Page 87 of As The Shifter World Turns

“Let me grab it.” I pushed the cereal box out of the way on top of the fridge and pulled the bag out. “Here.” Archer’s eyes went wide. “What?”

“Just… that’s not real popcorn.” He scrunched up his nose. “Do you have pretzels?”

I did not.

“It’s not the cheap stuff.” I promised. “It’s justnaturaland a different color.”

“No pretzels?” He stuck out his bottom lip. I wanted to nibble it.

“It’s going on the list.” I kissed his lips and then went to the junk drawer to grab a pen. I made lists on my phone but often resorted to the familiar pad and pen. “Pretzels are officially on there. And what brand popcorn did you want me to get?”

“The kind in a jar.”

“Like the kind people used to make before…” He nodded. “And on the list it goes. Anything else while I’m here?” It would change twenty times before the night was over. His eating habits were like that lately.

Because he was carrying our babe.

Mine

I closed my eyes and savored the words of my unicorn. I still didn’t fully grasp the hows and whys of it all, but I didn’t need to. I just needed to make it right with him. He’d been there with me always and I had no idea. How could I?

We didn’t have beasts. That’s the way it was. Except we did or at least I did.

Yes. Ours. Mate. Babe. Omega ours.

We still hadn’t got more than single words but I could sense him now and it was everything. And the runs we took—I finally understood why the others looked at runs the way they did.

In so many ways it was like I was living for the first time.

“Your unicorn chatty?” Archer wrapped his arms around me as I put a hand to my ear.

“How’d you know?”

“I remember when I first started to shift—I’m so happy for you.” He stood on his tip toes and kissed my cheek. “I still want popcorn though.”

“I can go to the store.” I pressed a small kiss on his forehead. “Then we can snuggle on the couch and watch aliens.”

“No snuggling.” Archer rolled his eyes. “You’ll distract me.”

“Fair enough. I’ll be right back.” One more kiss and I was out the door. There was a small grocer a couple blocks away and I figured that was the best bet over the convenience store that was only a block in the other direction. I loved microwave popcorn but if my sexy pregnant omega wanted kernels in a jar, I was going to get it for him.

The store wasn’t busy at all and I grabbed the popcorn and a few other things he had texted me that I remembered from when I was a kid. My grandfather used to get the kind of popcorn in the tin pans and cook it on the grill. It was meant to cook on a stovetop and that resulted in a couple of pretty unsuccessful batches when he burnt a hole in the bottom.

I looked at memories like that in an entirely different way now. I wanted to give them to our child. Give them things to look back on with love.

My phone started to ring about half way home, announcingArcherwhich was my oh so clever ringtone.

“Think of something else?” It would be easy enough to go back.

“No. The power went out.”

“Oh. I’ll be home in a few. Maybe it will be on by then.” At least it wasn’t winter.

“It won’t be,” he sighed. “You know how electricity is included in our rent?”

I did not like the sound of where this was going.

“Yes?” Please don’t let him be saying what I thought he was saying.

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