Ascension - Book Eight - Man x Man

Chapter 111

What could I say? We'd already had this conversation, I knew how he felt about it. "So that's why he didn't want to stick around." 

"He told me to remind you that you have an event with sponsors and a new band who wants funding... something like that." I step away to collect the bacon and place a bagel on a plate for him. Thankfully for me, Fenrir had been a good influence in one way, it gave him a voracious appetite. 

Harboring a creature who consumed everything had made him something of a bottomless pit at times. After a night of performing, he was sure to be starved, cautiously stealing the bagel takes an annoyed bite before putting on a kettle of water for tea. "And this doesn't concern you?"

Guarding his mouth with the back of his hand as he speaks around the chunk of pastry, I chew on a piece of bacon as I lean back against the counter. Of course, it did, I was horrified, but I was also uncertain about what my options were. I was unwilling to be away from my children for an extended period of time, this would give us a month to figure out if there was an alternative way to remove the cuff. Then... it came to the realization of the second part of that conversation. 

I was cursed, instead of blessed, with loss. Swallowing hard, I glance up at him. "This cuff... is completing the blessing that Darrius gave me."

"This again- Nic..."

Flinching, I try not to look too hurt, that wouldn't help me stay rational. "Randy, it's true. Adriam confirmed it and left it for me to tell you. I... was... pregnant. But I lost it because the gift that Darrius gave me is not complete. He's just a child, a novice, just like the way he made those men disappear is the way he's somehow given me a space to bear a child but no way to provide for it."

Horrified, he places the bagel down, those light eyes boring through my body as if trying to locate this sinful gift. Scanning me, over and over again, searching me for some assurance that this was a cruel joke. 

I hated this, I hated that I hadn't told him, that I'd kept it to myself when I'd scolded and threatened him, again and again, to not lie to me. "I'm going to keep.. getting pregnant.. and losing it because of that gift until Darrius is old enough to fix it."

"You knew this and we still...." Gritting his teeth, he curses at himself and I approach him quickly, refusing to let him toil on this. 

"Randy, it's a damned heat cycle, I can't help it!" Even now, my body was on fire, my scent was intoxicating even to me and my body demanded to reproduce. We'd joked about it, spoken about it lightly, but the possibility of a man going through this was something he hadn't been willing to entertain. 

Verando's lips part, then he shuts his eyes as I place my hands on his chest. The rigid nature of his body under my fingertips was more than I could bear. I couldn't let him slip away from me, retract further when we were just starting to rebuild. "Do you want me to go away?" I whisper. 

"Damn it, of course not. It's hard for me, too. I can't even bloody well think straight with this-" Gripping my wrist, he holds it to his cheek, I see the flash of the feral nature in his eyes and swallow hard as I look up at him. His nose skirts over my skin.

 Our hearts pounding, our wolves fighting to reunite with each other while our bodies were so painfully separated by human hearts and emotions. "If I were any less of an Alpha, any less in control, you'd be unable to leave that bedroom."

His voice was rough from the concert, hence the need for tea. I bite my lower lip and he allows a shakey exhale of frustration, "I'm not trying to entice you."

"Everything about you entices me right now. It's all I can think about." he manages, causing me to flush. Kissing my wrist, I hear his teeth grind as he comes back to our conversation. "Why didn't you tell me that this happened? Why did you go through this on your own?"