Page 10 of Bred By the Minotaur
“If it’s not a girlfriend,” she begins as she starts the wash cycle going, “then did you go back to DreamTogether?”
I should have known it was foolish even to try to hide it. My shoulders sag.
“Yes. I did.”
Mom turns to face me, her arms crossing. “Why didn’t you just tell me that?”
I fumble for the right words. “I didn’t know what you’d think. I just... I had to do it, and I didn’t want anyone to try to stop me.”
She tilts her head. “Why would I stop you?”
I hate when she forces things out of me like this, just asking innocent questions. It’s a tactic that works every time.
“Because I know Milo is a lot, and I’m not married, so I’m doing this by myself, which means you have to step in and pick up the slack all the time. But I’m going to hire a nanny for them this time around, so?—”
“I don’t have to do anything,” my mother says with infinite patience in her tone. “I like spending time with my grandson. Just like I’ll enjoy spending time with my other future grandchild.”
I huff and glare down at the floor. She’s really trying hard to make me feel guilty about lying to her now.
“Did you see her again?” Mom asks, more gently this time.
My head shoots up at the question, and a little smile crosses her face.
“Thought so,” she says. “Milo’s mother.”
“How did you know?”
“I remember what you were like back then,” she says, reaching into a cupboard to pull out a tin of shortbread cookies. I’m surprised when she opens it and there isn’t a sewing kit inside, but actual cookies. “After your first visit with her.”
Was I that obvious? I try to think back to it, but all I can remember from that time is Rapunzel. No, Phoebe. My hormones went wild after mating with her, and I had to jerk off twice, sometimes three times a day for a few weeks just so I wasn’t hard all the time. It’s rather awkward when you spend twelve hours per shift with three other people, trying to be normal.
“Afterward,” Mom clarifies. “I remember afterward.”
“Oh.” Now I understand. When I got the call that my surrogate was pregnant, and I wouldn’t need to visit again...
I hadn’t been in the best place, that’s true. But I thought I put on a better face. I didn’t know Mom even sensed anything was wrong. The understanding that I’d succeeded in impregnating Rapunzel but not seeing her, not smelling her, not burying myself in her while she carried my calf? That had sent me sinking like a lead weight.
“Why didn’t you say anything?” I finally ask, snatching one of the cookies out of the tin and breaking it between my wide teeth. “If you knew all this.”
Mom reaches out and brushes a crumb off my chin, even though I’m not five, like Milo. “I didn’t think it would help. You wanted to suffer alone. I thought it would pass, but then it never did. Even when Milo came, you weren’t the same.”
I go to wipe my hands on my pant leg, but she holds out a napkin I didn’t realize she had. I grunt as I take it, then lean back against the counter.
Thinking back on it, maybe she’s right, and I haven’t really been myself since the last time I walked away from Phoebe. Not until today.
“I gave her my name,” I finally admit. “I put it all out there.”
Even though it’s risky with all my funds invested in DreamTogether, I had to do it. Phoebe is special—I know it.
A pleased, warm smile crosses my mother’s face. “Good. I’m sure that if she feels the same connection you do, you’ll hear from her.” She pats my shoulder. “And I’m excited for a new baby. Don’t get a nanny.”
Then she leaves the kitchen and starts tidying up Milo’s scattered toys. I don’t know how I got so lucky as to have her for my mother.
It’s almost time for my shift, so I go looking for my little bull calf. He’s up in his room, gently petting Darla on the head while she soaks up the attention. Ever since he was little and I told him to “be gentle” with her, he’s always petted the cat like this, just gently running the palm of his furry hand over her head. She purrs, tilting her face so his hand is rubbing over her cheek instead.
“Darla told me today that she doesn’t actually like eating mice all that much,” Milo says when I sit down next to him on the bed.
I raise my brows. “Oh? But she sure likes to catch them and drag them in through the cat door.”
