The Hellhound's Un-Christmas Miracle - Zoe Chant Page 0,81
into his and squeezed it.
“Is it all right that I’m here?” she asked Caine. “I mean—I can feel this is the heart of your pack. Somehow. Is there a ceremony, or…?”
Caine looked flummoxed. “God knows. But you’re welcome here, of course you are. Both of you. Pack or not, Fleance, you’re one of us, and your mate is, too.”
“You need to get started writing that manual,” Fleance joked.
“That sounds like a task I could hand off to you, now,” he replied, grimacing.
Sheena asked what they were talking about, and when Fleance explained, snorted. “I’ll write the manual, and then you’ll both be sorry.”
“Please. Both of you come in, and—” Caine took a deep breath and gestured helplessly. “I don’t want you to think I abandoned you. Meaghan was onto me to go after you as soon as Rhys and Manu let slip where you’d gone. She was right. Or maybe she was just sick of me trailing after her like an anxious puppy. But things happened—early, not too early, but sudden. Opal came at once, of course, and she’d helped Abigail when Ruby was born, so she knew what she was doing, but it was still…”
Sheena gave Fleance a worried look. He had a strong suspicion he looked petrified, himself. Then Meaghan, Caine’s mate, called from inside the house:
“For God’s sake, Caine! Stop terrifying them and bring them inside!”
*It was the most terrifying moment of my life,* Caine muttered to Fleance as he opened the front door for them.
Meaghan was in the living room, ensconced in a throw rug with the sun streaming in and turning her dark curls into a halo around her head.
She smiled as Fleance and Sheena came in. “He fainted,” was the first thing she said, and Caine groaned out loud. “Not that I’m meant to tell you that. Protecting his alpha dignity, et cetera.”
“You were just glad I got myself out of the way,” Caine accused her, ducking to kiss her on the forehead.
“The floor isn’t ‘out of the way’!” she grumbled. It sounded like a well-worn conversation. Fleance barely heard it.
He was speechless. If he needed any more proof that Caine trusted him, this was it. Tucked up in Meaghan’s lap were two tiny babies, their scrunched-up faces and fluffy tufts of hair enough to break any shifter’s heart.
“Meet Lola and Hamish,” Meaghan said, as Caine slipped onto the sofa beside her and took one of the twins. “The newest members of our pack—but… not your pack, anymore?” She stared hard at Fleance, as though she was trying to look inside him, then blinked and rubbed her forehead. “It might just be the sleep deprivation talking, but…”
Fleance was speechless again. Meaghan was human; so far as he’d been aware, she’d never been able to sense the pack bonds before. But Abigail Heartwell was human, too, and she’d said that after she had Ruby, she had been able to connect to her daughter psychically. Maybe the same was true with hellhound mothers, with added pack sense?
Caine picked up her hand from her forehead and kissed it. “You’re right,” she told her. “He’s broken the pack bond somehow.”
“By forming another.” Fleance was surprised. His voice didn’t come out choked, or surly. It was warm and heady with pride. “Sheena, this is Meaghan, Caine’s mate. Meaghan—Sheena Mackay. My mate, and the reason Parker isn’t going to be a danger to your family or anyone else, ever again.”
Meaghan’s eyes lit up. “So, you’re your own alpha now?”
“Well…” He exchanged a look with Sheena. “That depends. What day is it?”
“Meet-your-family day,” she murmured. “Which means you’re in charge.”
She narrowed her eyes at him, and power tugged deliciously under his skin as they each tested one another’s authority. Sheena pushed up onto her tiptoes and nipped him on the chin. “And no take-backs,” she warned him.
*Not until tonight,* he replied, and she blushed bright red.
“Lunch!” Meaghan announced, and there was a flurry of activity from the direction of the kitchen. Fleance cast out his senses and found Rhys and Manu. Meaghan grinned. “If I don’t give them anything to do, they default to standing around staring at me and the babies like they’re terrified we’re going to shatter into a million pieces.”
“Or call up absent members of the pack to join the vigil,” Caine said, suitably abashed. He nodded at Fleance. “If my message sounded a bit panicked…”
“It’s because he is panicking. Constantly.” Meaghan sighed dramatically, then met Fleance’s eyes. “You said Parker isn’t a danger anymore?”