His smile turned to a scowl fast as lightning. "It's not failing, Brigid. Don't speak that way."
"But—"
"Any worries I have are for your sake now," he said firmly. And then he was quiet for a moment, a frown slowly deepening and taking over his face. "That's not true. I want this child too. I don't want to lose them, and I don't want to lose you. I'm scared too."
It shouldn't have been comforting, but it was. I stretched and kissed Torion's brow.
"Tell me more," he said, settling us deeper into the bed, one of my legs remaining draped over his, the both of us fully dressed, our hands joined over my stomach.
I told him about the evidence of the pregnancy so far, answered his questions about how I was managing my morning sickness, how I made meals out of the porridge I suddenly found myself craving too often, and the pickled wild ramps I snacked on.
I paused as I started to describe my first pregnancy, but Torion held my gaze, my hand, and I found my tongue growing loose and eager. I told him about discovering Malcolm with another woman just after I'd started to suspect I was with child, the depression that had followed, how much I'd loathed myself for accepting Malcolm back in my bed.
And I told him the very worst of the truth.
"There were days I regretted getting pregnant. Where I was frightened that a child would force me to remain with a man who didn't love or respect me. Some days I was ecstatic, and some days I thought the child would transform Malcolm into the man I wanted him to be, and some days I wished I wasn't pregnant at all. So when?—"
Torion cut the words off with a swift, hard kiss and a simple, "No."
I blinked, the tears that had been gathering slipping away. "But?—"
"You're not at fault, Brigid. Don't argue," he said, lifting his hand from mine just long enough to pinch my lips shut before I could speak. "Every time that thought rises, I want you to throw it out. It's not true. If women could control their own pregnancies simply by wishing they weren't pregnant, we would have significantly fewer dragons. So don't take that route, my love."
My love.He kept saying those words. It terrified me how much I liked to hear them, but the terror was muffled tonight. I was far too exhausted now to give it any energy to grow. I poured out every secret and every fear I possessed into the lap of this man I'd known just a few months. And he'd taken them into his care, just as he had me.
As we settled, clinging to one another, I slipped my hand on my belly out from under his to reach up and stroke his face, the rough stubble over his strong jaw tickling my fingers. His palm rested over my stomach, warm and weighty, promising protection. For the night, for a few hours, just to help me fall asleep, I would believe the promise.
Chapter Twenty-Six
TORION
My world had been shifting for months now. First, with my father's death, then again with Brigid's arrival at the keep, and once more during the days and nights of our rut.
Now I was realizing these weren't separate disruptive events, but simply that my life's axis had changed, tilting and sending me sliding down into the arms of the woman asleep beside me.
How could someone take such a firm and unyielding grasp on my heart, while breaking it at the same time?
It was barely dawn, the room cast in gray light, and Brigid's eyes were still swollen from crying the night before. I'd managed to unwrap her from my family plaids while she slept, but I hadn't wanted to disturb her any further, and the red of her gown made her cheeks look especially pale, her freckles faded.
There was no outward sign of her pregnancy yet, but I had already begun picturing how it might go—a subtle swell at first, a rounding where now she dipped in, and then slow growth till she was swollen and irritable and burdened with our child in the most beautiful way. It filled me with pride and terror and hunger, made my head spin. Brigid was constantly in motion,at work. How would I contrive to make her rest, or would being pregnant manage that for me?
How would she take it if I followed her back to the cottage? There was no question in my mind now that wherever Brigid went, I would be, and if that meant I had to abandon the keep to crowd her in her little home, so be it. If she made me sleep outside the door, I would.
Bellfry's ballocks, I was going to be a father the same year I'd risen as alpha. This was some combination of madness and uncanny luck.
Brigid stirred with the soft and familiar grunt of her rousing, and everything but my omega slipped out of focus once more. She came before all else now. She had to. Ned might say I was making the same error as my father, but Brigid was not the same woman as my mother. She took her duty as omega to the Hills seriously and would remind me of mine, but no one had ever honored their responsibility toher. That was my right now.
"Don't tell me you've been guarding me all night like that," Brigid rasped, one barely slitted eye offering me a glare, her face mostly buried in the pillow.
I had been, and I wouldn't apologize for it.
"I've been thinking about how to get the betas to leave this morning," I admitted instead.
Brigid sat up, rumpled and dreadful looking and grumpy…and so stunning, it struck me dumb. "Torion, you know you can't."
I was wearing a fool's smile as I gazed down at her. "I can."
Her eyes narrowed in answer. "Then you know it would be unwise. I'll be all right today, I promise."
