Page 31 of Wrong Number, Right Valentine

Don’t do anything silly.

I won’t.

Back home, I rolled out plastic sheeting to protect the floor and got to work with a roller. But after one sweep over the wall, I stood back and studied the color. I approved, but as I turned around, doing a three sixty, I had doubts about doing all four walls the same color.

Hmmm. Maybe white on three walls and the lilac on one. I should have bought white paint, but which one? There were so many different shades of white. Maybe three gray and one lilac would do for now, and when we were both on paternity leave, we could paint the three white ones.

Good plan. I didn’t have as much energy as I thought.

And I couldn’t do the top section. Shit, I should have bought a paint roller extension pole.

Okay, back to the hardware store to buy that long-handled thingy, and when I returned home, I was pooped and took a nap. When I woke, it was almost dark and that one nursery wall appeared much larger than it had in the daylight.

I sank into the rocking chair. That one splash of lilac paint I’d made with the roller was pretty small, but it snaked to the right and was about head height. I couldn’t hide it behind any furniture.

But we had the original gray paint tins in the room that could not be named. With a clean roller, I covered up the splash of lilac and removed the plastic sheeting. With the little energy remaining, I washed the rollers and paint trays.

My belly rumbled as I finished up. Just in time to heat up dinner and watch TV.

I must have fallen asleep on the couch because a kiss on the cheek and a hand on my belly had me opening my eyes.

“Is it morning?”

“No, babe. But it’s late. Let’s get you to bed.”

I needed a shower, but I was too tired.

“I kinda expected to arrive home and find the nursery painted lilac.” He grinned as he helped me into bed.

“What? No. That would be a heap of work, and I doubt I could do it on my own. Besides, who would paint the upper part of the walls?”

“Mmmm, I wonder who.” He brushed my face with his thumb. “Strange that you have lilac paint on your cheek and there’s a roller extension pole in the spare room.”

“Odd. Wonder where they came from?”

24

REG

When Banks said he wanted to have the baby on pack lands, I was a bit confused. He was human. Humans usually gave birth in hospitals. It was what they knew. It was what they were familiar with, and I expected that to be his plan. We hadn’t specifically discussed it, but all the people he saw for prenatal visits were connected to the hospital, so it was an easy assumption to make.

Then, suddenly, one night, in the middle of the night, he woke me up and said he wanted our daughter to be born on the land of my family. I thought he was half-dreaming and told him, absolutely, whatever he wanted. I loved the idea, but I’d never hold someone to a sleepy mumbling.

But the next morning, he came home shortly before lunch, letting me know he’d officially begun his paternity leave and that he’d be ready to leave in an hour. When he woke me up, he hadn’t been talking in hypotheticals or a dream-like stupor—he meant it. He wanted our baby born on pack lands. My wolf was down with that.

And just like that, we were doing this.

I called my parents, who were thrilled we were coming, and they promised to get one of the cabins ready for us to stay in. We packed up the car and headed home to my birthplace.

The restaurant would be fine without me, and they were thrilled when I called them en route to let them know I was officially starting paternity leave. If they needed anything, they could call me—but they wouldn’t need to. They had this. It wasn’t like on Valentine’s Day, where we were short-staffed with people calling in sick or injured while simultaneously being swamped. It was just normal, everyday restaurant time, and they were doing fantastic.

We were greeted as soon as we pulled into the pack lands, not only by my family but by the pack healer, the pack midwife, and a bunch of the omegas Banks had made friends with since we mated. All of them were excited about our baby.

“Alpha is having a pack run just for you tonight,” my brother said.

“Just for me?” Banks held his hands on his belly. “Or do you mean for this little one?”

“Fine, for that little one.” She was already stealing the show, and she wasn’t even born yet.

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