Page 25 of Guarded By The Black Bear

“When are Davis and Cameron coming over?” He asks me.

“About twenty minutes.”

“Cami and Casey are going to want a treehouse, too, as soon as they see it,” he says, and I see him smirking as I climb back down.

“And you can go help Davis build one!”

He gives me a look out of the corner of his eye, and I laugh.

“It will give me a reason to spend some time with Cameron.”

“You see her all of the time,” he reminds me.

He’s right. Cameron and I see each other pretty much every day. We have play dates for the kids, or sometimes we leave the kids with our husbands and have a girls’ night out.

Gunner and I got married in a small ceremony at city hall about two months after we became mates. We found out that we were expecting just a week later. Cameron was also pregnant, and going through that together really brought us closer as friends.

We had our daughter and then, just three months later, learned that I was pregnant again with our son. After that, we decided to be done with kids. At least for a little while.

Gunner and I head inside, and I smile when I hear our kids starting to stir. It’s rare that they take naps these days, but they were tired from playing late last night.

We head back to their rooms, and I smile as I scoop our daughter, April, up in my arms. Alvin runs to Gunner, and he lifts him up.

“Want to see something cool?” I ask the kids, and they cheer and start talking a million miles an hour.

I follow Gunner back out to the treehouse, and the kids go crazy when they see it.

“A tweehouse!” April screams, and I smile at her as I set her down.

Alvin is right behind her, and I let Gunner help them up. He joins them, making sure that they don’t get close to the door.

“Now, you can’t come up here unless Mommy or I are with you,” Gunner tells them.

“Hello? Anyone home?” Cameron calls as she and her family come around the side of our house.

“Hey, guys! We’re back here.”

Cami and Casey come running around first, and they scream when they see the treehouse. Davis is right behind them, and he grins as he waves at me and then moves to help them up into the treehouse, too.

“That’s so cool!” Cameron says as she joins me.

“Thanks. Gunner built it for the kids.”

“We might have to get one, too,” she says, giving me a side hug.

“Want to sit?” I ask her once the kids and our husbands are up in the treehouse.

Cameron and I sit in the chairs on the back porch and smile as we hear our kids laugh.

“Who would have thought that we would one day be living in Alaska together?” she remarks, and I laugh.

“Or be married to shifters?”

She grins, and we both relax back into our chairs.

She’s right. I never would have expected that I would be living in Alaska, or better yet, that I would love it here. I never thought, that I would get married or have kids, but meeting Gunner changed all of that. And I’m so glad that it did. I love my life now and can’t imagine it any other way. I’m so lucky that I had a growly bear who was willing to guard and protect me all those years ago.

Gunner sticks his head out of the treehouse, and I smile as our eyes meet. I can see the promise in his eyes, and I grin.

Looks like I’m going to get lucky tonight, too.

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