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“It can?” I asked weakly.
“Your mother died too young to tell you any of this, I suppose.”
“Apparently not…”
“Your chances aren’t good, and there’s a very high chance you’ll miscarry before eighteen weeks anyway, but while he’s around, worth the chance,” Marcella said. “Want some tips?”
“No, I think I know how babies get made…” I ignored MaryAnne trying not to snicker at me. My brain was too busy fizzling and throwing sparks at the instruction to head right to Florida, find a relic,andconceive a baby.
In no particular order.
Half The Pie, As Agreed
Searle watched me fold up jeans and some flannels. Not exactly Florida-in-April wear, but it’d get me there. I could source some tacky airbrushed tourist-bait tees on the way to the swamp.
He smelled of annoyance, aggravation, and something deeper that didn’t have an easy name. “I do not appreciate being a yo-yo.”
But he signed up for it. Wouldn’t do any good to point out the obvious to him, and it would just rub salt in his wounds. I stopped packing. “Nobody istryingto play with your feelings.”
Gaia might be, but we couldn’t argue with Her. Just shake our fists at the uncaring ground.
“I do not even know where you aregoing,” he growled.
“Fieldwork is part of an Adjunct and Apprentice’s life.” Color menotsympathetic.
Searle’s scent morphed into a deep, bloody jealousy. “I knowwhoyou’re going with. So you know what I’m talking about.”
“You’re jealous of the other half of my soul. He isalwaysgoing to be part of me. Death isn’t going to erase that, and there’s a chance his deathwill kill me.”
I’d made that promise to Sterling, but the reality was mates oftendidn’tsurvive each other. The despair and grief and emptiness often consumed and devoured their existence. When my mother had died, I’d been terrified my father would fade and follow too. My mother, unbeknownst to me, had also found a way to survive, while my father had never been in danger at all.
Maybe, ultimately, her cancer had been a manifestation of a loss she could no longer endure.
“Death isnotgoing to erase what he is,” I repeated. “You say we’re broken halves, so why do you keep getting upset you’re only getting half the pie? You agreed to half the pie.”
“Because,” Searle said, “I could let myself fall in love with you. And I wish you would let me try to love you. I want us to at leasttry! But you refuse to try.”
No, not my fleas, not my circus. “Grabbing my crotch and humiliating me after Equinox because you think you got cucked is really not how to win anything but a long night on the floor in the hallway.”
He shifted his jaw. “We could be happy together, and you keep clinging to that wolf.”
“He’s theother half of my soul. I don’tclingto him, he’spartof me. You keep grinding on me that he’s going to die in July, but have you accepted there’s going to be somegrieving? Or do you think I’ll just weep quietly in private at a mutually convenient time?”
“Which is why we are all telling you to start distancing yourselfnow. Like breaking in a new pair of boots! Start wearing them a little at a time. I don’t want to see you suffer, and none of us want to see you die.”
Oh, so this was about what theywanted. How extremely adorable. “The most you will ever get is half of me. The broken half. Not because that’s what you deserve, but because that’s what you agreed to take.”
Searle’s teeth ground together and his muscles tensed, then bunched. He shifted closer. Had itfinallydawned on him that I wasn’t an emergency exit slide that magically inflated into something functional? Or that I wasn’t about to fling myself into his furry arms with glee that I could trade in my controversial, maybe-a-hybrid-definitely-a-problem, low-prestige, too-human, no-pack actual mate for Prince Feral Dreamboat?
“That’s it, isn’t it,” I said as it dawned on me. “You had it in your head I’d be so happy and grateful and flattered to be claimed by a semi-feral Elder First Beta with a shot at making Alpha that you’ve got ants under your tail that I’d waste a breath on Sterling.”
Searle snapped, “It’s that you won’t give me achance.”
“What have you done to earn a chance?” So far he’d done exactlyonething that maybe could be construed as him earning some good feelings from me: taking me on that run. He’d been pretty good company, even if I’d gotten the vibe he’d deliberately set the hard pace to test my paws.
Searle gestured to the bedroom. “Your den, my lady.”
I choke-laughed on shock. Seriously? “A roof, a blanket, and not physically assaulting me are thebare minimum standard. The bar is on the damn floor and you haven’t even stepped over it. This deal for the den got struck between you, Demetrius, and Sterling while I was incapacitated. So don’t come to me to collect. Not my responsibility.”
