Page 77 of As The Shifter World Turns

77

THE TRIALS AND TRIBULATIONS OF WORKING PARENTS

Ivor

“Do we really need to discuss that now, love? It’s not happening for a few months.”

That was my mate’s response whenever I mentioned going back to work. “The few months have passed and the time is now, Ryder.”

His face registered shock. “What? No? Dyani’s too young.” He picked her up and she gurgled and tried to grab his nose.

I put my hands on my hips and counted to ten. Ryder was disagreeing because he loved our daughter and wanted one of us with her at all times. And he was worried about me taking on too much. He’s doing this out of love .

My wolf hated being parted from our daughter as well so it was two against one. I was outnumbered but determined to get my point across. “Babe, you’d think I was going to waltz out the door saying make your own lunch and don’t have any parties while I’m gone.”

“What?”

“Joke, love. I was joking. You remember what a joke is, right?”

He didn't reply but held Dyani tightly to his chest and his stag was close to the surface. “You and I will be chaperoning any parties our child and any future children attend.”

“Good to know, love.” I kissed his cheek. “But can we talk about the here and now?” I loved being with our daughter but I needed a break from diapers, feeding, spit up, and walks to the park. “Remember, I’ll be working from home three days a week, so it'll only be two days when we need a sitter.”

As I was making coffee and Ryder was getting ready to go to the office, I thought of how I’d turned around my insecurities. I wouldn’t get rid of them entirely but I’d gone from never wanting to be apart from Dyani and not trusting my mate to know what was best for her, to needing a little breathing space.

And while I had to credit Joy, my therapist, for guiding me, I was proud of having put in the work and getting over that huge hump. There would be other bumps in the road, but I was certain I was equipped to handle them.

“Who would we get to look after Dyani when you’re at the office?” Ryder asked as he walked into the kitchen and took a bite of my toast.

“Hey. Get your own.” Twisting my head, I noted my mate was only wearing his boxers and if it hadn’t been a work day, I would have jumped him. “But getting back to the issue of a sitter, all the agencies in town vet the people on their books.”

He screwed up his face.

“You come up with a suggestion,” I told him as I sipped my coffee.

“It’s the jam. Let’s not buy this one again. Yuck”

“Fine.” We were getting off the subject, and I suspected he was doing it on purpose to avoid discussing it. “But I’ll be juggling Dyani and work three days a week, so why don’t you take her the two days I’m in the office.”

It was a throwaway remark because taking the baby and all her stuff from home to Ryder’s office was very different to me working in our apartment where she could sleep in her own room and everything she needed was here. I could wear sweats most days and it wouldn’t matter if I brushed my hair.

“Okay.”

“You’re going to be late.” I held out my arms for the baby but he didn’t hand her over. Instead he inhaled her aroma. “As you’re the boss, I guess you can stroll in at nine-thirty.” Ryder was a stickler for being on time and hated when anyone kept him waiting so it wasn’t like him to be dawdling.

Something was niggling at me. Something I had to do or say or think about. I searched for the memory but couldn't find it. But as I rinsed my coffee cup, it hit me. The thing I’d been trying to recall. I swirled around. “Okay? What did you mean by okay?”

“Huh?” My mate was kissing Dyani’s tummy and she was squealing and giggling. It was a heartwarming moment and I let them have their fun.

“When I said you could take her to the office, you said okay. Spell it out for me, please.”

“You made a suggestion and I agreed. Pretty simple.”

I sank onto a kitchen chair and rested my arms on the table. “You’d take our daughter to work. Two days a week?”

“Why not? How hard can it be?”

I sent him a glowering look because he’d seen the state of the apartment and me when he arrived home in the evening and I told him about my day. And that was without me working.

Wait, was I bonkers wanting to add work onto my crazy schedule? Maybe, but I’d looked at it from different angles and I was way more relaxed about coping with a baby than I had been in those early weeks.

“We’ll need two of everything. Crib, stroller, toys, diapers. Because taking all the paraphernalia back and forth will drive you crazy.” And me.

“We can do that, can’t we, my darling girl?” Dyani snuggled against his chest.

He’d need help. We both would. Working while looking after a baby was far from easy and we might decide it was too much and hire a sitter. But for the moment, things were settled and we were both about to become working dads.

.

Daire

My bear wanted to mate Nate. It rhymed . Mate Nate! I was lying in his arms naked after giving one another mutual blow jobs. Nate had always been a little prickly about the subject of mating. Prickly! Ha! I was making jokes left right and center. Nate—or my Nate as I thought of him—was a hedgehog shifter, so yeah the word prickly came to mind when he came to mind, which I did. Often.

I’d brought up the subject a while ago and he’d been hesitant saying he didn’t want to rush into things. He’d heard me talking about Ryder and Ivor’s journey toward mating. Our own dating life had been rocky and he didn’t want either of us to regret claiming one another. I didn’t see how that was possible after mating.

But perhaps my parents were a prime example. They were each other’s one true love but I got the impression they would have been better experiencing more of life before mating.

“You awake?” I asked.

He wriggled his ass, telling me he was.

“I’ve been thinking.”

Mate. My grizzly was getting impatient, but Nate travelled a lot for work—he was a freelance photographer and videographer—and I had to speak my mind now while he was here.

Centuries or even decades past, it would have been the alpha claiming the omega. There wouldn’t have been a discussion. And definitely no omega, like me, would have broached the subject. But thankfully, times had changed.

“Go on.” He turned to face me.

“Don’t hate me,” I started.

“I could never.” He bopped my nose with one finger.

I hoped that was true after he heard what I had to say. “Mating,” I blurted out. “I love you and I want us to mate. ”

Even though shifters’ eyesight was better than humans’, Nate switched on a lamp. “Say that again.”

I gulped, hoping this wasn’t where he read me the riot act.

“Mating. I want us to mate.”

He stroked my cheek. “I like that idea.”

“You do?” I sat up and turned on my lamp. “But I thought?—”

He silenced me with a finger against my lips. “On my last trip away, I gave it a lot of thought. Even though we haven’t known one another long, I know it in my heart—and my beast does too—and it was silly of me to suggest we wait.”

After brushing a stray hair off his brow, I said, “It wasn’t silly. Being forced into mating is not something I’d ever do.”

He held up a hand. “But.”

I made a face and he grinned. “I want a public mating ceremony.”

“Where we get naked in front of everyone and bite and claw one another?”

Nate giggled. “No, we can do the actual mating in private but I want us to gather our friends and family to celebrate. We can each write vows just as humans do.”

Nate worked with a lot of humans and had been to many of their weddings and he mentioned how he enjoyed the ceremonies.

“We can do that. And I know just the place.”

“Let me guess. Either the Sunshine Manor roof, the beach house, or the lake house where you and your friends shift.”

“Lake house. The grounds are huge and everyone can shift afterward. As long as you’re okay with that? Did you have somewhere else in mind?” I nibbled my bottom lip hoping I hadn’t trampled over his idea of a dream mating location.

“Nope. That sounds perfect.”