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Chapter 1
Ren
Naturally,the string of Christmas lights I’d been unraveling and hooking along the hedge ended exactly five feet before the hedge did. I glowered at the string and at the hedge, as if that were going to convince one to grow or the other to shrink. Unfortunately, neither gave a damn what the leader of all shifter kind would have liked.
I stepped back into the courtyard of the avian estate and considered. Worse to leave a gap in my decorations or to have to go searching for another extension cord?
The damp chilly wind swept over my hair, flicking strands across my cheeks. It wasn’t the biting cold I was used to from New York winters growing up, but at least in New York we’d have had a little chance of seeing snow. Aaron had told me it hadn’t snowed in December here by the west coast in as long as he could remember.
Good thing I had three more Christmas celebrations after this to cover all the bases.
Footsteps tapped across the courtyard, and my avian alpha’s sister, Alice, came to a halt beside me. She cocked her head at my handiwork.
“We do have estate staff who can handle this kind of thing for you, you know,” she said in a slightly teasing tone. “There’s no reason our dragon shifter should be out in the cold, hanging lights.”
I made a face at her. “It’s not really a strain stringing lights on a hedge. I’m staying off ladders as promised.” The dampness in the air filled my lungs as I dragged in a long breath. “All these celebrations were my idea. I wanted to show how much I value the support I’ve gotten from the kin. I’m not sure that’ll really come across if I sit back and make them do the work for me.”
“I think they’d understand. You’re eight and a half months pregnant. Which no one with eyes would be able to miss, even if all shifter kind hadn’t been celebrating the news since you announced it.”
I rested a hand on my rounded belly. As if in answer, my daughter prodded my bladder with an elbow or a heel—something knobby. She had an awful lot of knobby bits, I’d discovered over the last few months of squirming and kicking.
Not yet, I reminded her.Sleep in there a little while longer.Not that I wasn’t looking forward to having all of her out where I could cuddle her without my internal organs getting bruised.
“I’m fine,” I said, waving Alice’s comment off and patting my belly. “We’re a team effort. Believe me, I’ve already promised at least ten people that I’ll put up my feet the second I start feeling worn out.”
Alice gave me a skeptical look, but she didn’t prod any further, just walked with me back to the front of the courtyard by the avian estate’s massive house, where I’d left the last string of lights. Possibly I waddled more than walked. Even my dragon shifter reflexes couldn’t completely offset the extra weight in front of me. It wasn’t a struggle to carry my growing child, but it did require a bit of a balancing act.
“Have you decided on a name?” Alice asked. “Not much time left.”
My daughter squirmed again, and I smiled. “I’ve thought about it,” I said. It was hard not to, with all those months feeling her grow inside me. “But I don’t think I’ll know what’s right until I’ve actually gotten to meet her.”
“Fair enough. But you know all the kin will be waiting with ears perked for that announcement.”
The wind settled down as we moved along the last hedge. We’d just positioned the last of the lights when a golden eagle soared by overhead.
My heart leapt at the sight of my mate. Aaron dipped down around the side of the house—probably to land on the balcony of his bedroom.
A few minutes later, the avian alpha strode out the mansion’s front doors in slacks and a wool coat. I hurried over to meet him. A pleased light lit in his bright blue eyes as he leaned in to kiss me, his hand coming to rest over mine where my fingers had instinctively smoothed over my belly again.
“How are you?” he asked. Not exactly an unusual question, but I’d swear I’d been hearing it ten times more from the moment my pregnancy started showing.
“Ready to kick things off,” I said. “Did you get everything set up out there?”
The corners of his eyes crinkled with his smile. “Following your precise instructions.”
“All right then. I think we can start letting people in.” I turned to Alice. “You want to help me see about some wine?”
Aaron’s sister grinned. “Absolutely. Especially if I get to drink for both of us.”
As the kitchen staff helped set up the beverage tables, the avian kin who’d responded to my widespread invitation to our Christmas festivities trickled in. By the time Alice finally got to partake of her first glass, the courtyard was buzzing with eager voices.
I stepped back to survey the crowd. The faces of the assembled shifters were as bright as their voices. And more than a few bellies as big as mine showed in the crowd. A swell of sorrow-tinged happiness filled me at the sight.
For the sixteen years before my return, with their dragon shifter missing and their alphas unmated, none of my kin had been able to have children of their own. I hadn’t seen any youngsters at all when I’d first toured the territories. They’d had to wait so long, but now there would be a whole lot of shifter children returning to our community alongside my own.
A pair of large hands came to rest on my waist. I leaned back into the familiar brawny form of the man who’d come up behind me, and my bear shifter mate’s arms rose to encircle me just above my belly.
“Keeping warm enough?” Nate asked in his low rumble of a voice.
