Chapter 120

Kayla

I hesitated, unsure of what to say, what to think, or even what to feel.

The baby—Nicholas’s son, or at least the child everyone believed was his—lay cradled in Anna’s arms, his tiny face scrunched up in blissful sleep. He was so small, so fragile, his little chest rising and falling like a hummingbird’s wings.

I had never held a baby before. Not once. In fact, the very thought of it sent a jolt of panic through me.

What if I dropped him? What if I held him wrong? What if he started crying, and I couldn’t soothe him? What if—

“Kayla?” Anna’s voice broke through my spiraling thoughts, cocking her head to the side. She shifted the baby slightly toward me. “Are you alright?”

My gaze flicked to Nicholas, who was standing at the other end of the room, engaged in a conversation with someone else. He didn’t notice me staring, looking at him as if he could tell me what to do.

Finally, if only to not look like a total freak over something so mundane as holding a baby, I nodded and said with a terse smile, “Okay. Sure. I’d love to hold him.”

Anna smiled—a small, genuine smile that caught me off guard—and carefully shifted the baby into my arms. My breath hitched as his weight settled against me, warm and solid despite his tiny size.

I cradled him awkwardly at first, my arms stiff and unsure, but then he stirred, his tiny face scrunching up before he let out a soft sigh and nestled closer to me.

And just like that, something inside of me shifted.

A surge of warmth washed over me, so sudden and intense that it nearly knocked the breath out of my lungs. And then, to make matters worse, his tiny fingers curled around my thumb, his grip surprisingly strong, and I felt a lump rise in my throat.

He was so small, so perfect, his skin soft and warm against mine. And for a moment, the world seemed to narrow to just the two of us, the noise of the party fading into the background.

I had never considered myself to be ‘mother material.’ The thought had always been a distant, abstract thing, something that other women always dreamed about but never me. In fact, I’d spent many nights telling myself that I didn’t want kids, that I would never have them.

Without a wolf, I had always felt it would be better not to pass on my genes. If it was a genetic mutation that was causing me to be wolfless, I wouldn’t want my child to suffer like I had. I wouldn’t want them to feel the sting of rejection, the struggle of being different, other, the constant need to prove themselves in a world that saw them as less than worthy.

But holding this baby now, feeling the warmth of his tiny body against mine, something inside of me stirred. I couldn’t put a name to it exactly, but whatever it was, it was deep and primal and ancient.

Longing, I realized.

It was a longing I hadn’t noticed was there, buried deep beneath the layers of doubt and fear that had settled in my stomach since I was a little girl. And for a moment, just a brief and fragile moment, I let myself imagine it.

A life with Nicholas. A family. A child of our own, with his amber eyes and my stubborn streak. Wild auburn hair, freckles, and a stern gaze.

A home filled with laughter and love, where I could be the kind of mother I had always wished I could be.

The image was so vivid, so achingly real, that it took all of my effort not to drown in it.

But then reality came crashing back in, just like it always did, like a cold bucket of water being dumped over my head. The baby opened his blue eyes, stared at me in confusion, and then… his face scrunched up and began to cry as he realized that I was not his mother.

This wasn’t my child. This wasn’t my life. And no matter how much I might want it, I couldn’t let myself forget the truth. I couldn’t let myself get lost in fantasies that might never come to pass.

I quickly brushed off the moment as pure hormones, my cheeks flushing with embarrassment at how easily I had been swept away. With a watery smile, I carefully handed the baby back to Anna, my arms feeling strangely empty without him.

“He’s beautiful,” I said softly, my voice trembling despite my best efforts to keep it steady. “You’re very lucky.”

Anna’s eyes softened, and for a moment, I thought she might say something—something real, not something guarded and carefully curated. But then she just nodded, her smile returning as she cradled her son close. “Thank you, Kayla. That means a lot.”

I forced myself to smile back, although my chest felt tight, like a vice was squeezing the air from my lungs. I turned away, my gaze instinctively seeking out Nicholas.

He was still standing at the other end of the room, only now he was looking at me. And his expression was unreadable as he watched me. There was something in his eyes—something intense, something that made my heart skip a beat—but I couldn’t quite put a finger on it.

Later, after the party had ended and the decorations taken down and we had returned home, we all gathered in the study. I paced the room, wringing my hands nervously. Nicholas was standing resolutely beside his desk, his arms folded. Jade and Emma were perched together on the armchair, and Noah was sitting on the sofa, his head in his hands.

Noah had returned from his mission into Gray’s office with a flash drive, and now Marcus was sitting at Nicholas’s desk, his fingers flying across the computer keyboard as he worked to decode the encrypted files.

He’d been silent for some time, but was clearly straining to work it all out, if the press of his lips and the way his hair was a disaster from running a nervous hand through it so many times was any indication.

“Got it,” he finally said, clicking one final button and leaning back. We all scurried over, crowding around the computer. He clicked on the first email, and we all leaned in closer, our eyes scanning the screen in tense silence.

Emails. So many emails.

But not just any emails.

The emails were between Gray and the director of the hospital. They discussed the purchase of the silverbite drug—the same drug that had been used to put Noah in a coma—as well as faking the paternity tests with Anna.

All to keep Nicholas from joining the guild.

My stomach churned as I read on and on, the pieces of the puzzle slowly falling into place.

But that wasn’t all.

Gray mentioned Grace and her mother in the emails, their names jumping out at me like a punch to the gut. And then, at the very end of the last email, was a single line that sent a chill down my spine:

“It is imperative that I find this relic before anyone else. Absolutely imperative.”