Page 29 of My Master
“So it’s true…” a voice sounded at the bathroom door. Startled, Ezzy pulled her shirt down and turned. Maria was standing there, staring at her with wide brown eyes.
“What’s true?” Ezzy faked nonchalance but knew that it would be useless. Maria had seen her stomach. Maria knew the truth.
“Esmeralda, you’re pregnant…”
Esmeralda couldn’t help herself; she began to cry. “Oh, please don’t tell Antonio! Please! It’s not something he can deal with right now!”
Maria looked at her with an expression of surprise on her face. “Why can’t he deal with it right now? He has to know, Ezzy…” Maria came forward and put her hands on Ezzy’s shoulders. “What’s going on with you two?”
Esmeralda cried harder, burying her face in her hands. Maria pulled her into a hug and rubbed her back in small circular motions. The action calmed Esmeralda down, if only a little, so that she could tell Maria what was going on.
“He doesn’t want children,” Ezzy sniffled. “He told me so when I asked him about it. Besides, he’s too busy worrying about everything else right now. I don’t want him worrying about me too.”
Maria clicked her tongue in annoyance. “That’s such bull, he’s yourSoul Mate. He’s supposed to worry about you! You have to tell him, Ezzy. Look at your stomach! He’s going to notice sometime. Actually, I’m surprised he hasn’t noticed yet. How far along are you?”
Esmeralda shrugged. “I don’t know, I only just found out. Babies aren’t supposed to grow this big this fast, are they? A few hours ago my stomach was completely flat.”
Maria’s eyes widened. “What?” She swore then went to lock the bathroom door. She came back over to Esmeralda and lifted up her shirt, baring her stomach. “It grew this big in two hours?” Maria asked curiously. Ezzy nodded. Maria swore and paced the bathroom floor. “This is bad,” she was saying. “Very, very bad.”
Fear gripped in Ezzy’s throat. She forced it down. “What’s bad?”
Maria stopped pacing. “What do you know about human-vampire pregnancies?”
Esmeralda shrugged. “I know they’re like any other pregnancy. If it’s a Natural Born vampire then pregnancyispossible and that the child can either come out vampire or human. That’s all I know, really.”
“Yeah, did you know that if you get pregnant with a human child it develops normally, like all other human children? But if one becomes pregnant with a vampire child, well, it develops just a tad bit faster.”
Esmeralda reached for her stomach. “Vampire?” she asked in a soft voice. “I’m carrying a vampire child?”
Maria looked at her sadly and nodded. “When a woman is pregnant with a vampire child, it can be dangerous since the vampire can be stronger, more powerful and with a different anatomy and diet than a regular baby.”
Ezzy made a face. “Is my baby going to suck me dry from the inside?”
“No, that’s dumb. Like human babies, using the umbilical cord, they take the nutrients they need to grow plus a little extra. Vampire babies can sometimes take the mother’s energy—spiritual energy—and use it to help them grow. Sometimes, it’s all that they feed on—energy, and the more energy they feed on from the mother, the more it will drain you of ‘power.’ It’s pretty dangerous because if the baby takes too much, then it can kill the mom. Which is why you look like crap, I would guess.”
“Are you saying that my baby is killing me?” Esmeralda leaned against the sink for support. She was dying? Her baby was killing her? She was instantly reminded of Antonio’s mother, who had died while giving birth to Maria, which was probably one of the reason’s Maria had been so panicked—and was so well informed.
Maria shook her head. “It doesn’t always happen that way, though. Yes, your baby is stealing your energy to become stronger, but that’s why you need to keep yourself hydrated, you need to eat a lot—even if you aren’t hungry; because if you don’t then there is the possibility that you may die. My guess is that the reason you had a spasm out there was because the baby was trying to feed but you are so drained that it started to hurt you.”
Esmeralda took a deep breath in through the nose. She felt a tug at her stomach. She did feel a little hungry, a little empty. She was going to have to eat a lot more than she had been, and keep her strength up if she wanted to save both herself and her child.
Ezzy tried not mentally kicking herself for not taking care of herself in the beginning, not after everything that was unfolding. She swallowed and nodded.
“Okay,” she said. “But, please, don’t tell Antonio. Not yet, anyway. I want to tell him on my own terms.”
Maria nodded in agreement. “One more thing,” she added. “I’ve heard it’s a myth, but it’s said that if a human woman is pregnant with a vampire child, that if the child is powerful enough it secretes certain...” she paused, chewing at her bottom lip before going on, “hormones...that will allow its mother to share its vampire powers. That’s just what I heard, who knows if it’s true or not…We should get going,”
They unlocked the bathroom door and walked out of there, where they found Antonio and Marco sitting down, waiting for them, as far away from each other as possible. Esmeralda resisted the urge to roll her eyes at both of them for acting like immature children, but the thought of children made her think about her baby. She held a hand to her stomach, hoping that no one could tell if she had her hoody on.
The FBSI team were throwing on their gear and grabbing weapons all around them, like they were preparing for battle. It was good, Esmeralda thought, that they now had police officers on their side and they wouldn’t be doing anything super dangerous all by themselves. They would only take part in the investigation, not the actual ‘battle’. It saved her the worry.
She spotted Victoria and Terrance. Terrance was wearing a bullet proof vest and he held various guns and weapons of all shapes and sizes on a hip holster. Victoria, however, was free of a vest; she was a werewolf, and when werewolves were shot they healed quickly.
Esmeralda briefly wondered what kind of supernatural Terrance was; she had guessed he was a half-demon or something and that he had the power to draw out memories from people, which would explain the scene with Rich earlier.
Victoria was straightening the vest on Terrance, and they were speaking in hushed voices, both of them looked serious and intense and it made Esmeralda wonder if they were saying their final goodbye’s, just in case things didn’t run too smoothly. But she shook that thought off as insane. Victoria didn’t seem like the ‘saying goodbye’ type. But then again she couldn’t judge what she didn’t know.
“Ezzy.” Esmeralda looked up. Antonio was towering over her, when he had stood up, she wasn’t sure, but he was holding a little plastic green bag in his hand. “Here.” He handed it to her; she took it gingerly and looked down at it. It was a bag of raisins. “I got it from the vending machine downstairs,” he continued, looking slightly awkward. “You looked hungry, and you haven’t been eating much lately…” He let the sentence trail off in the air.
