Family Dinner
Plan A had ended in disaster. He clearly couldn’t get he and Sam out of the house alone. He’d not been thinking.
Plan B had been even worse. Getting the kids out of the house wasn’t the answer either. And that was exactly what made Plan C perfect.
Vaughn didn’t know what he’d been thinking. He was trying to ask Sam to marry him alone, and the universe had made it clear that was the wrong move. He needed to propose when the kids were with them, to show them how much he loved their Papa.
Vaughn patted himself on the back while sending a quick thank you to the goddess for not letting him mess it all up.
He and Sam had built their lives around the kids.
Their family was everything to both of them.
It only made sense. And he’d come so close to going about his proposal the completely wrong way.
This time, nothing would go wrong. He slipped out of bed the moment he heard his Nana enter the house. He needed an accomplice to get Sam out of the house for a few hours so he and the kids could make an awesome dinner for Sam. And then bam! Proposal.
Nana agreed, which made him even more convinced that everything was finally going according to plan.
She helped him with a menu and promised to get someone in the pack to the grocery store for him.
They still needed to pick up a few things for the next night’s big Valentine/birthday celebration for Nat, so she’d take Sam to the store later in the afternoon.
Their morning routine went off without a hitch, and Vaughn made plans to get back to the house a few hours early to get dinner going. He called in not one, but three extra staff members for the clinic. His back-up plan had a back-up plan.
He shouldn’t have been surprised when he got home to find everything not going according to plan. He sighed when Sam’s face looked pinched. It was Sam’s I’ve had enough look. It took a lot to get Sam to that point so Vaughn knew it wasn’t going to be the happy night he’d hoped for.
“What’s wrong?” Vaughn asked gently.
“They’re cranky.”
“Cranky?” The kids were a lot of things, but cranky was rarely one of them. “All of them?”
“Yep. Everybody’s in a mood. I know you came home early so I could sneak out to the store with Nana, but I think we should postpone it until tomorrow. I can ask your Mom to—”
“No, it’s fine. I can handle it.”
Sam didn’t seem convinced.
“Daddy,” Ollie whined. “I want Daddy.”
“He looks exhausted,” Vaughn said as he picked Ollie up and snuggled him close.
“I know. And he slept for almost two hours this afternoon. Jack’s in his room pouting because Emily yelled at him. She’s in time out at the moment. Ben’s on the couch watching a documentary. He said no to a snack of blueberries.”
“What?”
Ben never turned down blueberries. Ever.
“I know. Henry and Natasha are fighting over … honestly, I have no idea why they’re fighting.”
Vaughn brushed his lips to Ollie’s forehead. He felt a little warm, but not enough to cause alarm.
“You go on with Nana. I’ll see if I can get the kids settled.”
“You sure?”
“Yes, love. You need a break.”
Sam sighed. “I really do. Okay, we’ll be back in an hour or so. Call me if you need us home.”
“We’ll be fine. Mercury is in retrograde or something.”
With a grin, Sam leaned in and gave him a quick kiss. He nuzzled Ollie, too, before going to say goodbye to the rest of the kids. Vaughn went to check on Emily, who had her nose in the corner. She turned to him with tear-filled eyes.
“I’m sorry I was mean to Jack.”
“I know you are, baby girl. So go get Jack and give him a hug, okay? Tell him you’re sorry, and then you guys come on back downstairs and we’ll do a couch cuddle.”
She leaned into him for a second before running upstairs. Vaughn carried Ollie over to the couch and found Ben stretched out watching his show with glassy eyes. “Ben? What’s wrong, buddy?”
“I don’t know. I don’t feel so good.”
“Okay.”
Vaughn leaned down and pressed his hand to Ben’s forehead.
He was warm. Too warm. And suddenly it dawned on Vaughn why he had a houseful of cranky, tired kids.
They were about to get hit with a plague.
He carried Ollie into the bathroom and grabbed the thermometer from the cabinet along with a stack of disposable ear pieces and a handful of alcohol wipes.
This really didn’t bode well for his evening plans. At all.
He carried everything back into the living room and sat Ollie down on the couch. He checked his temp first. Ninety-nine. He cleaned the thermometer and checked Ben. A hundred even. The other kids came over, and they all had low-grade fevers.
He grabbed his phone and called his mom, who was still at the clinic. “How’s your dinner coming? You need help? I saw Nana and Sam leave a minute ago.”
“Dinner is off. The kids are sick. Can you bring supplies over? I don’t have a ton of stuff here at the house.”
“Oh, no. And yes, I’ll be right over. What do you need?”
Vaughn rattled off a list of necessities before ending the call and turning his attention back to the kids.
He picked up his phone again and called Sam.
“Need me back so soon?” Sam asked.
Vaughn could hear the smile in his voice. “I need you to alter your shopping list.”
“Yeah?”
“Chicken soup, lots of Gatorade. A new bottle of pain reliever. Some tissues.”
“Oh, no,” Sam said. “They’re sick. That explains so much. Why didn’t—”
“Don’t do that. You didn’t miss anything. Everything’s low grade. There’s a bad flu bug going around, and I have a feeling they’ve got it.”
“Okay. I’m on it. We’ll be back as quickly as we can. I love you.”
“I love you, too.”
“I want Papa,” Ollie whined.
“Papa will be home in a little bit,” Vaughn said as he rubbed Ollie’s back. “Let’s go get you some juice, okay?”
“Apple.”
“Apple works. You want to help me pour or do you want me to do it?”
Ollie stuck his face in Vaughn’s neck instead of answering.
“Yeah, I feel the same way, little man.”
Vaughn managed to get all the kids cups of juice. They had a collection of cups with lids and straws they’d somehow accumulated over the past few months. Sam let the kids keep water with them while they did their school work, but he wouldn’t risk them not having lids near their books.
He carried Ollie back to the couch and sat him down next to Ben.
He leaned back against his brother and Ben wrapped his arm around Ollie’s waist. They kept a collection of cozy blankets folded up in the linen closet, so Vaughn headed there next and made sure each kid had a fresh, clean blanket.
Ben’s documentary ended, and Vaughn replaced it with one of their favorite cartoon movies.
Everyone had settled down, and they’d all curled up in a lump on their big sectional couch.
He had a sneaking suspicion that he was in the calm before the storm.
The front door opened, and his mom came bustling in followed by an alarmed-looking William.
Sam’s dad absolutely doted on the kids, and they doted on him right back.
“All of ‘em?” William asked.
“Yep. You should consider staying over at Mom and Dad’s for a few days.”
William glared at him until Vaughn held up his hands in surrender.
“Don’t say I didn’t warn you.”
“I already got it if I’m gonna get it,” William griped. “Now, I’m gonna get started on some soup. I’m guessing Nana Jean’s got enough supplies in there for me to get it going.”
Vaughn knew better than to argue. His mom carried over a bag of supplies from the clinic and immediately checked everyone’s forehead herself.
It was so funny how the instinct to do that carried over.
He did it, even though the doctor in him knew the only way to know for sure was with a thermometer.
There was something about a parent’s hand on your forehead, though.
It reassured, somehow, that they were on top of it and everything would be okay.
He unpacked the bag his mom had handed him while she fussed over the kids. Industrial sized hand sanitizer, disinfectant, extra thermometer covers.
“Daddy?”
Emily’s voice drew him back to the couch. She looked up at him pitifully. Vaughn’s heart melted into a giant puddle. Man, he loved these cubs more than anything. “Did you need something, sweetheart?”
She sniffed and her lip wobbled. He hurried around the couch and sat down next to her. The rest of the kids adjusted their positions until he was in the middle of the cuddle pile. His mom smirked at him and walked away.
“I’m here,” Vaughn whispered. “Everything’s going to be okay.”
“Daddy, I wanna be a wolf,” Jack whimpered.
“Not how, buddy. We’ll do a big shift when you’re all better, okay?”
Jack looked ready to argue, but Vaughn flashed his eyes at him. Jack’s lower lip wobbled, but he settled down. He climbed over the others and plastered himself onto Vaughn, sticking his hot nose in Vaughn’s neck.
Ollie was definitely the most tactile of their kids, but Jack was a close second. The wolf in him wanted his alpha, which was why he wanted to shift. Vaughn got it. He was feeling vulnerable and wanted to be safe.
Vaughn settled in and got comfortable, leaning back against the sofa cushions and closing his eyes.
The kids were all focused on the movie, except Jack, who’d fallen asleep against Vaughn’s chest. Nana and Sam made it back more quickly than Vaughn expected, and his mom went outside to meet them.
They came inside quietly, loaded down with groceries and supplies.
Sam hurried over to him and leaned in to kiss Vaughn’s head.
“Okay?”
“Yeah. Jack’s out. The rest of us are watching a movie.”
Sam smiled down at him before leaning over and touching his hand to everybody’s forehead.
They all pushed into the touch, even as he fussed and clucked at finding each forehead warmer than the last. Vaughn was honestly surprised when Ollie didn’t immediately demand to be picked up, but when he glanced over, he found him cuddled up to Ben and half asleep.
While the grandparents got soup prepared, Vaughn made sure they all had the medications they needed. He’d done everything he could. Now all they had to do was wait.
Twelve hours ago, his house had been completely normal.
Now he was in a war zone. Well, technically a flu zone.
Vaughn washed his hands then added a squirt of hand sanitizer.
They’d had issues with the kids’ immune systems from the very first time they took them outside of the house.
They’d never been exposed to all the numerous bugs and germs ordinary kids experienced.
It didn’t matter that they were constantly surrounded by guards who would crush anything who attempted to harm them. They couldn’t protect them from germs. The slightest hint of contagion, and his kids were going to catch it.
The only upside was that they generally got better a little faster. Everything else was exactly the same as human kids. The doctor in him knew that.
But the dad in him? He hated every second of it, and he wanted to make them better with the strength of his will alone.
“Daddy,” Emily whimpered.
Vaughn hurried back into the girls’ room and found Emily with her blankets thrown off. “Hey, baby. What’s wrong?”
“I need more drink.”
“Okay. I’ll go get you some. Be right back.”
It wasn’t until he was standing in the dim light of the refrigerator door that Vaughn realized he’d once again missed his chance to propose to Sam. What would have been their amazing family dinner was shoved to the side of a bunch of bottles of juice and some leftover chicken soup.
He filled up a cup for Emily and carried it back upstairs. Once he got her situated again, he went back out to the sitting area outside the kids’ rooms. Sam was leaning back on the couch with his eyes closed. Jack had crawled onto his lap an hour before, unable to rest without one of them close by.
Sam opened an eye when Vaughn settled down beside him. He found himself getting a little choked up and couldn’t have said why.
“Vaughn?”
But of course Sam saw.
Sam saw everything.
“Marry me.”
Sam’s other eye opened. “What?”
“Marry me. I know we’re mated, but I want the ceremony. I want our kids to be dressed up and see us say that we’ll love each other and them forever. I want our pack there, showing us their support. But mostly, I want to make sure you know that I want to spend the rest of my life with you.”
Sam reached out and grabbed his hand. “Well, when you put it that way. Yes, Vaughn. I’ll marry you.”
Vaughn leaned over and kissed him sweetly. “I love you.”
“You better.”
Ollie stumbled out before Vaughn could answer and climbed onto Vaughn’s lap.
Emily clearly didn’t want to sleep in her bed, because she was out with them a minute later.
Vaughn wrapped an arm around Sam’s shoulder and let the kids sprawl all over them both.
Sam tucked his head against Vaughn’s shoulder and let out a sleepy yawn.
“Sleep,” Vaughn said gently.
Sam relaxed against him, and Vaughn glanced out the window.
He’d been looking for a perfect time, and he’d found it.
He may not have had the world’s most romantic proposal—he was pretty sure Ollie had wiped his nose on Vaughn’s shirt earlier, and Jack was known to drool.
Emily had spilled soup on him when she’d sneezed while trying to eat—but it didn’t matter.
If they could take on six kids with the flu, they could take on the world.
As long as they were together, let the trouble come.