A surprised laugh escaped me. "Your pack? As my patients?"
"They would be honored, Beloved. To have their Queen analyze their minds, help them understand their own darkness. Help them heal all the trauma welled up inside of their dark souls." He leaned closer, and his breath warm against my ear. "And you would have access to case studies that no researcher has ever dreamed of. Fifty-two unique psychological profiles, all yours to explore."
I thought about it.
Really thought about it.
The Spade who had laughed while taking bullets. The Diamond who had slit a throat without breaking stride. The Hearts couple who killed while holding hands, so bonded that one's wound made the other scream.
What made them this way? What trauma, what biology, what twist of fate turned them into the Broken Court?
The clinical part of my brain—the part I thought had died in that padded cell—stirred with interest.
With hunger.
With the familiar thrill of a puzzle waiting to be solved.
"I could help them," I said slowly. "Not cure them—I don't think any of them want to be cured. But I could help them understand themselves. Help them function within the Court. Help them find. . .peace, maybe."
"You could." Rook pressed a kiss to my temple. "And they would worship you even more for it."
I would still be Dr. Willow Lark. Still be a psychologist. Still have purpose beyond being his Queen.
The realization filled me with unexpected joy. I hadn't lost myself in this transformation—I had expanded. Become more than I was before. The clinical detachment and the primal surrender could coexist, two sides of the same coin.
Just like love and madness.
"How do you feel?" Rook's voice softened as he studied my face. "Truly?"
I considered the question. Felt into my body—the pleasant ache, the satisfied exhaustion, the strange new wholeness that hummed beneath my skin.
"Sore," I admitted. "But absolutely loved."
His eyes darkened with satisfaction. "Good. That's exactly how you should feel."
"My heat. . ." I touched my abdomen, suddenly aware of the possibility growing there. "I think it's over."
"I noticed." His hand covered mine, pressing gently against my belly. "Your scent has changed. Settled. You smell like yourself again, but. . .different. Deeper."
"Different how?"
A wicked smile curved his lips. "Like you might be carrying my child."
My heart stuttered. "It's too early to know."
"Perhaps." His thumb stroked circles against my stomach. "But my biology recognized you before science could explain it. Why should this be any different?"
Pregnant.
The word bloomed in my mind like one of his garden orchids—terrifying, beautiful, and utterly transformative.
"And if I'm not pregnant?"
The wickedness in his smile intensified, and heat flooded my cheeks.
"Then we try again, Beloved." His voice dropped to that low register that made my thighs clench. "And again. And again. Until your body accepts what it was made to carry."
A shiver rolled through me—not of fear, but of anticipation. The memory of his knot swelling inside me, locking us together, the endless pulses of his release flooding my depths. . .
