18. Blake
Blake
By the time Maceo returns from Ember House, I’m halfway through the board’s response to our procedural motion.
He settles across from me with Victor’s supplemental filing open beside his laptop, marking the sections the review panel has temporarily removed from consideration while I add notes to the margin of my copy.
Quentin calls before either of us finishes.
My cane rests against the desk within reach, and the crackers Grayson packed into my bag remain unopened beside it because the thought of eating them has been turning my stomach since I arrived.
“Your cardiac results are stable,” Quentin says once I answer, and the tension in my shoulders loosens before he continues. “There are changes in the rest of the panel, but I don’t think anything is wrong. I also don’t want to speak before I know what I’m looking at.”
My pen stops above the page. Maceo glances up from his screen when the silence stretches between us.
“What changed?” I ask.
“Your hormone levels have shifted in a way that doesn’t fit your medication or recovery. It may be a pack response, and I’d like to test Luca before I tell you what I think it means.” Quentin pauses rather than rushing past the words. “Bring him in when you can. This isn’t an emergency, Blake.”
The nausea that has followed me through the last several mornings turns sharply beneath my ribs. Tenderness pulls across my chest beneath my shirt, another symptom I’d blamed on medication, stress, or the weeks my body has spent recovering from everything I demanded of it.
“You think I’m reacting to him.”
“I think it’s possible,” Quentin answers, his voice softer than it was during my last appointment. “That’s as far as I’m willing to go until I test him.”
I look across the desk at Maceo. He has closed Victor’s filing and is already reaching for his phone, though he waits for me to finish before contacting anyone.
“We’ll be there,” I tell Quentin. He reminds me to bring my medication list, then ends the call without trying to fill the uncertainty with explanations he can’t support yet.
Maceo rises and moves around the desk while I place my pen across the board response. His hand settles against my shoulder before he reaches for the cane and passes it to me. “Your heart is stable. That’s good,” he says, keeping his voice low while I push myself upright.
“That’s the part I understood.” I take the cane from him and wait for the room to settle after standing. “He wants to test Luca before he explains the hormone changes.”
Maceo’s attention sharpens, but he doesn’t name the possibility hanging between us. “I’ll call Grayson. Luther can meet us there if he’s able to leave the security review.”
I nod and reach for the crackers. The smell turns my stomach before I open the package, so Maceo takes them from me and slips them back into my bag without comment.
We find Luca at Ember House with Grayson in the expansion office. They’re standing over a table covered in revised intake schedules and resident-governance notes when we enter. Luca looks up from the page beneath his hand, and something in his expression changes before I say anything.
Maceo closes the door behind us while Grayson moves around the table and rests one hand against my lower back.
“Quentin called,” I tell them. “My cardiac results are stable, but the rest of my bloodwork has changed. He thinks my body may be responding to something inside the pack, and he wants to test Luca before he says more.”
Luca’s hand moves toward his stomach and stops there. The gesture is small enough that he might not notice it, but all three of us do.
Grayson’s fingers tighten against my back before he reaches for Luca with his free hand. Luca lets Grayson pull him close, though his eyes stay on me.
“The nausea?” he asks.
“And a few other things.” I move closer and rest my hand over the one he still has against his stomach. “Quentin said it isn’t an emergency.”
Luca turns his palm beneath mine and links our fingers. His scent has been different for weeks, softer around the edges and heavier in the nest, but too much has been changing around us for any one explanation to stand out.
Maceo contacts Luther while Grayson gathers Luca’s bag and the medication list we’ve kept updated since my collapse.
Less than an hour later, all five of us are crowded into Quentin’s largest examination room.
Luther arrived before us and now stands behind Luca with one arm resting around his middle while Quentin reviews the intake questions. Grayson sits close enough that his knee touches Luca’s, and Maceo has pulled a chair beside mine rather than remaining near the door.
Quentin draws Luca’s blood first. He labels the tubes, checks the information twice, and feeds one into the rapid analyzer while the rest are prepared for the full laboratory panel.
Luca watches the machine instead of the needle mark inside his elbow. His hand remains wrapped around mine, and his thumb moves slowly across the center of my palm while Quentin waits for the first result.
The analyzer chimes several minutes later.
Quentin checks the screen, then checks it again before turning the tablet toward us. Some of the clinical distance leaves his face when he looks at Luca.
“You’re pregnant,” he says. “Approximately eight weeks based on the hormone levels and developmental markers.”
Luca’s breath catches beneath Luther’s hand.
For several seconds, no one moves. Grayson reaches first, covering Luca’s free hand with his own before leaning in to kiss his temple. Luther’s hand spreads over Luca’s chest while he presses his mouth into Luca’s hair, Luca staring at the result on Quentin’s screen.
My own body answers before my mind catches up. The nausea rises beneath my ribs, but the feeling is familiar now that I know what it belongs to.
Luca looks toward me. His eyes are wet, though his mouth begins to curve when I bring our linked hands to my chest.
“You knew,” he whispers.
“I suspected after Quentin called.” I lower my forehead against his. “I wasn’t willing to say it before he tested you.”
Maceo remains beside my chair with one hand braced against the back of it. His gaze stays fixed on Luca and the tablet, stunned but careful, as though any sudden movement might disturb the moment.
Quentin gives us time before he returns to the chart. “Blake’s hormone changes are consistent with the same Delta response we saw during Luca’s earlier pregnancies. His cardiac results remain stable, and I don’t need to alter his medication today.”
I keep Luca’s hand against my chest while Quentin explains that the nausea and tenderness may continue. My body has followed Luca’s pregnancy before. Knowing the cause makes the symptoms easier to separate from the warning signs Quentin still wants me monitoring.
Luca looks from the results to Quentin. “How much time does that give me?”
“I can’t give you an exact delivery date yet,” Quentin says. “Your previous pregnancies were different between the twins and Rosalie.”
Luca’s fingers tighten around mine. “Rosalie was about four.”
“A little over,” Quentin confirms. “The twins developed faster early and then slowed. This pregnancy may resemble either of them, or neither. I’ll have a better range after the follow-up scans.”
“So the baby could come in another month,” Luca says.
“It’s possible,” Quentin answers. “Or you could have closer to five. Right now, the development looks normal, and that’s the only timeline I’m willing to promise.”
Luther lifts his head. “Can you identify the biological father?”
“I can run a preliminary fetal-marker comparison today if everyone wants it.” Quentin places the tablet on the counter instead of pretending the result will be immediate or absolute.
“Fetal cells are already circulating in Luca’s blood.
I can compare the blood-group markers and a limited inherited profile against samples from all biological mates. ”
“All of us,” Grayson says, his thumb still moving over Luca’s knuckles.
“All of you,” Quentin confirms. “I’m not ruling anyone out based on what I know, or don’t know, about your private lives. The rapid panel should take twenty to thirty minutes after I have every sample. The full laboratory comparison will take about a week.”
Luca looks around the room, his hand still locked with mine while Luther’s arm remains around his waist. “Do it.”
Quentin draws blood from Luther, Grayson, Maceo, and me. He labels every tube in front of us, loads the rapid panel, and leaves after reminding us that the preliminary result may need confirmation.
The room grows quieter once the door closes.
Luca remains on the examination table with Luther behind him, one of Luther’s hands resting low over his stomach while Grayson sits close enough that their shoulders touch.
Maceo takes the chair beside mine, though tension keeps his hands clasped between his knees.
Another wave of nausea moves through me. Luca notices before I can breathe past it and reaches across the space between us, taking my hand from the handle of my cane.
“Is it worse?” he asks, turning my palm upward over his knee.
“It’s passing.” I lean back and let him rub his thumb through the center of my hand. “It feels familiar now that I know what it is.”
Luca lifts my knuckles to his mouth and keeps them there while the tightness beneath my ribs eases. His other hand remains low against his stomach beneath Luther’s palm.
“You had enough reasons not to recognize it,” he says. “Your medication changed. You’ve been recovering, and I didn’t know what my own body was doing.”
“I should’ve mentioned the nausea.”
“You did.” Grayson’s fingers move slowly over Luca’s thigh while he looks toward me. “You just didn’t turn it into a crisis.”
Maceo shifts closer until his knee touches mine. He watches Luca for a moment before lowering his attention to the small bandage inside his own elbow.
“I don’t know what I’m supposed to hope for,” he admits.