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“I paid attention around the dinner table,” I correct her. “Back when you wouldn’t shut up about it.”
“See, aren’t you glad I annoyed you with it?” As if realizing that she’s gotten too friendly, she shuts down her smile. But she goes on, “If you trust me enough to tell me all this, do you trust me to do further research? Look into what the symbolism could mean?”
“That would be really helpful.” Impulsively, I reach over and cover her hand with mine. She doesn’t pull away, and tears spring to my eyes. “And I’m grateful for the offer. And grateful that you’re still here.”
“Well, where am I supposed to go? Back to Newfoundland?” She makes a noise. “It’s so dry there. Does nothing for my hair.”
I want to leave on a good note, so I decide it’s time to go. “I have another appointment this afternoon but if you wanted to have dinner or…”
“I think I’ll pass on dinner with the man who murdered my sister.”
So much for leaving on a good note.
“Right. Well. I’ll check in.” I stand and go toward the door.
“Bailey.”
I stop and turn back.
Tara is twisted in her seat, one arm on the back of the couch. “I don’t like him. But I’m happy for you.”
I snort. “Happy for me because I’m with someone you don’t like?”
“Happy that you found love with your mate.” She smiles sadly. “It wasn’t that way for all of us. But I’m glad it’s the way for you.”
“Well, I’m not sure ‘love’ is the right word for what Nathan and I have. We’re under a spell,” I remind her. “But if you can feel happiness for me, that might mean that I’ll get the love of my sister back, too.”
She doesn’t reassure me that she does still love me, or that our sisterly bond will somehow recover. But she does nod, casting her eyes down, a tear gliding over her cheek.
That gives me hope, and hope is really all I can ask for.
CHAPTER 67
Somehow, in all the ugliness of pack politics and multiple attempts on my life, I totally forgot about pre-natal care.
I’m just not sure how to get it, at first. Thralls are in charge of all of our medical care, and I don’t know how much we want them to know. But Nathan and I decide that we can’t take a chance with the baby’s life.
As we wait in the exam room, looking at all the posters of werewolf fetal development and the plastic anatomical model of the baby’s head in the birth canal—no thank you—I find the situation becoming more real by the second.
“Did you ever think you’d have kids?” I ask Nathan, who’s looking over a pamphlet about the first trimester.
He lifts his eyebrows and folds the pamphlet before neatly tucking it into his inside jacket pocket. “I assumed I would. In a hypothetical, detached kind of way. There’s so much pressure to find a mate and breed right away. That’s never appealed to me.”
“It’s not so appealing to me, but here I am. In a paper gown.” I laugh nervously. “Having a baby.”
“Are you…” he frowns slightly, almost like he’s embarrassed. “Is this something you don’t want?”
That’s a good question. Sometimes, I think about the fact that I’m going to be a mother and it’s all baby snuggles and soft, fuzzy edges. Other times, it’s just a dark voice in my head reminding me that I was raised by someone who made her daughters hate every part of themselves and I’m gripped with the debilitating fear of ruining my child.
“I’m a female werewolf,” I say finally. “It’s never been a question of what I want. That pressure that you felt to have children? It’s ten times, no, it’s a billion times worse for us. I’ve never considered whether I want to have children, because the rule of the pack dictates that I will, by default.”
“True,” he agrees. “I suppose it wasn’t a choice for you. I just assumed all female werewolves want to bear progeny for the pack.”
“Our laws are archaic,” I grumble. “But since you asked about me, specifically? I’m fine with this.”
“I should have asked before—”
“Maybe,” I cut him off. “But if you had asked, I would have told you that I’ve honestly been a little afraid, ever since I learned about how babies are made, that I wouldn’t be able to have one. My mother and father had been married for decades before they managed to conceive us. They had to wait until science made it possible.”
“No thrall magic to help with that?” Nathan wonders.
“No dominion over life and death,” I remind him.
“Right.” He taps his fingers on his knee. “I wonder where the doctor is?”
There’s a knock at the door and a muffled, “The doctor is here,” before the door opens to admit a thrall who appears to be in her thirties, with reddish-brown hair held back in a low ponytail and big freckles on her pale skin.
