Chapter 303 The Thirty Percent Chance

Chapter 303: Chapter 303 The Thirty Percent Chance

Emilia’s POV

Nobody fought us on the second trip except Tiffany, who whined that Zurich in the off-season was "tragically boring." So Mila and I flew out to Switzerland again.

I was more wound up than the first time. For a whole month I’d swallowed those pills on schedule, morning and night, never once knowing whether they were doing a thing to my body. This visit would tell me which door I was walking through, hope, or the other one.

Dr. Vogel ran the finest fertility program in the pack territories, wolves and humans both, and I’d clung to that fact like a rope for thirty days.

After a battery of tests, Mila and I sat in front of Dr. Vogel’s desk, both of us stiff as fence posts. I couldn’t stop my knee from bouncing.

"So?" I said. "Don’t leave me hanging, Doctor. Did it work, or did I choke down a month of horse pills for nothing?"

Dr. Vogel went quiet for a beat. Then she smiled and nodded. "It’s working. The response is quite visible, actually."

Mila grabbed my hand. "Emilia, did you hear her? It’s working. It’s working."

"I heard, I heard." I laughed and squeezed back. Eve stirred in my chest, warm and pleased. See? We’re not done yet.

We hugged right there in the office.

"I’ll keep you on the medication to push the development along," she went on. "This is a three-month course. I’m adding one new pill to the list, take it exactly one hour after the others. Not before."

"One hour after. Got it." I could have kissed her.

We got back to the hotel that evening, ordered dinner up, and I ducked into the bathroom to soak away the flight. Somewhere behind the door I heard Mila’s phone go off, her voice low and clipped for a minute or two.

Then a knock. "Emilia, I’m stepping out for a bit. I won’t be long."

"Out where? By yourself?" I called through the door.

"An old friend wants to grab a coffee. Back before you know it."

"Okay. Watch yourself out there."

"I know, I know. You stay put and don’t go wandering."

The door clicked shut behind her.

Three hours crawled by. My hair dried, dinner went cold, and still no Mila. I finally caved and rang her.

"Where are you? You said ’not long.’ It’s practically midnight."

She came back an age later, and the second she stepped through the door I knew something was off. Her eyes were rimmed pink, the skin around them puffy.

"You said you’d be quick." I met her at the door. "I was ready to send a search party."

She gave me a thin, tired smile. "Sorry, sweetheart. Haven’t seen her in ages. We got to talking and lost track of time."

"Have you been crying? Your eyes are a disaster."

She scrubbed at them, and fresh tears welled up even as she laughed. "God, how embarrassing. Twenty years since I last saw the woman. I took one look at her and blubbered like a child."

I set a hand on her shoulder. "Must be some friend, to pull that out of you."

"An old one. The kind you don’t replace."

"That’s a rare thing." I thought of Lily, the two of us stacked on one dorm bed at three in the morning, howling over nothing. Twenty years apart, and I’d cry buckets too. "I get it. Come on, sit down."

We flew home after four days. On the plane Mila kept lifting a newspaper to her face like she was riveted by the market pages.

I let her have it.

Somebody who cries in front of a friend she hasn’t seen in twenty years is allowed a little privacy.

Sebastian picked us up again, and this time the man had clearly learned his lesson, because he came bearing two bouquets, one for me and one for his mother. Mila’s shoulders eased a fraction the moment the flowers touched her hands.

Back home, dinner done, I went up to unpack.

Sebastian slipped in and crouched in front of me, elbows on his knees.

"Well? Did you bring me back a present?"

"I did."

"And what would that be?"

"Close your eyes."

He obeyed, which never got less funny. I leaned in and pressed a hard kiss to his cheek. His eyes snapped open, caught completely flat-footed.

"That’s the gift?"

"What, not to your taste?"

"I like it. I like it very much." He caught the back of my head and planted one on my forehead. "And since I’m no thief, here’s yours in return."

We looked at each other and grinned like a couple of fools, and for one clean second the whole tangled mess of Claudine and Abigail didn’t exist.

Then I spotted the stray bottle wedged in my suitcase.

"Hang on, this is Mila’s blood pressure medication. How’d it end up in my bag? I’ll run it down to her."

I carried it out and down the hall to their room. I raised my hand to knock, and that was when I heard it. A cracked, broken sound from inside. Someone crying.

"What did she say? Tell me. Don’t just sit there and weep, love, say something." Titus, low and desperate.

"Emilia can’t carry a child." Mila’s voice came apart on every word. "Vogel called me out to meet her and told me the truth. She said she never saw any real development in Emilia’s womb. She just didn’t want to pile the pressure on her, so she said nothing to her face. She told me a woman’s state of mind matters more than anything with infertility. If Emilia decides there’s no hope, then there really won’t be any."

"Vogel added a new drug to Emilia’s course. If it works, there’s still a chance. If it doesn’t, it’s hard to say."

"How good a chance?" Titus pressed.

Mila couldn’t bring herself to answer right away. "Thirty percent."

"Only thirty?" Titus dragged in a breath.

Mila broke into sobs. "What am I supposed to do? What are we supposed to do? Sebastian and Emilia are so happy together. What happens to them if they can’t have children?"

Titus gentled his voice. "Mila, don’t cry. Thirty percent is better than nothing at all."

"Stop trying to comfort me, Titus. Vogel as good as told me Emilia will never conceive. I know exactly what thirty percent means."

The bottle slipped in my hand. I caught it against my chest before it could fall.

My legs stopped holding me the way they should. I pressed my back to the wall and slid down it until I was sitting on the cold floor of the hallway.