Avenging Angel (The Fallen #4)(77)

“I mean you could be pregnant right now.” Angels could get pregnant, just like any other fertile being. Since his mother had been an angel, Brandt had certainly been proof of that.

It didn’t happen often, so maybe they’d have luck on their side, but it could happen. “I’ll get condoms,” he said. “We’ll be safe from now on.” He wouldn’t make this mistake again.

She simply stared back at him. Uh, yeah, why wasn’t she freaking out on him? He’d just told her she could have a shifter hybrid in her belly right then. And she was just . . . staring at him.

“A child?” She bit her lower lip and tilted her head to the right. “I’ve never thought about having someone of my own like that.”

Well, it wasn’t like the hypothetical kid would just be hers. He’d never walk away from his child. “I wouldn’t be like my father.” His voice came out rough, gravelly. Tanner cleared his throat and tried again. “I promise, if something . . . if we have . . .” Could he screw this up more? Probably not. He exhaled. “I would never hurt him.” She had to believe that. He would never hurt any child he had.

Voice soft, she said, “I never thought you would.”

What?

“You’ve never hurt me. Why would you hurt your baby?”

Because he was the product of one screwed-up family tree. Because he was violent inside. Dangerous. “I wouldn’t.” He’d sooner cut off his own hands than ever lay one on a child. No matter what else happened in this world, he’d never hurt an innocent.

He could still hear his own cries in his nightmares. It had taken the child he’d been a while to learn that the tears only made his father hit more. Hit harder.

He took another deep breath and just pulled in more of her scent. Marna would never hurt a kid. She’d love the child. Protect him. Always keep him safe.

What the hell? Was he starting to picture her carrying his kid now? “It might not happen.” He rolled away from her. Headed to the desk of drawers near the wall and found an extra pair of jeans inside. Kali, that doctor with the dark brown eyes and sad smile, had told him that she kept extra clothes upstairs for her patients.

He’d count himself as a patient then.

He glanced back at Marna. “I’ll be careful from here on out.” Shouldn’t she be yelling at him? Telling him how he’d messed things up for her? It wasn’t like she could actually want to be saddled with his kid.

Hybrids weren’t exactly the easiest of the supernaturals to raise. They both knew how the last shifter and angel mix had turned out. Brandt had been more devil than savior. “You can yell if you want,” he offered cautiously.

Her brows rose. “Why?”

Because I f*cked up. Because I didn’t take good enough care of you. “Because I put you at risk! I could have gotten you pregnant.”

She shrugged. Shrugged.

She might just make him lose his mind.

Then she said, “I think I’d like to have a baby.” Her words almost broke him.

Careful now, he asked, “A baby . . . or my baby?” Because if any other dumbass came around her . . .

She might want a child with another angel. A pureblood. And Bastion had sure been sniffing around her.

Bastion could screw off.

Tanner took a nice, long count to five. The red faded from his vision. He could actually stay sane. He could. “I didn’t mean—”

“Yours.”

The panther roared inside, pride filling him. Tanner advanced toward her. “Marna, I—”

Footsteps raced up the stairs. Heavy. Hard. Tanner’s head whipped up and around to the door just as a fist pounded on the wood. “Kali needs you downstairs, shifter!” Riley yelled. “Now!”

Marna jumped from the bed. Her back was to Tanner, and he glimpsed her wounds. He frowned a moment. The red scars looked like they’d risen higher, and when he’d touched them before, the ridges had actually felt more solid, too. He hadn’t really thought much about it then because he’d been too lost in the best orgasm of his life, but—

They look different. They felt different.

“Your brother’s dying!” Riley shouted.

He forgot about her scars and leapt for the door.





CHAPTER SIXTEEN

Marna raced behind Tanner as he hurried down the stairs. When he’d yanked open the bedroom door, she’d immediately conjured her clothes. Being naked in front of Riley wasn’t an option she was in the mood to consider.

She only wanted to be naked with Tanner. For Tanner.

He leapt over the last few stairs and darted toward the back room. Marna wasn’t sure what she expected—maybe a makeshift operating room like Cody had once had at his place in the swamp—but inside the tiny room, she only saw a bed. A wall of surgical instruments. And a line of refrigerators that hummed.

She took a breath and caught the heavy scent of blood.

“Usually vamps are the only ones who come to see Kali.” Riley was at her side. “We figured out fast that we needed one of our own to help us when things got desperate.”

The small woman with the dark eyes and fragile beauty—she was a vamp? The lady’s hands were currently covered in blood because she had her fingers shoved over Cody’s bleeding wounds.

“The sutures didn’t hold. The bleeding’s too intense!” The woman—Kali—glanced up, and Marna clearly saw the fear on her face.