Dr. Morales crossed a leg over the other. “I know who you two are.” A quick smile appeared. “I’m pretty sure everyone here knows who you two are.”
“Okay.” Josie looked relieved. “I don’t think I’m very far along or anything, but we really don’t know what we’re supposed to do other than get an appointment with an OBGYN.”
“There aren’t any OBGYNs here,” Dr. Morales said.
“We expected that,” I intervened, still moving my hand along Josie’s back. “Not like a lot of students here are having babies, but we figured it would be a good idea to get checked out and find out what our options are.”
“Okay.” Dr. Morales rose, reaching for the stethoscope around her neck. “What I can do is do a general exam and make sure that all the vitals for you are normal, and then we’ll go from there, all right?”
Biting down on her lip, Josie nodded, and then it was time for me to step back and give them some space. Dr. Morales got down to work, listening to Josie’s heart and then her lungs. Josie even got her ears checked, as well as about every orifice except for the interesting ones. Then Dr. Morales moved onto questions. Personal ones. Ones that made Josie flush even deeper.
Was this her first pregnancy?
Was she positive she was pregnant?
When did she think she got pregnant?
That was when I jumped in. “It’s been about five to six weeks.”
“You can sit up now,” Dr. Morales said after palpating Josie’s stomach. I had no idea what that did. “All of your vitals are perfect, and this is definitely an early pregnancy. Usually at this stage in a pregnancy, it’s a wait and see period.”
“What does that mean?” Josie straightened her shirt as I returned to her side and got back to the rub-down.
Dr. Morales sat back on the stool. “What do you two know about pregnancy among our…among our kind?”
I lifted my brows. “Well…”
Josie shrugged as she started gently swinging her feet. “Is it not like a…a mortal’s pregnancy?”
The doctor smiled then. “In terms of pregnancy length? It’s nine months. Some don’t make it to full term, just like with mortals, and have the baby a little early. That does appear to be more common with our kind, especially the pure-bloods, and I imagine that will be the same for you two based on the amount of aether you both have.”
“Wait.” Concern rippled through me. I didn’t know a lot about babies, but I knew delivering early could be bad, real bad. “How early?”
“Nothing too serious. Definitely in the third trimester, usually around eight months, but…” She exhaled hard. “Pregnancy between two pures is notoriously hard to carry out of the first trimester, and with half-bloods, it’s even harder.”
I stiffened, but I didn’t let my hand still. “I didn’t know that.”
“I didn’t think so. I know that pregnancy is not something that is often discussed among…” She trailed off, but I knew what she meant. Since I was a half-blood while I was Apollyon, pregnancy was forbidden. “No one really knows why. Some truly believe it’s just Fate and nothing medical.”
My upper lip curled. Fate. Gods.
“Is there something I can do to make sure I don’t lose the pregnancy?” Josie asked.
“We’ve had women go on bed rest from the moment they found out they were pregnant and it hasn’t made a difference. It’s something that will either hold.” Dr. Morales looked at me. “Or it won’t.”
That sounded like utter bullshit to me.
Josie glanced up at me, her eyes wide.
Dr. Morales focused on Josie. “Right now, you still have several weeks to go before you make it to the second trimester. I can tell you that typically women in their third trimester are more symptomatic.”
“What does that mean?” I curled my hand around the nape of Josie’s neck, smoothing my thumb along her pulse.
“More fatigued. Nausea and vomiting usually affect our mothers in the third trimester and not the first, like with mortal pregnancies. Backaches and other things like that, but you two…you two may be entirely different.”
Josie inclined her head. “In what ways?”
“As far as I know, and granted, it’s been a long time since I took Myths and Legends, but I do not recall there ever being a child of a demigod and a god.”
Shit.
Both of us had been so sure that there had to be another case like ours. If there wasn’t, that meant…
Josie’s feet stopped swinging. “So, you’re saying that we’re the first?”
“First documented case that I know of.” Curiosity filled Dr. Morales’s gaze. “Anything is possible with the pregnancy.”
Chapter 9
Josie
The best OBGYN.
That was what Seth had ordered when Dr. Morales said she was going to make some phones calls to find us an OBGYN. Dr. Morales assured us that would be the case, but at that point, I would have just been happy with any doctor who specialized in the whole birthing babies thing.
Seth and I were the first ever god and demigod to get together and have a child? That was… Wow, that seemed insane to me. Which meant that everything Dr. Morales said, about having difficulty carrying a baby to having more symptoms in the third trimester, could mean nothing.
Like the nurse before her, the one who administered the pregnancy test, Dr. Morales took a blood test just to confirm the necessary hormones were still present.
I didn’t need the blood test to confirm what I already knew. I was still pregnant. Call it instinct or a soon to be mother’s intuition, but I knew.
Seth and I didn’t get the chance to really discuss anything the doctor had spoken to us about, since we went to the cafeteria to grab some bacon and ended up running into Alex and Aiden. They were on their way to see Marcus and that’s where the four of us ended up, in Marcus’s office.
Alexander, Alex’s father, was there, a silent sentry who smiled in such a way that the moment he saw his daughter the skin around his eyes crinkled.
A pang lit up my chest as I watched Alex break away from Aiden, and go right up to her father and hug him. It wasn’t the burning feel of jealousy or envy. But I did envy that, their relationship. I wanted that with my father. Heck, I would have liked to see my father. So, mostly, I just felt…sad.
I looked away as I walked to my chair, catching Seth’s gaze. There was a soft look in his eyes, one that made me wonder if he knew what I was thinking.
His fingers brushed along my arm as I stepped around him. The touch was oddly soothing as I sat in one of the large, wingback chairs across from Marcus.
“Thank you,” Marcus said, sitting down behind his huge, mahogany desk as he eyed Seth. “For not just appearing in my office, but instead walking through my door.”
Aiden smirked from where he stood next to the other empty chair.
“I figured I need the exercise today.” Seth folded his arms across his chest. “But I’ll make sure to pop in when you least expect it later on.”
Marcus shot him a droll look before looking over at Alex. She sat in the chair beside me. “I’m assuming you all are here to discuss what happened yesterday?”
So much had happened yesterday that I wasn’t exactly sure which part they were starting with.
Alex spoke up, taking the lead as usual. “So, we think we have some information on the half-blood that was killed.”
Sitting back, Marcus dropped one leg over the other. “Right now, I would love nothing more than to have the name of the perpetrator.”
“That we don’t have,” Aiden chimed in.
“And what would you do if you had a name?” Seth asked.
Marcus’s gaze slid to where Seth stood beside me. “What I would need to do is turn the person over to the authorities, but that is not what I would want to do.”
Seth inclined his head. “Understood.”
“Okay,” I blew out a long breath. “Now that that’s out of the way… The mask yesterday had Ares’s symbol on it.”
Marcus’s jaw hardened. “It did.”