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I never asked him to do it, because I didn’t want him to get out of control with my begging, but I did want his bite. I wanted a bond between us, and I thought that it would entirely sever whatever thread of a connection I still had to Damian if we did.

I wanted it, though, mostly just because of how much I loved Vincent. I wanted the physical connection of it, the intensity of it, the wolfness of it.

“I mean, if I were pregnant, having us bonded like that would be good,” I said. “He’d be in tune with me, and he’d be ready to react to me and the baby the way we needed.”

“That’s either creepy or really fucking romantic,” said Casey. “I’m never sure, when you talk about this omega shit, if I’m intensely jealous or just very relieved it’s you and not me.”

“You could just come down here and date a werewolf,” I said.

“Me?” she said. “With a werewolf?” She laughed.

“It could happen,” I said.

“Has it been three minutes yet?” she said.

I turned back to the pregnancy test. I sucked in my breath.

“What does it say, Leo?”

CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO

“WELL,” SAID VINCENT, studying the positive pregnancy test, “this was irresponsible of me, wasn’t it? Knocking you up before I properly claimed you, just jumping the gun on it? I’m very sorry, Leo.”

“You’re a terribly irresponsible person, as we all know,” I said, grinning. “I, of course, had no responsibility in this happening, none at all. It’s just all your fault.”

He came over to me, and he cupped my face in both of his hands. He kissed me. “All my fault, yeah.” He moved one hand to my belly. “You want it, right?”

“I’m thirty-three years old,” I told him. My birthday had been recently. “I want it. It’s time. I’m running out of time. You want it, right?”

“I want to, like, marry you first.”

“Well, do we have to do that right now? Because I don’t want to be pregnant in my wedding pictures.”

“Okay,” he said.

“But bite me, though,” I said in a guttural voice.

“Yeah,” he said, his voice just as guttural. “Yeah, I can definitely do that.” He kissed me roughly.

I felt something sweet and wild rush through my body. This man. He was mine. We were going to be a family, a unit, a little pack together.

He pulled back. “Now? Or, uh, you want me to do it while we’re naked?”

I giggled. “I don’t know. I don’t know.”

“I think I should take any excuse I can take to get you naked,” he said.

“You definitely already do that,” I said.

“Damian probably will be…”

I shrugged. “Well, fuck him.” Because even though Damian and I had that good conversation, where he seemed really okay with Vincent, Damian had resisted any overtures from his brother, and they were still not really speaking.

“Yeah,” he said. “It’s only… I wish I had someone to call, you know? You’ll call your dad and your mom and your sisters—you probably already called them.”

“No.” I shook my head.

“I’m the first to know?”