Page 97 of Abel's Omega
“The Jackson guys are going too, but Justin’s staying. He’s going to apprentice with Jason’s dad over the summer. They need more tradespeople there.”
We did…they did. Not me anymore. But Justin? “Does he have to?”
Abel kissed the top of my head. “You’re not the only one responsible for them. I’ve talked to Bram’s parents, and to a few other responsible shifters. They’ll be more closely supervised. All of them.” He put extra emphasis on those last words. “So, road trip? I think that’s what the humans call it.”
I laughed. “I have no idea. But yes, I’d love to visit.” I hadn’t seen my family at all the last time, though Abel told me my mother had been by. I didn’t remember it at all. “When do you want to go?”
“Couple of days? Let me wrap a few things up here first.”
Wait a minute… “What are you going for?” Abel didn’t know the first thing about hooking up solar panels.
“We’re signing the papers for Jason once the panels at Montana Border are hooked up.”
“Oh, that’s wonderful.” I hugged him hard. “Will we bring the pups?”
“We can. We’ll be in the truck and the van anyway. We can send Justin and whoever comes to do the plumbing part back with the truck after we’re done in Montana Border, and take Mac with us to Buffalo Gap. Kind of a long trip, but we never got a honeymoon.”
“He won’t want to get right back to Jason?”
“I talked to him yesterday. The problem is seating—unless we tie someone to the roof of the van, we don’t have enough seats to take extra security until after Jackson-Jellystone. And it’s not like we can leave Mac behind, since he’s the one getting mated.”
“I see.” I guessed I saw. It was still a shame, though. “That’s a long time to be gone. You sure you can take that much time off?” Coming from a man I practically had to knock over the head like a caveman to get him out of the office, this struck me as odd.
“I’ll bring the laptop—all the hotels have internet. Quin put in for the last of his leave and finally got approved, so he’ll take over the day-to-day running of the pack. Not much of a vacation for me, but it gives me a chance to sweep you off your feet.”
“You did that ages ago,” I replied absently, my mind already racing ahead.
A vacation. I’d heard of them, read about them, but no one in the packs really took a vacation. Mercy Hills shifters had more spare time than I’d seen in either of my other packs, but they all still worked long, hard hours. Now that it was summer, it felt like half the pack was out working in the gardens, plus doing whatever else they did in the winter. The school-aged shifters were also out of school, working in gardens or trying out different jobs by following around established shifters. I wished Buffalo Gap could see this; it might give them hope.
“So, you want to go?” Abel asked again.
“Yes. Definitely.” Except… “What about?” I gestured at my belly.
Abel began playing his fingers over the back of my shoulder. “We’re not going to be able to hide a new baby in the fall, we talked about that. I say we treat it as nothing special, and deal with the consequences when they come. If we’re casual enough about it, maybe they won’t be so bad.”
I was glad to hear that he expected some repercussions, though I thought his hope that they wouldn’t be terrible and upsetting was a bit over-optimistic. Then again, as an omega, I’d been pretty sheltered. I had to trust that he knew what he was doing; he so often did.
“All right.” If we were going, though, there was another problem to deal with. “I’ll need clothes before we go.” I’d been willing to stretch things and get by with nice tops and one or two pairs of pants of stretchy material, but I remembered those rare times when Uncle Mitchel had gone visiting and how nice the clothes his mate packed were. And Patrick, even, had insisted I have ‘company’ clothes, though he never took me outside walls with him. I didn’t want to show Abel up.
He shifted his weight a little, pulling me more on top of him. “Yes, you’ll need something to show you off. Bram will know who the best person is, I suppose. Call him today and have him introduce you.”
“I will.” And maybe if Bram and I had something to bond over, he might listen to my advice about Justin.
The baby poked, hard. “Oh!” I cried and smiled as I put my hand over that spot. I’d felt flutters before, but nothing to run to Abel for. There was no point teasing him until he could feel it too. “Give me your hand!” I placed it over that spot and held my breath, waiting. Abel’s muscles were tense beneath me.
Poke.
“I felt it!” He spread his fingers wider, pressing more firmly against my skin, head bent close to my body as if he could hear as well as feel. “He’s really in there.” Then he looked sheepish and slightly embarrassed. “I suppose there’s nothing exciting about this for you.”
“It’s always exciting.” I placed my hand over his and marveled at the difference between this pregnancy and my others. I’d never have done this with Patrick. But Abel… I kind of wished I’d told him about the flutters and let him try to feel them. “There’ll be more from now on. It’ll get easier to feel.”
“They get stronger?”
I smiled at him and this time it wasmyturn to kiss the top ofhishead. “A lot stronger. Sometimes you can see my belly change shape.”
“Really?” His fingers tapped against me, a sure sign that he was thinking. “So this is what Mac was talking about.”
“Probably.” I hadn’t been around for those conversations, but I could guess. “So what do you think, Pap?”
