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“Same,” Javi agrees.
Lo’s still nursing her glass of wine, so the waiter looks to Chey in question, having cleared hers.
“I’m good, thanks,” she breathes, reaching for her water glass instead.
The waiter nods and walks away, Javi arching a brow in Chey’s direction.
“Turning over a new leaf?” he asks once the waiter is out of earshot.
“Something like that,” she murmurs, taking a small sip of her water. “I used to drink to forget, but now…” she trails off, glancing toward me with a soft smile. “Now, I want to remember.”
“Aww,” Lo coos, pouting her lower lip.
Javi picks up his water glass, reaching across the table to clink it with Chey’s. “I’m proud of you,” he declares.
“Thanks, Dad,” she snorts, rolling her eyes.
He levels her with a stare. “I mean it.”
Chey stares back at him, a faint blush rising to her cheeks. “Me too,” she replies quietly.
The waiter reappears with two bottles of beer, setting one down in front of Javi and moving to place the other in front of me. Someone passing by bumps him as he’s reaching between Chey and me, beer tipping from the rim of the bottle and splashing her arm.
“I’m so sorry,” the waiter gasps, tugging a cloth from his pocket and reaching for Chey.
She flinches back reflexively.
I intercept him before he can touch her, grabbing my napkin off my lap to wipe it away. “I’ve got it,” I growl, shooting him a warning glare over my shoulder.
He jerks backwards, eyes widening. “So sorry, Alpha.”
“It’s fine,” Chey says with a tight-lipped smile, taking the napkin from me and wiping the droplets of beer from her skin.
The waiter scurries away and Javi makes eye contact with me from across the table, flickering a concerned glance toward Cheyenne. I’m glad she’s got him to look out for her, but it isn’t his job anymore. It’smine.
I silently offer my hand to my mate and she takes it, threading her fingers through mine. The two of us have developed our own system. Her anxiety still gets the best of her sometimes, but she doesn’t like attention being drawn to it. So, I squeeze her hand to ask if she’s good. She squeezes back once, meaning she is.
“So, about this photography gig,” I drawl, glancing over at my sister as I smoothly steer back to our prior conversation. “When can she start?”
Cheyenne
“Do you have any inkling of what this one is?” Lo asks, glancing down at my belly.
“I don’t know,” I sigh, resting a hand on my bump. “I had a strong feeling about the other two, but this one’s a wildcard.”
“We’ll find out in September,” Iver remarks smugly.
“Ugh, how can you stand waiting that long?” Lo groans, scrubbing a hand down her face. “It’s not evenmypup and the anticipation is already killing me.”
“It’s fun not knowing,” I reply with a shrug. “There are few true surprises in life, you know.”
“Yeah, you guys should wait to find out with your next one,” Iver suggests.
“Nope, two’s my limit,” Lo states firmly, darting a glance toward our rambunctious children running around the lawn together.
I chuckle to myself as I reach for another slice of pizza from the box resting on the coffee table. If I’ve learned one thing over the past five years, it’s that life’s constantly changing.
It feels like just yesterday that me and Iver were out to dinner with Javi and Lo, still settling into our mate bond and making plans for the future. Our double dates look a lot different these days. Instead of restaurants and cocktails, it’s takeout and playdates, but I have zero complaints. I aways wanted a family of my own, and the one I’ve got now just keeps growing. Not only do Iver and I have our third pup on the way, but his little sister Harper recently announced her own pregnancy. At this rate, we’ll soon be able to field our own baseball team.
