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TWENTY-TWO
My classes flew by.When I got home, the house was a wreck and Elliot looked like he’d barely survived a tornado, but both of my guys were grinning, and kissed me when I got there.
They had already been to the park, but Elliot claimed it had been a war to convince Evan to leave, so I threw some sandwiches together and we headed back there for a playground picnic. There was a little snow on the ground, but between our coats and our wolfy genes, we weren’t cold.
Elliot and I sat side-by-side, eating and chatting, while we watched Evan tear through the playground like a man on a mission. If he’d been in his human form, we would’ve had to follow him closely to make sure he didn’t fall off anything. But in his wolf form, he was faster, more balanced, and a hell of a lot more agile. So he just had a blast with the other six kids on the playground—a pack, most-likely, Elliot had explained to me—while we hung out.
When we were done eating, our fingers knitted together, and we sat side-by-side, watching the kids play.
“So do you think the kids are a pack, or the parents?” I murmured to Elliot, my eyes scanning tables and benches set up around the playground. Two women sat beside each other on one of the benches, chatting quietly. Two men occupied one of the tables, both scrolling on their phones. Another two women were on their own benches, on their phones as well.
“Definitely the kids.” Elliot didn’t have to think about it for a moment. He murmured, “See the guys sitting on the table together?”
I nodded.
“Sometimes the women in a pack don’t get along great, but the men always do, because they’ve grown up together. Not a chance those guys are in a pack.” He paused, and flashed me a guilty grin. “Plus, I know them both, and they’re from separate packs. One’s in his early thirties, the other in his mid-twenties.”
I laughed. “Cheater.”
“Hey, it’s not my fault I’m in on the town gossip,” Elliot teased me.
My head tilted to rest on his shoulder, my lips still lifted in a smile. “What’s the town gossip say about us?”
He chuckled. “More than you want to know.”
I shot him a curious look. “You can’t just tell me that and not explain.”
“Mostly they’re just talking about me, and how difficult it must to raise a kid who isn’t mine and doesn’t look like me. It doesn’t seem to matter to the gossips that I don’t find it hard outside of the normal difficulties of parenthood—or that I don’t care that he doesn’t look like me. There’s a hell of a lot that matters more than whether or not our appearances match, you know?”
“I know.” I slid closer to him, wrapping my free hand around Elliot’s bicep. “People will always find some reason to judge you for one thing or another. There’s always judgment, and there’s always gossip. We can never make everyone happy, or earn everyone’s approval. All we can do is keep our chins up while we live our lives however the hell we want.”
Elliot gave a soft chuckle, his other hand reaching over to rest on top of mine, on his bicep. “Glad you feel that way too.”
“Thank you for last night,” I said, sporadically.
He flashed me a wicked grin that made my cheeks hot, as I shook my head at him. “Not for that, though I enjoyed that a whole damn lot. For what you said, about my parents. About me being who I am not because they treated me like crap, but because of myself. I needed to hear that.”
“No need to thank me for treating you the way you deserve, Liz.” He tugged my hand off his bicep and lifted it to his lips, brushing his mouth over my fingers before pressing them to my palm.
Warmth flooded my lower half, like the damn climax was coming back to life, reminding me that the plethora of children around didn’t completely erase the mating process hormones.
“Are we supposed to make dinner tonight?” I checked.
“Nah. They took me off the food duty rotation when I started chasing Evan around.” He flashed me a grin. “Another pro to the instant dad situation we’ve got going on.”
I laughed. “It’s been more than a month, yet I’m still shocked that you’re so positive about it.”
“You’ll get used to it. And eventually, annoyed by it, probably.” His grin widened. “My positive attitude drives some of my pack members crazy sometimes. Not so much now that most of them have ladies in their lives, but you should’ve seen the way they growled at me when we were in high school and college.”
I couldn’t fight a grin. “I can’t imagine why.”
“Hey.” He kept grinning, squeezing me closer with the arm draped around my shoulders. “You’re damn adorable, you know that?”
“I’d prefer sexy or badass,” I drawled back, still grinning.
He turned toward me, his lips brushing my ear as he growled playfully, “My sexy badass mate.”
I laughed.
