Dark Legend Page 0,52

determined to unlock the key to our bodies so that we could conceive more often and be more successful in the carrying. I had wished to be able to understand why we conceive males instead of females but I could not find the answers." She shook her head. "No, this cannot be."

"You know I speak the truth. I knew our women can only conceive every so many years, and that they manipulate that time, but I also knew the chances were very good that, as you had never conceived, you would be ripe to do so and I took full advantage of that."

She stared up at him a moment in silence, in shock. "But I am a woman, a healer. You could never have done such a thing without my knowledge..." She trailed off as she pressed her hands to her flat stomach in a kind of wonder. "It cannot be so." Even as she denied it, she closed her eyes and sought inside herself. There it was. The miracle of life. The thing she had longed for. Cried for. Wanted more than anything. The very thing she had given up ever having. Growing. Changing. Cells dividing. A child. She wanted to be upset. She had given up the idea several hundred years earlier. She was prepared to go to the next world. She was not prepared for such an event.

Francesca raised her head so that her eyes met his. "You really did this?"

"I would like to say I knew you wanted a child above all else. I had read that in your memories. I had also read your resignation and acceptance that you would not. I would like to tell you I did such a thing for you, or even more nobly, for a cause, for the continuation of our race, but the plain truth is much uglier than that. I did it so that I would not lose you. So that you would be tied to this world and not escape me into the next. Until Lucian is dead, I could not follow you. I did not want to be alone anymore. I acted out of selfishness. I changed the direction of your life inadvertently so many centuries ago and now I have deliberately changed it again."

Francesca just stood there, shock registering on her face. "A baby. I had all but forgotten the possibility of a baby." There was no condemnation in her voice, only a soft musing as if she couldn't comprehend such a thing.

"I am sorry, Francesca. There is no real way to make amends." Gabriel rubbed his forehead with the palm of his hand. "There is no excuse and there can be no forgiveness."

She wasn't listening to him; her mind was turned inward. She had longed for a baby, a family. More than anything she had wanted a child. Even if she had chosen to spend the last years of her life with Brice, she would never have brought a child to their union. Her pregnancy was a miracle, and she couldn't quite come to grips with the idea. "A baby. I do not remember what it is like to dream of such a thing. It cannot be, Gabriel. How is this? How did I not know?"

"You are not listening to me, Francesca," he said, his black eyes searching the sky overhead as if it might offer answers. He rubbed his temple. He needed a way out of the mess he had created with his arrogant decision, yet there was none. He had to be honest with her. He respected Francesca too much to give her anything less than the truth. In any case, she was his lifemate and eventually she would read his memories.

He should have waited, taken his time. He could have stopped her from choosing the dawn if there was such a need. But he had taken the attitude that she belonged to him and owed him complete surrender.

Francesca took a deep breath and laid her hand on his arm. She could easily read his inner turmoil, his anger at himself. In truth, she didn't know how she felt, but she didn't like the way his mind was so consumed with guilt.

Gabriel, her legendary hunter.

He had given so much to his people, had always done the right thing. Francesca didn't have it in her to condemn him. "In your defense, Gabriel, it was not a conscious decision on your part."

"Francesca!" Gabriel stepped away from her, unable to bear her touch when he