CHAPTER NINETEEN
Preston
Nightshade Bear Territory
After his tea, Mori lay down for a nap and Wess set about making a handful of flavors of snow ice cream.
Andy taste tested it every step of the way, including sticking his tongue in the milk.
Wess shrugged it off and said we just wouldn’t tell the others if they asked for some.
I didn’t think there would be much left over for sharing besides for Mori.
Colton went back to our parents’ home to check in with the guards and all of that, but I did my best not to think about any of it.
I was carrying not one but two little babies inside me.
My horns kept letting out little puffs of frost whenever I got too warm and eventually, I opened the back door.
Baby Andy had his fur coat on and didn’t seem to notice the additional cold.
“Mori will be okay,” Wess said as he mixed together ingredients. “He’s just having a delayed reaction to being almost blown up.”
“Mori wants his mate,” I said, letting out a long, slow breath.
“That’s the long and short of it. Sure, he wants other things too but he can’t get it out of his head how close they were to meeting but they wouldn’t have been if Dern didn’t try to meddle.
It’s like he’s grieving something he didn’t have to lose in the first place. ”
“I think he wants a baby,” Wess said. “He wants a family and I can’t blame him. I didn’t think about it too much up on the mountain but now I don’t want to live without you three or should I say five now?”
“I just wish there was something I could do for him. It’s almost Yule and I hate that he’s sad. I’d like to kick Dern in the nads.”
“I could probably do that but don’t want to leave you all alone,” Wess grinned. “But we will share our ice cream with him. What do you usually do for Yuletide?”
“What we’ve been doing. Well, not what you and I do, but the party and the tree and the gift shopping.
Though, we did most of that online this year.
The kids go caroling tonight. That reminds me!
We’ll need hot chocolate or something to give them.
They always end up at the dads’ house but I like to have something to give them for coming to sing for us. ”
“Maybe that will cheer Mori up,” Wess offered hopefully but I wasn’t so sure.
The front door rattled and Wess practically shoved Baby Andy into my arms as he sprinted through the house after grabbing one of the big knives out of the block.
The front door swung open as I entered the room but outside was empty.
Snow blew in around his bare feet but being that he was so cold-natured Wess didn’t even notice.
There on the floor was a postcard, picture side up.
I padded over and picked it up as Wess shut the door.
“It’s from Dern. He’s a Postcard Man or something like that,” I sighed and turned the postcard with Santa Claus and his reindeer flying through the sky over to read it. If it was annoying, I’d trash it before my twin ever laid eyes on it.
“Hey Preston,
Ha! You thought it was for Mori, right? I know you check the mail and have tossed out some of my postcards.
No hard feelings. You haven’t blocked anything too seriously but I talked to some friends who put me in touch with some of their friends and about a dozen people out I found a snow demon who was willing to talk to me.
You have about six weeks from conception before your babies arrive. That is if they take after their sire.
Anyway. Stop tossing out my postcards!
Happy holidays, congratulations, and all that crap.
Dern.”
I handed it over to Wess and padded back into the kitchen.
If the dead wolf was right, we had about a month give or take before we’d have twins.
Yuletide or no Yuletide it was time to get down to business.
We had twins to plan for and that probably wouldn’t stop Sharon from showing her ugly face here again.