Alpha's Solace (Black Moon Saga Book 1)

Cast in the Past

Kylie sits sideways on the exam table with her legs dangling, patiently allowing the doctor and nurse attending to her to take her vitals and examine her. Dr. Kosh is out-of-town today, so she is seeing another doctor who works at the clinic. He introduces himself as Dr. Williams and says he has only been working here for a couple years. Adam is unfamiliar with him and seems to be a bit on edge about him handling Kylie directly. To his credit, Dr. Williams senses this and is being careful about letting the nurse take the lead when he can. He is pretty used to dealing with how male werewolves are about their mates. Finally, the doctor and his nurse step out of the room, advising that it will be a small wait while he confers with the radiologist about the x-rays she had taken earlier that afternoon.

Once they are gone, Kylie turns to Adam with a smirk. “That’s some Alpha-level possessiveness,” she teases him.

At this point he is pacing the length of the room because he can’t bring himself to sit in the chair provided for him. She can tell something is on his mind, but she can’t make sense of how restless he seems. It’s not like the doctor telling them her arm isn’t quite healed yet is that terrible of an outcome. If not for Anya’s intervention it would have taken a few weeks anyway, so she is more than happy to wait only a few more days.

What she doesn’t know is that Adam is far more pre-occupied with the other matter he came here to talk to a doctor about. He trusts Dr. Kosh to be careful when attending to a sensitive matter such as a surprise pregnancy, but he doesn’t know if he can trust this new doctor. On the one hand, he wants to know today if he has anything to worry about, but on the other, he would much rather deal with the same doctor who has been seeing Kylie since she was a child and not this fresh-faced boy who probably doesn’t even have children of his own. Beyond that, the idea of him examining Kylie in the way he knows will be necessary if she is pregnant has him agitated just thinking about it. He doesn’t remember feeling this way when Melissa was pregnant and it’s throwing him off.

He turns to look at her grinning face and can’t help but smile, remembering that he made the same comment about her just a short while ago. “Can you blame me? Look at you. I’m sure he’d love to steal you away from me, but that’s not happening on my watch. You’re all mine.”

“Oh, stop. I wouldn’t even want him, not when I’ve got this,” she reassures him as she reaches for his hand. “Sit, Boo Bear. You’re making me nervous.”

“Boo Bear?” He laughs and shakes his head. “No, I’m not a bear. You’re not calling me that.”

She rolls her eyes and argues, “Boo Wolf just doesn’t have the same ring to it. Besides, we had this discussion already.”

“It’s not happening,” he insists as he stops pacing and looks directly at her with his best stern expression. “Think of something else to call me.”

“Oh, fine. But only if you sit down and stop pacing like a crazy person.”

“I see what you did there.” He chuckles as he realizes he was set up and fell right into her trap. Then he sits as she demanded and tries not to jiggle his legs too much from the anxiety he is feeling. Instead, he scoots his chair close enough that he can take her hand again. Just that small amount of contact with her soothes him enough that he manages to keep it together until Dr. Williams returns.

“Sorry about that wait, guys,” the doctor apologizes as he breezes into the room, smiling broadly and holding a digital pad. He grabs his rolling stool from the corner and brings it near where Adam is sitting and sits himself down. “Okay, Miss Kylie. We’ve got some good news for you today.”

“Cast is coming off?” She guesses, trying but failing to temper her hopeful excitement.

“You got it! Cast is coming off.” Dr. Williams holds the pad out for her to take. “Did you want to look at the images we took today? The break is healed, but we do need to talk about that wrist,” he warns her.

She takes the pad from him, flipping through the images as the excited grin fades into a grimace. “Yeah, I know. Cartilage is deteriorating and some of the carpal bones are grinding together pretty severely. Range of motion is declining. Soon it might be time to consider surgery to fuse the bones together to prevent further damage.” Adam gives her hand a squeeze to communicate his support, trying to keep his true reaction from making it to his facial expression.

Dr. Williams raises an eyebrow, impressed by her awareness of her situation. “I take it you’ve had this talk before, then?”

She sighs, letting her shoulders fall some as she hands the pad back to him. “Yeah, about six months ago. I’m sure it’s a little worse now, but I’m still not ready for an invasive medical intervention that could potentially make it so I can’t type anymore. I need to be able to type for my job.”

The doctor nods and smiles softly. “Yeah, I get that. And it’s entirely up to you. I do just want to say one thing, and then consider me officially butting out of your decision-making process unless you have any questions you want to ask.”

She turns her head slightly to the side, curious what he feels he needs to say. “Okay, what’s the one thing?”

The doctor ensures that he has her full attention by making eye contact with her. He purses his lips together as he considers exactly how he wants to phrase it, then continues. “The longer you wait, the more you suffer, and eventually your condition might make it so you can’t type or do the things you want to do anyway. Plus, there’s no guarantee that you wouldn’t be able to after surgery, it’s just a possibility.” He makes a conscious effort to transform his serious expression into an encouraging smile. “But that’s about all I have say about it for now. I trust that you’ve heard it all before and as a smart, capable woman, you are well-equipped to make good decisions for yourself.”

She flashes him a genuine smile, relieved that he is not the sort of doctor who feels the need to lecture and be endlessly patronizing. “Thank you, Doctor. I really appreciate that. I’m here to get my cast off, not dredge up old news.”

Dr. Williams chuckles, then nods. “Fair enough. Let’s get that going for you, then.”

It takes just a few minutes for the doctor to remove the cast, then he calls in his nurse to attend to the rest of the process. She needs to wash Kylie’s arm and assess how it is moving and functioning now that the cast is off. While the nurse has Kylie preoccupied, Adam steps out of the room to talk to Dr. Williams privately.

He catches him only a few paces from the door and calls out to him. “Doctor, there’s something else I need to discuss with you.” He waits for the doctor to turn back around to face him before continuing. “I haven’t had the heart to tell Kylie about it yet, either. She has a lot going on and I don’t want her worrying about this if it isn’t even a real concern.”

The doctor looks intrigued. “Alright, what is it?”

Adam sighs, staring at a loose piece of crumpled paper poking out of the trash bin a short distance down the hall from them which has become particularly interesting to him in this moment. Then he begins to explain, “Earlier we told you about the witch who healed Kylie’s arm and discovered that she is a werewolf but is cursed to not appear as one. The same witch told me that she thinks Kylie is pregnant.

The thing is, up until that moment everyone thought Kylie was a human, including me, so when we first started being intimate I told her that we didn’t need to use condoms or anything because I couldn’t get her pregnant. So, I guess what I am wondering is if you think it is even possible, considering that whatever curse or spells are affecting her are suppressing her wolf traits. Plus, in the state she is in, I don’t even know how dangerous it would be for her to be pregnant.”

The doctor has been listening intently and nodding where appropriate, and now he is quiet a moment as he thinks. Finally, he responds, “I am not well-versed in magic, but what I can tell you is that being or not being a werewolf is something that happens on the genetic level. Being or not being compatible to mate also happens on a genetic basis. It makes sense to me that Kylie could appear human, and lack the expression of her wolf traits, but they are likely still written in her genetic code. That being said, yes, I do believe it to be possible for you to impregnate her. How long ago were you intimate?”

Adam swallows forcefully, reality finally breaking through his denial. “The first time was about a week ago, give or take,” he answers.

“I see. That’s not long enough for a pregnancy test to be very reliable at this point. I’d say wait another week or so before testing.” Dr. Williams pauses for a moment, reflecting on Adam’s choice of words, then adds, “I would also say that considering you’re an Alpha wolf and she’s your true mate, if I understand correctly, there’s a good chance that if you didn’t get her pregnant the first time then you’ve gotten it done since, assuming you still haven’t been using protection.”

“Yeah, we haven’t,” Adam admits as he mentally kicks himself. The part of him that trusts Anya implicitly figured that since she was already pregnant, there was no harm in continuing to not use protection thereafter. The part of him that wants to be in denial realizes the logic fail of claiming it could be untrue and then not taking any preventative measures to avoid it happening eventually.

Dr. Williams notices Adam's agitation and gently puts his hand on his shoulder to convey his support. “Well, in about a week I’d advise getting her in here, sooner rather than later. Don’t put it off just because it’s a tough discussion to have with her. She needs to know.” Adam nods, but seems to be lost in his own thoughts for a moment. The doctor gives a gentle squeeze of his shoulder, then drops his hand back to his side.

Then he recalls the second part of Adam’s query. “Oh, and to address your earlier concern, yes, she would have what we call a ‘high risk’ pregnancy. We will need to monitor her very carefully if you intend to go through with it, and at a certain point maybe even put her on bed rest or admit her for inpatient care. Her body deals with a lot, every day, and that’s without a baby on board. If I’m being completely honest, I’m not confident that it wouldn’t eventually reject a pregnancy, so you need to prepare yourself for all possible outcomes. And I say again, she needs to know. Tell her soon.”

Adam blows out a breath, letting all of what the doctor said fully sink in. “Yeah. Okay. Thanks, doc.” He pats the doctor on his bicep and turns to make his way back to the exam room. This kid isn't so bad, I guess, he thinks to himself.

When he re-enters the room, Kylie is alone and has gotten down from the table and is working on placing her now cast-free arm into her crutch. She looks up at him and grins. “Hey, babe. Check this out!” She demonstrates how walking with her crutch is much smoother now that her cast is off.

He smiles, glad to see that her awkward gait is much improved. “Looks so much more comfortable. How does it feel?”

“So much better. And my arm doesn’t even hurt where it was broken. The nurse said there’s not really any apparent atrophy of the muscles or anything. Thanks, Anya.”

“Yeah, we’ll have to be sure to call and thank her properly. Are you all ready to go now?” He offers her his arm to hold with her free hand when she joins him near the doorway.

She accepts the arm he is offering her. “Yep, good to go,” she confirms. She lets him lead her down the hallway and out the front door of the clinic, then pauses for a moment to appreciate the glow and warmth of the sunshine that greets them as they step outside.

Once they are in the car and buckled, she glances at the time and realizes it is late in the afternoon, approaching evening. “My parents should be home now. Did you want to go see them?”

“Sounds good,” he agrees. “I’m betting we have a lot of catching up to do.”