Page 37

Othoni

The postcard men must have been taking their time because they still hadn’t kidnapped Mori by the time my pregnancy was half done. I crossed my fingers, toes, and eyes, hoping that they wouldn’t decide to steal him while I was belly up on the sofa half-naked while Doctor Leem took a look at Baby Zinnia.

“Will we find out today?”

Teddy asked him, leaning over the back of the sofa.

I’d heard so many horror stories about first-time sires trying to eat the doctors who tried to care for their true-mates. Teddy hadn’t tried to take a bite out of Jacob. I wondered if it was because they had a past or if Teddy’s dragon understood the nature of the situation. I almost asked but decided against bringing up their past hookups. While Teddy and I talked about our previous sex lives with the mundanity one might talk about the bread they buy, I knew everyone wasn’t like that. Hell, I wasn’t even comfortable with that when I first met Teddy.

“Probably,”

the doctor nodded, taking his portable machine from his pocket. “If she doesn’t have her legs crossed again.”

“Ah, you believe me then?”

Teddy grinned and squeezed my hand.

“I do but only because I met your carrier. If anyone could be in two places at once and tell someone about the future it would be Lotus Cromwell,”

Jacob chuckled as he slid his wand across my belly.

His eyes lit up before mine made sense of what the tiny monitor was showing us.

“Hello, Zinnia,”

Teddy said, glancing at my belly.

“Hot damn,”

Mori laughed. “I mean, I sort of believed you because it’s in my family lineage to know stuff ahead of time but damn.”

“She’s so beautiful,”

I said as everything inside me hummed with my jaguar’s purrs. “She’s so tiny and beautiful.”

“Our little kitten,”

Teddy nodded and leaned down over the sofa to kiss the top of my head.

***

After we knew for sure that our baby was Zinnia and not her brother, my carrier started hinting at the fact that he wanted me to come home to have my baby. Only I couldn’t imagine making the trip that far while pregnant. I couldn’t imagine Teddy’s first visit there occurring while I was pregnant either. I just didn’t see that ending well for anyone.

“But this place is starting to feel like home, Dad,”

I said on video call with him one evening. “I know that’s not what you want to hear. I know this is temporary and eventually I’ll be back home. I’ll live there again and all of this will be a distant memory but I need to make these memories.”

“I wish you didn’t view coming home as a punishment to prepare for,”

he frowned.

“It’s not a punishment. It’s a different phase of life and it’s one I’m not ready for. There’s so much I want to tell you but it’s not my business to talk about.”

“And if you tell me what’s up, you’re afraid I’ll tell Xenos,”

Dad sighed.

“And you would,”

I pointed out.

“Of course I would! I’d never forgive him if he knew something about you and didn’t tell me.”

“Whatever happened to privacy?”

“Uh…. You lived inside my body. What about my privacy?”

he huffed.

“Um… Dad. One more thing like that and I’ll go. I didn’t have a choice about that. I didn’t stand beside the bed as a spirit and slip you an aphrodisiac. You had sex and I happened. Not a choice on my behalf. So, it’s not fair to use any fact about your pregnancy in an argument.”

“I’m sorry,”

Dad said, frowning but at least he managed to apologize. “I worry about you so far from home. I worry about your baby too. What if she’s an omega and…”

“Nope. Not talking about that. We’re not going to hope the first born is an omega or alpha. We’re not going to hope anything except for her to be healthy. She’s a baby not the next step in your dynasty.”

“There’s nothing we can talk about then?”

Dad asked.

“There’s plenty to talk about that doesn’t take away my personal freedoms or decide the future of a kid who isn’t even out of the womb yet,” I sighed.

“Hey!”

Teddy said from the doorway. “Mori and I were thinking about going for a walk. Do you want to come?”

“Go on,”

Dad said before I could answer him either way. “I love you. Take care of yourself.”

“You too and keep going to therapy, old man!”

I teased him.

Teddy plopped down on the sofa next to me when the call ended and I cuddled up against him. We both knew Mori wasn’t home and no walk was in our future. My carrier was trying hard to break old habits passed down through generations of jaguars. Sometimes he even did well at it. Other times were like today.

“It’s killing him that you’re not coming home, isn’t it?”

Teddy frowned.

“Don’t feel bad for him. We’ve all told him that he can come visit here. If he chooses not to figure out how to do that, it’s on him. I’m the pregnant person. I’m growing a kitten. If he wants to see this kitten brought into the world he has to come to where that’s going to happen. I’m not leaving Mori all alone and I’m not going to argue with everyone about you being a dragon while I’m pregnant. If they pull something right now, mate, I will eat them and I won’t even feel bad about it. I don’t have the energy to deal with bigots and it’s almost the stormy season. One storm down there and this baby will shoot out of me across the room and thud into a mudslide before being blown away. Not doing it. No way. No How.”

Teddy wrapped his arms around me and kissed my cheek.

“If my carrier were alive, she’d be here,”

he said a long moment later. “She’d drive us crazy with fussing over you.”

“Depending on how she’s fussing I’d put up with it. By chance do you think she’d tell you that I need more belly rubs and toe bean massages?”

I said, flashing him a sheepish grin.

“Probably,”

he nodded. “Which one do you want me to start with?”

I shifted and stuck my hind foot in his face.

“Good choice,”

he said and kissed my toes. If I were in human form, I’d have blushed, but my jaguar was beyond shame. The heavier our bellies grew the more of it he shed.

“Keep that up and I might let you kiss somewhere else later,”

I teased him over our mating link, and he licked between my toes, sending goosebumps up my back. A little body hair never scared off my mate.