Micah shifted his palm on Sam’s stomach and held his breath.
Oh my God.
This couldn’t be happening.
But there was no denying it.
The strange buzz of energy he was feeling. It was coming from inside her. Coming from inside her belly. It was—
“Why are you crying?” Sam placed her hand over his. “Am I . . .? Is it . . .? Is there something wrong with me?”
Was he crying?
He swiped his fingers under his eyes. They came away wet. “Nothing’s wrong.”
“Am I okay?” Desperate worry edged her words.
He bent forward, kissed her stomach, and stretched his gaze up her body to her glorious, beautiful, enchanting face. “You’re more than okay, baby. You’re pregnant.”
For a second, she looked back at him like he’d just spewed gibberish in a foreign language she couldn’t understand. Then her mouth fell open as her eyebrows shot up in her forehead.
“I’m pregnant?” Her head cranked down, and she stared at her stomach like it was going to grow a mouth and start talking to her. “Are you sure? Really? How . . .? I thought—”
“That I couldn’t get you pregnant without a calling? Yeah, that’s what I thought, too.”
But there was no denying it. She was carrying his young. That’s where the odd white noise had come from.
He blinked, bent forward again, placed both hands on either side of her abdomen, and kissed the smooth expanse of skin right below her belly button. “I hear you,” he whispered. Then he looked up, meeting Sam’s glistening eyes. “I hear them.”
She covered her mouth with her fingertips as a tear dropped off her lashes. “Them? As in . . .?”
He nodded and tipped his forehead against her stomach. “Twins. You’re carrying twins.” His voice was but a whisper. “My twins. My young. My babies.” God, it felt good to say that.
He forced himself to breathe slowly, calmly, despite the stinging in the backs of his eyes.
Pregnant. His precious Sam was pregnant.
He’d thought for so long that children were never going to happen for him. So long, in fact, that he had assumed he must be sterile. But no. He wasn’t shooting blanks. He’d gotten his mate pregnant without a calling, and that was as far from shooting blanks as a male could get.
Hallelujah.
Take that, Lakota! Oh, he of the powerful sperm who could get a female pregnant just by looking at her.
Everything else Micah had learned tonight faded like fog in the morning sun. His thieving brother. His living father. The ankh that Ronan had stolen from him. None of that mattered anymore. All that mattered was that Sam was carrying his babies.
Babies! Because as sure as he lived and breathed, Sam most definitely carried not just one child, but two.
He felt them both.
Overwhelmed with emotion, he wrapped his arms around her waist as he pressed kisses over her stomach. “My mate, my children.” Moisture licked his eyes as more tears welled and dropped to his cheeks.
No longer was he the odd man out. Over the past several months, he’d watched his friends announce their own coming bundles of joy. Tristan, Io, and Malek were all going to be fathers, and now that Trace had mated Cordray, he would likely join the father-to-be club sooner rather than later, especially since he was on the verge of his calling.
Now, Micah could be the one to walk into the room full of proud fertilization factories and proclaim that, yes, he was going to be a father, too.
Tremendous relief engulfed him, and he tipped his forehead against her stomach as if in prayer as he squeezed his eyes closed and let his tears slide down his cheeks.
Sam’s fingers smoothed into his hair and cradled his head against her.
“You’re going to be a father.” She spoke softly, reverently.
She knew how much he’d wanted this.
Lifting his gaze to hers, he blinked through the film of moisture blurring his vision to find her smiling down at him. Her own tears dripped from her softly pointed chin.
“And you’re going to be a mother,” he said.
The corners of her mouth lifted as she nodded, the smile expanding over her face and brightening her eyes.
“I had begun to think this would never happen.” He slowly rose to his feet.
“Why?”
He studied her shimmering eyes. “Because of Kat. Because I was never able to get her pregnant. And because you didn’t get pregnant when I had my calling. I thought . . . maybe I was the problem.”
Her eyebrows scrunched into a compassionate furrow as she tilted her head. “Oh, Micah.” She caressed his face. He dipped his cheek into her palm and closed his eyes. “You should have talked to me.”
“I didn’t want to worry you.” He kissed her palm and placed his hand over her belly again so he could feel the twin life forces stirring inside her. “But now I don’t have to. What I thought might never happen has.”
She giggled and glanced down at her stomach again as she covered his hand with hers. “I’m going to be a mother?” Her words lilted like a question, but he could see in her mind that she felt more a sense a wonder than disbelief.
“Yes, baby. You’re going to be a mother. A wonderful mother.”
His mind shot to what they’d done earlier . . . how rough he’d been with her. She wore the evidence of his harshness all over her body. The bite marks where he took her blood. The bruises on her wrists where he’d restrained her, and between her legs where his body had slammed hard and repeatedly against hers.
Recoiling, he took a quick step back and inspected her. “Oh, my God, Sam. Look what I did to you. I hurt you.”
“Huh?” Bewilderment replaced wonder in her expression. “What are you talking about?”
“This!” He lifted her hands and glared at the bruises around her wrists then stared pointedly at the lingering signs of the bite marks he’d left on her neck and the parts of her breasts that weren’t covered by her tank top.
He had taken blood from her when she needed it most. When his unborn young needed her at her strongest.
“What?” She looked at him like he was crazy. “A little bruising?”
“It’s not a little. You look like you were in battle.”
She laughed, reaching for his hands even as he continued inspecting her. “Calm down. I’m fine. Really.”
She couldn’t know what she was talking about. This was his responsibility. He needed to protect her, keep her safe, ensure no harm came to her.
Shaking his head, he pulled her into his arms and tucked her against him. “I promise to take better care of you. I promise not to hurt you like that again.”
“Whoa!” She shoved out of his hold and planted her fists on her hips. “Are we back to that?” She cocked her head. “I already told you. You didn’t hurt me. I’m fine. I’m better than fine.”
“You’re pregnant, and—”
“And I’m not going to break like a dry twig, Micah. I’m a tough bitch. I can handle you, no matter how rough you get.”
“As the male, it’s my duty to—”
“Yeah, yeah.” She rolled her eyes and crossed her arms. “It’s your duty to take care of me and keep me safe and dote all over me now that I’m your baby mama.” She squared him up in her sights. “Micah Black, I don’t need to be handled like I’m made of paper-thin glass. If we’re going to have kids together, we need to get that straight right now, because I can assure you, if you start treating me with kid gloves, it will hurt me more than anything you’ve ever done to me in bed.”
He took in her determined, stalwart expression. Sam was a tough female who could dish it out as well as take it. She had moxie and verve, and she thrived on her independence and her ability to roll with the punches. It was why he’d mated her, because he needed a female who could stand up to his overbearing personality and not wilt when he sank into one of his moods. Her strength was what had drawn him to her in the first place. Maybe he needed to have a little more faith in that.
“Come here,” he said, opening his arms, wanting to feel her again, needing that physical connection.
She stiffened her shoulders and raised her chin. “Do you understand how important this is to me, Micah? Do you get how important it is for me to know you don’t see me as weak? Because if you don’t—”
“I do, baby. I get it.” He stepped toward her, arms still out. “I’m sorry. I’m just feeling a little overprotective at the moment. This is all new to me. I’ve never had young, and I got caught up in the excitement.” He slid his palms over her hips. “But give me some leeway. It’s in a male vampire’s nature to tend to his pregnant mate.”
She uncrossed her arms and gently pressed her palms to his chest as if she wasn’t quite ready to forgive him. “Then tend to me, but don’t coddle me.”
His thoughts jumped to Kat. I detest coddling. That’s what she’d said to him that night. Now Sam was warning him not to coddle her, either. The two most important females he’d ever welcomed into the most intimate corners of his life were alike in so many ways. Maybe they weren’t one in the same, but they were certainly spiritual twins.
“Why are you smiling like that, Black?” she said, arching one eyebrow as she fought back a smile of her own. Her hands smoothed up his chest to his shoulders.
Shaking his head, he tightened his grip on her hips and tugged her closer. “I’m just happy. You make me happy.”
She allowed the smile to blossom over her face as she acquiesced and leaned into his body. “Good answer.”
“Are you sure I didn’t hurt you. Are you sure you’re okay?”
She sighed and angled her head to one side. “Yes. I’m fine. You don’t need to give me a blood transfusion or anything.”
“Funny.” Lacing his fingers over her rump, he pulled her against him as he flicked his gaze to the kitchen. “You hungry?”
“A little. I just had that peanut butter, but I could eat. Why?”
“Because it’s kind of an honor for a female to eat from her male’s hand, especially when she’s pregnant.”
“This is going to be a thing with you, isn’t it?” She brushed her mouth gently over his.
He licked her taste from his lips. “Yep.”
One delicate brow raised into a shallow arc as her eyes twinkled. “Okay, fine. I’ll let you feed me . . . on one condition.”
Oh, how he adored her, always negotiating her will into his. “Anything.”
She stepped into him and ran her hands down his arms. “You have to let me take a few bites on my own, too.”
The embers in his soul began to smolder again as heat rose within his body. “Then I will feed you”—he leaned in and kissed the curve at the base of her neck—“and then I’m going to make love to you”—he crossed to the other side of her neck and kissed her there—“and then I’m going to bathe you”—he kissed her nose—“and then I’m going to hold you while you sleep.” He planted a chaste but burning kiss on her lips then broke away and pulled a plate from the cabinet.
“You are, are you?” She leaned her hip against the counter, watching him.
He nodded. “I most definitely am.” He gathered cheese, crackers, a small bunch of purple grapes, and a knife, piling it all on the plate before taking her hand and leading her to the bedroom.
“And you don’t think this is coddling?”
He pushed open the bedroom door with his foot. “Absolutely not.”
She resisted the smile pulling at her mouth. “Then what do you call it?”
“I call this ‘Micah milking the newfound knowledge he’s going to be a father to its fullest extent, because his little soldiers are as badass as he is to get you pregnant without a calling.’ That’s what I call it.”
She laughed and let him pull her to the middle of the bed, where they sat cross-legged, facing each other. He rested the plate between his knees and picked up the block of cheese in one hand and the knife in the other as she opened the paper sleeve filled with buttery Keebler goodness.
“How am I going to survive the next nine months with you?” she said, giggling as he cut off a piece of cheese and held it out to her.
She leaned forward and parted her lips, taking the nibble of cheese into her mouth. A sensation like butterflies taking flight erupted inside his chest at the way her tongue swirled around the tip of his finger. Her teeth grazed his skin as she slowly pulled away then moved on to his index finger.
The breath blew out of his lungs, and he let out a quiet groan. “How am I going to survive the next nine seconds with you performing fellatio on my fingers?”
She giggled seductively, inching closer as she plucked a grape and popped it in her mouth. “I call this ‘Me milking your overactive hormones to their fullest, because I’m an opportunist who knows how to push your buttons to get what I want.’ What do you think of that?”
He sliced off another bite of cheese and leaned closer as he held it in front of her. “Wicked female. Taking advantage of me like that.”
She took the morsel of food into her mouth, briefly letting her lips close around the tips of his fingers before easing away. “You bet your pants I’m taking advantage of you.” She ate another bite, took the knife and cheese from him, moved the plate to the nightstand, and then scooted closer until her knees rested on top of his. Her hand slid up the inside of his thigh to his erection. “Especially when you’re so much fun to take advantage of.”
Resting his hands on her hips, he glanced at the abandoned plate. “I thought you were hungry.”
“I am.” Lifting onto her knees, she maneuvered onto his lap, eyeing his mouth. “I’m very hungry.” Her hand eased inside the waist of his pants, and her palm glided down the length of his cock before wrapping around the base.
Lying back, he pulled her down on top of him. “Mmm, then maybe I should feed you.”
Her supple curves molded perfectly against him as she freed his erection.
Reaching down, he helped her push his pants off then removed her panties.
Hours ago, he’d needed hard fucking. Punishing sex. He’d needed to take, take, and take some more to drive out the shock and confusion that had resulted from earlier events.
Now, none of that mattered.
Sam was pregnant. He wasn’t sterile. He had new priorities that had nothing to do with his father and brother.
There was nothing he couldn’t overcome now that he’d achieved what all male vampires aspired to once they’ve taken a mate.
As Sam’s lips found his, he closed his eyes and let out a relieved exhale, pulling her against him, one arm wrapped around her shoulders, the other locked against her lower back. His mouth fused with hers, and his tongue slid past her lips. He gently rocked his hips between her legs, desiring the friction but in no hurry to bury himself inside her.
Earlier, he couldn’t claim her fast enough nor hard enough. Now he wanted to take his time. Taste her inch by inch. Feel every ripple of her body. Worship her.
The creation of life was a miracle in itself, but to carry that life? To nurture it as it grew and became another living being? That was truly miraculous. Truly divine.
She was his goddess, and he her faithful subject.
“You’re shaking,” she whispered, pushing up on her arms.
He opened his eyes as a tear broke free and rolled down the side of his face.
She ran her thumb down the tear’s trail and searched his face. “Micah?”
He cradled her cheek then stroked his fingers down her face. “I love you. I love you so damn much.” His heart broke open at the way her green eyes sparkled, her expression softening. “There’s nothing I wouldn’t do for you. Nothing I wouldn’t do for our children.” He was changing. With each moment that passed, he was becoming a new version of himself, and he had no idea when the transition would end or who and what he would be when it was over.
She kissed him. “I love you, too.”
They stared into each other’s eyes for the longest time, their bodies gently rocked against each another. He still hadn’t entered her, but it didn’t matter. Feeling her slick core glide up and down his length was more provocative than being inside her, especially as her breathing intensified.
She wrapped her fingers around his, clutching them tight, and pressed his hands to the pillow on either side of his head. Her exhales morphed into moans, each growing higher pitched than the last. Her hips rocked harder, forward and back, dragging her clit over the full length of him, all the way to the head, before driving down to the base again.
He lay beneath her, fascinated by the way she took what she wanted and restrained him. By the way her eyes drifted closed before she forced them open again to stare into his, as if she took her desire by stealing it from his gaze. As if eye contact alone propelled her rising arousal to its climax yet kept her from launching skyward as her orgasm crested.
Crying out his name, she threw her head back then forward. Her grip crushed his hands, pushing them hard against the bed, and her body fell into violent tremors.
That’s when the primal warrior inside him broke free.
In one fluid motion, he had her on her back, still in the throes of her orgasm as he drove into her, a relentless barbarian, unleashed and abandoned.
“Micah . . . Micah . . . God, yes . . . MICAH!” She came again, driving her blunt nails into his back.
His body seized, his hips convulsed, and a keening, sated growl roared from his throat as he emptied inside her.
In the afterglow, both of them breathing hard, arms locked around each other, his cock still twitching every few seconds within her slick heat, an overwhelming sense of gratitude washed through him. Gratitude and peace. The priorities in his life had shifted. For a thousand years, he’d known only one life. Now, a whole new existence had opened to him.
Sam and his unborn children were his life now. They were his heart.
With his arms still around her and his face buried in her soft hair, he inhaled deeply and saw a new path for his life.
“I’m done,” he murmured.
Her fingertips skimmed up his spine. “Mmmm, I know. So am I. And it was incredible.”
He pushed up on his arms and stared into her eyes. “No. I mean, I’m quitting my job. No more AKM.”
Her eyebrows scrunched. “You’re quitting your job? Why?”
“It’s time. Time for something else.”
“Like what?”
But he had no idea. He just knew he couldn’t go on being a grunt enforcer.
He lowered himself over her again, resting his weight on his elbows. He gave a little shrug. “Maybe I’ll just stay home, make love to you all day, and make babies, now that I know I don’t need a calling to get the job done.”
“If you stayed home all day, you’d drive me nuts.”
“Good nuts?”
“No, the bad kind.”
“I’ve got a pair of good nuts with your name all over them.”
“You’re not hearing me, Micah.”
The concerns she was voicing inside her mind told him everything he needed to know about what she thought of his sudden desire to quit his job. She was worried he was jumping too quickly without thinking things through. She was concerned he would grow restless and frustrated if he wasn’t out on the streets, tracking down drecks and kicking criminals’ asses.
Maybe she was right. Maybe not.
More than anything, she feared he would become bored and, in an effort to keep himself entertained, try to interfere too much in the groove she’d created for herself and settled into as his mate. She had things she wanted to do without him. Things she needed to do to maintain her identity. Her independence was important to her, and if he was around all the time, she was afraid she’d feel suffocated.
Honestly, part of him worried about all those things and more, but he just couldn’t see enforcing as a viable career option, anymore. Too many rules. Too many restrictions. It felt like for every step AKM took forward, they were knocked back three by the loosely worded terms of the truce. If they were going to make a real difference and put an end to cobalt distribution and the slow chipping away at the vampire race the drecks were getting away with, they needed a new approach. One that didn’t bind their hands. One that gave them a fair shake against the drecks’ new tactics, including those perpetrated by Bishop. Because everyone knew Bishop worked for Premier Royce. That he, in fact, had Royce’s blessing.
“I’ll figure something out,” he said, resting his body weight on his elbows. “Right now, I just want to love you full time.”
“That sounds dangerously like coddling.”
“It’s just for a little while, then I’ll find something else. A new job.” He chuckled. “Maybe I’ll take up music and tour the club scene with Ari.”
“Oh, I’m sure he’d love that.”
“Hey, we get along now. It’s not like how it used to be between us.”
“Yeah, well, I doubt Ari is looking to become a duet with anyone other than Severin.”
Micah rolled to his back, pulling Sam against him. “Then I’ll get a normal job.”
A lightness filled his soul. He was daring to be something else. Someone else. All his life, he’d been a warrior of one kind or another, but now he was eyeing a future as a family man. Maybe he could get a regular job. Something that didn’t put him in harm’s way every night. Didn’t he owe that to his unborn children? Sam? Himself?
“Like what?” she asked.
“I don’t know. Accounting maybe?”
She laughed. “I can just see you the first time your accounts don’t balance.” She mimicked taking out a knife and stabbing something with it over and over. “Damn fucking numbers! Balance, little shits! Goddamn stupid . . .” she trailed off on a series of garbled curses of discontent that sounded like miniature roars.
He shrugged. “Okay, so maybe not accounting.”
She laughed. “You could become a hairdresser.” She ran her fingers through his hair.
“That’s Aiden’s job.”
Aiden was one of the youngest children from Cordray’s shelter, but despite being only three years old, she had mad skills when it came to braiding his hair.
“Yeah, that kid’s got talent.” Sam brushed her fingers through his hair.
“For a toddler.”
Sam rolled her head and looked at him like he’d missed something. “Baby, she’s got talent for a seasoned Hollywood stylist for the superstars. I swear that girl is going to grow up to be the most in-demand hairdresser in the world. People will probably pay her to travel to London or Tokyo just to do their hair.”
Micah laughed then sighed as Sam settled against him again. “Well, I’ll think of something to do. Something normal.”
But would a normal job make him happy?
Honestly happy?
He craved action. He needed the adventure and mental sharpness that came with hunting drug dealers, vagrant drecks and vampires, and the occasional mutant. Normal might not cut it.
He dismissed the troubling thought. His happiness didn’t matter as much as becoming a father. He didn’t want to leave Sam without a mate and his kids without a dad if something were to happen to him.
“Micah, you know you’re not cut out for normal work,” Sam said, giving voice to the concerns rumbling through his own thoughts.
“I could be.”
She laughed and propped herself on her elbow. “You’re a fighter. You won’t be happy unless you’re out there fighting.”
“You don’t know that. I could change. People change all the time.”
Sam drew in her breath to reply, but the doorbell interrupted her, followed by a loud, urgent knock.
“Who the fuck?” Micah growled up at the ceiling out of frustration. He was trying to have a serious conversation with his mate, for Christ’s sake. “Go away!”
These untimely interruptions were one thing he wouldn’t miss once he officially quit his job.
The knocking came again, more insistent.
He had liked it better when the apartment had been a secret hideaway no one at AKM but Tristan knew about. Now every fool and their uncle knew he lived there. At least when he wasn’t at the house in the burbs.
Sam scurried out of bed and started pulling on her clothes. “You’d better answer it. It sounds important.”
“This”—he gestured between her and him—“is important.” He pushed himself off the bed and reached for his clothes. “That”—he pointed in the direction of the front door then began tugging on his pants —“is a nuisance. It’s why I want out of my job. I can’t even spend a night with my mate—the most important night of my life—without being interrupted.”
She smoothed out her hair. “I know, I know, and we’ll discuss it. And I’ll support whatever decision you make, but right now, you still have a job to do.”
Pounding came from the front door again, even more insistent than before.
“Jesus! I’m coming! Lay off the fucking door!” He stormed out of the room as Sam followed.
Whoever had come to throw water on his love fire had better have a good reason for being there, because they’d just landed on his boot-up-the-ass list.
Flinging the door open, he frowned and took a step back.
Severin stood in the hall with Micah’s dad and that dreck who ran Grudge Match, Digon, behind him.
“What’s going on?” he said to Severin, eyeing the other two.
Severin appeared stuck between bewildered and pissed off. “I could ask you the same question.” He glanced over his shoulder at the two males standing behind him. Clearly, Sev had gotten the lowdown on Daddy-O and was just as confused by Digon’s presence as Micah.
“It’s your brother,” his father said, his expression grim.
Micah’s sixth sense lit up. “Ronan? What about him? What’s happened to him?” He might not feel all warm and fuzzy about his father or his brother right now, but Ronan was family, and blood ran thick in Micah’s world. Nothing bad had better have happened to Ronan now that he’d only just learned of his existence.
“You need to come quickly,” Digon said.
“What are you even doing here?” Micah asked him.
Digon sighed and gestured toward the elevators. “That’s not important right now. You need to come with us. Something has happened.”
“I’ll determine what is and isn’t important, fuck you very much.”
“Micah . . .” Sev took his arm, and Micah picked up all kinds of grave thoughts from the guy. Something about an attack, venom, blood, and Ronan in excruciating pain.
“Somebody had better tell me what the fuck is going on. Right now. I’m seriously not in the mood for games.”
Severin drew in close and lowered his voice. “Your brother? Ronan? That Skeletor guy . . .?” Sev’s blue eyes lasered in on Micah’s to let him know he knew the truth about his newfound family issues. “He got bitten by a werewolf.”
“So?” Vampires couldn’t die from werewolf bites.
“This apparently wasn’t a normal werewolf,” Digon said.
That caught his attention. “How so?”
“We’re still trying to figure it out, but it’s not looking good.”
Cold gooseflesh prickled Micah’s body at the grave expression on his father’s face. “What do you mean, it’s not looking good?”
His father sighed, and concerned lines furrowed his face, which sent stabs of dread up and down Micah’s spine.
“Micah . . . it’s bad. Real bad.” He frowned and cleared his throat. “Ronan could die.”
“From a werewolf bite!” This had to be a bad joke.
Digon placed his hand reassuringly on his dad’s shoulder. “Like we said, Micah, they weren’t normal werewolves.”
Well, shit. This night just couldn’t stop raining on his parade.