Pregnant with the Alpha’s Baby and He Has No Idea

Chapter 19 – Not Relocating

Adam Pierce’s smile doesn’t reach his eyes.

Up close, I can see the careful blandness there, the don’t‑spook‑the‑client calm. He’s done this a thousand times: walk in, offer “better options” to people who don’t know how to say no without sounding ungrateful or unfit.

Too bad for him I’m past polite.

“I appreciate the concern,” I say, because Dr. Hart drilled bedside manners into me so deep I can’t cut them out. “Really. But we’re not moving.”

Hazel makes a small, strangled noise that might be a choked laugh. Wren just stares at her hands.

Pierce’s brows knit with gentle confusion. “Ms. Nightfall, you haven’t even heard what we can offer.”

“An apartment in a city where I have zero support, no job, and a landlord who doesn’t know the difference between a high‑risk pregnancy and a late pizza order?” I tilt my head. “Pass.”

“We have partnerships with clinics,” he says. “Vetted childcare. Safer infrastructure than—” he gestures vaguely at the cracked ceiling tile “—this.”

My temper flares. “Safer how? Because the walls are thicker? Because you’re closer to a Starbucks?”

Nolan clears his throat. “Maris…”

“No, I want to hear this.” I fold my arms, fingers digging into my sides. “Safer because it’s away from here?”

Pierce exhales, patient. “Because it’s away from certain…complicating factors. Wildlife incidents. Unregulated armed patrols. Divided jurisdiction. We’ve had multiple reports now, and you’re in the center of all of them.”

“Exactly,” I say. “I’m in the center. Not alone on the edge.”

He blinks. “I don’t follow.”

Hazel leans on the counter, eyes bright. “She has a point,” she murmurs.

I gesture around us, at the dingy office, the crooked sign, the silent monitor.

“Here, I have a job,” I say. “I have a clinic that knows my file, a town that checks on me, a school ready to take my kid when he gets there, and—” I bite the word off, then let it out anyway. “—a pack willing to throw themselves between us and anything with teeth.”

Pierce’s gaze flicks to Nolan like she’s talking metaphorically, right? Nolan stares stubbornly at a point over his shoulder.

“In your city program,” I go on, “I’d be one name on a list. One more single mom in a gray building with thin walls and no one watching the parking lot at three a.m.”

Pierce clears his throat. “We have security measures—”

“You have cameras,” I cut in, heat rising. “I have men and wolves who actually show up when the feed glitches.”

Wren’s fingers tighten on her mug. Hazel’s eyes widen at wolves, but she doesn’t comment. Smart woman.

Pierce’s smile has started to crack at the edges. “Ms. Nightfall, this isn’t an attack. We’re offering you resources—”

“Good,” I say. “Because here’s what I actually need from you.”

He blinks. “Pardon?”

“I need your office to stop flagging ‘armed men outside her residence’ every time a ranger truck drives past,” I say. “I need you to put in your report that this town responds fast and hard to threats, that the clinic knows my case, that my housing may be ugly but it’s stable, and that any attempt to uproot us right now would increase risk, not reduce it.”

Hazel murmurs, “Amen,” under her breath.

Pierce’s jaw tightens. “I don’t think you appreciate the liability we’re looking at if something happens to you or the child while you’re here.”

I feel something cold and sharp settle in my chest.

“Here’s what you’re not appreciating,” I say quietly. “Two years ago, I kept a man I didn’t know alive all night in a boathouse while he bled on me. A month later, I found out I was pregnant. I raised myself and my sister and a baby in a city that didn’t care if we lived or died, with no one to call but a landlord who sent plumbers three weeks late.”

My voice thickens; I push through it.

“I came here because I was out of options. Since then, I’ve had more people stand at my door in one week than I had stand up for me in ten years. Some of them with badges. Some with claws. All of them picked here as the place to draw the line.”

I hold his gaze, daring him to look away.

“You want to help?” I finish. “Put in that file that this valley is not neglecting me. That this motel isn’t a hazard, it’s a hub. That we are doing the absolute best we can with what we have—and that ripping me out of it for a tick‑box called ‘safer housing’ would be malpractice.”

Silence stretches. Hazel’s cheeks are flushed; Wren is staring at me like I’ve grown a second head.

Pierce studies me for a long moment, some of the patronizing softness gone.

“Ms. Nightfall,” he says slowly, “are you refusing voluntary relocation assistance?”

“Yes,” I say. “Respectfully.”

“Even if an advisory panel deems—”

“Yes,” I repeat.

He presses his lips together, glances at Nolan again. The sheriff lifts one shoulder, a fractional shrug that says you heard her.

“All right,” Pierce says finally. “I can’t—won’t—force you to move without clear evidence of neglect or abuse.” His gaze skims the room, the hall, Hazel, Wren. “I don’t see that here.”

Relief hits so hard my eyes sting. I swallow it down.

“I will, however,” he adds, “recommend regular check‑ins. You’ll be seeing us again.”

“I’ll have coffee on,” I say. “You can meet the wolves next time.”

His smile comes back, thinner. “Let’s…keep it metaphorical.”

He hands me his card, nods to Hazel and Wren, and leaves with Nolan in tow.

The door shuts. The office is suddenly too quiet.

Hazel exhales slowly. “Well,” she says. “That was…a thing.”

Wren looks at me over her mug, eyes wide.

“You really just turned down the state,” she says. “On paper.”

“On paper,” I say, feeling the baby kick, strong and steady. “And in blood, apparently.”

The bell over the door jingles again, and Kaelan steps in, eyes scanning my face before the room.

“How bad?” he asks.

I tuck Pierce’s card into the desk drawer, where it joins chalk dust and signed Council forms.

“They wanted to relocate us,” I say. “I said no.”

He studies me, something proud and dangerous in his gaze.

“Good,” he says simply.