Lena's POV
"Six weeks," Dr. Arden said. "Possibly six and a half."
He set the printed results across my knees and turned up the saline drip.
I stared at the word positive until the letters blurred. "The baby is alive?"
"For now." His anger was aimed past me, toward everyone who had allowed the collection. "Your blood pressure crashed, your hematocrit is dangerously low, and you are already showing uterine irritability. You need observation, fluids, and complete rest. No travel. No work. No arguments with an Alpha who has forgotten the first duty of a mate."
The last sentence broke through my shock. I folded the report and pushed the blanket away.
Dr. Arden caught my shoulder. "What did I just say?"
"Carter has to know."
"Then call him."
I had called twice while the nurse stabilized me. Both calls had gone unanswered.
"I need to see his face when I tell him."
Dr. Arden studied me with the exhausted patience of a physician who knew his patient was about to make a terrible decision. Finally, he disconnected the portable fluid bag from its stand and hooked it over my arm.
"Five minutes," he said. "Then you come back, and I arrange a transfer to a proper obstetric unit."
The corridor seemed twice as long as it had that morning. I moved slowly, one hand on the wall and the other protecting the folded report against my chest. Beneath the fear, a fragile hope insisted on breathing.
Carter had wanted an heir before sponsorships, press conferences, and Sienna's return consumed him. He had once traced the edge of my mate mark in the dark and promised our child would never have to hide. Maybe he had become lost inside the life he had built. Maybe this baby would force him to remember the man he had been.
The door to the private recovery suite stood partly open.
Carter sat beside Sienna's bed. He held the silver wolf pendant awarded to every Frosthawks captain after a championship season. I had watched him polish it before every important game. He fastened the chain around Sienna's neck, then tucked a loose strand of hair behind her ear.
"You'll have the best rehabilitation staff in the league," he told her. "I'll be there through all of it."
I pushed the door open. The rubber stop struck the wall.
Carter stood so quickly the chair scraped back. "Why are you out of bed?"
"Because you ignored my calls." I stepped into the room. "We need privacy."
Sienna touched the pendant. "Carter was only helping me settle my treatment schedule."
"Leave," I said.
"She stays," Carter answered. "You lost the right to issue orders when your credentials were suspended."
The hope inside me did not die all at once. It cracked, thin line by thin line.
I held out the lab report. "I'm pregnant."
For three heartbeats, his face opened. His eyes dropped to my abdomen. The bond between us surged with shock, fear, and something that felt painfully like wonder.
Then Sienna shifted behind him, and the shutters came down.
"How convenient," he said.
I thought I had misheard. "What?"
He took the report, read the result, and checked the collection time. "You discover this the same day the league opens an investigation against you."
"I discovered it because you forced me to donate before the screening was complete."
"You knew we were under pressure. You knew Sienna's comeback determines our playoff revenue. Now you expect me to believe a pregnancy appears at exactly the moment you need leverage?"
"It did not appear today. Your child has been growing inside me for six weeks."
His mouth tightened. "Do not say that where anyone can hear you."
The command was so quiet that it frightened me more than a shout.
"That is your response?"
"My response is that you will keep this private until the investigation is resolved. If the press learns my hidden mate is pregnant while accused of sabotaging a teammate, every sponsor will assume this was a domestic feud. The team will be destroyed."
"I could lose the baby."
His gaze flicked toward the fluid bag hanging from my arm, but he did not ask what the doctor had said.
"Then follow medical instructions," he replied. "Do not turn this into another spectacle."
Sienna lowered her eyes, unable to hide the satisfaction at the corner of her mouth.
I took the report from Carter's hand. "Once my name is cleared, I am leaving you."
He stared at me. "No, you're not."
"You called our child leverage. You used my career to take blood from me. There is nothing left to discuss."
His Alpha power pressed against the room, instinctively reaching for the bond. "Lena, stop."
For the first time, I did not. I walked back into the corridor and let the door close on his command.
Dr. Arden was waiting with a wheelchair and an expression that told me he had heard enough through the thin wall.
"The obstetric unit has a bed," he said. "You are going now."
Before I could sit, Grant Thorne approached with my coat folded over one arm.
"The team leaves for Seattle in forty minutes," he said. "You are no longer cleared to treat players, but the league has not terminated your contract. You will travel with the staff and remain available for questioning."
Dr. Arden stepped between us. "She is not medically cleared to travel."
Thorne glanced at the IV bag. "Seattle is only three hours by bus. We return to Portland immediately after tomorrow's game."
"Dr. Arden said no travel at all," I corrected.
"And if she refuses?" Dr. Arden asked.
Thorne's expression did not change. "I record abandonment of duty and noncooperation in an active safety investigation."
Carter appeared at the end of the corridor. He had heard. He said nothing.
That silence made the decision for me. If I stayed, Thorne would use it as another admission. If I went, I could preserve access to the schedules, medication records, and service logs that might prove someone had framed me.
Dr. Arden made me sign a discharge against medical advice form. He wrote strict restrictions across the top in red ink, handed me emergency medication, and made Nurse Bell sit beside me on the bus.
The trip north passed in a gray blur. Every vibration traveled through my lower back. By the time we reached the Seattle Vipers' arena, the pressure in my pelvis had sharpened into a steady ache.
Thorne sent me to the visiting staff office rather than the hotel. "Sort the nonclinical incident files before tomorrow's hearing," he said. "You wanted access to the records. Now you have it."
I made it as far as the restroom.
Inside a stall, I pressed both palms to my abdomen. "Stay with me," I whispered. "Just stay with me until I can get us out."
A cramp tore through me so suddenly that my shoulder struck the partition. I bit down on a cry and waited for the pain to ease.
When it finally loosened, I reached for tissue.
Bright blood covered my fingers.
