Page 55 of Knot Broken

“Well, that sounds ominous.” I tried to smile but instead just kinda bared my teeth. “We’ll talk afterwards. Just head back to the suite and I’ll meet you there.”

Grey didn’t want to accept that. His brows drew down as his face grew thunderous and as his hands formed fists, I wondered what the hell he was going to do. Not turn on his heel and march off without another word.

“We’ll be there.” Tex’s hands landed on my shoulders and gave them a squeeze. “Don’t worry about a thing.”

When had that phrase ever worked for anyone? I thought as I entered Riley’s office.

“This is the hard part,” she said, hands forming a steeple before her. “Shit, no, it’s all hard, but…”

Her monitor was turned my way.

“I won’t bore you with the science. People have let me know that clients find it overwhelming, but these numbers here.” She circled several on the screen. “They tell me that you are in the midst of transition. When you went into adolescence, your pituitary gland pumped you full of female hormones, getting your body ready for menstruation, then childbirth. You moved from being a child, to having the body of a woman. If you had revealed as an omega as a teenager, a similar process would happen, with some added extras. Increased estrogen to transform you into the typical curvy omega. Increased testosterone and androgens to lay down muscle and build your strength for your first shift, but not so much as to create the kind of imbalance you see in someone who has PMOS. That’s what’s happening to you now.”

“So a second puberty?” I asked with a weak smile. “Do I get to listen to really loud emo music and slam a lot of doors, claiming no one understands me?”

“You get to decide whether or not to let these changes progress,” she replied.

“What?” I studied the screen more closely, but the labels still meant nothing to me. “Is that possible?”

“It is, at a price.” My stomach dropped as a wave of ice crashed over me. “Suppressants stop the changes from happening. They may even force your body to revert back to its usual shape.”

That, my heart beat. I wanted that.

“But those same hormonal changes mean you are very unlikely to be able to have children.” There it was. It felt like I’d been waiting for the other shoe to drop since the moment I walked into that work site. “Even if you managed to get pregnant, those drugs would be extremely dangerous to any foetus you carry. We require all omegas that choose to take suppressants to have an IUD implanted, as the birth defects are significant.”

I couldn’t feel the chair, my skin or my face. Instead, I was just one big flayed nerve, wavering in the wind. The alphas I saw in the cafeteria, with their omegas and their children. It wasn’t hard to imagine Tex baby wearing or Grey leaning over to feed a little boy.

My little boy.

Parenthood was a vague dream for me. Wanting to have a baby was one thing, but the thought of any of my exes being that child’s father stopped me every time. And now? I was still getting to know Tex and Grey, but if we were fated to be together then surely…

“And the other option?” I asked.

Riley shot me a sympathetic smile.

“To go through transition while you’re here in the unit. We’ll be with you every step of the way. There are some medications that can help bring out your wolf.” Her focus shifted as I gripped the chair arms tightly. “Under controlled conditions, with supports in place to bring you back to skin if the shift fails…”

She said a whole lot more, discussing the pros and cons of each choice, but right now I wish the guys had stayed. They could listen, take all the details down, because my brain had reached capacity.

I needed out of here.

That strange restlessness grew and grew and while I tried to white knuckle my way through this conversation, in the end, I failed.

“I need…” Riley’s look of concern was hard to face. “Sorry, but I need to go.”

“You’ve got some time,” she said. “Take a day or two to process and then let me know what works for, because Nadia.” Her eyes met mine. “We’re here for you, every step of the way, no matter what you decide.”

But the consequences would be mine to bear. I’d be the one to go through painful option 1: never having children or 2: being forced to shift into a fucking wolf. I didn’t manage anything more than a nod before heading for the door. I walked blindly, not seeing where I was going, because the movement was what was soothing me. Run! my brain screamed. Run, run, run.

Only problem was wherever I went, there I’d be.

With a blink, I realised I was back at our suite. Punching in the code, the door popped open. Stepping inside, it was apparent I had a welcoming committee. Tex looked up from the TV screen, but it was Grey who crossed the floor to get to me.

“How’d it go?” Tex’s smile faded the minute he saw the state I was in. He was leaping over the back of the couch, but Grey was already here.

“This way,” he said in a low growl.

Opening my bedroom door, the blinds had been pulled low, casting the room is a soft violet light. My bed had been transformed somehow, and for a second I thought he’d dumped all my clothes on it.