4. Jinxed

Layla stood in the shadows of the trees and watched one of the younger trainees stop and listen to his surroundings. He wouldn’t find her. She had this part of her gifts down; she could do it without effort. 

The boy lowered to his haunches and tilted his head. He was listening to the vibrations in the air, the sound of breathing, a heartbeat. Anything at all so he could pass through this stage of his training. At least he would get a chance to advance. She was just stuck there.

It was also supposed to be a test for her to make sure she kept practising her skills. She wanted something more challenging than playing around with the kids in the woods. They must have forgotten that she’d killed enemy wolves with her bare teeth in her human form. And she was the one who’d got that witch who’d plagued them all. Or it was precisely the reason they kept giving her these stupid exercises because she was beginning to suspect that no one wanted to spar with her. Brit would probably get further ahead in her training once she started. 

The young trainee rose and started walking again. The warrior in charge of the session claimed the young man already mastered how to sneak up on the enemy, but it sounded like a herd of elephants was trampling through the forest to her ears.

She had an unfair advantage. It was why she needed to find a better way to train. Jax was the only one she could go one-on-one with, but maybe it was time she asked her mother. Her mother knew of the dangers out there; she would teach her if asked to. 

Maybe it was time to finally bury the hatchet and rebuild their relationship properly. 

When the boy walked out of the woods to tell the trainer he failed, she sighed and slipped out of the shadows that engulfed her. She didn’t bother masking her scent or any sounds she made as she marched out of the woods. 

“Can I move on to weapons training or something else?” she asked.

The trainer lowered his gaze, and it exasperated her. That was another reason they didn’t train her as hard as they prepared the others. She was their Luna, and her mate was an overprotective bastard. 

“Um... I’ll see what Alpha Jackson says...”

She sighed and walked away before he spewed any more words that would ruin her mood. 

The man once told her he would bring her back to the packhouse and train her when she thought of running away from the Hunters. Now if he wasn’t the one doing it, no one else was allowed to. 

Still, that was a problem for another day. She had Brit to worry about that day. 

Hope was in the lobby when she walked into the house. The toddler’s face lit up when she saw her, and she ran into her arms for a cuddle. 

“Good morning, Sunshine,” she said as she kissed her daughter on the top of her head and then balanced her on her hip. 

Hope’s hair was growing fast, and the bright red made her stand out the same way she had stood out when she’d been younger. She suspected Hope was like her, but with her father’s genes, she had no idea what was in store for her child. But she knew Jax would have to let Hope train like the others. He couldn’t give any special treatment to either of them just because they were his. 

“Morning, Miss Layla.”

She smiled and walked across the lobby to Faith, who’d offered to babysit Hope so she could talk with Brit.

“Morning, Faith. Are you just about ready to leave?”

The semester break hadn’t started yet. Faith only came home for the birthday and memorial, but there were still a few more weeks until they broke off for the summer. 

“Yeah, we’re leaving later this afternoon,” Faith answered as they started to walk together to the kitchen. “Mum’s already crying like I’m not going to come back.”

“She misses you when you’re not here, but don’t worry. Hope and I look after her.”

The woman in question was busy giving orders as the morning rush began. Grace’s face lit up like Hope’s when she saw them, and she came toward Faith to embrace her. They had the type of relationship she hoped to have with Hope when she was older. The kind she wished she had with Rebecca. 

“Come and sit down for breakfast, Faith. You’ve lost so much weight; you haven’t been looking after yourself,” Grace said as she fussed over her child.

Faith rolled her eyes but smiled as her mother led her to the kitchen island and placed a plate of steaming food in front of her a second later. 

“What may I get you, Luna?” Sandra asked as she turned around to face her and Hope. 

Her cheeks were reddening, and she sensed the older woman’s mortification. She fussed over her child before attending to the Luna like any good mother was supposed to. There was no need for her to feel like that. 

“Don’t worry about me. I was just coming to say we will have breakfast with my sister in my room this morning. You can lay out the dining room for everyone else,” she answered with a smile.

There was no point in everyone skipping a meal again. She would take Jax’s suggestion and ease everyone into things.

She told Faith not to forget to say goodbye and left the uncomfortable Omegas to their duties. Jax said it would take some time until they opened up to her like Faith, but at least they weren’t afraid of her anymore. 

Jackson was just coming down the stairs when she returned to the lobby. He looked tired. Even after he’d made love to her, his thoughts kept him up longer than they should have. He hadn’t even woken up when she’d got up for training. 

He smiled when he saw them and kissed the top of Hope’s head before he kissed her lips.

“You should have woken me,” he said. 

“You needed the rest. Maybe we should take a break today?” she offered.

“I have a lot of—”

“Come on,” she urged, putting her free arm around him. “Everything is fine. There’s nothing urgent that you need to do. We could spend days in bed; no one would notice.”

“Pretty sure this young lady would notice,” he said as he took Hope into his arms when the little girl demanded his attention. She squealed when Jax blew raspberries on her chubby cheek.

Jax was right; the little girl always looked for him. Hope was a daddy’s girl through and through. Just as she had been before her mother left, before Gerald became a shell of himself. In times like these, when she watched the two of them together, her heart twisted with thoughts of her father. She would never understand how anyone could have a child and discard them so easily. He’d sold her to pay off debts. That was how little she meant to him. 

Her mood lowered. Jackson stopped kissing his daughter and met her gaze over her head. 

“You’re right,” he said after a while. “Everything is perfect right now. We have our health, we have our little family, and we have peace in our territory. Everything is fine. There’s no reason why I can’t take a few days off and just relax with my girls.”

A small smile formed on her lips as his words pushed her father out of her mind again. 

“You’ve just jinxed us,” she teased. “You’re not supposed to say things like that, or everything will go wrong.”

Jax chuckled as he put his arm around her and then turned to go back up the stairs. 

“Don’t tell me I mated a superstitious woman,” he teased. “Before that witch, we were pretty much the happiest, safest territory in the world. I doubt anyone will mess with us now that I have you by my side.”

“Imagine if they came here and found out I’m actually pretty useless because no one is training with me,” she snorted. 

“Are we going to fight about that?” Jax grinned. “Because I have a stack of paperwork on my desk...”

She didn’t know if Jax chose to be that dense about that subject on purpose or if he genuinely thought she was happy with the crumbs he threw her when he did train with her. But she didn’t want to fight about that at all. 

“I’ll get Brit for breakfast so we can hang out together. I need you to make more of an effort with her,” she said. 

“Yes, dear.”

He didn’t hide his grin this time.

But she had to admit that arguing about the little things was much better than constantly fighting for their lives and wondering if he loved her. Perhaps this was the ‘happy ever after’ part of things, after all.