Mark of Betrayal (Dark Secrets #3)(116)
Author: A.M. Hudson

“Yeah, but, what?” Jason said.

“I don’t know. But we need to flush it out.”

“How?” I said.

They both scratched their cheekbones on one side.

“Is the child even possible?” I placed a flat hand across my belly.

“I don’t know,” David said, looking at my hand. “Are you pregnant yet?”

“No.” I let my hand fall away. “I mean, I haven’t had my period, but that’s probably the stress.”

David half smiled. “Maybe. Have you taken a pregnancy test?”

“No.”

“Maybe you should do that.”

“And what then?” I asked. “What if I am pregnant? What do we tell our people? The king is dead. They’ll demand to know whose baby it is.”

“Tell them it’s mine,” Jason piped up.

We both looked at him.

“Ara and I can just pretend to be together.”

David ran a hand over his hair. “Okay, that’s actually a good idea, but she’s not pregnant, Jason. I can smell her. She smells exactly the same as she always does.”

Jason nodded. “So, why not tell them she is anyway? Tell them it doesn’t change her body like it does a human. None of them would know. None of them were around when Lilith had children, right?”

“Except Arthur,” I said.

“No. He wasn’t. He was alive, but he never came to Loslilian,” Jason said.

“How do you know?”

“Because we talked about it—talked about Lilith having children. He said he never saw the miracle occur, but was told stories of this childbearing vampire.”

“Okay, but, why would we lie—why would we tell them I’m pregnant?”

“To see what reaction it has.”

“Also, it would make Jason king by rights,” David said. “It would appease the distress of the people.”

“Yeah, but when I go to swear my oath, David and I can switch places,” Jason said.

I looked up at David with a smile. “Yes. You could become official.”

His eyes narrowed as if this idea suited him. “Come to think of it, feigning pregnancy would flush out Morgaine’s true motive as well—if she has one.”

“Yeah, especially if she doesn’t really believe in this prophecy child,” I said, shrugging. “And who knows, if she is the traitor, it might change her allegiance.”

“Doubt it.”

“But on the bright side, Ara,” David said, reaching across to pull me into him. “With Jason here, I can come back more often and no one will question the scent.”

“Oh yeah.” Everything brightened, like the sun just shone down through the roof. “I didn’t think of that.”

He kissed my forehead. “It was one of my very first thoughts.”

I snuggled into him and squeezed his ribs tight. “So, will you stay tonight?”

He shook his head against the top of mine. “I can’t. When I got the call, I was in the middle of something.”

“What?”

He looked at Jason, sighing.

“Really?” Jason said.

David nodded.

“Well, tell her.”

“Tell me what?” I looked up at David.

His jaw went square, tight. “I’m not ready to tell you, Ara.”

“Please tell me. Or at least tell me what it’s about.”

“Your family,” Jason said. “Your bloodline.”

I stepped back a little so I could look at David without angling my neck. “What about it?”

He let the hesitation out through his open mouth in a hard breath. “I couldn’t get your dad’s DNA. I wanted to test it against yours, so I took some of Sam’s.”

“And?”

“And…I gave it to a friend of mine who works in human medicine. She ran a DNA scan. I wanted her to run some other tests but she couldn’t get permission for those kinds of investigations—”

“What kinds?”

“I wanted to know, not only if Sam was biologically related to you, through your father, but if he had odd cells, maybe proving if he was a half-blood or even of Lilithian descent.”

“What, like my dad might be Lilithian and not know it?”

“Perhaps. If Amara was his mother, then he would be Lilithian, surely. We just don’t know how it works; we don’t know why only females are born to Lilithians, but I wanted to find out. She couldn’t do those tests, but she did check the DNA.”

“And?”

“And…there is a distant ancestral connection.” He paused.

I frowned at him. “What does that mean?”

“It means that your father is not your father, Ara,” Jason said.

My heart sunk; David grabbed my arm.

“But he is related to your bloodline—just, perhaps not the Lilithian bloodline,” David said. “Maybe he was your real father’s cousin or uncle or something. I don’t know. That wasn’t discussed, but, my love?” He sat beside me where I fell onto Jason’s bed. “One fact was certain; Greg Thompson is not your real father.”

My hands shook, my eyes tearing to blindness. “Then my namesake—his mother. Was she…”

“I think Greg may have been adopted by Amara—and it’s possible she’s not the same Amara I saved.”

I nodded, biting my lip.

David delicately wrapped me up in his arms. “I’m sorry, Ara. I didn’t want to tell you this.”

I nodded, wiping my face. “I…we both kind of knew it was a possibility. It’s just…I have no one now, David. My mum, who wasn’t really my mum, is dead, and now I don’t have a dad, either.”

“You still have a dad, Ara.” He cradled my face against his quiet heart. “That man loves you and would give his own life for you. He is your dad whether that relation is biological or not.”

I sat up from him and looked at Jason for a second, who seemed as though he was fighting some great internal battle not to push David aside and hold me. “So, you need to trace his family tree, in order to find mine, right? If we were distantly related.”

David stiffened. “When I say distant, I mean, quite possibly, centuries of distance.”

I swallowed. “So, what are you doing about it then? Just…nothing?”

He shook his head. “I’ve traced back as far as I can go, but, I had an idea this morning. I remembered a book in Arthur’s study back home, and the name Greg came up, but the book was ancient. The only reason I even thought of it—connected it to you, was because it also mentioned something about grapevines.”