Page 12 of Duke's Baby Deal
He nodded. “I’ll heat up the rest later. Or Holland will.” He shot me a wicked smile and nudged me with his elbow. “Seeing as how he’s appointed himself Chief Protector and nursemaid. Don’t let him bother you. This—” He gestured to himself, the swept his hand around in a way that seemed to take in both the baby and myself, “—is hard for him.”
“What happened?”
Bax shook his head. “Not my story to tell, but maybe once we’re past this rough patch, you can ask him. I don’t know if he’ll tell you, though.”
Fair enough. I would have liked to know, though, so I didn’t keep stomping on his toes. But now I was thinking it was something even more horrible than the rumors, and that made me even more curious. “You want any help getting settled?” I wondered how much pain he was in, and my omega line twinged, like it knew what was coming.
“No, I’m fine, just a little tender. It’ll be gone tomorrow. Mostly I’m sleepy, but with a ravenous pup, you get your rest when you can.” He wiggled down into the pillows and pulled the blanket up to his chin. “We borrowed movies from the library, if you want to go watch. Or there’s books. I just finished one—I think it’s still on the kitchen table, if you want to go look for it. The cover’s blue.”
“Thanks.” I glanced back as I was going through the door and he was asleep already, eyelashes a dark half-circle against the faint shadows underneath his eyes. He was beautiful and that bit of jealousy and resentment that I could never quite get rid of prodded me again, then vanished in a puff of sudden understanding. Yes, he was prettier, and had better manners—something I was trying to fix—but he knew a hell of a lot more about being an omega than I did, and I should have listened, instead of getting my underpants in a bunch.
Holland had covered all the pots and left them simmering on the stove. The vegetables were waiting on a wooden cutting board for someone to drop them into a pot of water. I checked the time, then decided to set the table, because it was nearly time for the pups to be home, unless Abel decided to leave them there for the evening. So I set the table for Abel, Holland, and the pups, set out butter and salt and pepper, filled glasses with ice water for the adults and milk for the pups. I was just putting the last of the drinks on the table when Holland walked in.
“The pups will be back—” He paused and looked at the table. “Oh. You’ve already set it.”
“It was the least I could do.” I took my bag of sheets from him. “I’ll go hang these out.”
“Did Bax eat?” he asked as he went to the stove and set water on to boil.
“About half. I put the rest in the fridge. He’s asleep now.”
“Good.” Holland sounded as tired as Bax, now that I was paying attention.
I didn’t really know what to say to Holland, so I went out back and hung my sheets up on the clothesline. The light had turned blue-gold in the time I’d been inside with Bax and the temperature had dropped enough that I regretted not putting my jacket on again. As I came back into the kitchen, I heard the thump of small—and large—feet out front. Fan barreled into the kitchen, saw Holland at the stove and me at the door, then turned on his heel and bolted for the bedroom. I peeked around the corner to find the other three pups, plus Abel, Quin and—oh no! Duke!—in the front hallway.
“Fan!” Abel’s voice rang down the hallway, and the little feet stopped. “Come here.”
Fan dragged himself back, and Abel got down on one knee in front of him. “Wait and see if they’re sleeping, okay? Dabi’s tired, and the baby is small. We’ll go right in as soon as we know that we aren’t waking them up.” The other pups gathered around them, and Abel hugged them all while Fan pushed out his lower lip, but after a moment, he sighed and nodded. “Okay,” he said. “Can I have a cookie?”
“Supper first,” Holland said from the sink. He rinsed whatever he was rinsing, then left it in the sink. “Go wash your hands.”
“I’ll take them,” I offered, willing to do anything to get out of the kitchen while Duke was there. I held out my hands to the pups, ignored Abel’s startled and slightly resigned expression, and herded them off down the hall to the bathroom.
We took our time, making sure we were so clean we shone, and then I sent them back to the kitchen for their supper, and slunk into the living room to hide. Bax’s novel was sitting on the edge of the couch, not in the kitchen like he’d thought, and for lack of anything better to do, I picked it up.
Half an hour later, two-and-a-half year old Beatrice crawled up beside me and curled in against my side. “Hi, Brammie.”
“Hi, Bea. How was school today?”
“It was fun. Did you know that I got a new baby brother now?”
“I do! What do you think about that?”
“He’s not much fun. I thought he’d be bigger.”
“He will someday. But he’s only just born now.”
Someone knocked on the door, but Abel got to it before I could untangle myself from Beatrice. I heard surprise and then concern in his voice, and realized it had to be Adelaide. My face prickled and felt cold, and when Abel came around the corner, his eyes fell on me and I could tell he’d figured it out.
Adelaide gave me a look that said, “Come down when you can do it discreetly.”
I nodded and avoided Abel’s eyes. “Beatrice, did you take your plate to the sink?”
“Ummmm,” she said, clearly trying to figure out if she could tell me no safely.
“Let’s go do that, okay?” I stood up and took her hand.
“Beatrice,” Abel said, his voice rumbling down into that alpha timbre. “You’re big enough to put your own plate in the sink. Bram needs to come with me. Go find Holland.”
