Page 16 of Pregnant, Rejected and Exiled By the Lycan King (Forbidden Alpha Kings #45)

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Rhea

The nausea started on Monday, mild enough to blame on the gas station coffee.

By Wednesday, smells that never bothered me before sent me rushing to the bathroom.

Wayne’s cologne hit like a physical assault when he passed my desk.

The jasmine-scented air freshener turned my stomach inside out.

Even my own shampoo, the cheap lavender from the dollar store, had me gripping the toilet bowl at dawn.

I sat on the cracked tile floor, forehead pressed against cool porcelain, and did the math I’d been avoiding.

Fifteen weeks since that night. Fifteen weeks since my last heat.

Fifteen weeks of telling myself stress and trauma could delay my cycle indefinitely.

The human side of my brain offered logical explanations: malnutrition, psychological trauma, the disruption of leaving pack territory.

But the wolf part knew better, had known for weeks, whispering truths I refused to hear.

The Wayne Garrett Real Estate office bathroom had become too familiar. Yellowed linoleum curled at the corners, exposing black mold that explained the persistent dampness. A spider had built its web in the corner by the window, growing fat on the flies that buzzed against the frosted glass.

Thursday brought exhaustion so profound I fell asleep at my desk, waking to Wayne’s concerned face hovering above.

Drool had pooled on the Henderson property file, smearing the ink.

My neck ached from the angle, and my mouth tasted like copper pennies.

The overhead fluorescents stabbed at my retinas as I straightened, trying to orient myself in space and time.

“You look like hell. Go home early.” Wayne’s voice carried more command than suggestion, his usual gruffness softened by genuine worry.

“I’m fine. Just tired.” The lie came automatically, practiced from weeks of deflection.

My hands shook as I straightened papers, trying to look busy and capable.

The omega clinic on the edge of town would have answers, but medical records left trails.

A banished omega seeking reproductive health services would ping alerts through the pack medical network.

One database search and they’d know exactly where I was, what condition I was in.

So I suffered in silence, adding saltines to my desk drawer, pretending the wool of my cheap blazer didn’t suddenly feel unbearable against sensitive skin.

January in Millbrook brought its own miseries.

Ice crystallized on the inside of the office windows, creating patterns that caught the weak winter sun.

The radiator clanged and hissed but never quite heated the space.

I’d taken to wearing fingerless gloves while typing, my breath visible in small puffs as I answered phones.

The cold usually helped with the nausea, but today nothing helped.

My body had declared war on itself, each system rebelling against the secret it carried.

The coffee pot gurgled in the corner, its burnt offering a constant assault on my heightened senses.

Three months ago, I’d lived for that first cup.

Now the mere sound of percolation sent acid climbing my throat.

Wayne noticed, of course. He noticed everything with the quiet attention of someone who’d learned to read people like weather patterns.

He’d started drinking his coffee in the back room, claiming he needed the quiet.

We both knew better, but kindness came disguised as indifference in places like Millbrook.

By Thursday evening, I’d memorized every stain on the ceiling tiles.

Water damage created continents and islands, a map of neglect that told the building’s history.

I traced their borders while fighting waves of dizziness, wondering if anyone else had ever lain on this floor counting ceiling stains while their life restructured itself at the cellular level.

The answer felt obvious. This bathroom had seen decades of desperation. Mine was just the latest installment.

Please let me be wrong. Please let this be anything else.

***

I was at the pharmacy three towns over by Friday evening. I had spent yesterday wallowing in the what-ifs and what happens until sleep had taken over my brain. Now with my baseball cap pulled low, sunglasses despite the darkness outside, made me look like an actual tool.

The drive had taken forty minutes through winding back roads, each mile adding distance between my real life and this necessary errand.

Marcy had been kind enough to let me borrow her car without asking any questions.

All I had to do was cover for her next week when she asked for another emergency sick day.

I’d told myself I was being paranoid, that no one tracked pharmacy purchases, but survival meant assuming threats everywhere. The last gas station I’d passed had been twelve miles back, a comforting buffer of isolation.

The automatic doors whooshed open, releasing a blast of antiseptic air and elevator music.

I grabbed a basket, the red plastic cold against my palm.

Props for the performance. A normal woman doing normal shopping.

Paper towels first, then shampoo I didn’t need.

Candy bars I’d never eat. Building a camouflage of mundane items around the real purpose of this trip.

The pregnancy test aisle stretched before me like an accusation.

Three brands stared back, pink and blue boxes promising accuracy and early detection.

I stood frozen, the basket growing heavy in my hand, reading the same labels over and over.

Ninety-nine percent accurate. Results in three minutes.

Early detection up to six days before the missed period.

That last one almost made me laugh. Six days.

I’d missed two entire months, maybe three.

The signs had been screaming at me while I’d stuffed my fingers in my ears.

I had a faint idea of how wolf conception worked, but that didn’t mean my timeline was accurate.

We had fucked twice. Fucking hell. I had only had sex twice and here I was already fetching pregnancy tests.

The irony was not lost on me. But I had been an idiot.

I should have done something after the first night.

But I had been caught up in the excitement of having a mate that I had forgotten all about contraception. And now I was going to pay for it.

How had I missed it? The question tormented me as I reached for the cheapest generic brand.

My mother would have known immediately. Neva Thornback had a sixth sense for omega cycles, could diagnose pregnancies from across a room just by the way a woman held herself.

She’d taught me to track my cycles with military precision, to notice every shift in temperature and mood.

“Your body tells you everything,” she’d said, marking calendars with colored dots. “You just have to listen.”

But I’d stopped listening. Stopped tracking.

Stopped everything that connected me to the omega I’d been.

In my determination to disappear, I’d disappeared from myself too.

The exhaustion I’d blamed on stress. The nausea I’d attributed to grief.

The heightened senses I’d written off as hypervigilance.

Each symptom dismissed, rationalized, ignored.

My body had been screaming the truth while I’d been too stubborn or too terrified to hear it.

I grabbed three different tests. Different brands, different methods, different price points.

As if spending more money might change the outcome.

The boxes felt heavier than they should, weighted with consequences I couldn’t calculate.

A woman with a toddler passed by, her cart full of diapers and formula.

She smiled at me, that universal acknowledgment between women in this aisle.

I wanted to run. I wanted to throw the tests back and pretend I’d never come here.

She had no idea what it meant for me to be taking these tests.

Her baby was loved, mine, if there was one, had no idea what its future would hold.

My mother’s voice echoed in my memory. “When you have your first, I’ll be there.

I’ll teach you everything just like my mother taught me.

” Promises made in a kitchen that no longer existed, by a woman I’d never see again.

She’d be in the outbacks now, if she’d survived the journey.

And it was all my fault. I would find a way to call her tomorrow, there had to be something on that burner Papa had given me that could help me speak to her.

The teenage clerk came into view as I rounded the endcap.

Tyler, according to his nametag, looked barely old enough to be out past curfew.

Acne clustered on his chin, and his uniform shirt hung loose on his skinny frame.

He scrolled through his phone with the dedication of his generation, earbuds blocking out the world.

Perfect. The last thing I needed was a chatty cashier asking about due dates and baby names.

I added more camouflage items. Magazines whose covers carried women with perfect hair.

Gum I’d never chew. A phone charger that didn’t fit my phone.

Anything to bury the tests in the middle of the pile, to make this look like a random shopping trip instead of a desperate mission.

My hands shook as I placed items on the conveyor belt, arranging them with obsessive care.

Tyler scanned without looking up, muscle memory guiding his movements. The tests beeped through without fanfare, just three more items in an endless stream of consumer goods. He mumbled the total while texting, one hand extended for payment.

“That’ll be $47.83.” His monotone suggested he’d rather be anywhere else.

“Keep the change.” I threw a fifty on the counter and fled before he could count it out.