“Your gene prediction is way off,” Miriam replied.
“A hundred bucks says it’s not.” Chris glanced up from a report.
“That the best you can do?” Miriam pursed her lips.
“I’ll empty my piggy bank when I get home and let you know, Miriam,” Chris said. Miriam’s lips twitched.
“Let’s go,” said Matthew, “before they start arguing about something else.”
“Oh, they’re not arguing,” Gallowglass said, holding the door open for us. “They’re flirting.”
My jaw dropped. “What makes you say that?”
“Chris likes to give people nicknames.” Gallowglass turned to Matthew. “Chris called you Wolfman. What does he call Miriam?”
Matthew thought for a moment. “Miriam.”
“Exactly.” Gallowglass grinned from ear to ear.
Matthew swore.
“Don’t fret, Uncle. Miriam hasn’t given any man a tumble since Bertrand was killed.”
“Miriam . . . and a human?” Matthew sounded stunned.
“Nothing will come of it,” Gallowglass said soothingly as the elevator doors opened. “She will break Chris’s heart, of course, but there’s naught we can do about it.”
I was deeply grateful to Miriam. Now Matthew and Gallowglass had someone to worry about besides me.
“Poor lad.” Gallowglass sighed, pushing the button that closed the elevator doors. As we descended, he cracked his knuckles. “Perhaps I will wrestle with him after all. A good thrashing always clears the mind.”
A few days ago, I’d worried whether the vampires would survive being at Yale once the students and faculty were around. Now I wondered whether Yale would survive the vampires.
16
I stood in front of the refrigerator, staring at the images of our children with my hands curved around my belly. Where had the month of September gone?
The three-dimensional ultrasound pictures of Baby A and Baby B—Matthew and I had elected not to learn the sexes of our two children—were uncanny. Instead of the familiar ghostly silhouette I’d seen in friends’ pregnancy scans, these revealed detailed images of faces with crinkled brows, thumbs rammed into mouths, perfectly bowed lips. My finger reached out, and I touched Baby B’s nose.
Cool hands slid around me from behind, and a tall, muscular body provided a strong pillar for me to rest against. Matthew pressed lightly on a spot a few inches above my pubic bone.
“B’s nose is just there in that picture,” he said softly. His other hand rested a bit higher on the swell of my belly. “Baby A was here.”
We stood silently as the chain that had always joined me to Matthew extended to accommodate these two bright, fragile links. For months I had known that Matthew’s children—our children—were growing inside me. But I had not felt it. Everything was different now that I’d seen their faces, crumpled in concentration as they did the hard work of becoming.
“What are you thinking?” Matthew asked, curious about my extended silence.
“I’m not thinking. I’m feeling.” And what I was feeling was impossible to describe.
His laugh was soft, as though he didn’t want to disturb the babies’ sleep.
“They’re both all right,” I assured myself. “Normal. Perfect.”
“They are perfectly healthy. But none of our children will ever be normal. And thank God for that.”
He kissed me. “What’s on your schedule for today?”