“Make what work?” I muse as I curl into Hale’s arms.
“Araya, the new samples of blood I took from you the other day, did anyone touch them besides you?”
“No. Why? Is something wrong with me?” I panic.
He sighs as he slumps down to a chair, and he grabs his head as though it aches with the strain Atlas felt when he held the world on his shoulders.
“I don’t know how to say this. I never thought these words would leave my mouth, but, Araya… you’re… you’re pregnant.”
Ice seems to fill the room when my own breaths chill me to the core. Hale doesn’t move. He feels petrified just as I do while time passes us by. Brazen’s eyes are just as wide, but Grayson seems confused as the three of us remain frozen by the words I never thought possible to hear.
“How is she pregnant? Hybrids can’t have children,” Grayson objects.
“I know they’re not supposed to be able to bear children. Her blood is different though, and she’s barely over a week pregnant. Her blood heals, and Hale has been drinking it in heavy doses for a long, long time. Not to mention, in her savage state her blood changes. I’ve never analyzed it in phase three since she’s only been there once, but it’s possible it healed her dormant womb and made her able to bear a child while making Hale fertile.”
“Fucking shit,” Brazen exasperates while gripping his head. “You’re sure about this?”
“I’m positive.”
I stumble when I start to fall, and Angelica catches me before I hit the ground. Hale is still frozen, ashen, and damn near trembling.
“They’ll be after her if they find out. They’ll want that baby, not to mention everyone else. A hybrid child being born from a hybrid… they’ll never accept it,” Angelica murmurs to Brazen and Clay while my incoherent hybrid stares blankly at the wall.
“I have to get her out of here until the child is born. We’ll think of something after that,” Hale’s hoarse tone rattles free, finally acknowledging Clay’s bomb drop.
“We have a few months before she will start showing. If you leave now, it’ll raise suspicion when you’re gone for nine months. We need to stay together. Go forth with the wedding as planned. Live your lives as though nothing has changed, and I will send you on detail together for a few months when Araya can’t hide her bump any longer.”
Bump? Oh fuck. I can’t be pregnant. This isn’t possible.
Tears flow from my eyes, and I feel the chill shattering around me as Hale pulls my frozen body to him. His soft lips gingerly stroke my forehead, and I feel him suppressing his own emotions to help me handle mine.
Elation, jubilance, terror, and absolute shock all mingle together in this bomb that has just landed on us. My purple eyes have burned through the blue contacts as they release their acidic tears that burn through my shirt when they drip too far. The excitement of the fact I’m having a child is eclipsed and jaded by the reality this child will be hunted because it’s new, evolved, and different - even more so than me.
Instinctively my hand strums across my belly, and Hale’s hand covers mine as he feels the home for his child. Our child.
“Do you think they got my blood in phase three?” my crackling voice forces out.
“I don’t know. You were bleeding for a while before the two of you healed off each other. I can’t be certain if they did or didn’t,” Clay huffs out in exhaustion.
Hale’s fingers stroll through my hair as he kisses my forehead comfortingly. Each breath everyone exhales is laced with anxiety right now - including my own.
“I’m not going to let anything happen to our child,” he whispers into my ear.
“Neither am I,” I say with a newfound strength and protectiveness growing inside me.
“None of us will,” Grayson asserts. “We’ll just have to figure out a way for them to raise the child without arousing suspicion. You’re the damn commander, so can’t you adjust the laws where hybrids can be adopted? That would explain a child in their home.”
“I wish. I’m working on that though. Adoption is illegal due to experimentations in the past which were conducted. At one point they believed it to be more humane to send an abandoned hybrid to live as a forgotten in an effort to keep the freaks, creeps, and experimenters away. In some cases that is very true, but when you have places like Cheyenne… we’ll figure something out. Perhaps I can bring up an officer’s adoption. United officers are highly regarded, and it’s possible we could curve the law where only officers can adopt.”
“Do what you can. We’re raising our child even if we have to do it in hiding,” Hale growls.
“I’ll make it work, Hale. I won’t rest until I get it all sorted out. Keeping her secret is the most important thing right now. The rest is on me, and I won’t let you down.”
“Do we know where Ty is crouching yet?” I grumble as his sadistic face flashes through my mind.
If he was willing to do the things he had someone do to me five years ago, what will he do with my child?
“We’re checking over the western areas. The sand had a residue can only be found there. There were also some moist patches of soil recovered, meaning he could be in the dark lands or wetlands.”
