Kansas exhaled slowly. He opened his mouth…
And threw up.
I stood in shock, knowing I should wipe the vomit from my chin at the least. But I was too worried about Kansas to worry about myself. I reached for him, but holding him now would just mean wiping him with his own vomit. His cheeks were flushed. Nerves? Or something else? "Kansas?"
"Here you go," Nash said, and I expected to grab a towel or something else to wipe myself clean with.
Instead, he handed me a pregnancy test.
Chapter Twelve
Kansas
I really wished I hadn't thrown up on him. If nothing else, it made it impossible to keep the upper hand. You couldn't be mad at a person you'd just covered with the contents of your stomach.
I wasn't sure where the urge had come from either. I'd been fine, until I wasn't. Now, Wyatt had me in the bathroom with a cardboard box clutched in his hand.
"Are you going to shower?" I asked.
"No, you're going to pee."
Wyatt sat me down on the edge of the tub, ripped his soiled clothes off, and wiped his skin clean using the wet wipes in the cupboard. He broke open the small box he'd carried in with us, pulling out a thinner, wrapped item. I'd seen pregnancy tests before, on the shelves. I'd never thought I would need to buy one, much less use it. We'd already done this and had decided that whatever force had made it possible for Riley and Phin to conceive wasn't what was going on with us.
"I'm probably just coming down with something, Wyatt. Besides, you're just trying to distract me from the fact that you ran into danger, half-cocked, and now you're hurt. Do you even know how many shifters they've called in to help? How large their army is now? You could have run into an ambush." I might not have known much about the real world, but I knew how to stay one step ahead, and that wasn't achieved by busting into a situation with guns blazing.
"You're right, okay? Is that what you want to hear so we can move on to this?" He lifted the wrapped test between our faces.
I hated seeing it. I knew what it would say: negative. I'd thrown up, and now Wyatt was hoping for something that hadn't happened. Something that wasn't possible. "No, that isn't what I want to hear." I didn't know what I wanted to hear. Not the wasps buzzing in my brain, that was for sure. I'd eaten today—Wyatt had made sure of it—so why were the brain bugs coming?
"Kansas, baby—"
"Stop calling me baby!" I snapped. That hadn't been what I'd meant to say. At least, not all of it. I loved the term; I just didn't think Wyatt meant to say all that I wished he was saying with that small endearment. I closed my eyes, but that only made the buzzing louder, so I opened them again.
I'd expected my outburst to put some distance between us, but when I looked at Wyatt again, he was closer. Our noses nearly touched, and he'd set the test down, cupping my face with his free hands. "Kansas, breathe."
I inhaled quickly and exhaled, trying to get it over with so he'd step back and I could think again. That was my problem, I decided. I couldn't think when he was so close to me. Especially when we were locked away in a small room. Any other time, one or both of us would've been naked by now.
I guessed Wyatt did want me to take out my dick, but only so I could pee on that stick and disappoint him.
"No, not like that. For real. Breathe, Kansas. In and out. In… hold it… out…"
With my eyes closed, I listened to his instruction, breathing as he told me to. When I opened my eyes, the wasps were gone, and the room didn't look quite so small.
"There you are," he said, searching my eyes with a smile. "I know we tested this before, but we need to test again, for real this time."
I pulled my bottom lip between my teeth and nodded, letting him guide me to the toilet. I unzipped while he prepared the test, and when I thought he would stand back and let me handle the rest, he didn't. He held me and the test, directing the flow until he was satisfied.
"We'll be doing all this again, under sexier circumstances," he promised, winking at me in the mirror as he washed his hands.
"How long do we have to wait?" I'd put myself back together, and Wyatt moved over to share the sink.
"Just a few minutes longer," he replied. Now that I'd done what he asked, he didn't seem quite so intense.
Was he worried that we'd been wrong before? I didn't think we were. What would he do if it was positive? He was a good man with a strong sense of responsibility, but I didn't want him to feel responsible for me.
The realization hit me like a wrecking ball. I'd been a burden to every person in my life, from my uncle to the marks I met while hunting. At least with Wyatt, I got to feel helpful now and again. But if our relationship changed and he felt chained to me, he'd only ever see me as a brick weighing him down.
"Now?" I whispered, thinking it had to be at least a few minutes since I asked.
"A little longer," Wyatt replied, whispering as I had.
I tapped my toe against the tile. "Now?"
Wyatt laughed. "Not yet."
How could he laugh at a time like this? Maybe this was just a precaution, and he didn't actually think I was pregnant. I started counting the tiles on the ground, counting out three rows before lifting my face again.
"Now." Wyatt stretched over the test.
I didn't want to look. He could just tell me what he saw there.
His lips stretched wide, and my stomach clenched again. Was he happy it was negative? Could I survive this moment if that was the case?
"It says you're pregnant, Kansas," Wyatt whispered.
"What?"
"He said you're pregnant," someone said from the other side of the door. It sounded like Nash.
Wyatt frowned but opened the bathroom door. "I'm pretty sure I gave you privacy when you were doing this exact thing."
"You messed with me mercilessly," Nash said. His pleased expression didn't match their brotherly bickering. He looked around Wyatt to where I stood, still frozen to the ground. "Welcome to the pack."
That should've made me happy. Ever since coming to this house, all I'd wanted to do was stay, but I was always careful not to overstay my welcome. How would that be possible now?
"But I'm not a shifter," I reminded Wyatt. "We tested it."
His eyebrows met each other, the expression matching Nash's exactly.
"You have to be a shifter… there's no other…" Nash stepped back, revealing the others in the hallway with him.
They'd all heard, but instead of smiling, I saw varying levels of confusion.
The test said I was pregnant, but I was still just a normal human. I didn't have any extra senses like Phin or Riley. I couldn't turn into a wolf, which mean when it was time for this baby to come out, there was no exit.
Unless it crawled out of me alien-style.
We traveled as a group back to the living room.
The others looked stuck between wanting to congratulate me and wondering the same thing I was. Where would this baby come out of me?
"Riley didn't find out he was a shifter when he found out he was pregnant," Branson offered. "He didn't shift until later."