Page 17 of Watcher's Omega

Jolly’s tail went even faster.

“Not today, though. They need some more time to grow.”

“They?” Eamon asked.

“Always better to assume multiples until the screen proves otherwise,” Midwife Felp explained.

After a few more questions, Eamon managed to lay down. The table, like all examination tables on Hemlock Mountain were required to be now, was large enough to hold a dragon shifter in their human form. That meant that Jolly was able to lay next to Eamon and put a paw on his belly when Eamon tried to raise his shirt up.

“Jolly,” I said, my voice low like a warning growl.

Jolly whined and put his other paw on Eamon’s belly too.

“Gotta let him see the puppies.”

Jolly shook his head. His body language was on guard but in the way that asked why I also wasn’t on guard. I scooted my chair a little closer to the table and sniffed Eamon’s stomach. If he or the midwife thought I was being strange neither of them said anything. Nothing smelled off. I took a moment to explore my own feelings on the matter. My wolf was a little frustrated that it wasn’t our dads doing the ultrasound. They were trustworthy. This fellow could’ve been anyone. He could’ve been a great puppy eater for all we knew.

Eamon’s eyebrows arched high on his head as he met my gaze. He wasn’t too impressed with the great puppy eater comment. To appease Jolly and to show him that despite what my scent said, we were not going to eat the healer, I pulled up Eamon’s shirt myself. He moved his paws and sat up to stare at the healer. Thankfully, the new tiny machines didn’t make the whoosh-whoosh sounds the old ones had. Jolly might’ve bit the midwife for making that sort of racket.

Instead, he watched intently as the healer slid the ultrasound wand this way and that across Eamon’s stomach. I watched the screen on the wall with Eamon but kept Jolly in my peripheral vision just in case he decided to bite. His lip snarled here and there whenever Eamon moved or he thought the wand pressed a bit too hard.

“Three,” I whispered as the healer made the same round over my mate’s stomach. “One. Two. Three.” I glanced at Eamon whose mouth hung open a little. I bit the inside of my cheek. Was he mad? Was he afraid? Was it because I predicted it?

“The baby won’t grow up alone,” I offered, hoping to comfort him.

“Three healthy babies,” Midwiffe Felp said. “Three little heartbeats.”

“Can I carry three?” Eamon blurted out and Jolly snapped in the direction of the midwife. The guy was quicker than I expected him to be. He leapt back out of Jolly’s range and glanced in my direction.

“Jolly, buddy,” I said and he whined. “Eamon, I can take him out but then you’d be alone and I don’t like that.”

“I’ll be alright. Really,” he squeezed my arm.

As I carried a growling Jolly out of the examination room, I heard Eamon say ‘It’s been an interesting start to the new year…”

And our lives were to stay interesting that year. That afternoon we waited until Glenn was home and settled into his room before we gave him the good news that he’d be a god father in a few months. He fingered the skin on his arm that was once burnt but was now only a few shades paler than the rest of his skin but the grin that spread across his face was genuine and by that weekend when my parents came down to celebrate and have us a little mating feast/puppy shower he was already talking about how to create better working skin grafts for vampires. Him and Lee snuck off and talked about it for hours. I had the feeling that Glenn was going to make a name for himself in vampyric medicine and maybe even change the world.

That night when we were finally alone (except for Jolly who guarded the bedroom door any time Eamon was inside the room now) I couldn’t stop thinking about the fact I worked New Year’sEve because my life was uneventful. This year had turned out to be anything but that. From hunting down a bigot to cuddling up with my pregnant mate who was just starting to show the tell-tale signs of carrying triplets, I was having the best new year ever and I hoped our blessings would continue for many years to come.

I spent the next seventy-three days doting on my mate and preparing the house for three puppies. Three wasn’t the largest litter that I’d seen. Jolly was one of seven and Frieda was one of five. Three was a reasonable number though. We could hold all of them and one of us would still have a free hand.

The first thing we did the morning after everyone left from our party was to arrange our parental leave. I went back and forth on how soon I’d take it. I didn’t want to be overbearing with Eamon, but I also didn’t want to miss a moment of his pregnancy.

“I’ll go on leave when you do,” he told me right before I made the phone call and that settled it. I was taking the full amount of leave I was entitled to. Eamon worked as a costume designer, and I didn’t want him lifting anything heavier than a coffee mug or a fork. Was I a cave-alpha? Probably but there was a reason wild wolves raised big litters that mostly survived. We were lucky to be part of a pack who wanted to encourage population growth and understood that meant they had to let parents actually raise their pups without worrying about money. Parental leave wasn’t the only thing they offered but it was one of the biggest. Not having to worry about what Eamon might need while I was watching for doors was probably safer for everyone.

His pregnancy allowed our lives to fall into a comfortable rhythm. We woke in the morning and he often read in bed untilI cooked breakfast. Then, especially, in the early months, if it didn’t set off his morning sickness we’d have breakfast in bed. If Glenn was still home when I woke up, I’d leave him some too and some days he joined us, sitting on the sofa in our room. More often than not it was just us.

We’d do a whole lot of nothing except talking and maybe playing around together if Eamon was up for it until after lunch. Eamon found a workout online that he liked to do and I took Jolly for a run. Some days Eamon came with us but he wasn’t much of a runner except for our Thursday evening hunts. There was nothing sexier than him leaping onto the back of a buck and then chowing down until he was covered in its blood and looking so content that I shifted back just so I could carry him home.

We spent a lot of our evenings talking about what having three pups would mean and one day he asked me a question that proved sometimes my wild born status did make me a bit oblivious to ulterior motives unless they were deadly.

“If it came down to it would you stay home with the kids while I went to work?”

I bit my lip and he thought I was going to say no.

“Well, you know I would,” I said, to ease his worry. “I was just trying to figure out if I’d bring the babies to you to chest feed or if you’d pump. We could do the formula. I was a formula baby and turned out okay. I think my parents added extra stuff, though. So I could ask them.”

His eyes teared up and my heart plummeted into my stomach.