Page 15 of The Lab: Rigg

Connor’s laughter filled the house with so much joy and love that I was back to looking at the ceiling again. It was something I’d been doing often since growing my little household from one to four.

Not wanting to miss out on the fun, I picked up Lily and threw her over my shoulder. “When you’re in your fur, you can run through the river to clean up. But when you have skin and toes…” I tickled the bottom of her feet and made her squirm on my shoulder. “It’s bathtub or shower. What do you prefer?”

“Bathtub!” they said in unison. That was something else they did a lot of. It was as adorable as it was creepy.

* * *

“Do you have to be human all the time?” Connor asked as Niles was pulling a clean shirt over the boy’s head.

“We like the wolf you better.” Lily was quite the charmer when she wanted to be. “But this you is okay too.”

Niles laughed and glanced up at me. “Not all the time, but as you two mentioned earlier, wolves don’t do baths, so I have to be in my skin most of the time.”

“Do you like being a wolf?” Connor wanted to know everything about being a wolf. Even though they were probably a decade out from shifting, they were both anxious to be in fur and able to go out in the woods by themselves. “Because when I get my fur, I’m never gonna be human. It’s so boring.”

“If you two eat all your veggies, I’ll shift afterward and give you rides.” Niles helped him into a pair of sweats while I was right beside them, brushing Lily’s hair.

As soon as they were dressed again, they ran to their scooters and started doing laps around the cabin. That was one nice thing about living in what was basically a two-room space. Except the bathroom and bedroom, they could play in every corner of the cabin.

Niles came at me and gave me a quick kiss. “I hate that you have to leave tomorrow.”

I pulled him into my lap and pressed my forehead to his shoulder. “Me too, but it’s just for one night.”

“We’ll miss you.” He turned and gave me a soft kiss. “But I know this is important for all of us.”

It was important. Our children would never be safe as long as there were labs hunting them down to turn them into weapons. And Dax confirmed there was a new lead they were strategizing about.

Even though his pack had more resources than I could imagine, I wanted to be involved. I’d been working too hard to just sit on the sidelines while they had all the fun. “You sure you’re ready for two full days alone with them?”

“No, not ready at all.” Niles chuckled. “But I’m fairly confident I can keep us all alive until you get home. And Gramps is just a phone call away.”

I smiled every time I heard Niles refer to my chosen grandpa as Gramps. Joel did too.

“You’re so good with them, Niles.” I pulled him flush to my chest. “They love you so much already.

His eyes got glassy, and he swallowed. “I love them too.”

Before he could beat me to it, I kissed his lips and then rested my forehead on his. “I love you too, ya know.”

He sucked in a shuddering breath. “I know, but I fucking love that you’ve finally said it.”

“Finally?” I nipped at his shoulder and scraped my teeth across his skin. “It’s barely been a few weeks.”

He shrugged and wiggled his hips over my growing erection.

“I was ready to say it that first night, but I understand that humans can be a bit slow on the uptake.”

My jaw dropped. “Slow on the…” I stood up with him in my arms and carried him to the bedroom. The kids were loud enough that we could hear everything they did and said. If it got quiet, we’d come check on them. But as long as they were noisy, we could get a little noisy ourselves. “I’ll show you slow on the uptake until you’re begging me to go faster.”

10

RIGG

“Glad you could make it.” Dax met me in front of a large house that looked like it had been built a few hundred years ago but was in pristine condition. “We’ve been working on a few scenarios that you might want to be involved in.”

A handful of beat-up trucks and motorcycles were parked in loose formation around the house.

A tall guy with shoulders as wide as a barrel and the command of an Alpha joined us. I pegged him as retired military or law enforcement. He just had that air about him.

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