Page 164 of Sins of Arrogance

My so­lu­tion usu­ally in­volves death. Or at the very least, co­pi­ous amounts of pain.

Pain. Ah. Kara told me she was wor­ried the pro­ce­dure would be painful.

“You were anes­thetized for the pro­ce­dure, weren’t you?” I gave very clear in­struc­tions in that re­gard.

At first, the doc­tor tried to as­sure me there would be no more than mi­nor dis­com­fort for Kara. But af­ter my sub­se­quent talk with him, he agreed putting her un­der for the pro­ce­dure would be best.

If he did not do so, I will keep ev­ery prom­ise I made dur­ing that dis­cus­sion.

“What?” Then her eyes fo­cus on me, and she nods. “Yes.”

The anes­the­sia might ex­plain her dis­ori­en­ta­tion, but not the tears. “Was there more pain than you ex­pected when you woke up?”

I’m within touch­ing dis­tance now and my mus­cles are rigid with the need to reach out and do so.

We’ve been mar­ried for six weeks and I’m still get­ting used to the com­pul­sion I have to phys­i­cally con­nect with her when­ever she is in the same room. I don’t act on it un­less we are in our bed­room, but it’s there all the same.

Once she is preg­nant with our son and we are able to have pen­e­tra­tive sex, the in­ex­pli­ca­ble need will de­cline sure as cer­tain. But right now, my prim­i­tive in­stincts to claim her com­pletely are go­ing un­ful­filled.

And they’re grow­ing stronger by the day.

In­stincts I un­der­stand. They’re base an­i­mal urges, not born of the emo­tions I don’t feel.

“I…” Kara shakes her head.

“What’s wrong, a stór?” That is not a ques­tion I ask.

Be­cause I don’t care.

How­ever, I am Kara’s hus­band and watch­ing out for her is my duty.

“They just threw them away.” The last word ends on a sob. “In the g-garbage.”

Feck this. I pull my ten­der-hearted wife into my body and wrap my arms around her. “What did they throw away?”

Who­ever threw away some­thing of Kara’s that is this im­por­tant to her will lose more than their job by to­mor­row.

“The girl em­bryos. They’re gone. Tossed out with the trash like they were never even there.” An­other sob wracks her body.

The girl em­bryos? We only need boy em­bryos for the in vitro. How­ever, I have enough in­tel­li­gence not to say that.

I may not un­der­stand why she is so dis­traught, but she is and that is what mat­ters.

And some­thing pri­mal in me is fu­ri­ous the clinic had the au­dac­ity to dis­pose of what be­longs to me.

“I knew I didn’t mat­ter to seanathair. To any of you. But this…” She pounds on my chest. “They mat­tered to me.”

“If you want daugh­ters, we don’t have to use in vitro to make them.” Af­ter our son is born, Kara is never go­ing through this process again.

Tak­ing the fer­til­ity drugs has been hard on her. She’s had al­most ev­ery neg­a­tive side ef­fect the doc­tor warned us about: ir­ri­tabil­ity, in­creased anx­i­ety, headaches, nau­sea so bad she can’t eat some days, hot flashes and even pain around where they gave her the shots.

“They’re gone,” she says again, sound­ing heart­bro­ken.

I have no heart to break, but that does not mean it is okay with me that some­one broke hers.

Plans for her grand­fa­ther’s fu­ture be­gin to form in my head as I rub her back. I’ve never done this be­fore, but I’ve seen my fa­ther do it for my mother and I’m very good at mim­ick­ing.

It works and even­tu­ally, Kara’s tears ebb. I re­lease her and she steps back, the des­o­la­tion on her face fill­ing me with fury.