He turned around and put his hands on my hips. “Elias can cook if necessary. Jayden, too. I’m more of a lover than a chef. I hope that doesn’t change your mind.”
“Nothing could change my mind about you. I can cook.”
“Not a chance.” Elias came down. No shirt. Only pants. I looked down at the floor; otherwise, I might vault myself at him and Carter and demand they ignore my hunger and continue loving me upstairs. “I’m on breakfast duty.”
“I thought you said he was grumpy in the mornings, Carter.”
Elias came over and kissed me. “Maybe you’ve changed my ways, omega.” He lightly touched his mark on my body, and I relished the shudder it caused.
“Or you’re just as hungry as me.”
“Or that.”
Elias went to work while Carter and I shared a cup of coffee. He took it like I did: obscene amounts of cream and one sugar.
“I have to go to work today. Our firehouse just adopted a new schedule. Four days on and four days off, but Elias and Jayden will be here.”
Elias turned. “I have a shift tonight but I can call in if you think your heat isn’t gone.”
Omegas’ heats usually lasted days, but this seemed to have been a mini one. Maybe it was biology signaling me, or kicking me in the pants, in the direction of choosing this pack. She knew what I needed.
“I think it’s over for now.”
They both nodded. Over breakfast, we made plans. I insisted on working still. Jayden stumbled in and put me on his lap while he ate breakfast.
My wolf was settled, maybe for the first time.
“I’d like to do some nest shopping if that’s okay?”
Carter groaned. “I’m going to miss the nest shopping. I’m gonna have to find a new job.”
“No, I can pay for my own things. A little.”
“You’ll do no such thing,” Jayden spoke for the first time that morning. “We have savings, and a lot of that was put away with the dream of an omega to spend it on. All the nest shopping without the pesky alpha.”
He was enjoying this.
Carter was not.
Elias was calm.
And I was one damned happy omega.
Epilogue
Elias
One year later…
Anathea sat in bed, pillows piled up behind her back. Cradled in her arms, our daughter. She was not the result of that first mini heat, but it was followed by a four-day true version just a couple of months later, and in that blur of lovemaking—I insisted that we call it that, although it was wild and a little rough and unending—we created one perfect, beautiful little person.
“Is she here yet?”
I kissed our omega gently on her lips and Katrina on her soft, pale-lavender curls. I’d assumed Anathea colored her hair when we met, and I loved how natural it looked. Turned out, it was natural to her, and now our daughter. “Carter says they will be pulling up any minute.”
“I can’t wait to see my sister. It’s been so long.”
When she got pregnant, she asked for Teri to come and visit. Not her parents. She was trying to get past her anger and grief at what they did to her. They spoke on the phone occasionally, but she had not given them the green light to come meet their granddaughter and her pack in person.
