Page 19 of Watcher's Omega

“Why would I choke on it?” he laughed.

“You said both and you get what you ask for,” I teased, walking toward the kitchen.

Chapter Ten

Eamon

Hemlock Mountain

I didn’t understand why I felt the need to stay in therapy even after Glenn was okay until after that conversation with Rhomas. He was a great guy. The best really and I still couldn’t help but to fear that somewhere under all that wonderfulness was an alpha like my sire. I went to therapy so that he didn’t have to prove that he wasn’t that guy every day.

Rhomas could’ve never been anything like my sire. He was too doting. Too in tune with me. So much so that sometimes I wondered if I gave enough to our relationship. It was something we talked about a lot. I expected Rhomas to shrug it off and say of course I did but he talked about what he loved about me at length until I was a blubbery mess. After that he started thanking me every time I did something he liked whether it was kissing or falling asleep at labor class when we were supposed to be practicing our breathing exercises. It became hard to be extra critical of myself when he was constantly thanking me for everything. He made my pregnancy easier even when I was so fat with pups that I couldn’t tie my own shoes or get out of bed on my own.

“Thanks for letting me help you,” he said over and over.

“You know that you don’t have to keep that up forever, right?” I laughed one morning when I was two days out from my due date.

“I know but you always smile and that’s what I’m trying to do. I want you to know that you bring so much to our family and our relationship. I don’t want you to ever feel like you don’t. Relationships aren’t fifty-fifty all the time. Sometimes one person needs more help than the other and then it changes. You’re growing three puppies. You need help and I need to help you because oh-my-fucking-god you’re having our puppies!” He laughed, his eyes lighting up like they did every time he talked about the triplets. His wolf wasn’t out but I could practically see the furry guy’s tail wagging.

I laughed again and everything inside of me must’ve gotten really shook up because something ran down my legs, showering our feet.

“Our puppies!” Rhomas said, his eyes twinkling.

Jolly howled his joy.

“Don’t let go of me!” I laughed. “I think I’d topple over and I’ve wet myself!”

“Your water has broken. There is a big difference, mate,” he said and stole a kiss. “Sorry – alpha-izing.”

“I’ll let you by with it this time,” I said as my brain put together all the pieces. My back had ached for days but since I looked as if I swallowed Jupiter I figured I should be more worried if my back didn’t hurt. Now it was all coming together. Our puppies would be here soon!

The great thing about the house was that it had a birthing pool installed years ago. Our plan was to inform the hospital and the midwife would stay on standby but only interfere if we ended up needing help. They tried to keep it a secret but they all expected we would need their help before because I was a first-time carrier birthing three puppies. In my mind, it was a coinflip, but I had Rhomas who not only had a sixth sense but also seemed to react in sync with situations as they evolved.

I won’t say it was easy. Giving birth has never been easy – not since the first time someone had to push a whole other miniature copy of them out of their body – but I wasn’t as afraid as I thought I’d be when the time came. The hardest part was the waiting. At first the contractions were further apart and I paced through the house while Rhomas communicated with the midwife and his parents. I asked him to send a text to Glenn because I didn’t trust myself not to squeeze my phone so hard that it cracked in my hand if a contraction hit me mid-text. Jolly followed at my side. At first, I thought he was trying to brush up against me for comfort, but he was leaning into me so that I knew that I could lean against him and he’d keep me upright. I ran my fingers through his thick, silky fur. Rhomas had taken him to the salon just a few days before.

“Three puppies,” I whispered to Jolly as Rhomas’s nimble fingers danced over his phone screen.

The waiting was the worst part because at first the contractions seemed unpredictable. Then as they grew closer together waiting was the worst part because I knew what was coming. I knew the pain was about to torpedo through me and there was nothing I could do to stop it. I could only hold onto Rhomas’s hands and count down the seconds – then they camecloser and closer - resuming their unpredictability and it was time to get into the birth pool.

Jolly waited outside of it and Rhomas stood behind me, rubbing my shoulders. When it was time to push, my wolf growled and the sound reverberated up my throat. Without being conscious of the movement, I found myself on all fours, panting and pushing. After hours the first of our puppies was nearly there. My wolf snarled and I snapped at the empty air, gnashing my teeth as he threatened to come out. Once our first puppy was born everything stopped for a long time. For over an hour, we had a little peace. Our pup, a little boy with grey fur and shut eyes rested against my chest, happy to be warm and full of milk.

Then it all started all over again. Only this time, I was too tired to pace. Sometime during the second round of contractions, Glenn came home from the lab. He’d been in the middle of a graded lab for a certificate and couldn’t check his phone or leave in the middle of it. He cuddled our firstborn who Rhomas named Eamos, combining our names. I hadn’t heard the name before but I loved it as soon as it belonged to my puppy.

Then next baby came in long, grunting pushes. He yipped and yowled as if we’d plunged him into ice water upon his delivery. It rolled through Rhomas’s thoughts that if we were all wild wolves we might call that one Big Mouth. I laughed, finding it funny while I reveled in all the love-coated hormones surging through my body. Of course, we didn’t name our puppy Big Mouth or even Streak for the white smudge going down his forehead. Raymond, my way of putting our names together, but starting with R like Rhomas instead of an E like mine. I’d met a few random Raymonds in my day, but the name was uniqueenough that I didn’t worry about having ten of them in the class when the triplets started pre-school.

Waiting for the last one was the hardest. I drank so much tea with so much sugar because my body longed for sleep but every time I dozed off, holding Eamos and Raymond, another contraction would grab me around my middle and squeeze as if labor was an invisible constrictor snake trying to squeeze out my baby and eat it.

Because our puppies stayed in their little shifted forms for the whole of my pregnancy, we didn’t know who to expect. The triplets weren’t identical by any means. Eamos was grey – almost silver. Raymond’s fur was closer to black with the little white smudge on his head, running down his muzzle. If they had been, I’d have expected another little boy and I’d have been wrong. The last puppy who came out in three big pushes that sapped the last of my energy was our little girl. She was umber and shades of grey, gorgeous and yipping. Rooting around the air for milk before Rhomas ever cut the connection between our bodies. She knew that the air meant food and smelled the milk on her brothers’ breaths. She was the most difficult to name because I was tired and Rhomas was too even if he didn’t let on. That was the thing about my mate. He’d press on and on until the task at hand was complete and then and only then would he let you know he was exhausted hours ago. In the wild, rest had its time, but that time wasn’t during survival tasks and sometimes I thought he considered everything a survival task. Though, I’d never be so grateful for his endurance as I was that day. It was he, along with Glenn, who helped me clean up and get to bed after everything was said and done. He moved the puppies into the bed with me and Glenn went off to make something to eat. I wasn’t sure I was ready to eat yet. His parentshad arrived back on Hemlock Mountain, but I wasn’t ready for visitors yet either. Our little girl didn’t even have a name.

“What about Ema? Not Emma. EE-ma. Like Ima but with an E?” Rhomas suggested.

“I like that. She does look like an Ema, huh?” I said right before I gave into my wolf taking over. I had three pups and two nipples in human form. That wasn’t working out for them. Ema kept knocking her brothers away with her big swaying head.

“They are so perfect. Just like you,” Rhomas said, leaning his forehead against mine. “You did so well. You’re so strong. You’re amazing.” Coming from any other alpha I ever met, I’d have said he was laying it on thick. Only Rhomas was always like that. It was as if the wild wasn’t as uncivilized as we thought it was. Perhaps, packmates ran around rooting each other on all the time. Maybe that’s the way they had to be when their survival depended on each other.

“I love you too, mate,”I said over our mating link.“Let’s rest, though. Just a little rest. Glenn will cook. Your parents will barge into the house soon and take over in the most beautiful way. They’ll arrange food and keep annoying people away. They can guard for a bit. Nap with me.”

Rhomas shifted into his wolf form, and I curled around our pups. He lay over all of us, like a big warm blanket, keeping the outside world from laying one finger on our peaceful little existence. Our lives together started with a literal bang, but the wild wolf who fate chose for me brought more peace into my life than anyone I’d ever known.