Chapter 7 The Unexpected Second Line

Lila POV

The follow-up appointment was supposed to be routine. Just additional blood work for my visa application, Dr. Kim had said. Standard procedure to ensure the wolfsbane poisoning hadn't left any lingering complications.

I sat in the sterile examination room, rolling down my sleeve after the blood draw, when Dr. Kim's expression changed. The doctor was staring at her computer screen with the kind of focused intensity that made patients' hearts skip beats.

"Is everything alright?" I asked, trying to keep my voice light.

Dr. Kim turned the monitor slightly, showing a lab result that made no sense. "When was your last menstrual period?"

"I... what?" I mentally calculated, my organized mind suddenly fumbling with dates that should have been automatic. "Maybe six weeks ago? Seven? I've been stressed with the visa application, so I wasn't really tracking—"

"Lila." Dr. Kim's voice was gentle but firm. "Your HCG levels are elevated. Significantly elevated."

The words hung in the air like smoke from an explosion, visible but incomprehensible.

"That's impossible." My voice came out as a whisper. "You said the wolfsbane damage made natural conception nearly impossible."

"I said extremely difficult. Not impossible." Dr. Kim pulled up the old medical files, comparing numbers on dual screens. "Your hormone levels indicate pregnancy at approximately five weeks. Which should be impossible given your medical history, but..." She gestured at the unmistakable test results.

Five weeks. My mind raced backward, landing on a night I'd been trying not to think about. The evening after I'd discovered Marcus's affair, when I'd been drunk on wine and desperate to feel something other than betrayal. When he'd come home late and found me crying, and I'd let him comfort me in the only way I knew how.

The night I'd conceived a child I couldn't have with a man who was carrying on with someone else.

"I need to run additional tests," Dr. Kim continued. "Given your medical history, this will be considered a high-risk pregnancy from the start. The wolfsbane damage could complicate everything—development, delivery, your own health."

I nodded numbly, barely processing the medical terminology. High-risk. Complications. Development issues. The words floated around me like debris after a hurricane.

"How long do I have to decide?" The question came out automatically, though I wasn't sure why I'd asked it.

Dr. Kim's expression softened with understanding. "Given your circumstances, both medical and personal, you have time to consider all your options. But not unlimited time. With your history, waiting increases the risks exponentially."

I sat in my car in the medical center parking lot for twenty minutes, engine off, staring at the ultrasound appointment card Dr. Kim had pressed into my hands. The small white rectangle felt impossibly heavy, like it contained the weight of every choice I'd never thought I'd have to make.

A baby. Against all odds, against medical certainty, against the cosmic unfairness of my situation—I was carrying Marcus's child.

The child he'd said we weren't ready for while planning a future with another woman. The child I'd believed was impossible while he was celebrating Vera's pregnancy. The cruel joke of biology that had given me what I'd always wanted at exactly the moment when having it would destroy everything.

My phone buzzed against the passenger seat. A text from Marcus: How did the appointment go? Everything clear for the visa?

I stared at the message, my thumb hovering over the keyboard. How did I even begin to answer that question?

Fine. Just routine blood work.

Another message appeared immediately: Great. Can't wait to celebrate your European adventure properly. Love you.

The casual cruelty of it—his excitement about my leaving while his pregnant mistress waited in the wings—made my stomach clench. Or maybe that was morning sickness. I'd probably been attributing the recent nausea to stress and heartbreak when it was actually the earliest signs of the impossible.

My phone rang, interrupting my spiraling thoughts. An unknown number.

"Hello?" I answered cautiously.

"Congratulations," Vera's voice was sickeningly sweet. "I hear you'll be running away to Europe soon. How convenient."

"What do you want, Vera?"

"Nothing. I just thought you should know—Marcus and I went shopping today. For the nursery." There was a pause filled with malicious satisfaction. "He's so excited about becoming a father. His first real child, you know. Not like the pretend family games he's been playing with you."

I closed my eyes, one hand unconsciously moving to my still-flat stomach.

"He told me all about your little European escape plan," Vera continued. "How relieved he is that you're finally giving him space to build a proper life. With someone who can actually give him what he needs."

The irony was suffocating. If only Vera knew that I was carrying exactly what Marcus claimed to want—an heir, a legacy, the child he'd been planning to have with someone else.

"You know what the best part is?" Vera's voice turned vicious. "He doesn't even feel guilty anymore. Says you've grown apart, that you're not the same woman he married. Apparently, saving his life turned you into some kind of damaged goods."

Damaged goods. The phrase hit like a physical blow, especially knowing about the medical records hidden in my purse—proof that my "damage" had come from loving him too much.

"I have to go," I said quietly.

"Of course you do. Running away is what you do best, isn't it? Well, run fast, because once this baby comes, Marcus won't even remember your name."

The line went dead.

I sat in the silence of my car, one hand still pressed against my abdomen, mind reeling with impossible mathematics. I was carrying Marcus's child—the heir he desperately wanted—while he planned a future with another woman carrying his backup plan.

I was pregnant and getting divorced and moving to Paris and carrying medical proof that this pregnancy was essentially miraculous.

I was pregnant with the child of a man who called me damaged goods.

The ultrasound appointment card stared up at me from my lap, and I made a decision that felt like stepping off a cliff.

I would keep the appointment. I would see what five weeks of impossible looked like on a monitor. I would make my choices with complete information, just like I'd been doing with everything else.

And Marcus would never know that I was carrying the heir he thought only Vera could give him.

At least, not until I decided whether that heir was a gift or a weapon.

The parking lot was emptying around me as the medical center closed for the evening, but I remained seated, processing the newest piece of an increasingly complex puzzle.

I'd thought the hardest part was planning my escape. Now I realized the hardest part might be deciding what—or who—I was escaping with.