Page 195 of Omega's Heart

Kaden’s heartbeat sped up. “Absolutely.” And was rewarded with his mate’s very satisfied smile.

C H A P T E R 1 0 1

A round the first week of April, Kaden put things in place to move Felix back to Mercy Hills for good, or at least until the baby came. His mate was carrying well, according to all the rest of the omegas, and hadn’t suffered any of the usual ills of pregnancy—a fact which apparently made both Jason and Bram green with envy—but at five months along, flying became an only in emergencies thing. So they’d moved back to the apartment in Mercy Hills and Kaden was going to be working week on/week off in Washington. Until the pup decided to put in an appearance, anyway.

It was good to be home again.

Even better, all the nagging and phone calls back and forth had resulted in tonight’s hopefully epic surprise for Felix.

“I’m still allowed to fly at this stage, you know, as long as a doctor signs off on it,” Felix reminded him, about three days after they’d gotten settled back in. “There’s still Green Moon. And Winter Moon. We haven’t been to those yet.” He was making meals to put in the freezer in case the baby came early. Hunter sat at his feet, his expression hopeful. “Go sit with Kaden,” Felix told him, but Hunter paid him no attention, simply fidgeting in place to be ready in case anything fell.

“I think Holland wants to go to Green Moon. And I’m not taking you anywhere near Winter Moon right now. It snowed yesterday.”

“I’m from Colorado. I know snow.”

“Don’t care.”

Felix shot him an exasperated glance and Kaden hid his smile behind the newspaper he’d picked up on the way home from work today. Casually, he checked his phone to see if… Oh, there it was. Quin’s text.

It’s ready.

Kaden folded his newspaper up and set it aside. “Want to get out of the apartment for a while?”

Felix eyes him suspiciously. “Why? What are you up to?”

“Nothing!” As usual, it didn’t work. His mate would not be fooled. “Okay, I thought I’d go over and see how the construction on the new house is coming. Humor me?”

“Funny alpha.” Felix smirked at Kaden’s laughter and set the dirty dishes in the sink. “All right, but we can’t be long. There’s a lot of dishes left to clean.”

“You know, we can get food at the restaurant if you don’t feel up to cooking after the baby comes. Or I can cook.”

“I’m not even going to dignify that with a reply. Besides, I won’t be helpless, you know.”

“I know.” Kaden got up and crossed the apartment to press Felix against the kitchen cupboard and kiss him thoroughly. The baby kicked like he or she wanted to toss Kaden across the kitchen. From being hard to feel a couple of months ago, now Kaden wondered how Felix got any sleep at all with the acrobatics going on inside his belly. “Come for a walk anyway?”

“All right. Grab my shoes for me?”

“Sure thing.” Kaden gave him another kiss for good measure and went to hunt for their shoes. It wasn’t as much fun as hunting rabbits would have been, but he was a soldier and he could adapt. Besides, Felix was starting to have some trouble getting back up to his feet—it was a small thing for an alpha to do if he was going to look after his omega.

Kaden led his mate on a slow amble in the direction of the old Enclosure houses. Hunter bounded around them, ecstatic over this change in his routine—Kaden had to call him back every couple minutes as the pup disappeared to chase new and unfamiliar scents.

They passed the end of the grove that camouflaged the old houses from the rest of the enclave. The trees had been left there as the pack had expanded into better-built homes and more trees had been added after as the houses began to show the wear of hard usage. It was likely that a few of the trees would be cut down once the houses closest to the main building were fixed up and livable again, but that decision was pretty low on the list of priorities right now. Kaden might argue against it anyway. The more trees they had inside walls, the better it was for the pack as a whole, and a few trees here and there wouldn’t leave them hurting for space, especially after big brother Abel had pulled off that spectacular land purchase. Now all they had to do was tear down the laws that limited them to that space, and they would be… not golden, but with a paw on that path.

Their house was probably about as far from the main building as it could get, aside from the plot set aside for Quin’s planned home. Kaden glanced at his mate, strolling contentedly along beside him in the light of the half-moon. “How are you feeling?” he asked. Just checking. It was common knowledge that the last stages of pregnancy were tiring.

“I’m fine.” Felix swayed against him gently. “Call your son, would you? He’s disappeared again.”

They were nearly at the house. If Hunter spoiled the surprise… “Hunter! Come back here!”

Everything was silent for a moment, then faint barking came to their ears, growing rapidly louder just before their foster pup pelted out from between two houses. “Where have you been?” Kaden demanded, but Hunter just bounced, inviting him to play, then spun on his good leg and took off toward their house. I swear, pup, you and I are going to have words. Kaden gritted his teeth and pasted an expression on his face that absolutely did not give away that there was more to this walk than Felix expected. He hoped, anyway.

The house was forest green with white trim, almost invisible against the trees that the builders had somehow managed to salvage around it. A covered porch ran across the front of it, protecting the door into the house itself, and another one that led into the tiny two-room suite that was going to become Kaden’s office here in the pack.

That last was Quin making assumptions about Kaden’s future political career. Kaden had only argued about it for a minute. After all, they could turn it into a guest suite if they didn’t end up needing it.

No lights on, thank Lysoon.

He led Felix up the right-hand stairs and tried the door into his office. It swung open noiselessly and he turned the light on. “Ah, they got the shelves in.” Quin was going to assign him an assistant of some sort, to which Kaden had made a face, but if brother Quin was going to pay for it, he wasn’t going to complain.