Page 48 of Call Don't Fall

“No thank you,” I laughed.

“I still miss the old truck. I’d probably have kept it as a work truck and got something more pup friendly.”

“We can still do that if we can find a used one like you’re old one.”

“That would be more money than we’ve budgeted.”

“It’d be okay.”

“Save your money for the baby,” he said like he had a thousand times before.

“You’re allowed to have stuff you like too,” I reminded him.

“I have plenty of stuff I like. I just don’t like much stuff,” he shrugged. “I also want a truck that can make the drive to see the leaves next fall and sleep us all comfortably in the bed.”

I grinned at him. I couldn’t complain about that. The tentative plan we made in the hospital was taking shape. We’d decided that this time we wanted to go alone without any of our friends or family. Just me, Kirk, and Delanie.

“Don’t be mad,” Kirk said as we turned onto our street.

“What would I be mad at?” I blinked. “The truck stuff?”

Then I saw the cars lining the street on both sides. I recognized some of but not all them.

“What’s this?” I asked, my nails digging into the door handle.

“Grina and Treg’s surprise baby shower for you. I told them they were only allowed in the kitchen and living room.”

“I should bite you!” I said, swallowing down a growl from my wolf.

“Your parents are here. Mine too.”

“What?! You didn’t warn me?”

“You’ll be fine. My parents will love you to pieces!”

And they did. The evening wasn’t as bad as I thought it would turn out to be. My wolf behaved himself well enough as our friends and family lavished us with gifts for Delanie Hope and told stories about us when we were kids. There was something quaint about it all – something that made our house feel even more like a home. With only a few weeks left to go before Delanie Hope was born it was nice to check off the final items from our ‘to-buy’ list without having to go into a store or waiting on a drone to drop them off on the porch. It was even nicer to realize we weren’t alone in this whole raising a baby thing. Our parents were more than ready to be grandparents. The people gathered around us loved Delanie Hope almost as much as Kirk and I already did. I forgave them all for infiltratingour den and told them I wouldn’t make them wait too long to meet our baby once she arrived.

Chapter Twenty-Four

Kirk

The closer to Delanie Hope’s birth we got the more I doted on Chasten and the more he let me. No longer did he complain that I did most of the cooking or reminded him when it was time to check his blood sugar or have a snack. I also took up guard duty, answering the door and not allowing anyone inside. As the days passed, he spent more and more time in his wolf form. It wasn’t part of his original birth plan but I was quickly coming to suspect that he was going to give birth while furry. It wasn’t that uncommon for shifters to do and doctors were trained for it as well.

When Doctor Dreala came to check out the birthing room, Chasten hid in the bedroom refusing to shift back to his human form. Her ‘inspection’ didn’t take as long as I thought it would and within half an hour, she gave the room a thumbs up and insisted on checking on Chasten. It took me a few minutes of coaxing him, but in the end, he agreed to see her. She took one look at his twitching belly and asked me if we had all the baby supplies we’d need for the first few days of our daughter’s life. Thanks to Chasten’s obsessive ‘baby’ shopping and the baby shower our friends hosted, we did.

“Good and I’m glad the birthing room passed too,” she said, her voice low and steady. “That baby’s coming today, Kirk. Maybe not right this minute. Maybe not within the hour, but today. Do you think you can get him in there?”

“I know I can,” I said and shooed her off into the birthing room to get things ready.

Her expression didn’t look fond of being shooed anywhere, but she was in our territory now. I tiptoed back into the bedroomnot wanting to set off any anxiety or fear in Chasten. I peeked back into the bedroom where we had left him in the bed, but he wasn’t there.

“Mate?” I called out softly and tiptoed toward the bathroom on my socked feet.

The first snow of the year had come the night before and Chasten insisted we both needed to put socks on. I hated fabric clinging to my feet around the house, but I gave in to my pregnant mate.

A whimper sounded from under the bed, and I smiled to myself, no longer sure we’d make it to the birthing room. For a second, I almost barricaded the door. The need to keep the world out radiated all over our mating link from Chasten. Instead, I stretched out on my belly and asked him what the plan was over that same link.

Chasten put his paws over his eyes and shook his head. We weren’t going anywhere. So, I left Doctor Dreala to muck around in the rest of the house and grabbed some clean towels from the bathroom and stretched back at the foot of the bed with my mate. I massaged his ears and face as early contractions moved through his body. I stayed with him, only getting up to turn out the lights and grab a pillow to lean on while I was down on the floor.

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