Pain and anger flashed across Vanya’s features for an instant, but she recovered quickly, and the smugness returned to her expression. “Seek me out again when you’realone.”
Dropping her hand, she turned and sauntered away, her tail lazily swaying behind her. Drakkal didn’t remove his eyes from her until she was gone, but Vanya being out of sight offered him no comfort. Her scent, woefully familiar, lingered in the air—and on his cheek. Once, he’d longed to have that scent in his fur, had craved it, had thrilled in it. Now he wanted nothing more than to scrub it off.
He turned to Shay and froze.
Her skin was pale, too pale, and her lips were pressed into a tight line. She stood with her feet wide apart, posture stiff. The angry fire that had burned in her eyes moments before had vanished, replaced by a gleam of fear. He knew immediately the change had nothing to do with Vanya.
“I fucked up, didn’t I?” she asked in a shaky voice.
Drakkal’s brow furrowed, and his heart quickened. “What’s wrong,kiraia?”
“I…I think my water broke.”
He tilted his head and lowered his gaze. There was a dark stain beginning at the crotch of her pants and continuing down her leg, but he couldn’t detect even a hint of the distinctive scent of terran urine. “I…don’t understand.”
“The baby, Drak. The baby is coming,” she said, speaking quicker and quicker with every word, her voice rising as tears filled her eyes. “It’s too soon. She’s not supposed to come yet! Oh, God, I fucked up.”
For a second, perhaps two, Drakkal couldn’t process what she’d said. Itwastoo soon. Wasn’t it? And how could the cubpossibly comenow, after what had just happened? But even if his logical mind was slow to catch up to the situation, his instincts roared up from his subconscious.
He scooped her off her feet, cradled her in his arms, and ran back toward the hovercar. “You’re all right. You’re both all right. We’re going back now.”
She wrapped her arm around his neck and sniffled as the tears ran down her cheeks. “I messed up like I always do. I-I shouldn’t have tried to attack that woman. I did this.”
“Quiet, female.” He maneuvered through the surrounding foot traffic, which fortunately wasn’t as thick as in many places in the Undercity—the upper portion of Arthos had nothing if not abundant pedestrian pathways.
He roared at the people in his path regardless, unwilling to risk even the slightest delay.
“It’s her time to come,” he said to Shay in as calm a voice as he could muster between those roars. “You didn’t do anything wrong.”
Shay gasped and hunched forward, body stiffening. She grasped a fistful of his mane, pulling his fur, as she clutched her belly with her other hand. Drakkal barely felt the pain. He increased his pace as much as possible without jarring her.
When they reached the hovercar, he wasted no time in opening the passenger side door and settling her on the seat. He fastened her safety harness and closed the door without allowing himself even an instant to fret over her condition—every second was precious now. Urgand had warned them that this could happen at any time, and that there was a chance she’d have little warning. The data he’d found on terran pregnancies suggested that no two were quite the same.
He vaulted across the front of the hovercar, tugged open the driver’s side door, and climbed in. The vehicle swayed under his weight. He activated the engines before he even hadthe door fully closed and ascended the moment the hovercar was ready.
Keeping his left hand on the controls, he held the right out to Shay. “I’m here. We’re going to get back, and everything will be fine.”
She grasped his hand and nodded, breathing heavily for a few moments before some of the tension left her. “Okay. Okay,” she said, still holding her free hand over her belly. “Hear that, baby girl? Everything…is going to be fine.”
As much as Drakkal disliked voice commands, this was exactly the sort of situation in which they were useful.
“Call That Horny Prick,” he said.
Shay huffed a laughed despite everything. “That’syour contact name for Arc?”
“Tell me it doesn’t fit,” he replied with a fleeting smirk.
The vehicle’s center control screen switched to a commlink array, displaying a pending connection with a commlink number. The connection was accepted almost instantly.
“Pussy Cat,” Arcanthus said smoothly. “I thought you were on a date with Shay. Were you?—”
“I will claw your fucking eyes out if you make one more cat joke,” Drakkal growled. “Cub’s coming. We’ll be there in ten. Have Urgand ready.”
“Baby’s coming right now?” There were muffled voices in the background, too low and garbled to understand. “We’ll all be ready. Drive safe.”
The call disconnected.
“Oh fuck, fuck, fuck.” Shay’s grip on Drakkal’s hand tightened again as her breaths shallowed and quickened.