Page 55 of Dimitri

“I do not require you to come to my family over yours. I know your family will help just as much as mine would.” Dimitri stopped, pulling me to a halt with him as I was holding on to his arm while walking through the deep snow. “I want you where you are most comfortable. But yes, I do wish for you to reach out for help if you should need it. Even if it is through our bond and you ask for me to be returned, that is what I wish.”

I was smiling but, again, knew he couldn’t see it. “I will,” I told him. “I am feeling so much better. Even you have commented on how much more energy I seem to be having.” I did have to drink the other tea at night. It wasn’t that I couldn’t sleep without it. That wasn’t an issue. But I had problems with staying asleep. I wasn’t nearly pregnant enough to have the aches that I did, but they had appeared from the beginning and were still keeping me from resting as I needed, so Dimitri and I had agreed that having a cup of the other tea before bed was my best course.

“I know, lyubimyy.” Dimitri leaned in and placed his forehead on mine. “We can continue this conversation inside. Or even later. Right now, if I don’t get you over to that porch and inside, I believe my mother is going to come running over here, and that, in turn, will upset my father.”

I turned my head and saw a couple standing on the front porch. There was a tiny woman standing there with a rather large man with his arms wrapped around her. That could only be Dimitri’s parents. It could be nobody else.

“Oh. We should probably hurry up. If your father is anything like you, then I would imagine he’s not going to be too happy with your mom being outside in the cold.”

“Nyet.”

I chuckled as I tugged on Dimitri’s arm to get him moving again. It didn’t take long, and we were climbing the steps to theporch. Dimitri’s father was holding his mate back, and I couldn’t help but smile.

I heard him say something, but I didn’t understand, so I looked up at Dimitri in question.

“He told her that she has been through this before and to be patient.”

“Ah.”

Dimitri moved across the porch, bringing me with him. “Caspian, these are my parents, Shen and Millie,” he said.

I smiled, but since I still had my scarf wrapped around my face, I knew they couldn’t see it, so I pulled it down and continued to smile. “It’s so nice to finally meet you,” I told them. I chuckled when Millie started wiggling in her mate’s arms. She was so tiny, but that seemed to be the normal thing for fox shifters, but the size difference between her and Dimitri’s father was quite a bit.

Dimitri said something to them, and his father opened his arms, freeing his mate, and then Millie was rushing toward us. I wasn’t sure if it was because he knew what to expect or if it was because Dimitri was being protective, but he stiffened his arm and held me in place while taking a step forward. I wasn’t sure if Millie picked up on it or not, but Dimitri effectively kept his mother from plowing into me. He held out his free arm and wrapped it around her when she reached him.

“Hello, Mother. It is good to see you again.”

I let go of Dimitri’s arm and gave him an encouraging smile. Dimitri took his now free arm and wrapped it around his mother. I couldn’t help but notice the tall, imposing man who was Dimitri’s father as he approached us. I looked up at him and smiled.

“Hi. I’m Caspian,” I said, holding out my hand.

“Shen,” he told me. “We are pleased that Dimitri has found his mate.” He glanced at his son and mate and smiled. “Perhapswe could continue with hellos inside out of the wind and cold?” Shen asked. “I am certain Dimitri does not want his pregnant mate out in the cold any longer than necessary.”

I was a bit surprised by Shen’s words, but I shouldn’t have been. Everyone knew I was pregnant.

“Ja,” Dimitri said. Dimitri managed to disentangle himself from his mother before he wrapped his arm around my shoulders. “I do not wish for Caspian to be outside in this weather. It wasn’t a far walk, but it is exceptionally cold today.”

“Inside,” Shen said. “Everyone else is already here.”

I looked at Dimitri, worried we had been the ones holding up everyone. “We’re last?” I asked. “I thought we had plenty of time?”

“We do. Everyone else is early. Do not worry.” Dimitri sent his father a look, but I found myself suddenly being pulled into the massive cabin. The temperature inside was drastically different than what was outside, but I wouldn’t call it exactly warm. At least not to my own standards. Would I freeze? No. But I had to remember that this was a cabin full of dragons, and they went around outside without a coat on most of the time.

While Dimitri was helping me out of my coat, I picked up on the auras in the cabin. Four were incredibly familiar to me, two more were becoming so, and I looked back at Dimitri with wide eyes. “My family is here?”

He smiled at me. “Ja. It cannot be a family dinner without all of the family.”

“Little Flora is just the sweetest,” Millie said. I looked over at my new mother-in-law.

“She is.” I reached out, and although her eyes widened briefly, she quickly wrapped her arms around my waist. “It is nice to finally meet you,” I told her. Her arms tightened on my waist before they loosened, and she took a step away. I noticed she stepped back into Shen’s arms.

“I was wrong. You do look like Chin, but you most certainly look like your father. Almost his clone, to be exactly.”

I heard Dimitri chuckling through our bond.“Much to Mother’s heartbreak. Although there are a couple of my siblings that take after her, but yes, Yéye’s genes run strong in our family.”Dimitri looked at me. “I hear Arturo and have a feeling that if I don’t get you into the den where he can hug you again, I might get scolded.”

I rolled my eyes. “Papa loves you,” I told him. “But I agree. We should get in there so nobody has to wait any longer for us.”

Shen and Millie led the way, and although Dimitri walked at a slower pace, I didn’t pick up on anything out of the ordinary. When we got to the back room though, there was certainly a good time being had. Papa, of course, noticed us, but I was certain he had been watching. He came rushing over, and instead of hugging just one of us, his arms were wrapped around the two of us. I had seen him a few weeks ago, but now that he was hugging me, it felt as if it had been so much longer.

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