“We’ll need to have a garage sale because we have two of so many things.” Remy was walking through his place, making a list of items we could sell or donate.
“Have we made a mistake buying a house?” I was thinking of all the work we had to do before and after moving.
“You want to back out?” Remy grabbed both sides of my face. “Now?”
“Not really. I want to spend time with you, not packing, sweating, and having people haggle over our stuff at a garage sale.”
He nuzzled the base of my throat. “We have a lifetime of being together. Life can’t be just about sex.”
I snorted. “I didn’t mention S-E-X.”
My mate put a hand over his mouth and giggled. “Why are you spelling it out?”
“I’m practicing for when the baby is here and is old enough to ask ‘What’s sex?’”
“Oh, good thinking.” He made a face.
“You’re jerking me around.” I nudged him, and he took off and continued making his list.
I grabbed a bottle of water and considered our future, one where we were settled in what I hoped was our forever home.
“The hard work and long hours moving from two houses into one will be worth it.” That was what I kept telling myself.
“Do you think the back yard is big enough for a swing set?” I poked my head into my mate’s office where he was on the floor sorting out books.
“Probably. But the baby won’t be using a swing for a while.” Remy didn’t look up as he put the books into three piles: keep, donate, and sell.
“I wasn’t thinking of the baby. I love swings.”
“In that case, you should go back to the house and measure. I know how you and your tape measure enjoy alone time.” He cackled and went back to what he was doing.
“Pfft.”
20
REMY
When I first found out I was pregnant, I wasn’t sure what kind of pregnancy it would be. Was I having a human baby? Was I having a shifter baby? Would my pregnancy look human? Would it look like a koala pregnancy? There was no way to determine the answers besides waiting and seeing. If I went into my second trimester without any shifter happenings, I was going to have a human birth.
I was getting close to there, and I’d become more confident as the days rolled by that our baby was going to take after his alpha father, or at least the birth would. But this morning, when I stepped into the shower, I saw how wrong I was.
My pregnancy was still fairly early on, but I’d developed a nice little round belly. If you saw me from the right angle, you knew I was pregnant, but I was hardly popping at the seams yet. And if you saw me straight on, you might think I had a few too many burgers at most. That wasn’t the unusual part. Having a small bump at this point in the pregnancy was normal.
Having a dark red line across my torso just below my rib cage—that was the part that wasn't. At least not for humans.
“Honey,” I called out, glad my mate could hear me. He was in the bathroom in only a few seconds. “I want you to see something.”
“When you say you want me to see something, do you mean get naked and come in the shower with you and seesomething?” He waggled his eyebrows, and I nearly cackled. “Or… do you mean you’ve got a weird mole you want me to check out?”
“Neither. Both. I mean, yes, come under the water, but also, it’s not a mole, I promise.” How did we get talking about moles?
It didn’t take him long to come under the water with me, and I took his finger and traced the red line with it.
“What is that? Did you have, like, your seat belt too tight or something?”
I could see how he’d think that, now that he’d said it.
“No, feel it again.”
