Page 58 of Our Haunted Omegas
“You could. We’d be there with you. So, you could.”
“Odie’s going to try putting the harness and leash on the murder dog today,”he said.
“Don’t let Teal hear you call it that. It’s an Irish Water Spaniel, don’t you know?”I teased.
“He’s calling it Guardie. Mostly because we had to call him something. He’s becoming more and more dog like.”
“Guardie works. At least we’ll have a name to tell the others.”
“Is Teal going to be Ambry’s doctor or do we need to find another one to come live out here?”Cobalt asked.
“I’m not sure. I didn’t have much of a chance to talk to him afterward. He’s tired. Teal’s conked back out too. It’s going to be a long drive.”
“Can you put the coffee on? I’m stuck under Odell and I want to let him have these last six minutes of sleep before he needs to get up?”
Chapter Twenty-Three
Odell
“Guardie is such a good boy,” I said, plopping down on my butt in front of the shadow dog with the harness and leash in hand. “Guardie is going to meet my mate’s family today. Our new family. And he’s going to behave. I’m going to get him a hotdog with all the fixins. I’m going to play fetch with him. They’re all going to love him and he’s going to keep them safe too while we’re there.”
Guardie’s shadowy tail wagged, and I breathed out a sigh of relief. Generally speaking, if he wagged his tail, it meant that he was in agreement. He hadn’t gone too hard against my wishes since forming into a dog. Sometimes it was easy to forget that he was once energy that haunted the shrapnel in my butt cheek. That he was made from the war that took everything except Ambry and his dad away from me.
I wiggled the bright green harness onto him. He was the most compliant dog I’d ever met and the more we interacted with him the more solid he became. We could pet him now and of course, put on his harness. His tail wagged around even faster as I hooked the leash to the garment and led him onto the porch. He head bumped Cobalt who waited there for us. My mate squatted down to pat him and scratch behind his shadowy ears.
“Who’s a good boy? Who’s the best murder dog ever?” He cooed and Teal grunted and rolled his eyes.
“I don’t think Guardie minds being called a murder dog,” I shrugged. “He’s not exactly just a hand or tentacle or whatever anymore, is he?”
“I don’t think the rest of the family will get it,” Teal sighed. “I know, I know.” He glanced at Cobalt. “I don’t get it because I don’t have a mate. I get that some things are important enough to go against the grain for but…”
“Uncle Nicky will know that he’s not a normal dog or just some shadow creature,” Indigo walked out onto the porch with Ambry on his heels. My friend had that ‘just laid’ flush and I looked away before I laughed. How did our lives become this? From a tiny apartment to a jumbo cabin with a murder dog as some sort of macabre guardian harpy.
“Not a harpy,” the triplets said at the same time.
“One of our family friends is a harpy. Most people don’t consider using their race in place of angel as a slur but it sort of is. I don’t think he’ll be there today but eventually you’ll meet him and his mate. So, nope,” Cobalt said and I blushed.
“Sorry. I didn’t know. I won’t use it that way again, but Guardie is like a guardian of some sort.”
“He is, but he’s not a harpy. Harpies weren’t born from trauma,” Cobalt said.
“Nor has a harpy been born from your butt,” Ambry said, playfully bumping into me with his shoulder.
“Uh… The dog didn’t come from my butt.”
“He did, though,” Ambry said, taking the porch steps down two at a time. “Right from your butt cheek. He’s your firstborn.”
“No, I just put my demons on a leash,” I retorted with a shrug and took Cobalt’s hand in my free one. “Every therapist who told me I didn’t try hard enough to ‘feel better’ can kiss my ass now.”
“Why? So Cobalt or Guardie can eat them?” Indigo laughed, leaping over the steps to catch up with his mate.
“Exactly!” I said.
“They can’t kiss your ass,” Cobalt said. “You’re too shy to moon them. I remember the butt ultrasound.”
Laughing, I climbed into the front passenger seat and Ambry slid into the back seat behind me. On the ride here we tried to just sit behind our mates but that wouldn’t be enough for this trip. Indigo wanted to be right next to his pregnant mate and I didn’t blame him. If an accident happened, I fancied his chances of saving Ambry and the baby over mine. He was a giant dragon after all. Besides, I didn’t want to be that far from Cobalt today. As excited as I was to meet their family, my insides were all tossy-turny over the idea too. I didn’t do well with crowds. Sometimes long car rides made me sad because they gave me too long to think about the war or reminded me of my parents. There were too many what-ifs and---
Guardie licked my bare knee, distracting me from my thought spiral. I gave him a smile and scratched behind one of his big, floppy shadow ears. It was almost furry.
