Dominic learned authority from a man who used his sons as chess pieces. Amos learned protection from a man who fractured his ribs. I learned motherhood from a woman who looked at her own child and saw a revenue stream.
The thought I've been circling all afternoon finally lands. What if I'm her. What if I look at this baby and the first thing I calculate is what it's worth to the Hale estate instead of what it needs from me. What if the honey trap instinct is genetic and I'm already doing the math on how this pregnancy secures my position in the triad before I've even thought about whether I want to be someone's parent.
My scent has gone sour. I can smell it on myself, the burnt wood bitterness of fear cutting through something else underneath, something warmer and sweeter that wasn't there this morning. Vanilla, maybe. Or honey. My body is already changing and I didn't even notice.
The tears come without warning, streaking down my face. My chest heaves and the sound that comes out of me is the ugly kind of crying that I haven't done since I was a kid locked in my closet listening to my mother entertain her latest mark in the next room.
I'm crying on a park bench at sunset with two pregnancy tests in my pocket and the terrifying possibility that I am already my mother sitting in my chest like a stone.
My phone buzzes. I swipe at the screen to decline, but my fingers are wet and clumsy and they slide wrong. The call connects.
Dominic's voice fills my ear, raw in a way I've never heard from him.
"Firefly? Mattaniah, please. Where are you?"
Dominic
"Firefly?Mattaniah,please.Whereare you?"
The line goes dead and I pull the phone away from my ear to stare at the screen, more worried now than I was three hours ago.
The bond has been fluctuating since he left, cycling through anxiety and denial before hitting something sharp and cold about an hour in that hasn't fully receded. But the most recentspike made me dial his number for the fourth time. The sound I caught in the half-second before he hung up was either wind or crying.
The hangup makes it worse.
"Something's wrong." I set my phone down and cross to the door.
"He probably just needs time." Amos doesn't look up from his laptop. "He asked us to let him have space and we agreed to—"
"No. Something is wrong." I grab my jacket from the hook. My scent has gone acrid in the apartment, sharp enough that Amos should be able to taste it. "I can feel it, Amos. This is something new and he's going under."
Amos looks up. His expression shifts as he tunes into the bond. His face goes still.
"Go find him." He stands. "I'll be here."
The bond is not a GPS. What it gives me is a directional pull against the mark on my neck. The signal gets louder with every block.
He's not at the pharmacy or the coffee shop four blocks south. The pull leads me past the apartment building toward the park at the end of the street.
The park is nearly empty at dusk. A jogger circles the far loop and a couple sits on a blanket near the fountain. Mattaniah is on the bench at the edge of the playground with his knees pulled to his chest and his hand pressed flat against his stomach.
I smell him before I'm close enough to see his face. His scent carries the sour bite of distress, burnt wood and fear. Underneath it there's something I've never caught on him before. It's warm and sweet, vanilla threaded with honey beneath his usual coconut and woodsmoke. My stride falters for half a step before my legs carry me the rest of the way.
He doesn't look up when I approach. Through the bond, he registers my presence but the distress doesn't ease.
I sit on the other end of the bench, not beside him, not touching. His eyes are red and swollen, his cheeks streaked with dried tears. His scent is so wrong and so new at the same time that my hands grip my knees to keep from reaching for him.
"I heard you crying on the phone." I keep my voice level. "Tell me what happened."
His chin stays on his knees, arms tightening around his legs. The playground swings rock in the evening wind and the sound of the chains carries across the empty park.
"I went to the pharmacy." His voice comes out muffled against his knees. "The doctor said I needed a pregnancy test before she'd refill my blockers. She said it was standard protocol."
My fingers dig harder into my kneecaps.
"So I took one. And then I took another because Amos has ruined me with his sample size obsession." A wet, broken sound escapes him that's trying to be a laugh. "Dominic, I'm..." He swallows hard enough that I can see his throat work. "I'm preg—" The word fractures. He presses his forehead against his knees and tries again. "I'm pregnant."
The word hits the bond before it hits my brain. My mark throbs so hard my vision whites at the edges. My hands are shaking on my knees and my teeth are clenched. Somewhere beneath the shock my scent surges thick enough to flood the bench between us.
