Patrick got home a few hours later, just as she pulled the shepherd's pie out of the oven to cool. She'd just checked on Angela, still asleep, though she'd need to be woken up soon. Tim, as per usual, was in his room reading.

She turned when he entered, stepping out into the living room so she could see him. Unsurprisingly, and despite the ten-hour day he'd just worked, a big wide grin broke out on his face as soon as he saw her.

She was helpless to follow, striding forward, beaming brightly at him. They met near the sofa, and almost melted into each other, Shelagh laying her head against his chest.

"Hello, my love," he said, dropping a kiss upon her head. "My loves, I suppose," he corrected himself, and she laughed a little against his chest. "That wasn't a dream earlier, was it, Shelagh?" he asked. "We're really going to be having a baby in a few short months?"

"No, it wasn't a dream, Patrick," she said, "though it feels like one. But baby has scarcely stopped moving about since I got home." He looked down at her, his eyes alight with joy. "I have a feeling this one's not going to be the little darling Angela is. She's quite energetic."

"She?" Patrick asked, eyebrow raised.

"Call it mother's intuition. Just have a feeling. I remember my father telling me that I kept my mother awake all hours during her pregnancy, while my brother was quite lethargic." She laughed, looking up into her husband's dark eyes. "I can't imagine what it's going to be like in a month, or two."

"I can't wait," he said, his right hand reaching up to cup her cheek. "You are going to be the most beautiful pregnant woman Poplar's even seen. And it's seen a lot of them." She chuckled, feeling rather comforted in spite of her previous doubts. Somehow having him here with her made all her worries seem far away.

"Well, I suspect this little one will be payback for all the hell I put my father through when I was a girl." She rubbed her belly as the baby shifted again. Patrick smirked.

"Ah, and I can't wait to hear more of those stories," he said, wiggling his eyebrows suggestively.

"You're incorrigible, Dr. Turner. Isn't it enough that I'm already in the family way?" He laughed.

"I hope you're not implying we stop just because it's done the trick?" he asked, touching his forehead to hers.

"I wasn't implying that in the least," she whispered, getting a little thrill from watching his eyes darken with desire and feeling him pull her closer to him. "Though I definitely did not mean right now, right here on the sofa," she scolded, trying very hard to feign disapproval at his naughtiness, to pretend that she didn't very much want to do what she had just recommended they shouldn't.

The truth was, it had been a while. Just a little more than a week since the last time, both of them so tired with the baby, with Timothy and his schoolwork and his unending questions, with the surgery and the clinic that more often than not, one would come to bed to find the other already completely fast asleep. Truthfully, it'd been like that for a few months. She supposed it was a wonder she managed to fall pregnant at all.

With a new baby on the way, that would be the first thing they'd have to start putting more effort into: carving out more time for just the two of them to spend together. She made a mental note to try a little harder from now on. Enlist Chummy or some of the Nonnatans to watch the children once in a while, go out to the theatre, or to the pictures.

They'd never had time as just husband and wife since their honeymoon, what with Timothy and then Angela coming along not much later. And now there were barely four months left before two children became three. They'd be outnumbered, then. It would be chaos if they weren't ready.

Patrick cocked his head at her, feigning disappointment. "Shame," he said, and she giggled.

"Now, no more dirty talk, you," she said, tapping him firmly in the chest with her finger, "Timothy's only in the next room. And it's time for supper. Go wash up and set the table, and I'll get the baby." Patrick leaned down to kiss her softly yet soundly, his eyes never leaving hers even as he pulled away. She felt the flush rising on her cheeks as she realised that this kiss was a promise. A promise that tonight, once the children were asleep, no matter how exhausted they both were, they would spend some time together as husband and wife. She nodded imperceptibly at him and he winked, and then, just like that changed the subject.

"What's Tim up to?"

"Oh, I expect reading up on the latest advances in obstetric medicine in The Lancet," she said, making her way toward the bedroom to get Angela.

"You told him?" Patrick asked, surprised. Shelagh shook her head.

"I didn't have to tell him, Patrick. Apparently, he already knew. I told him it would have been nice if he'd have let us in on the secret."

"What? How?"

"He noticed my expanding waistline. And I suppose I got a little faint in front of him a few times. I tried to hide it but he's an incredibly observant boy."

"Tell me about it. He's all but forced me to quit smoking. And somehow he knows when I've had one. It can be hours later and he'll still know." They laughed. "He'll be quite the physician some day."

"He's had a great teacher."

"He's had two great teachers," Patrick told her, pointing his finger at her. "And," he said, grinning mischievously, "at least we won't have to worry about who's going to support us in our old age." He knocked on the boy's bedroom door.

"Patrick," Shelagh scolded, but she was still smiling at his little joke when she entered the bedroom to find Angela standing up in her cot, awake and beaming back at her.

Σ

"When the baby comes, where are you going to put Angela?" Tim asked, sometime later, taking a sip of his milk before picking up his fork again and continuing to annihilate his mashed potatoes. Shelagh couldn't believe that so much food could fit in such a slight frame.

"Well, we haven't really had a chance to talk about that, Tim," Patrick said, catching Shelagh's eye. She'd barely had a chance to attend to her own meal, as Angela was choosing today of all days for her first incidence of fussy eating. Peas, apparently, were not to her liking this evening, as she'd spit out every one of her mother's attempts to feed them to her. "Here," Patrick said, his eyes on Shelagh's nearly-untouched plate of food, "I'll take over there. You eat. I can't have you fainting on me in the clinic again."

Shelagh attempted a half-hearted protest before handing the baby's bowl to her husband. She reluctantly began to tuck into her own dinner, relishing at being able to eat unperturbed. She had been starving, and realised a little guiltily that she'd been neglecting her diet lately. It was the likely reason her pregnancy had gone undetected as long as it had; she was fairly certain she'd lost close to a stone since Patrick's episode with the Prendergrast baby.

But there would be no more of that now, she thought. She'd seen the effect malnutrition of the mother had on babies; low birth weight, infections, developmental delays. She needed to start eating better, and eating more. Her body was no longer her own for the next few months.

"I suppose she could stay in our room, Patrick," she suggested between forkfuls, as her husband tried to catch the pureed peas dribbling out of their daughter's mouth. "She could stay in her cot on the floor and we could put the baby in a bassinet near the bed?" Patrick nodded, shrugging. "I can't bear the thought of waking up and not seeing her little face staring back at me." Shelagh smiled at her daughter, and the baby grinned gummily back at her.

"It'll work for a while, Shelagh, but in a year or so you know she'll need a proper bed and some space of her own to sleep."

"I know," she said, stroking her daughter's hair, "but I don't want her feeling left out, Patrick. I don't ever want her to feel that she's any less a part of this family because she's the only child not related to one of us by blood."

"I don't think that's ever going to be possible, my love," Patrick said softly, "the three of us dote on her enough to make Sister Evangelina raise an eyebrow. I'm fairly certain she thinks we're spoiling her." He lifted a spoonful of mashed potatoes to the baby's mouth and she ate it gratefully. Potatoes, apparently, were perfectly palatable. Peas were off the menu for now, it would seem, as evidence by the green-stained bib had around the baby's neck.

"Have you told anyone yet?" Tim asked, scooping up the last dregs from his plate onto his fork. He'd cleaned his plate a second time quicker than Shelagh had been able to eat half of her first helping.

"No," she said, catching Patrick's eye. "We will. I'd just like to do so at my own pace, if you two don't mind. I don't want everyone worrying about me."

"But, Mum, this is big news! Everyone will be totally thrilled. You have to tell them!"

"And I will, Timothy," Shelagh said, trying to keep the mild impatience out of her voice. "If you both would just oblige me a few days. I promise by Christmas we can start spreading the news. Agreed?" Both men nodded at her, mollified for now. "Besides, in a few weeks or so everyone will know. I'll have to enlist Chummy to manufacture me a maternity nursing uniform." She shook her head, still a little bit in disbelief.

"Now that is going to be a sight," Patrick said, glancing at his giggling son and completely ignoring the withering look his wife was giving him.