I sat in the vinyl chair beside Amelia's hospital bed, the monitors beeping their slow, steady lullaby. Whatever they'd pushed through her IV had finally won; her lashes fluttered once, twice, then settled. She'd fought sleep like a soldier, terrified that if she closed her eyes the video of her baby would vanish. Thirty minutes straight she'd watched it on loop (tiny fists waving, rosebud mouth yawning), tears sliding sideways into her hair.
Revelation had bullied the NICU staff into letting us record the infant. I'd only had to soften the request with a please and a tremble in my voice. They'd caved. Revelation filmed from the doorway (Amelia was too weak to be wheeled down), and we'd carried the baby to her on a glowing screen.
Now Amelia slept, cheeks still wet. I eased the phone from her slack fingers and tucked the thin blanket higher around her shoulders. She looked impossibly young with the fight drained out of her.
I turned to hand Revelation her phone. She wasn't looking at the screen. She was staring at me like I'd grown wings.
My brow creased. "What?"
She let a few heartbeats pass, then shook her head with a faint, wondering smile. "You're a puzzle I will never solve."
"What does that mean?"
Revelation's gaze slid to Amelia, and something hard flickered across her face (just a flash, gone as quickly as it came).
"I know she's hurting," she said quietly, still watching the sleeping girl. "But part of me hates her anyway."
My head snapped toward her. "Rev."
She met my eyes, unflinching. "For what she tried to do to you. She was sent here as a weapon. I don't do pity for weapons."
I exhaled slowly, then gave her the smallest smile. "Bishop or Keenan, whoever, yes. But have you considered she might not have had a choice in following his command?"
Revelation snorted. "Everyone has a choice, Gen."
"Really?" I rubbed slow circles over my stomach, feeling the faint flutter of pain beneath. "If the devil himself put a gun to your head and said, 'Keep the baby, walk into that house, and tear Knight's wife apart, or I pull the trigger,' what choice is that, exactly?"
Revelation opened her mouth, closed it. Her silence tasted like concession.
"I'm not excusing her," I went on. "I'm just saying… simple from here isn't simple from there."
I looked down at Amelia's calm face, the bruise-colored shadows under her eyes. "She's not good. But she's not evil either. And I can't find it in me to hate her."
Revelation sighed through her nose. "As much as I want to argue (and God, I do), you're right. Doesn't mean I have to like it."
The room settled into quiet for a moment, the kind that feels almost sacred in hospitals.
Then Revelation tilted her head. "Be honest. Not one speck of resentment? Not even a little?"
I turned to her fully. "None."
She searched my face like she was hunting for cracks of the truth.
"I know it sounds insane," I said softly. "And you're probably thinking I'm some naïve little flower who…"
"I don't think you're naïve," she cut in. "You play sweet when it suits you, but you're not foolish. There's a difference."
I laughed under my breath. "Resentment, hatred… I know them intimately. I just never carried them inside me. They were always aimed at me. Fifteen years in my father's house taught me exactly what hate does to people. It twists them until they're unrecognizable. I won't let it twist me. Not for my stepfamily. Not for Amelia."
I brushed another stray lock from Amelia's forehead. "She hurt me, yes. But Kieran never even looked at her twice. That probably saved me more than I realized."
Revelation dropped her voice into an exaggerated, syrupy baritone: "Princess… I know every inch of your body like it's mapped on my soul."
Then, deeper still, dripping possessiveness: "You're mine."
I swatted her arm, cheeks burning. "He did not say that."
"Trust me," she grinned, "the real version is ten times cheesier. And twice as lethal."
The door slid open. A nurse arched a single, perfectly sculpted eyebrow at us (universal code for children, behave). Playtime over.
I stole one last look at Amelia, then followed Revelation into the corridor.
The moment the door clicked shut behind us, my stomach seized. I winced.
Revelation scanned the hallway, not noticing it. "So, where to now?"
"Company," I managed. "Need to settle…"
Another wave slammed into me. I couldn't breathe around the pain. A raw scream tore out before I could stop it.
Revelation spun. "Gen?"
She caught me as my knees buckled. "Genesis!"
The world tilted. Strong arms scooped me up (Revelation barking orders), and darkness rushed in to swallow me whole.
***
"Will you sit down? You're paler than printer paper, and that's saying something."
Revelation ignored me, pacing the foot of the exam-room bed like a caged panther.
The door swung open. The doctor strode in, clipboard in hand.
Revelation was on him before he took two steps. "What is it? Talk."
He blinked at the murder in her eyes, then turned to me with the kind of gentle smile that instantly loosened the vise around my ribs. Real doctors don't smile like that for bad news . Only sadists do.
I exhaled shakily and reached for Revelation's hand.
"Congratulations, Mrs. Blackwood," the doctor said, his voice"You're pregnant."
I whipped my head toward Revelation, a wobbly, triumphant grin already splitting my face. "See? Told you. Nothing to worry about, I'm just preg…"
The word snagged in my throat.
Pregnant.
The room tilted. Sound vanished except for the sudden, deafening roar of my own pulse.
I swivelled back to the doctor so fast my neck cracked. "Sorry, could you… could you say that again? I think the pain meds scrambled my brain."
He didn't laugh. He just looked at me with gentle, unshakable certainty and repeated, softer this time, like he was handing me something priceless and breakable:
"You're pregnant, Genesis."
Revelation's hand, still gripping mine, went slack for half a second then squeezed so hard my bones protested.
The war drum in my chest turned into a wild, joyous stampede.
Pregnant.
A laugh bubbled up, shocked, breathless, half-hysterical and spilled out of me before I could stop it. Tears followed instantly, hot and unstoppable.