of clean towels I keep there—the old ones, the soft ones, the ones that are too worn for guests but perfect for moments like this.

The water runs warm over my hands.

I watch it swirl down the drain. Pink-tinged. Carrying away the evidence of what just happened in my living room. The towels soak up water. I wring them out. Not too wet, not too dry.

When I come back, Alexander has stopped crying. He's still pressed against Kyle's chest. His eyes are half-open, unfocused, staring at nothing.

"Here." I kneel beside the whelping box. "Let me show you how."

I lift the first puppy—the smallest one, the fighter—and begin to clean it.

The fur is softer than I expected. Softer than Gas's fur, softer than anything. The puppy makes a sound when I run the warm towel over its back—a small mewl, half protest, half confusion.

"You're okay," I tell it. "You're okay, little one. We're just cleaning you up."

"Can I try?" Ethan asks.

I hand him a towel. Show him the motion—gentle strokes, following the direction of the fur, careful around the face and the belly. He mimics it exactly. Of course he does. Ethan never does anything by half.

"Like this?"

"Perfect."

"The optimal pressure appears to be approximately—"

"Ethan."

"—right. Less data, more doing."

Gas lifts her head.

Her eyes find mine. Instead she just watches. Trusting.

I reach over and stroke her head. The fur there is damp with sweat, matted in places. She needs cleaning too. But that can wait. Right now, she just needs to know that we're helping. That we're on her side.

"Good girl," I murmur. "Such a good girl."

Her tail moves. Weak but present.

Madison appears beside me.

"Can I help?"

Her voice is barely a whisper. The kind of voice you use in churches, in hospitals, in places where something sacred is happening.

"Of course, sweetheart."

I hand her a towel. Her fingers curl around it—small fingers, careful fingers. The puppy in her hands squirms. A small, blind creature searching for something it can't name. Madison's touch gentles it. Stills it.

"It's warm," she says. Surprised.

"They're all warm. That's how we know they're okay."

"It feels like... like holding a heartbeat."

My small girl who came to us broken and is slowly, piece by piece, learning to be whole. Her dark hair has come loose from its braid. There are circles under her eyes. She looks exhausted. She also looks more alive than I've ever seen her.

"That's exactly what it is," I say.

We clean all six puppies.

It takes longer than it should. Partly because we're tired, partly because we're careful, partly because Alexander keeps wanting to hold each one and tell it encouraging things before passing it back to its mother.

"You're a champion," he tells the second one. A dark brown puppy with a white patch on its chest. "A true champion. Did you know that? Your brother almost died and you were RIGHT THERE supporting him. That's what siblings do."

"They couldn't actually provide support."

"EMOTIONAL SUPPORT, Ethan."

Gas's head lifts. I finish cleaning her. Set aside the dirty towels. Make a mental note to start laundry later, when I can feel my legs again, when the world has stopped tilting slightly at the edges.

"There." I stroke her head one more time. "All done. Now rest. You've earned it."

Gas sighs. That deep, long exhale that dogs do when they've finally let go of tension they didn't know they were holding. Her eyes close.

Within seconds, she's asleep.

"We need to name them."

Alexander's voice breaks the quiet. He's sitting on the couch now—when did he get on the couch?—with his legs pulled up under him and his back against Kyle's arm. Kyle is beside him, his eyes half-closed, his head tilted back against the cushions.

"Name them?" Ethan is on the floor, cross-legged, close enough to the whelping box that he can monitor the puppies' breathing patterns. I'm not sure he realizes he's doing it. It's just Ethan, collecting data, even when he's exhausted.

"Yeah, name them. They're babies. Babies need names."

"They're dogs."

"Dogs are babies. Dog babies. And dog babies need names just like human babies do."

Madison is on my lap. I don't remember how she got there. One moment I was sitting on the floor, leaning against the coffee table, and the next she was climbing up, arranging herself in the space between my chest and my knees, Eleanor wedged between us.

"He's right," she says quietly. "They should have names."

Kyle shifts. "I have a suggestion," he says.

Everyone looks at him.

"There are six puppies." His voice is rough. Scratchy. The voice of someone who hasn't slept in too long and has spent too much of the night talking to a child who needed to hear that everything would be okay. "And there are three of you. Two puppies each. You each get to name two."

Alexander's face lights up.

"That's PERFECT. That's—that's democracy. That's FAIR."