Page 67 of Deadly Sweet

“Good to know.” He nods his head, smile still in place.

“So...you're a firefighter.” I say to Walker. Fucking sexy might I add. “You're ex-military turned bodyguard.” My eyes flick over to Leroy. “You're a cop.” I look at Caleb. “And you’re a teacher.” I end, looking at Jake.

“And you're the sexy badass vigilante completing our pack of randos.” Caleb chuckles. “Perfect fit to me, might I add.”

That makes my heart flutter, a warm, happy feeling filling me. No judgment, no rejection, like I was worried about. They... want me. For me.

Listen, I was really worried I was going to have to kill them for a little bit. But thank fuck I don’t have to.

“Now that we’ve gotten that part out of the way, wanna tell me more about her?” I nod towards the sleeping baby.

“This is Athena. She was made through surrogacy. The egg was from an anonymous donor,” Leroy informs me. “We’re not sure whose DNA she has, but it doesn’t matter to us. It’s why we mixed our samples together. We didn’t care who helped make her. We just wanted her. She’s ours either way.”

I smile. “That's so cute. You all came in the same cup and made a cum smoothie.”

They all groan except Caleb, who laughs.

“Something like that.” Jake chuckles.

“Why did you want to have a baby this way? You have a pack, why not find the right woman?” The thought of them being with another woman makes me want to stab someone in the eye right now.

“Our jobs took up most of our time. We were all busy. We were in no place to add a partner,” Leroy says.

“And we didn’t want to start something with a woman and not all be together.”

“Why wouldn’t you have all been together?” I frown.

“Because I refused to be with another woman when my mate was out there somewhere,” Jake speaks up, making my heart race. He looks at me with this intense emotion in his eyes that I don’t understand, but I sure as hell feel in my soul. “I already found my mate. There was no other person on this earth for me. Only you, Savvy.”

“But what if you never found me?” I find myself asking in a whisper.

“Then I’d have lived a life with the small hope that one day I would. I’d rather die alone than have been with someone who wasn’t you,” his voice cracks, and I feel my eyes welling with tears.

I hope he knows he just cemented what we have together, and the only way that man is getting away from me is in a body bag. I’m keeping him. He’s mine.

Taking a shaking breath, I smile. “Thank you.” He has no idea how much his words mean to me.

I turn my attention back to the group of them. “So, if you don’t know who the donor is, who carried and gave birth to her?”

That question earns me a nervous look from the group of them.

“What?” I ask cautiously, not liking how they’ve all gone silent, looking guilty as fuck.

“We had the egg placed into a surrogate.” Jake clears his throat.

“Yeahhh.”

“Ashley isn’t just Athena’s nanny.” Walker scratches his beard. “She was also the surrogate.”

My body goes stiff as I blink rapidly. So, they’re telling me the woman who gave birth to their daughter became her nanny. I don’t like this. Not one fucking bit. The idea of this woman building a mother-like bond with their child makes me uneasy.

“You said you didn’t have a woman.” My eye twitches as I try really hard to keep my cool.

“We don’t,” Caleb says quickly. “We’ve never touched Ashley in any way. She’s just the woman who carried our daughter and then helped care for her after she was born. Having a newborn isn’t easy, and we needed the help. We were in over our heads and didn’t know what we were doing.”

“So she lives here,” I start slowly. “In this house. With all of you?”

“Yeah,” Leroy answers awkwardly.

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