Page 15 of Betrayed Pregnant Mate

That pained sound comes from the room again, and I have to put a hand to my mouth to keep from gasping audibly, tears coming to my eyes. The pain and sorrow rip right into my own chest.

I hear something crash to the floor and Maisie yelping, and I turn the corner, walking into the room. Percy stands in the center, looking more like he walked into the tray of tools, rather than purposefully knocking them over. When our eyes meet, we stare at each other, chests rising and falling quickly.

It feels like I can hear both of our breathing, the inhales and exhales coming and going over my skin. His heart is next to mine, nestled into my chest, altering the composition of my organs, but, ultimately, reorganizing things into the way they always should have been in the first place.

I remember seeing a diagram once that showed how humans were split in two, which is why we have soul mates. With a jolt, I remember what Maisie said—I’m a shifter—and it occurs to me that Percy isn’t a human, so maybe he isn’t my soul mate.

As though moving of their own volition, my feet carry me across the room, and I reach up, wrapping my arms around him. Almost immediately, I feel his body relax, his breathing slowing. His arms wrap around me slowly, pulling me flush to him, and it’s so intoxicating to be near him again, touching him again, that I have to close my eyes against the feeling.

Chapter 8 - Percy

With her bright eyes and slightly parted mouth, Veronica is more gorgeous than I ever remembered. I know the blood-bond is mingling with the current mating bond, and the more time I spend in her company, the worse I will feel. As the bond grows stronger, it will be harder and harder to keep from putting my hands on her.

As her torso presses against mine, I have to take deep breaths to keep from running my hands under her ass, exploring her body, trying to learn everything about her body now, see all the ways it’s the same and all the ways it's changed from what I remember.

I want to take her right now, carry her back to my apartment, taste her, have her under me—

I cut the images off. Imagining her naked isn’t going to do anything but make me feel worse. My cock is already hard at the thought of getting inside her, finally, after years of waiting. When I remind myself that it will never happen, that I could really hurt her, or even kill her, I get a chest pain and step back from her, putting my hand over my heart.

“Percy,” Maisie says, “please sit down. I need to monitor you to make sure you’re not going to destabilize again.”

I sit down on the edge of a cot, watching as Veronica glances between me and the door, as though she’s not sure what to do. I want to get on my knees, beg her to stay, plead with her not to leave me. But I won’t. She doesn’t deserve that.

Veronica didn’t understand the gravity of the blood bond, and what it meant for her. Maisie didn’t even understand, and the thought made my chest tighten. If they had blood-bonded us together in an attempt to save me, and I’d died shortly after, Veronica would have died, too.

Not only will Aris, and the rest of the team, be pissed when they find out, but there’s not a doubt in my mind that they’ll try to break the blood-bond between us. I don’t know if something like that is even possible, but with how wonderful the blood-bonding felt, I can only imagine undoing it must feel like hell.

When I open my eyes, Veronica is still standing there, looking at me.

As a human, can she even feel the mating bond? The blood-bond? And what does it feel like for her?

I need to talk to her, figure out what we will do about it. But I’m not sure she’s even open to talking to me, despite her support and affection for me here. That’s just what she’s like—a nurse, always looking for a patient.

“Maisie,” I say, hearing how gruff my voice is and trying to clear my throat. After everything that’s happened—the wound, the vampire venom, and the blood-bonding—I feel like I need to swallow gallons of water so I won’t feel thirsty anymore.

“Yeah?” she asks, passing me a cup of pills. I don’t ask questions, I just swallow them back, gratefully guzzling the cup of water she offers me.

“Can you alter Veronica’s scent?” I ask, opening one eye and looking at the nurse, who looks startled. “If the others smell her, they’re going to know the truth. I’m assuming you want that about as much as I do?”

Maisie’s face goes white, and she glances back at Veronica, swallowing hard.

“That would be a fair guess,” she says, her voice a little too breathy. “I know you can erase a scent. I don’t know if you can alter one.”

“I don’t really see what our other options are,” I mutter, “other than sneaking her out of here before they can catch her scent, but I imagine that would also raise some questions.”

“I’m going to see what I can do. Rosa has been teaching me some things. Maybe all that chemical knowledge can come in handy.”

“Alter my…scent?” Veronica asks, wrinkling her nose and stepping forward as Maisie goes around the corner to a series of tubes and computers. “Are you trying to tell me something?”

Despite myself, despite the entire situation, I laugh. It has been so long since anyone from the team joked with me the way they used to. It feels foreign, but it's so, so good. I get a flash of the person I used to be—joking, laughing, seeing the light in everything.

It’s been hard to do that for a long time now.

“No,” I say, rubbing a hand over my head. Whatever Maisie gave me is starting to kick in, taking the edge off the wound in my side, which is starting to itch from the healing process.

“What does that mean?” she asks, the corner of her lips quirking up. “That you wouldn’t tell me if I smelled?”

“In the entire time I have known you,” I say, before I can think better of it, “you have always smelled like cinnamon.”

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