57
“You’re pregnant…” Meadows mouths it breathily, finally caving from fierce warrior wolf and slumps beside to instantly cradle my abdomen with a gentle hand and a face of instant tears. Carmen’s face colors darker as she looks away, her eyes misting so obviously, and her instant of heartache almost drowns out my own shock and numb at such a crazy revelation. “Chica? You’re pregnant!” Meds says it again with more energy, a hint of excitement, and I shake my head at her, still unable to let it sink in. Colton doesn’t even know or is even capable of knowing about this even if we were home. He should know, he should have been with me when we found something like this out…. It should have been together, a moment, a shared happiness, and not this cruel twist of being hit in the face with it while hours away from him. Tears fill my eyes and my heart shudders painfully at the thought that this should have been a life changing discovery, in his arms, and not like this, while he’s lost to me.
I don’t even know if this would make him happy, given we avoided the possibility because of the brewing war and the state of our lives under the shadow of vampires. I don’t even know if I’m happy. I don’t know how to feel. Our world is a mess, our lives aren’t simple, and my mate currently wants to kill me. This is so wrong, yet on some level a tiny piece of me shines bright and a warmth settle sin my heart that twists it in a good kind of way.
“Turning makes us miscarry” Carmen whispers the words, seemingly more to herself than needing to have a question answered and it tears my attention back to her swirling chaos of dark emotions. I can feel the deep and heavy grief of her mother’s death all over again, yet this seems different somehow, and a harsher, piercing kind of sorrow fills my senses and makes me stiffen in reaction. Carmen lowers her eyes and begins to cry softy, staring at her own body much like I was. “Right, of course… hybrids, not pure. Makes sense.” I don’t get why she is so upset but Leyanne fastens a steady look on her and seems to soften slightly, seemingly knowing the why in Carmen’s dissolving emotional state.
“It was you or both. If you didn’t heal you would die. There was no other options. Juan is a murderer, not you.” Leyanne seems to know something we don’t, and I literally gawp at Carmen as my brain registers on what she’s saying, pain hitting me tenfold for two reason, and I can’t get my head around the possibility Carmen was pregnant. It feels like she stabs me in the heart, not only for her pain but for the possibility of ….
“Colton’s?” Meadow is the one to say the words I literally can’t verbalize but thankfully she shakes her head. I feel so selfish for the relief in that, but I don’t know, somehow if she had created a life with him first it would have tainted my own bond to him. I’m so stupid, and jealous, and ashamed of my reaction and thoughts.
“A one-night stand that spelled disaster. It was never meant to be but still…….. just for that short time, I hoped. He didn’t want to know. Then he didn’t need to know anymore.” She can’t look us in the eye and turns her face away as it dawns on me that everything I suspected about a change in her…. It wasn’t just what Juan did. It wasn’t Colton’s betrayal, or the pack leaving her, hell, it wasn’t even her mom. It was deeper than all that and this is it right here.
Carmen’s loss, her constant weight of guilt, her change about caring about others… she’d been pregnant, and she lost something she’d grown to love instantly. For a girl who craves genuine love and a bond from someone who might just see and value her, it must have been doubly crushing. I can feel her agony so much clearer now as the sadness rises but she battle’s it back down behind that tough demeanor and shoves it behind that haughty tone and superior frown. Just a glimpse of her despair, but enough to break my heart for her for the rest of time. Meadow is silent as she absorbs this, finally that compassion I know she has on full show, tears filling her eyes, and Leyanne breaks the eerie quiet.
“Well, you three enjoy the heart to heart. Sister bonding seems to be much needed in your pack of three. Joined by fate… maybe you gals need to work on that. Like I said – early rise, be ready for my arrival; you don’t want to miss who I’m bringing along.”
She doesn’t wait for a reply, not that any of us have one to give as startled shock is causing strained silence and tearful faces but turns on her heel and leaves without a second glance. Disappearing into the darkness as smoothly as she first arrived, as the atmosphere around the fire grows steadily worse.
