He looked away. "At the time, I did believe the ceremony had locked us together for life and prevented either of us from taking other partners. I discovered her lie the hard way."
Oh dear... "You found her with another wolf?"
He nodded. "And she was pregnant to him."
"Shit." No wonder he hated the werewolf lifestyle so much.
He nodded. "Hence my suspicion that Eryn might have had something to do with your reluctance to get involved with me again."
"Well, she doesn't. But like her, I want a kid, whether now or later. And that makes getting involved with someone who can never offer me that a difficult choice."
Especially when they didn't like being one of many.
A smile briefly lifted the grim set of his lips. "And here I was thinking you were playing games, making me pay for walking away."
"I won't deny that was there as well."
He nodded again. "So, what do you intend to do?"
"I honestly don't know."
"And Misha?"
"I was always intending to fuck Misha. I need the answers he can give me."
"So you plan to become a whore for the Directorate?"
I ripped my fingers from his and stood. "Damn you to hell." I crossed my arms and stomped down the steps. "That's such a human way of viewing the situation. Besides, it's not that simple."
"It is that simple. Rhoan willingly sleeps with enemies to gather news. Isn't that what you'd be doing with Misha?"
"It's just sex." I blew out a frustrated breath. Quinn's views were never likely to change, no matter what I said. "And we don't know that Misha is an enemy yet."
"We don't know that he's a friend, either."
"True. But he may be the only fertile wolf I currently know."
"Then you believe he was telling the truth about that?"
"It would be easy enough to check." I walked to the black metal fence that stopped visitors getting too close to the edge of the mountain. The wind was fiercer away from the cross, chilling my wet legs and feet.
"Sounds to me like your decision has been made."
I closed my eyes. "It might have been, except for the fact that it was ARC 1-23 that kick-started my fertility."
"Meaning?" Though he was still sitting on the steps, his soft words cut through the rush of the wind as clearly as if he was standing beside me.
"Meaning, ARC1-23 can have deadly side effects on us half-breeds. They won't know for at least another few months what, if any, effect it will have on me."
And if they couldn't predict what effects the ARC1-23 would have on me just yet, then how could they predict what effect it might have on any child I conceived? If the drug could totally mutate my system, then what the hell could it do to a child growing in my womb?
That was the problem. That was the choice I faced.
Did I have the right to endanger my child in such a manner? Did I have the right to bring a life into this world who might not even live to see their first birthday?
Deep in my heart, I knew the answer was no.
But that would mean blowing the only chance I had of having a child myself. Oh, there were other options - freezing eggs, finding a surrogate, but it just wasn't the same. Wasn't what I'd dreamed of all these years.