“What? Does it not smell as good as I think it does?” I set down the knife and rinsed off my hands.“This place smells absolutely amazing,” Alicia reassured me. “We had a talk with Aspen after our meeting.”My stomach dropped. The only thing I could think of that they’d have needed to share with me would be a conversation about my council.I went to them, throwing myself in their arms. “They said no.” Aspen had tried to get the council to come and have an open dialogue with us about the entire situation. If anyone could convince them to do that, it would be him.“They said the law stands and they don’t need nor plan to discuss it further.” Dante didn’t finish the sentence. He didn’t need to.“Then I don’t get pregnant.” I’d already told them that was the case, but at the time, I hadn’t truly believed it would be necessary. I’d been sure it would all work out—except it didn’t. “Done.”“But you already told us that that’s not what you want.” Alicia kissed the top of my head. “If there w
“We need to clean up and get some s’mores.” Alicia took my other hand.I had two alphas at my side. How could I have ever thought this wouldn’t work out? The question was, how. And that was something only time would tell.We cleaned up in record time and rushed to the s’mores table. They had everything from chocolate chip cookies to graham crackers to sugar cookies with more kinds of candy bars than I’d ever seen in one place that was not the candy store, before. The three of us ate our fill, my stomach queasy by the time Aspen called for us all to take our fur and run, the cubs being treated to an outdoor movie while we did.Home. Home. Home.Yes, this is home.But for how long?TWENTYDANTEI was home alone and I had to admit my mates had done an amazing job of making the place not only function well, but it looked nice. I’d never mention it to them because they laughed at how little attention I paid to my surroundings.While I was sitting on the sofa, I rested my feet, not on the c
My Beta mate and I put our ears to the bathroom door. We cringed each time Clarissa heaved the contents of his stomach into the toilet.“We have to ask Healer to make a house call,” Alicia insisted. “Clarissa can’t walk over to Healer’s cabin and besides, he’s probably at home by now.”I sent Brian a quick text asking where his mate was, his mate being our healer, and explained the situation.He replied, He’s on his way to you.His response had me wondering if I’d made a horrible mistake. Alicia and I’d made a decision about our mate’s health and body without consulting him. Clarissa opened the door and without acknowledging us, stumbled into the bedroom. He cursed when he saw the unmade bed and hurried into the third bedroom, where he pulled the covers over his head.“I don’t need either of you hovering over me. Let me sleep and I’ll be fine in the morning.”Alicia flapped his hands, apparently wanting to do something other than ignoring our snow leopard mate. I closed the door, led
“Which room will be the nursery? This one or the other one. We need wallpaper and a crib and onesies.” Alicia was on a roll. But as he twirled around, he froze and almost fell face-first on the floor. “But what if you can’t stay in Bruin Ridge?” He curled up beside Clarissa and sobbed into our omega’s neck.Clarissa patted his back, saying, “It’ll be okay.” And despite the bed being small, I crawled on the other side and the three of us lay there with our own thoughts.“No matter what happens, you are our mate, forever and ever.” Alicia wasn’t hiding his distress and I handed him a tissue to mop up his tears.This wasn’t right. We should be celebrating new life, not wallowing in self-pity. I got up. “If we make our bed, will you come back into the main bedroom?” I couldn’t bear having Clarissa sleep elsewhere when… when… he may have to leave. Sorrow squeezed around my heart, making it difficult to breathe.“Sure.” Clarissa grabbed a handful of ginger candy.Alicia raced ahead to get t
Clarissa stepped back and twirled around. “These are paternity and they fit me the way they are supposed to fit me.”“And you’re pregnant,” I reminded him. “And you aren’t a human. These books were written for humans. If you were getting bigger than you should be, Healer would’ve told you by now. He doesn’t mince words.”Just as with our former healer, our current one told it like it was—but only to the patient because of human rules or something. I guess human rules around his whole doctor license thing-a-ma-bob had him being less informative to nonpatients than our retired healer had been.“I know. I just—why am I so big?” His bottom lip curled out in the most adorable little pout. I wanted to lean in and nibble on it. Clarissa wasn’t in the mood for that. He wanted assurance and love, both of which I could give.“Because.” I closed the distance between us and kissed his cheek. “You’re growing our young.”The door clicked open and in walked Dante. “Sorry I’m late. I was helping Samu
“Betas.” Julian’s voice came in through our open front window. “Betas, are you home?”I put down the instructions for the surprise I was building for Clarissa. “Hey, Julian. What’s going on?” He was a nice kid and had started to take on an active role in the den, particularly when it came to our rentals.“Beta Dante, Alpha asked me to get you two for a tour.” He put his hands in his front pockets. “So I’m to fetch you.” His head tilted slightly, a habit from his younger years, one many of us still fell into on occasion.“A tour? Why?” We did varied tasks as Betas, but tours generally weren’t one of them.“Alpha said you’d want to do this one.”“I’ll get Alicia and meet you down at the rentals.”“The Alpha house.” Julian looked down. “And I’m to bring you.”Nothing about this was how we typically did things around here, but I chalked that up to Alpha probably being busy. As Alicia and I got closer to Alpha’s, we scented it was more than that.“Alicia,” I said and then inhaled again, ju
I reached for Alicia’s hand. Forget being all formal. He was my mate and wasn’t that a big part of the reason we had this visitor in the first place? Being traditional wasn’t going to do any of us any good.We went through the rest of the den, Waylon asking questions about our agreement with the university and how we got our renters and even about the way we managed the plumbing so far out from what he considered a “city.” He seemed genuinely interested in all of it and more than once, he and Grant got off topic and started to talk history. Nothing about this visit made sense, and yet in a way, it all did.The tour ended where everything began, the rental Clarissa had first booked. Waylon had glanced at our hands multiple times since we joined them, but now he stared at them.“Now these rentals… how far out are they booked?” Waylon directed his question to no one in particular.Aspen answered, and instead of asking a follow up question, Waylon fixed his attention on us.“You love each
“What do you think?” Aspen asked. “Because you are den, vow or no.”“I think we need to add to the plan.” Our omega leaned back in his chair. “Even if we have a bear, this education will be beneficial since they could one day be the parent of a snow leopard if the recessive genes hit just right.”The next hour was spent making a tentative plan, Waylon agreeing to come on a pack run and stay for a few days while we worked out the details. The issue needed to be approved by the council at large, but the way Waylon spoke, this was all but a done deal.TWENTY-THREECLARISSA“Need some help.”Both my mates tore into the bedroom and kneeled on either side of the bed. I’d taken to sleeping some nights in the third bedroom, as the second had been converted to the baby’s nursery. Much as I liked sleeping with my mates, getting me out from the middle of that huge, custom-built bed took a while and with our young sitting on my bladder, I didn’t always have the time.They manhandled me to a sitti