Page 57 of Home: Posy 5

"I'll go get it!" Ash volunteered and ran off before anyone could object.

"He didn't have to go. I could have—" I started to say, but Jayden interrupted me.

"He needed to, sweetness. He needed to burn off some of the adrenaline. We can start walking, but we probably won't get halfway before he's back."

How Ash had any extra oomph was a mystery to me. Even after my six-hour nap, I didn't feel fully up to speed.

Well, he not the one getting mated for hours and hours and hours, was he?Lark teased. He got to swap out and rest while his brothers beat your puss—

That's enough!I scolded with a frown.

Ignoring her and her little smirk, I linked my other hand with Jayden's, and we walked along the shoreline with Wyatt and Mason flanking us on either side.

"I'm excited to build my first sandcastle!" I said as I swung their hands back and forth.

"Me, too, sweetness."

"And me, cutie!"

"Mason, Cole, have you ever built a sandcastle?" I asked, turning to look at first one, then the other.

"Nope," Cole said, and Mason shook his head. "We were at the beach two years ago, but that was a work trip for the king and there wasn't time to play or explore. Besides, can you see the two of us randomly building a sandcastle together?"

"No," I giggled as I tried to picture it. "So you never went to the beach as children?"

I was very careful to frame it that way, rather than ask if their parents had ever taken them. I didn't want to make anyone sad; there'd been enough unintentional drama already today.

"No, we always went to the cabin for vacation," Wyatt explained. "Once school let out, we picked one of our families and spent the whole summer at their house. Then, the last two weeks before school started, we went to the cabin, and our families joined us there for vacation."

"Are you talking about—" I caught myself before I said Pippi's Place, sensitive to Jayden's grief. "Where Cole took me on our date?"

"Yep," Mason confirmed, then his voice turned wistful. "Soon as school let out, one of the parents or grandparents gathered up all the kids and took us up the mountain. I haven't been there in years."

"I told Cole I'd like us to go back there. It was so beautiful. If you all would have been with us, I never would have wanted to leave," I said, watching Jayden's face out of the corner of my eye. "Can we go back in the winter? I bet it's so lovely when it snows, and Cole said the pond freezes over in the winter and we could go ice skating!"

"Sure, cutie. We love the cabin!" Wyatt chirped.

"I'm glad you liked it there." Jayden raised our joined hands and kissed my knuckles. "My grandfather built it for my grandmother. She loved that place. I always wondered if we might live there someday. After we retire, of course, and hand the pack off to our pups."

"I'd like that. Very much."

And his happy smile warmed my heart.

#

Before I knew it, our vacation at the beach came to an end. We threw everything into our bags and loaded Ash's SUV again - and I watched as Jayden found a safe place to pack the wind chime Wyatt and I had made from a piece of driftwood, wire, and my beach finds. I couldn't wait to hang it in my special room!

Then we were off to Crystal Caverns for the Swift family reunion.

I knew I had a grandfather named William, but my grandma had died in the sickness. So had all three of their children, which were my two uncles and my mom. One of my uncles had two children before he and his wife died: My cousins Liam, who was now the pack's alpha, and Camille, who was a year older than me and in college studying something called software programming.

When I asked, Jayden told me it had to do with computers, and I stopped him from going into more detail. Computers were still a mystery to me. I had figured out how to surf the web, text, and play games on my phone. That was good enough for me. At least for now.

Before we left the Royal Pack, Mason had done what he said he'd do and called my cousin to let him know the Everleighs were coming and to make arrangements for who was staying where. My grandfather, William, lived in his own house with Camille. We would stay with them because they had a finished basement that we could fill up with mattresses and use as a bedroom. The Everleighs, on the other hand, would stay at the alpha house with Liam, his wife, and their baby boy.

"How old is the baby?" I asked Mason as he opened my car door. "I've never held a baby younger than Winnie."

"I don't know. We'll find out." He chortled. "I hope they don't mind sharing him, though. Neither Ash nor Sid will be able to leave him alone."

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