Page 121 of Magic and Muffins

Wrinkling my nose at him, I turned to Shepard and glanced at the plates. “I also heard you wanted to feed me.” His eyes flashed gold, and he nodded. Cross held out my chair for me as Shepard went to the kitchen.

“Have either of you heard from Vena today?”

“Yes,” Shepard said. “She called early to tell you everyone is united at home and a big thank you from their whole family is waiting for you.”

“Did she say how Miles is doing?”

“He’s well. Having Grandma and Grandpa Hunter back helped tremendously, as did the time he spent with Princess Indri while researching in the Mountain. He’s accepted what happened and is doing his best to move forward.”

I let out a relieved breath and smiled up at Shepard as he served breakfast.

“So what are our plans for the future? Are you reopening Blur now that Orphia is gone?”

“I was thinking of keeping it closed for a while,” he said. “It’s a good time to renovate and maybe find a new manager. Someone told me I didn’t have the best work-life balance. Since I have a mate now, I need to fix that.”

“But what if your mate is busy with school and running her own bakery? Won’t you be bored?”

“Unlikely,” Cross said. “The alphas are still?—”

Something thumped under the table.

“Shepard, did you just kick Cross?”

“It was a love tap,” Cross said smoothly. “He missed me while he was making you breakfast.”

Shepard snorted.

“Are you going to tell me what the alphas are doing? Or do I need to go around you to find out,mate?”

Shepard winced at my tone. “They’re still unhappy the ring was stolen and questioning if I should step down. I told them to show me a better candidate, and I’d step down without a fight. The males they’re proposing are about on level with MC.”

“So you’ll be dealing with stupidity for a while. And what about you?” I asked Cross. “What are your plans for the future?”

“The same as Shepard’s. To spend every waking second with you. That you’ll allow, at least. To spoil you. Watch you smile. Shower with you. Touch you.”

Shepard kicked him under the table again. “Her back is bruised.”

“I didn’t say this second.”

I grinned, amused by their interactions. They bristled at each other sometimes, but the animosity that they’d once had for each other had vanished. Happy, I took a bite of my waffle and moaned.

“This is so good.”

The doorbell rang, and Cross shot out of his seat with an excited glint in his eyes.

“It’s our delivery. Stay here. Finish eating. It’ll take some time to set up.”

Shepard and I stayed at the table while Cross ran downstairs and returned with two people carrying a thin box that was nearly twice my height. Cross carried a smaller box and winked at me on the way through the room.

Once the bedroom door closed behind them, I looked at Shepard.

“Do you know what he’s doing?”

“No. But he said it’s something to commemorate our lives together.”

Suspicious, since he said it was more for Shepard than me, I glanced at the door repeatedly while we finished our breakfast.

A little while after the delivery guys left with the box, Cross told us to go look.

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