Chapter 10
A Broken Kitten Figurine, A Broken Unborn Pup Chapter 10
A Broken Kitten Figurine, A Broken Unborn Pup Chapter 10
Her voice grew smaller and smaller with each word.
She was clearly embarrassed by her own vulnerability, a direct violation of her usual tough-girl persona.
A sharp, painful ache flared in my chest. “You completely misunderstood, Zoe.”
“I bought those pastries for the entire department, not specifically for you. How could I ever give you peanuts when I know exactly how dangerous they are for you?”
She whipped her head around, her eyes wide. “You… you still remember my allergy? I thought you forgot.”
Her pure astonishment left me bewildered. Why would anyone forget something so vital?
“Of course I remember.” I said softly.
Zoe blinked, a small, fragile spark of joy lighting her features, though she fought hard to keep her lips pressed in a straight line. Slowly, she shifted her tiny body across the seat, pressing herself right against my side.
When the cab dropped us at the hospital gates, we still had a long walkway to cover.
I was moving too fast, and it wasn’t until we reached the crosswalk that I realized she was gasping for air, her little legs pumping furiously to keep pace with me.
I bent down, extending my arms. “Let me carry you, okay?”
“No,” she said, taking a swift step back as her eyes drifted fearfully toward my flat stomach. “You just came out of the hospital. You’re still hurt.”
With the traffic light about to turn green, I didn’t argue. I stepped forward and scooped her small frame into my arms. “I’m perfectly healed, Zoe. Don’t worry.”
Only then did her tiny arms wrap cautiously around my neck. “I’m kind of heavy.”
“Don’t worry, I’ve got you.”
The healer administered an immediate counter-injection, and within an hour, the agony faded from her small face.
As we sat together on a bench outside the clinic waiting room, I decided to ask the question that had been haunting me. “Zoe, why did you tell Mrs. Dawn you wanted my pup to disappear?”
She went completely silent, her head dropping as she stared intently at the tips of her little shoes.
I didn’t press her.
After a long, stretching silence, her tiny voice emerged. “Lily told me… when her mommy had a new little pup, her mommy stopped loving her completely.”
Lily was her new best friend from the kindergarten.
“And… that new thing in your belly was hurting you,” Zoe whispered, her words clumsy and childish. “It felt like it was eating you from the inside. Your belly kept getting bigger, but Mrs. Dawn said you were getting skinnier and sicker every day.”
“I hated it for making you sick.”
She kept her head buried in her chest, heavy tears splashing onto her lap.
“I wanted it to go away,” she sobbed. “But I never wanted you to get hurt. If you really, really loved it… I was going to try my hardest to love it too.”
“That day on the stairs… I really didn’t mean to shove you that hard. There was so much blood. It must have hurt so badly.”
“I’m sorry. It’s all my fault.”
Her apology devolved into a mess of violent, trembling hiccups.
I pulled her onto my lap, gently wiping the tears from her red cheeks. “I don’t blame you anymore, Zoe.”
The reassurance only made her sob harder. “I tried to visit you at the hospital, but Mommy locked me in my room. She said you hated me to death and that seeing me would only make you sicker.”
“On Saturday, I went to pottery class and made a little ceramic cat for you. I wanted to give it to you as an apology, but I was too clumsy and dropped it on the floor. When you said you didn’t want to see me, I was too scared to say sorry.”
“I’m so sorry. Everyone is right… I’m just a bad pup.”
The pieces finally clicked together.
The object that shattered on the Pack House floor wasn’t a meaningless toy.
It was her fragile, desperate attempt to apologize to me. A ceramic cat—because she remembered how much I loved them.
When I first mated with Blake, I had begged him to let me adopt a cat. He had refused immediately because Zoe possessed a severe allergy to cat dander. I had instantly dropped the matter, even going out of my way to avoid strays so I wouldn’t bring lingering fur back into the house.
I wrapped my arms tightly around her small frame, burying my face in her hair. “It’s okay, sweetie. I truly don’t blame you. You aren’t a bad pup. You were just worried about me, but you were too little to know how to say it.”
Her small fingers gripped the fabric of my shirt, her frantic cries slowly settling into a rhythmic, exhausted breathing.
For the first time since my miscarriage, a genuine spark of warmth bloomed in my chest—delivered by the tight embrace of this little girl.
“Tessa!” a sharp, venomous shriek broke the peace.
Wendy strode down the hospital corridor, her designer heels clicking loudly against the linoleum. Her face was twisted into a terrifying mask of rage.
She raised her hand high, aiming straight for my face. “You dare feed my daughter her allergen!”
“Are you trying to murder her to clear a path for whatever bastard pup you spawn next?”
