Page 12

Mulder

Madeline was in bed for the night, and Kenny was scheduled to go back to his pack in the morning. There was still so much for us to decide. We were mates, and that was great—but we had two very different lives, and somehow, we were going to have to figure out how to merge them.

“As cliché as this is, this omega is gonna go make sandwiches. I’m starving. You?” I’d have made something better, but it was time for grocery shopping.

“I could eat.”

We pulled on enough clothes to be decent in case Madeline woke up and went into the kitchen. Shifter kids were used to nudity in the shifting process, but they didn’t need to have adults wandering naked for no good reason.

I pulled the sandwich fixings from the fridge as he grabbed the plates and knives. I loved how he pitched in on the mundane tasks like this. Not all alphas would, especially not pack alphas.

“I hate to bring this up, but you’re supposed to leave tomorrow?” Ignoring it any longer wasn’t going to help anyone.

“Yeah, I am. I was thinking about that. A lot.”

He and I both. There wasn’t a quiet moment when I wasn’t hyper focused on what came next. I should’ve brought it up sooner, but part of me was terrified about how it would go, and I didn’t want to ruin the wonderful time we’d been having.

Being part of his pack had never been his plan. He went to college as an escape. He was even less happy about being thrown into the role of pack alpha. But that was the hand he’d been dealt, and the one he was currently living with. He took his responsibilities seriously, and the pack was significantly better since he took over.

“So, what are we going to do?” He grabbed the loaf of bread and made two sandwiches—one for me and one for him. Maybe this wasn’t as cliché as it could have been.

“I don’t really know.” I wish I had all the answers, or even one at this point.

“And as I see it, we have two choices. We can go back to my pack, or we can stay here.”

“Won’t that mess everything up for you?” His pack ran very differently than Alpha Aspen’s.

“No. It won’t.” He didn’t sound like he quite believed that. “Please don’t be offended by this question, but are you officially pack?”

“Ish. Madeline is. I am…pack-adjacent. They treated me like pack, but I never officially joined, mostly because I didn’t want to deal with the paperwork.”

He leaned forward in his chair, giving me his undivided attention.

I went on, “I was born into the cat equivalent of a pack. I haven’t seen them since I was a child, but I’m not officially rogue. It didn’t matter to me if I was pack or not. What did matter was Madeline having one.”

“Well, in that case, if we decide to stay here, you would need to become pack officially—and that would be the loophole. I know it’s not fair to ask you that, but rules are rules.”

“I’d need to talk to the alpha.” I wasn’t opposed to the idea, but I had turned down the offer once. It wouldn’t be right to assume that I could simply say backsies and have it be a done deal.

“Your alpha hinted that if I wanted to, I could be a beta here.”

“What do you mean hinted?” Aspen had always been very straightforward with me, but then again, I wasn’t the leader of another pack.

“I mean, he said if I wanted to take advantage of the loophole and stay here, then I could do that. He didn’t say you needed to become a member, not exactly. He told me to talk to you about your position in the pack, though, and I read between the lines.”

Aspen was always looking out for me.

“As far as the pack is concerned, I’m one of them. It’s not a usual situation, for sure.”

“Yeah, I’m beginning to see that.” He took a bite of his sandwich.

“Where does this leave us?”

“That leaves you to decide what you want to do. I’m making decisions for just me. You know what’s best for Madeline. It isn’t my call.”

“No, it’s not me who decides. It’s you. You’re a pack alpha. I may be deciding for Madeline and me, but you are deciding for an entire pack.”

We went back and forth as we finished our sandwiches, both of us basically saying, you decide; no, you; no, you .

When I put the plates in the sink, I dropped one a little too loudly and cringed. I was going to wake Madeline if I wasn’t careful.

Only thirty seconds later, I realized it was too late for being careful—because out she came, and she looked visibly frazzled.

“Hey, sweetie, are you okay?” I asked.

She ran over to Kenny and hugged him. “I had a dream. I had a dream that we had to leave everywhere, and we broke down, and we had to start a new life. And it was a bad dream.”

It was the dream of the story of how we came here, only instead of the two of us alone, Kenny was in it too. Somehow this situation melded with her past during her dreams.

She remembered a lot more about that time than she should. At first, I thought it was because I’d been pretty honest with her about our journey here. But over the years, she’d mentioned details I’d never shared. She remembered things I was sorry she’d been aware of—not a lot, but anything tied to deep emotions like that was too much.

“Well, you don’t have to worry about that,” he assured her. “You’re home. You’re safe. How about I tuck you back in and tell you the story about when I was in college and my wolf wanted to come out so badly that my foot shifted during a test?”

She gasped. “Is this a make-believe story, or is this like a book Daddy makes?”

“It’s like a story Daddy makes.”

She grabbed his hand and the two of them went in. Based on the giggling I heard coming from her, the story was hilarious.

He came out a minute later. “She’s already mostly asleep. Even my hairy foot story didn’t entertain her enough to keep her awake.”

“That’s good. From the sounds of her laughter, I need to hear that tale soon.”

“I can arrange that. In the meantime, I think we know what we need to do.”

“What’s that?” Because I sure didn’t know.

“We need to sleep on this. I’m going to send a text to my pack and let them know more meetings came up. Buy us a few days. But we shouldn’t be rushing into this too quickly, either way.”

Relief flooded me. Even though it was only a few more days to decide, the time felt like decades compared to what we’d just been facing.

“Tomorrow, I’m going to ask Aspen to make me officially pack. Then we have choices.” Even if we decided to stay with his pack, having Madeline and I both transferring from the same pack would be easier. “I have a feeling tomorrow is going to be a long day.”

“We should go to bed.” He stood up and approached me, hugging me close. “We’ll figure this out. And we’ll live our best life ever—you, me, and our beautiful daughter.”

“Gods, I love the sound of that.”

“Me too.” He kissed the top of my head and scooped me into his arms. “Now let’s go get some sleep.”

And we did get some sleep—but not quite right away.