Dom nodded, and his warm hand moved in circles between my shoulder blades.“It’s going to be great though.I’ll ask around to get some real babysitting experience.There have to be toddlers in the pack, right?Oh, I’ll build a crib too.Which room do we put the baby in?Upstairs, right?”
I looked at him, and my jaw dropped.I felt my lips part and anohescape.“You’re serious.”
“We are,” Ell said.
Dom picked up his phone, then put it back down on the table.“This is why I messed up your tea, Little Red.I wasn’t sure about the caffeine.I mean, I know it’s not my place to tell you what to do, but I thought since you didn’t know yet, maybe it was better to be careful, you know?Is it nine months for omegas?Fuck, I know nothing.Ell, do you have books I can read about this kind of stuff?”
Linc put a hand on his shoulder.“Slow down, Dom.”
“Huh?”Dom put his other hand on top of Linc’s.“Right.Sorry.”
Ell bit his bottom lip.“Marcus, you’ve been cooped up in here and it’s time for your stitches to come out.I was going to do it on the couch later, but how about I take you to the hospital and we do it there?”
I closed my mouth.“I do not have the right parts and—which opening were you all even thinking for the—for it to come out?You know what, this is funny.Really funny.Haha.Can we stop now?”
Ell kissed my hands.“You’ve been so sleepy.I thought it was psychological, from the breakup.And you’ve been going for high-carb foods.I should’ve really figured it out.Let’s head to the hospital, and we can talk through all the logistics there, okay?”
Iwantedthis to be a joke.The problem was, I had a pretty strong hunch that it wasn’t.It was like waking up in the guest bedroom all over again, with Dom shifted and pretending to be what he wasn’t.It was like learning werewolves existed all over again, except this time—nope.I didn’t really want to consider the logistics.
“I’m just getting old.Old people need naps,” I said, sounding dazed.
Ell, meanwhile, was putting his clothes back on.“We’ll talk it through.Linc, you and Dom are good here?”
Dom gaped.“I’ll come.”
“No.Just the two of them.”Linc sounded really firm.I had no idea what that was about.
“But…”
I couldn’t finish.There were too many impossibilities to cram into one sentence.No sentence should ever have to deal with that much fiction.
I followed Ell into the hallway and put on my shoes, and then I followed him to his car.
Before I knew it, we were leaving the house I had secretly started to think of as home behind, and I had no freaking idea what lay ahead.
29
Marcus was in shock.I was in shock.Fuck, I’d thought Dom was off his rocker when he’d texted too.
But he hadn’t been.Marcus’s smellhadchanged.It was still so subtle that you had to be shifted to notice, but that would change over the next few days.Once that happened, every werewolf who came near him would know.
That was, if that was what Marcus wanted.With a sigh, I pulled the car over and turned it off.
I unbuckled my seat belt so I could turn and look at our mate.“It’s real.”
“I… Ell, I do not have the parts.”He gestured at his abdomen.“You know.The parts.”
I cleared my throat.“Omegas have…the parts, and you’re an omega.You have a womb.I can talk you through everything.What I know isn’t really textbook medicine, but it’s what we as a society have kept alive of the medical knowledge.”
Marcus’s Adam’s apple bobbed.“You’re notsayingit has to come out the same way it got in, but you’re strongly implying that.You know, if you look at the surrounding plumbing, that seems so impractical.”
I inclined my head.“Well, yes.But only if that’s what you want.”I sighed and rubbed my eyes.“I was an idiot.We all were, but I think I was the biggest.As a general rule, when a werewolf goes into the medical field, they get access toourmedical knowledge.Things we’ve built on, studies we managed to run without it getting out, records of people who learned to treat our kind without anything to go on and decided to write everything down so it wouldn’t have to be learned all over again.
“Marcus, when we found you, I think meeting us, your mates, kickstarted your heat.You may have had a little bit of a cold, although I think it can sometimes present with a raspy throat.Then when we had sex, that ended your heat.I should’ve realized you weren’t sick, no matter how improbable it was that you were an omega.”
He was biting his thumbnail.“I mean, I had no idea.Heat, huh?Sure felt hot.You’re saying I have awomb.Fuck, but didn’t I get lucky it was you and not Steven?”
I growled.Marcus’s eyes widened, and I stopped.This was not the time to scare him or make him think we were those kinds of alphas.
