Feels Like Today Nix #2
Boy, does Nix like to be in trouble. The month before the babies were born and the six weeks after had been some of the longest of his life.
“Then no. I have not seen him. Ever. No recollection. Nope. Sorry. ” He crosses his heart (on the wrong side) and then zips his lips, dropping the pantomime key into the front of his shorts.
Gideon grins and then nods at the notebook, ignoring Luca still lying in Mari’s crib. “What are you working on?”
Nix remembers the letter he’d been working on and offers it to Gideon. “I’m trying to write something for the girls.”
Gideon steps forward, plucking the pen from Nix’s hand with that effortless confidence he always seemed to carry. Without a word, he flips to the page Luca had written on and adds something beneath the flowy script. Then, with deliberate care, he closes the notebook and sets it aside.
He leans in close, his breath warm against Nix’s ear, and whispers, “You will be naked in the living room on the bench at 9:00 PM. Yes?”
Nix nods, slipping his hand into Gideon’s hair and pulling him close for a kiss. It’s a slow, deliberate promise. When he finally pulls back, he captures Gideon’s lower lip gently between his teeth, letting it drag before releasing it.
Then he smiles his biggest, brightest grin and nods, adding a bratty, “Fuck you.”
Gideon barks out a laugh, pinching Nix’s thigh before spinning around to catch Luca peeking out through the crib railings, baby blankets still draped over his head.
“We’ll eat when I’m done reminding Luca that he can’t answer the door without pants,” Gideon says, his tone half exasperation, half amusement, but 100% promise.
Luca squeaks, rolling off the crib mattress and onto the floor before scrambling to his feet. He sprints out of the room, cackling like a maniac, only to crash into Leo and Grayson in the doorway.
Gideon lunges after him but is thwarted by the massive seven-foot-tall stuffed giraffe. It teeters as he stumbles, giving Luca just enough time to slip away, shrieking with victory down the hall.
“Dammit. I almost had him,” Gideon growls, steadying the giraffe with a huff.
Grayson giggles, bending the oversized stuffed animal’s neck to fit it through the door. “Getting slow in your old age, Gid.”
“Pearce,” Gideon says with a dramatic sigh, “I did feel bad that you’d be otherwise occupied with our offspring tonight, but now? I’ll treasure every moan and cry from our treasure a little bit extra because of your absence.”
Grayson’s face falls in exaggerated dismay. “What? Tonight? No.”
He turns to Nix, eyes wide with betrayal, but Nix acts busy, sketching in his notebook.
At the bottom of the page, a gangly giraffe with pink and green spots takes shape, stretching up the entire length of the page.
Its long eyelashes, full lips, and its shocked, betrayed eyes bear a striking resemblance to someone familiar, even with Nix’s admittedly questionable artistic skills.
Gideon winks at Nix, holding up nine fingers as a reminder before spinning on his heel to chase after his wayward soulmate.
Leo leans against the doorway, laughing as he rubs his hands together. For once, he’s just happy he’d kept his mouth shut.
“You were zero help!” Grayson huffs, punching Leo in the shoulder.
“I helped myself, dumbass. Now, where are we putting this, Nix?” Leo asks, patting the giant giraffe like it’s a prize.
When Nix shrugs, Grayson drags it into the corner behind the double-glider rocker.
“Whose idea was that?” Nix asks, raising an eyebrow. No one but Artem needs to know he and Luca had one in their sights on the day Nix had gone into labor.
“Gerard the Giraffe is the joint brainchild of the greatest minds this pack has ever seen,” Leo announces, bowing with an exaggerated flourish. “It’ll look even better once we finish the new kids’ room.”
Grayson nods solemnly before collapsing to his knees beside Nix, sliding a hand up the leg of Nix’s shorts to cop a feel. He presses a kiss to Nix’s soft thigh, almost knocking the notebook off the window seat in the process.
Leo snatches the notebook mid-fall, before settling on the floor beside them. “What’s this?”
“I’m writing a letter to the girls,” Nix says. He doesn’t mention that he hasn’t written anything himself yet. He just lets Leo flip through the pages, watching as his mate’s expression softens.
“Oh, hey, can I?” He picks up a green gel pen, popping the lid off with his lips, and scribbles something under Gideon’s chicken scratch before handing the notebook to Grayson.
Grayson grabs a pink pen, grinning as he adds a few accents to Gerard the Giraffe’s already unique likeness. Suddenly, a faint shimmer sparks across the page, and Gerard winks one long-lashed green eye.
Nix chuckles, shaking his head. “Show-off.”
Grayson smirks and writes two simple lines beneath Leo’s entry before turning his focus to the lower right corner of the page. With meticulous precision, he uses every color in the rainbow, layering and blending as the glow of Grayson’s magic fills the room.
Nix’s fingers find their way into Grayson’s growing hair, absently stroking as he watches, mesmerized by the steady pulse of energy flowing through their bond. Leo just sits back and observes, his hands resting on his knees, a small smile tugging at his lips.
When Grayson finishes, he hands the notebook to Leo. “Blow on it,” he instructs softly, waiting until Leo complies before leaning in to kiss him hard.
Grayson presses another kiss into Nix’s knee, and Nix swears he feels a spark of fire there, too. It mimics the fiery glow of the setting sun as it casts the nursery in the golden warmth of the early evening.
Jamie appears in the doorway with Mari and Rosie in his arms. Nix flashes back to earlier that afternoon, when he’d been thinking about how he could never have imagined how his life would have turned out.
Seeing his first love with their children safe in his arms fills his heart to overflowing with joy.
Grayson disappears, and a second later, the sound of water running fills the air.
From somewhere on the other side of the house, there’s a high-pitched shriek followed by the slam of a door. Nix smirks, his imagination already painting the scene: Luca, no doubt, paying the price for his bare-assed sass—and doing it happily.
Leo takes Mari from Jamie, cradling her with practiced ease, and accepts a kiss just as Rowan steps into the room. Taking Rosie from Jamie with equal care, Rowan follows Grayson toward the bathroom. Bath night is always a favorite—for at least half their pack, anyway.
“What’s going on with Luca?” Jamie asks, scooping up the notebook from where Grayson had left it. He flips through the pages, a soft smile tugging at his lips as he takes in the tiny doodles scattered throughout.
“He answered the door sans pants,” Rowan calls from the bathroom, his tone deadpan.
Jamie snorts, shaking his head, but whatever retort he’s planning is interrupted by Rosie’s indignant fussing the moment her toes touch the water.
She screeches like she’s about to melt into a puddle of green goo, but Leo, unfazed, launches into a dramatic song about rubber ducks, complete with over-the-top quacking.
“Ah,” Jamie murmurs, pausing as he reaches the page where the others have written something Nix hasn’t yet read. “What’s this?”
Nix just shrugs, handing him the ruby-red gel pen without a word, pulling his beloved down onto the window seat.
Jamie flashes him a quick smile before setting to work, doodling something with all the focus of a man on a mission.
When he’s done, he blows on the ink, caps the pen, and carefully places it back among the others, rearranging them into a perfect ROYGBIV order.
Rowan bursts out of the bathroom a moment later, shaking his soaking wet hair like the Wolf he is. “Big Daddy, save me! They are so mean!” he cries, throwing his arms around Jamie’s neck and making sure his dripping hair splashes down Jamie’s skin.
“Rowan! That’s cold!” Jamie yelps, wriggling under the clammy assault.
Nix giggles from the window seat. “Rowan, you probably deserved that.”
Rowan pouts dramatically before peeling off his wet shirt and tossing it into the girls’ hamper.
When the patio lights flicker on outside, Jamie sighs and climbs to his feet. “Gideon’s convinced me to grill again tonight, so I’d better get started. I understand we’re meeting in the living room later?” He winks at Nix before leaning down to kiss the top of his head.
Rowan gasps. “You’re what? No. I’m on with the girls tonight! No fair.”
“Sorry, Rowan. Life is unfair, but I’ve got some lost time to catch up on,” Nix says with a shrug. “But I promise I’ll make it up to you.”
“Yeah? Just me and you?” Rowan asks, sliding into the spot Jamie vacated on the window seat.
Nix watches as Rowan picks up the notebook, handling it in the same way Jamie had—a careful reverence that makes Nix smile. It’s eerie how alike the two enigmas are, especially as Rowan settles into parenthood.
Rowan flips through the pages until he finds the letter. He stops, his eyes scanning each line, and Nix notices the way they glisten.
“This is for the girls?” Rowan whispers, his voice soft.
“I haven’t read it yet, beyond Luca’s part,” Nix admits, watching him closely. “But you could add something, too?”
Rowan picks up a deep pink pen, scribbles something quickly, then slams the notebook shut. Before Nix can ask, Rowan cups his face and kisses him hard, stealing his breath.
“I’m going to change, and then I’ll be back with bottles, okay?” he murmurs, his lips brushing against Nix’s. Then he’s gone, disappearing out the door with the warm, spicy scent of rum lingering in his wake.
A moment later, Leo appears with wet hair and a towel slung low around his waist, carrying both girls bundled in soft towels with tiny hoods. Grayson trails behind, tossing their wet things into the hamper before pulling out diapers and pajamas with efficiency.