"She looks like a jellybean."

"He looks like a peanut."

"Is a jellybean peanut a thing?"

"Or is it a peanut jellybean?"

"Eeuw! Imagine a peanut flavoured jellybean."

"Or a jellybean flavoured peanut."

"Would it be sweet or salty?"

"Would it be crunchy?"

"The two of you need Jesus," my best friend said, looking at us with a horrified face.

Cuba Laz Diaz is the greatest human being on the planet. I couldn't stop kissing his face for two minutes after Fifi told me that he'd managed to track her down and get her to New York. We spent an hour catching her up on everything and I'm yet to really talk to her alone, but I couldn't have been happier to have them both with me.

"But would it?" we asked her.

"I don't know, and I don't want to know. I just know that I'm trying to wrap my mind around the idea of the two of you. You are such polar opposites, but at the same time you're not. Your bond and connection is strong, that much I can tell, but it's so weird," she said, making us laugh.

"That would make no sense to anyone else but us," Cuba said what I was thinking.

"This is honestly the last thing I expected when you told me that I needed to come to New York," she told him.

"How did you arrange that by the way?" I asked him.

"I talked to Connie and she gave me all the relevant details I needed. I then got in touch with a PI who tracked Fifi down. I called her and asked her to come to New York. She was obviously confused since I didn't mention you. I just told her that it was a matter of life and death and that I would arrange everything," he replied.

I turned to my best friend, scowling. "And you just went with it?"

"Oh no, I refused. Here's this strange man telling me that I need to come to New York but nothing else. He told me his name, so I took the liberty of doing my research on him. When I found out who he really is, I guess that's when my curiosity was stoked. I couldn't help but ask myself why this wealthy man would want me to be here, so I called him back and told him I'd come. I was honestly just as relieved to see you as you were me," she admitted.

"Well, I'm as happy as they come right now, so thank you for finding her, and thank you for taking the chance and coming here," I told them both. She sent me a wink.

"You're most welcome Mama Dori. I don't know about you guys, but I have no intentions of cooking, so I'm thinking of heading out and getting us dinner. It will give you guys an opportunity to catch up with me out of the way," he said as he stood up.

"You're just seriously raking in the brownie points," Fifi teased.

He chuckled. "A man can only try."

"Can I pwease have pizza?" I pouted, using my baby voice.

He sighed. "Dori we talked about this."

"I swear I'll stick to the new eating plan from tomorrow. I'll start on a new day," I bargained.

"Something tells me that the rest of my life is going to be filled with such deceitful bargaining," he joked.

Fifi mock sniffed, wiping away imaginary tears. "He knows your bullshit almost as well as I do."

"Don't make me hate having you both around," I warned them, and the two morons just laughed at me.

"I'll get you pizza, but from tomorrow we stick to the eating plan," he warned.

"Thank you," I said, doing a mini dance.

He shook his head, laughing, before leaning down and kissing me. "I'll be right back. Fifi, please keep an eye on her. I'm pretty confident that you're the responsible one in this relationship."

"You don't know the half of it," she said dramatically.

I smacked them both. "I resent that."

"You'll live. Behave," he said, shooting me a look before finally leaving.

As soon as we heard the front door close, we squealed like the little girls that we are before she smacked me with a cushion, making me giggle. "What the hell Lolo? I leave you alone for like five months, and you go ahead and get yourself pregnant by a man who I'm pretty sure should be fined for looking that hot."

"Right? I still can't believe he thinks I'm the beautiful one," I giggled.

Her eyes filled up with unexpected tears. "Oh God, and your hair; you finally cut your hair. You're glowing. You're so happy, it makes me so happy."

"Aaaaw Fifi, you're not allowed to do that. My emotions are already a wreck," I complained as I got teary eyed too.

She laughed, wiping away the tears. "I'm sorry. It's just so amazing seeing you like this. I know that you didn't expect it, but from my side, it looks like the best thing to happen to you since me."

I rolled my eyes, smiling. "Of course it's after you."

"You have to tell me about the name thing though. Laz and Dori?" she asked.

"They're our second names," I replied.

"I know that genius. I also know that you despise that name, and yet when he says it, you light up like he's giving you a pizza," she teased.

"Man, I really hope he brings back the good stuff," I said in thought.

I could taste it already.

She snapped her fingers in front of my face. "Focus Lolo. Your obsession with pizza and caffeine is concerning."

"Never, and I mean never, say those words around Laz. If you do, the rest of my life is doomed to a pizzaless and caffeineless existence," I said, shaking at the absolute horror.

"Rest of your life hey?" she asked, nudging me.

I blushed. "Well yeah. I'm pretty confident he's the one."

"So why haven't you told him that you love him?" she asked.

"What?" I whispered.

"It's in your eyes Lolo, and this is coming from the one person who knows you better than you know you. You love that man, and that terrifies you. However, I'm here to tell you that you have nothing to fear. He looks at you the same way you look at him," she pointed out.

I bit my lip. "You think?"

She smiled. "I know it. You don't even have to worry about a pizzaless and caffeineless life. He's weak to your charms I'm sure. You can convince him of many things," she joked, making me laugh.

"Mum didn't take the news too well," I said lowly once my laughter died down.

"I was wondering if they knew. What happened?" she asked, concerned.

"Well JR and dad don't know, or at least if they do, they didn't find out from me. She came to see me at my apartment since I wasn't returning their calls. It was just after I'd found out and I wasn't keen on facing anything really. Con was in communication with Laz and before I knew it, he was there. When she came to visit, she wanted to know why he was there and I just came out with it you know?" I said, getting emotional thinking back to that moment.

"Oh my baby. What happened?" she said, wrapping me up in her arms.

"She didn't even say anything Fifi. She just walked out. When Laz had to come back, I saw it as an opportunity to give her some space, so I came back with him. He suggested that I text her, and I did, but still, nothing," I replied, sniffing.

She just held me and let me cry, much like I had the last time I was with her.

I seriously hate pregnancy hormones though. The rapid change of emotions is enough to drive one crazy, and then you get frustrated by them, and then you're just going extra crazy and well, you get the picture.

"We have a recording of Nemo's heartbeat," I said after a while, my crying having died down.

She laughed. "You named your child Nemo?"

"Before you ask, you should know that I'm the one who came up with that name," I confessed.

"Oh, I already guessed that much. Cuba is weird, and you clearly bring out that side of him, but not even he would be able to achieve that level of weirdness," she taunted.

"I think you need to go back where you come from. Speaking of, where were you?" I asked.

"Here, there and everywhere. I wasn't vacationing as much as I was doing research. I went to Madrid, Thailand, Singapore, Dublin, Rio, Mumbai, Perth, Dubai, Cairo, Athens, Florence and Istanbul. However, I was in Honolulu when Cuba contacted me," she informed.

I smacked her. "Ow! What the hell was that for?"

"I know you were looking for inspiration and textiles, but you went to all these places without me," I scolded.

"You've already been to more than half of those places, and I just, I needed to go by myself. You know I love you more than anyone in the world, but I needed to do this alone Lolo," she argued.

"Did it at least help?" I asked.

She nodded, beaming. "The designs I have will blow you away. I've had all the material I was buying shipped off to Connie. I'm hoping she signed everything for me."

"She probably did, and you know we were a terrible friend to her right?" I pointed out.

"I know. It all came to me when I was signing to have everything shipped to her. I realized just how much of a major role she's played in our lives," she replied.

"Right? She was the first person I told about Laz, and without her there, I wouldn't have survived finding out about Nemo as well as I did," I said.

"We'll get her something before we go home, or better yet, we'll throw her a party for her birthday. We have about three weeks to plan it," she suggested.

"Oooh, I love that idea, but that means I have to go home," I said, frowning at the realization.

"Have you and Cuba spoken about that?" she asked.

"It came up, but we said we'd handle it since we have seven months or so to come up with a plan. I know for a fact that he can't up and leave his life here," I replied.

She raised an eyebrow. "And you? Can you see yourself here?"

"Honestly? I don't know. I mean, I hate the internship back home, so really the only thing tying me to SA is you guys. That technically means that I'm then the one who should move here, but there's a bit of a situation," I said before telling her about the will situation.

"He just continues to surprise me. So what now? Have you and Nate come up with an actual plan?" she asked.

"Nate said he'd handle it, so I'm waiting to find out from him," I responded.

She looked concerned. "Are you sure about this Lolo? Tricking Cuba I mean?"

"He's willing to give up millions for me Fifi, millions that he needs. It would be selfish for me to not do this. If he's mad, then he's mad. According to Nate, the will says nothing about divorce affecting the money thing, so if Laz really is mad, then we can get a divorce as soon as he's gotten the money," I explained.

"I hope for your sake that he sees the romance in this, as much as you did when you decided to make this decision based on what he thought was romantic. Seriously, the two of you are just something else," she smiled.

I blushed. "He's my Laz."

Just as I'd said that, we heard the front door open and close before he appeared with two pizza boxes and a plastic bag with some other stuff in it. My mouth was watering at the smell of the pizza and I waited patiently for him to put the box down.

"So I got a meat lover's pizza with extra cheese, and then the other pizza is split between cheese and chicken and mushroom. I remember Dori saying that you like chicken and mushroom," he told my best friend.

"Your conversations have gone as far as my pizza preference?" she asked amusedly.

"It slipped in there somehow. I'm surprised he remembered," I admitted.

"I listen to you Dori," he smiled.

"Yeah, yeah. Gimme the good stuff," I said excitedly.

"You are such a child sometimes," he chuckled, handing me the pizza box.

"You got her the meat lover's pizza?" Fifi asked him.

"Oh, that's not all. I also stopped for doughnuts, cake and ice-cream. I figured that if this is her last day eating like this for a while, then she deserved to at least go out with a bang. Also, this is my guilt thanking her for Nemo," he explained.

"You're so cute," she cooed while I was obviously teary eyed.

"Marry me," I sniffed.

He laughed before leaning down to kiss me. "If fate is on our side, then that's definitely in the cards for us."

I could only blush after those words before I remembered the pizza on my lap. I opened the box and I swear I went cross eyed from good it smelled. It tasted just as great as it looked and smelled, and I was in my own mini heaven.

"What?" I asked after a while when I noticed that the two of them were silent.

"You finished it," Fifi said in disbelief.

"You owe me ten bucks," Cuba told her.

"You bet on it?" I asked them.

My baby daddy nodded. "You were so lost in it that you didn't even hear us. She was sure that you wouldn't finish it, but given the beast I've noticed in the past week alone, I knew better."

"You're a monster," my best friend whispered.

I threw a cushion at her and she laughed. "Shut up."

The three of us spent the rest of the night just sitting there with the two of them getting to know each other better. Unlike me, Fifi had done her research on him, so she had a bunch of questions to ask him, questions that he gladly answered.

Their bonding experience was a learning curve for me too. I learnt a lot about Cuba's past especially. I knew that he'd done some things that he wasn't proud of, but listening to him to go into detail about those things was heartbreaking.

I could see the amount of regret he had about the path that he'd taken.

"He's going to be a great dad," Fifi told me. I was seeing her off to bed while Cuba went to take a phone call in his room.

"Right? I keep telling him that it's his past that will make him a great dad," I agreed.

"I really am happy for you Lolo, and I know that you're freaking out about disappointing mum, dad and JR, but this is your life, and I truly think that they'll be happy once they see how happy you are, and especially how happy he makes you," she said, hugging me.

"I would hope so, especially with the business and the whole marriage thing in the mix," I said.

"Yeah, maybe let's not tell them about that until much later," she suggested.

"We'll see how long it stays a secret for really," I replied.

"Fair enough. Anyway, I'm pretty tired, so get out," she said playfully.

I rolled my eyes at her. "To think I bothered to miss you."

"I love you too Lolo," she laughed before shutting the door in my face.

I laughed, shaking my head as I headed to Cuba's room. It was silent when I walked in, and I found him hunched over on the other side of the bed. He was shirtless and I got onto the bed and made my way over to him. I wrapped my arms around him from behind and kissed his back.

"What's bothering you?" I asked.

"How could I have been such a horrible person?" he asked lowly.

"The important part in that question is been. You were a horrible person, but that's not who you are now," I pointed out.

He turned to face me and I could see the turmoil in his eyes. "How can you be so sure? Don't they say you can't change a cheetah's spots or some shit like that? How can you be so sure that I won't go back to being the man who used to laugh in the face of poor people? The man who used to make people do crazy things simply because I had the money to make them do it? The man who hurt women simply because he was too afraid to admit that the problem was with him? The man who-"

I stopped him from speaking with a kiss. It became clear to me in that moment that perhaps he needed to see a psychologist. There were clearly issues that I couldn't help him get passed, and it was important for me to admit it to myself so that I could be able to advise him.

I took his hand and placed it in the middle of my chest. "What you need to understand is that I am only here because you are no longer that man. You know me well enough to know that that man isn't the kind of man I would give the time of day to, but the man sitting before me now, is a man who deserves all the time that I can give him."

"I don't know if I'm worth it," he whispered in a breath. I leaned in and placed a soft kiss on his lips.

"You need to see someone," I suggested.

He scowled. "You mean a shrink?"

I nodded. "Have you ever given it any thought?"

"It's crossed my mind, but at the time I was convinced that shrinks were for weak people," he replied.

"And now?" I asked.

He lightly caressed my cheek. "Now I understand that it's worth a shot if it will help sort through my insecurities and demons. I don't want them to be a constant burden, especially on our relationship."

"You know that you can talk to me about anything right?" I reminded.

"I know Dori, but I also know that I shouldn't have to burden you with everything just because I can. You already have things that you're dealing with, and I'm sure you wouldn't want to tell me everything that's bothering you either," he pointed out.

"I guess. I just don't want you to feel like I'm pushing you away or neglecting the things that bother you," I argued.

He smiled a little. "I get scared when you're being thoughtful."

I smacked him (I was doing a lot of smacking). "Dick."

He laughed. "I'm pretty sure you need to wash your mouth and stop being foul. I'd like my son to be born innocent please."

"Ha! As if your daughter stands a chance with parents like us," I mocked.

"I'm pretty sure you're not supposed to admit such things out loud," he said amusedly.

I shrugged. "Why deny the inevitable?"

I squealed when he attacked my sides, resulting in me laying back as he tickled me. He kept saying that I needed to stay as innocent as I could until Nemo was born. I hate being tickled, but after all the roller coaster emotions I was going through, I appreciated the laugh.

"You're so beautiful Mama Dori," he smiled, caressing my cheek.

"You're not too bad yourself Papa Laz," I returned the smile before we kissed.

I was the one to stop our make-out session simply because he had to sleep. Now that he'd cancelled the rest of his meetings to spend the afternoon with me, it meant that he had to go in early. He was whining the whole time we got ready for bed, and yet the moment his head hit the pillow, he was out.

I giggled to myself before leaning down to kiss his forehead. "Goodnight my adorable Laz."

When I woke up, he was already gone. He'd written me a note and put it on the nightstand, telling me that he would call me later on when he gets a free moment. I got up and got ready for the day, only to get downstairs to find my best friend attempting to burn the house.

I mean attempting to cook.

"What are you doing?" I asked cautiously as she fanned the pan.

"Cuba left me here with this eating plan and he asked me to make you the breakfast on it," she replied.

"And did you happen to mention to him that you can't cook to save your soul?" I laughed.

"No. I didn't want to disappoint him because he doesn't trust you to make the breakfast yourself," she whined.

"The belief you both have in me is astounding. I would never intentionally harm my child, so of course I'm going to take better care of my health. Now would you please switch off the stove and clean this mess so that I can actually make edible food?" I requested.

She glared at me. "You're a bitch, and I'm going to record you making and eating the breakfast as proof."

I giggled. "Whatever tickles you fancy."

"Wait, have you thrown up yet? He told me to check and to not let you eat until you have or else it will be a waste of food," she questioned.

I raised an eyebrow. "Did he happen to tell you absolutely everything the doctor told him?"

"He was speaking very fast, but yeah, I think that was the case. I think he's more freaked out than you are," she joked.

I laughed knowingly. "I don't know about freaked out, but he's definitely more curious than I am. I'm just going with the flow since he's stressing enough for the both of us."

"I repeat, he's too adorable. But seriously, have you thrown up yet?" she asked.

"I don't always throw up, so today might be one of those lucky days," I responded.

It was not.

I was in the bathroom within an hour after eating, and I had to eat again after my stomach settled. My evil best friend being who she is, was laughing the whole way because of my confidence levels from before.

"Man, I'm going to enjoy this pregnancy more than anyone else," she sighed, wiping away her tears.

I scowled. "It's not even that funny. You're so mean."

"It all depends on the point of view. Anyway, what are we doing for the day? We can't be stuck here," she pointed out.

"You want to go touring a bit?" I asked.

She nodded. "Do you think Cuba will mind?"

"I'll call him while we get ready. Knowing him, he'll probably arrange for either a driver to fetch us, or for Lana to fetch us," I replied.

"Lana's the best friend right?" she asked.

"Yeah and she's super cool. Anyway, let's get to it so that we can spend more time touring than waiting to do so," I said.

As I predicted, Cuba said he'd ask if Lana could come with us, and she called me a few minutes later to confirm that she was on her way. The security at the gate let her in when she arrived and I quickly did introductions once she was in the house.

"You know, you could've called me yourself. That's the whole point of having my number in your phone," she pointed out.

"I could've, but I would've still needed to tell him. He's in super protective dad and boyfriend mode right now, so yeah," I replied.

"Sounds like him. Anyway, let's head out. There's tons I want to show you," she told us.

"London's not allowed to eat any unhealthy food," Fifi said as we headed to the car.

"You can't tour New York and not try out the food. He will just have to forgive us later," she said unapologetically.

She took us to so many different places, and whenever we passed by a food cart that sells something she's a fan of, we'd stop to buy it. I made a compromise with Fifi in that I'd eat half and she'd have the other half of everything we were trying out.

New York City is fast paced, but I love it. A version of me would love living here, but the mum side of me always envisioned having a family in the suburbs. The city life is great for a single person or a couple that's still dating, but I wasn't too sure about a family life.

I yawned really loudly. "Man, I'm so tired."

"We couldn't tell," Lana taunted. We were on our way back to the mansion and it was late afternoon.

"No like you don't understand. I think I'm going to fall asleep and only wake up tomorrow," I pointed out.

Fifi mock gasped. "Without seeing your Laz?"

"Maybe I'll wake up for two seconds and kiss his adorable face before sleeping again," I joked, making them laugh.

Lana's laugh was cut short when we arrived back at the mansion. "Shit!"

"What's wrong?" I asked.

"Emile's here."