My Second Chance Mate is a Barbarian (Sera and Fenris) novel Chapter 288

Sera

I grabbed onto her. Both hands on her arm across my chest, gripping hard, and I couldn't make myself let go.

"I'm sorry." I was crying. "I'm so fucking sorry, Mina. I'm sorry. I keep... I keep hurting you and you keep being here and I don't deserve it. I don't deserve you being here."

"Shut up," she said into my back, soft. "Shut up. It's fine."

"It's not fine."

"It is. Shut up. Stop talking."

I couldn't stop. "I used you. I kept you in the dark and I used you and then when I was scared I turned against you and I thought you'd sold me. You. The only person who—"

"Sera." Firm. "I said shut up."

So I shut up. I stood there and held her arm across my chest and cried with my face wrecked and my nose running and absolutely nothing composed about any of it. She held on. We stayed that way until the breathing evened out and the fire had burned down to a lower sound and the guard's shadow had passed the window twice more.

She let go first. Came around to face me. She had been crying too, quietly, the kind she hid well. She wiped her face with the heel of her good hand, quick, annoyed at the tears for existing.

"You're a mess," she said.

"I know."

"Your face is disgusting right now."

"I know."

Her mouth pulled toward a grin. She caught it, pushed it back. Then she let out a long breath.

"You have to tell Fenris."

I blinked. "What?"

"The baby. You have to tell him."

I stared at her. After everything we'd both been through in the last ten minutes, after the ugliest apology in the history of apologies, she was right back to steering.

“But—” I stopped, and swallowed. “You made it clear I couldn’t tell him.”

"Yeah." She held my eyes. "And then I got blamed for it. So. I've had some time to think." She moved the one shoulder. "He should know. That's all I'm saying. He should know."

It took me a second. After the morning we'd had, the word landed strange. Then it landed right, and my whole chest came open.

"Wait. What? Since when?" I sniffled still having remnants of my emotions hanging.

"It's new. Newish." A real smile now, the first real one, breaking through whether she wanted it to or not. She ducked her head. "He's good to me. That's all you get."

"Mina."

"That's all you get." But she was almost laughing. "I want to bring him here. To meet you. Meet Fenris. For real."

"Yeah." I reached for her good hand and held it. "Yeah, you stupid thing. Bring him."

She let me hold it. After everything. She let me hold her hand and she was smiling and the morning had been the ugliest thing and somehow this was how it ended, with her trusting me with a new piece of her life after I'd proven careless with every piece she'd given me before.

"He's going to love you both," she said.

I left a while later with the morning feeling almost mended. My friend was happy. Now I had to tell Fenris about the pregnancy. It was a big risk.

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