Wolf-less Omega Luna novel Chapter 41

Alana’s POV

Coral has been teaching me to track and hunt. Even if it would be impossible for me to beat her in a competition, seeing as I didn’t have half her speed or keen senses, I was still giving her a run for her money.
Tracking was only one of the many things I'd been trying out in the last few weeks. I tried knitting but that didn't go too well. I attempted to write a book after reading tons of books but I ended up cringing and throwing the pen under the bed.
I still haven't gotten it out, by the way.
I took to helping out in the nursery with the kids and that was something I was getting almost too good at. I loved watching the Cubs purr and snarl at whoever was getting on their nerves.
Maybe, just maybe I was sowing a seed of faith into the expectation of my own little cub. Just saying.
Axel and I had also been on more dates within the last four weeks than in the number of years put together that I've been alive. Small dates within the confines of our room like watching movies and eating tons of snacks, and more elaborate ones. 
Right now, I was just sitting on the balcony of the house, chatting with…
“Luna?” Kennedy called again.
“Huh?” 
“What do you think I should do? Benny is really handsome and he said he likes me. But I don't think he's going to be my mate. Do you think I should date him?”
Kennedy had become somewhat close to me in the last few weeks too. After the feat with Emily, where I stayed with her when she was shifting for the first time, everybody seemed to forget about the disaster of a party I hosted where they almost died of wolfsbane poisoning.
I guess her Mom found me okay enough to talk to her daughter and so there was that.
I didn’t think much of it. Kennedy was barely an adult so I could understand why she acted the way she did.
Now she was asking me for dating advice. That wasn’t really my area of specialty. I had only dated one man and I still was.
Maybe Coral would have some insight on the matter. She wasn’t mated, but she wasn’t celibate either.
“Well, do you like Benny?”
“I guess I do. He got me a dress last week and he’s the only one who doesn’t have an issue with my hair.” 
I looked up to her wild strawberry blonde hair that was all over the place in thick curls. What did she mean?
“I don’t have an issue with your hair, Kennedy. I think it’s pretty.”
She chuckled. “Thank you, Luna. But maybe you’re just being modest”
“I’m not. And you’re never going to call me Alana are you?”
“I doubt so.” I only shook my head at her, wondering why she stuck with calling me Luna since the first day we met.
“Alana.” My favorite voice on the planet called out with his thick, masculine, and commanding voice, causing me to snap my head in a 180 in less than a second.
“Axel. Hi.” Pink crept up my cheek just like it did Kennedy’s a while ago because of Benny.
Speaking of Kennedy, she practically ran away at the sound of Axel’s voice. He barely had a frown and she was still scared of him.
“You chased her away.” I deadpanned.
“No I didn’t,” he traced the line of my jaw with his long fingers and planted a kiss at the corner of my lips.
“How’re you?” I asked, still a nervous wreck even after months of being together with him.
“I’m good. You don’t look so good, Alana.”
I didn’t feel good either. My head was a banging mess. My throat was parched, desert dry. And food tasted worse than sand from the desert.
“It’s that obvious, yeah?”
He gave me a small nod. “What have you eaten?”
“Food tastes like paper,” I frowned.
A crease appeared on Axel’s forehead.
The possibility that maybe, just maybe, hit me. My eyes snapped to Axel’s. “Could it be that…you know?”
I gestured with my hand to depict a baby, a little too excitedly might I add.
Axel’s eyes turned ten shades darker with his pupils enlarging to swallow up the blue in his eyes.
His hand protectively grabbed me by the waist as he sniffed my neck and hair, and put his ear against my stomach, listening for probably a heartbeat.
“I’m not sure. But come on, let’s go.”
“Go…”
My question got cut off as Axel picked me up from the floor, bridal style, and started to walk away from the house.
“What are you doing, Axel?” A playful laugh escaped my lips as I tried to slap his hand off.
“If there’s even a chance. One tiny chance, that you’re carrying our child, you can’t put yourself under any stress.”
“Walking is not stressful, Doctor Axel, I’m fine. I just said it. I don’t feel any different. I probably just need some rest.”
“You may be right, but still, we should go see Doctor Keith. Right now.”
“No, Axel. We’re not going to see her.”
We did. We went to see Doctor Keith.
After a series of tests, inspections, and prickling ophthalmoscopic light in my eyes, she finally sat us down in her office to give us some insight as to why my eyes and skin looked as pale as wilting petals.
I still stood by the fact that Axel was overreacting.
All I had was some headache and morning sickness. It wasn’t enough for him to drag me to the pack clinic at this early hour of the day.
“Well, there’s news for you,” Doctor Keith said, and that caused me to trash everything I was just thinking and snap my head to her. Maybe Axel was right after all.
As my eyes met the elderly doctor's, I tried to get whatever information I could from her expression. Her plain face gave off nothing so I was left to inch to the edge of my seat, waiting for her to spill.
“Let’s hear it, Doctor,” Axel spoke.
Somewhere at the back of my mind, I felt Axel’s heart do a little excited flip, followed by an impassive calm. On the outside, he looked like he couldn't care less but thanks to the bond, I knew beyond doubt that he was just as crazy as I was.
“Your body is in great condition.” She began to address me. “Better than what it was when you were here last and far better than what I would have thought it would improve to within months.”
This was good, right? 
“But,” Oh no. “You’re not pregnant.”
And with that, all the insecurities came rushing back at me. Guilt. Shame. Sadness. Anger.
I couldn't find the words to respond and I guess neither can Axel because we both just stared at her point-blank.
“Are you sure about this?” Axel's voice had dropped a notch down.
“I am.”
“Should we be concerned? She was in heat last month and…” he trailed off.
Doctor Keith took that as her cue to drop the test of the bombshell on us. “Your seed is very potent, Alpha, and It’s all over Alana’s system. But her body seems to be flushing it out. It’s more of a defense mechanism from her wolf. She’s not manifesting but she’s actively trying to protect Alana.”
“What does that mean?” I finally found my voice.
“It means that your body thinks it won’t be able to handle conceiving Axel’s child without your other werewolf abilities so it’s trying not to let your bond materialize.” She gave me a small apologetic smile.
My heart, as well as my voice, began to break.
“Does that mean I can’t…I can’t have…Axel’s…”
An audible gasp from outside, behind the Doctors’ windows told us that someone was listening in on our conversation.
As all three of us turned our attention to whoever it was, the back frame of my nemesis ran away in the direction of the pack with her ears pointing to the sky and her lips holding more than enough information to gossip to anyone who had ears to listen.
Axel stood up abruptly, probably to stop Britney from whatever she was planning to do but I held him by the arm.
“It doesn’t matter,” I whispered. It didn’t. And I couldn’t even care less.
What mattered was that once again, whatever semblance of a stable life I had envisioned for myself and was slowly grasping, was gradually slipping away right before my very eyes.