Page 21 of Jacked-up Mate
He brought it back in a nice little hand-carved wooden box, and I paid for it then stopped at the grocery store for a pregnancy test on my way home. I hadn’t considered that I might be pregnant, but it made sense…we were doing the things that created pregnancy.
Jack was already home when I got there. As I came in, he greeted me with a smile.
“You’re home earlier than I thought.”
“Yeah,” I said. “Went to the antique store. And, long story short”—I dug in the bag and pulled out the stick—“I need to go take this.”
I ran into the bathroom without further discussion. I couldn’t wait a second longer to find out. I peed on the stick, set it on the back of the toilet, and set the timer. Three minutes. Might as well be an eternity.
“Is it okay if I come in?” Jack asked through the door.
“Yeah, sorry.” I hadn’t meant to block him from this moment.
He pushed it open and walked inside.
“Are you happy? Tell me you’re happy,” he said, pulling me into his arms.
“I’m happy if it says yes. I think I’ll be sad if it says no. That’s why I want to find out right away.”
“If it says no, then we’ll just try again,” he said.
We hadn’t talked about having kids, but now that the idea was sitting right in front of us, I really wanted them.
The timer on my phone went off. We checked together…two lines.
I was pregnant.
Tears of joy broke through as I soaked in the good news.
“Let’s take this out of the bathroom,” Jack said, taking my hand.
“You should have told me. I would’ve come to the store with you.”
“I really didn’t have any idea until I was with Stan. Speaking of…” I said, suddenly remembering my gift for him. I popped up, grabbed the box, and tossed it his way, realizing midair how completely unromantic that was. “I got this for you.”
He caught it, opened it, and froze. “Is this…I mean, like a left-hand ring?”
“I was thinking, since you’re wearing my mark…”
Now it was his turn for leaky eyes.
“Take it out,” I said softly. “Look on the inside.”
He did, and his expression melted. “It looks like you.”
I helped him slide it onto his finger.
“I love you, alpha mine.”
“As I love you.”
Chapter Sixteen
Foster
I was one of the lucky omegas. I didn’t have morning sickness, and my exhaustion was minimal. Part of that was because, during the first trimester, I spent my nights in wolf form with my mate. It started with a “date night,” which we now called his pumpkin nights. I woke up feeling refreshed, and it became a habit. Sleeping in my fur seemed to stave off the exhaustion, and my mate enjoyed having my warmth on the bed, so it worked.
But as the pregnancy chugged along, I found it did change what I could and couldn’t accomplish, mostly at work. I was king of the grill at the diner. I mastered my job pretty quickly and loved it.
