Chapter 13
She snatched it up, heart already racing before she read the message from Dave, the stable manager.
“Doe, orange collar. Restless nesting behavior. Could be soon.”
Her hands shook as she typed back: “On my way.”
Spence’s eyes were open when she crawled out of bed, and she kissed his temple. “Bunny babies, maybe.”
He started to move, and she shifted her voice so the next words came out as an order. “Go back to sleep.”
He’d likely been in bed less than an hour; he needed his rest.
She was dressed and out the door in under three minutes, and she sprinted down the trail to the stables.
Dave met her at the door with a grin on his weathered face. Most hundred-plus year-old werewolves retire to a secluded cabin, but this one wanted to keep working, so Zander had figured out how to pay him under the table.
“She’s in early labor. No doubt.”
Emmy followed him to the birthing stall they’d prepared, and her breath caught at the sight of the doe hunched in the corner, pulling hay into a tight nest with frantic movements.
“I’ve birthed hundreds of foals, maybe a thousand calves, and no telling how many deer and sheep,” Dave said quietly. “These are my first rabbits, but my sons on his way, and he’s used to these little guys.”
She smiled. “And I’ve watched more YouTube videos than I want to admit to.”
The wait stretched. Dave’s son brought coffee, and she wished she’d grabbed some protein bars at the house, but she was fine.
And then, just before dawn, the first kit emerged.
Tiny, pink, and wriggling.
Emmy’s vision blurred as the doe immediately began cleaning her baby, instinct taking over. Then another kit. And another.
Three total. Three perfect, breathing, nursing baby rabbits.
She pressed her hand to her mouth, tears streaming freely.
“Well, I’ll be damned,” Dave said softly. “Congratulations. You pulled it off.”
She blew out a breath. “I pulled at least part of it off,” she managed, voice thick. “Time will tell if they are viable, but thank you.”
She stayed until the sun came up, watching the kits nurse, documenting everything with photos and notes. Only when she was certain all three were feeding well did she return home, quickly get ready for school, and then climb into the SUV so Delaney could take her to class.
She watched them on her phone while she ate lunch, and then midway through her next class, her phone buzzed again.
“Pink collar is nesting. Looks like today’s the day.”
She grabbed her bag and slipped out during the professor’s explanation of Mendelian inheritance. Ironic, considering what she was racing toward.
Delaney was surprised to see her exiting class early, but speedwalked with her through the halls to get to the SUV when Emmy explained.
A few hours later, there were two more baby bunnies, both healthy and slightly larger than the first litter, nursing and wriggling exactly as they were supposed to.
Five kits total. Five impossibilities made flesh.
Spence came to the stables a couple of times, to check on her, and then he arrived with food shortly after the second kit was born.
He took one look at her face before pulling her into his arms.
“They’re alive,” she whispered against his chest. “Five healthy kits.”
“I knew they would be. We all knew you could do it.”
Zander’s voice came into her head to add, You’ve been able to do anything you set your mind to since you were a toddler.
OMG , she responded. Don’t make it weird.
She hated it when he reminded her he’d known her as a baby, but his happy chuckle was his only response.
The next doe waited until that night.
Emmy had eaten dinner in the kitchen — a raucous meal with Spence and most of the flock while Zander handled business in the underground. She’d just finished her salad when Dave’s text came through.
Spence ran with her this time, his night vision as good as hers, so the two sprinted down the trail without the need for flashlights.
“They’re going to be fine,” he said as they walked in the door.
“You don’t know that.”
“I know you.” He reached for her hand and gave it a soft squeeze. “And I know you don’t do things halfway.”
This doe took forever to get started, but then delivered three kits in quick succession, and Emmy found herself crying again as they began to nurse.
Eight total. Eight perfect, healthy hybrid rabbits.
Spence stood behind her, his hands on her shoulders, and she leaned back into his warmth.
“You did it,” he murmured.
“We don’t know yet if they’re actually hybrids,” she said, but her voice lacked conviction. “I need to run genetic sequencing, and that means gathering some cells.”
But she decided to wait until the following evening for that. It wasn’t a terribly involved process, but she wanted to give them a little more time to settle into this new world.
The following evening, it took hours to collect the cells from each kit with minimal stress and carefully label each. They weren’t old enough for collars yet, so she used a Sharpie on the inside tip of their ears to keep them straight, making sure the cell sample was labeled the same as the ear.
It took her three days of careful work to be certain of the sequencing, because she had to do it twice, just to be sure.
And in the end, every kit showed both cottontail and domestic rabbit DNA, properly integrated, along with the edited promoter sequences.
No unexpected mutations. No off-target effects.
Perfect hybrids.
She called Professor Chen from the lab, her voice shaking. “They’re confirmed. All eight kits are viable hybrids with the synthetic promoter sequences intact.”
The silence on the other end lasted so long she wondered if the call had dropped.
“Emmy.” His voice was rough with emotion. “Do you understand what you’ve accomplished?”
“Yes, sir.” Tears pricked her eyes again. “I do.”
“I’m submitting your preliminary results to the committee immediately. This is thesis-worthy data.”
After they hung up, she sat at her desk for a long moment, staring at the genetic sequences on her screen. Proof. Actual, documented, replicable proof.
She’d done it.
And before she called her men to tell them, she called her mother.
Moments later, her mother’s excited voice filled the space.
“Darling, that’s wonderful! Your father will be so proud.”
“I still have months of monitoring ahead,” Emmy cautioned, but warmth bloomed in her chest anyway. “And nothing is real until they breed successfully without help—”
“Emmy.” Her mother’s tone gentled. “Let yourself celebrate. Just for today.”
She blinked back tears. Again . She’d cried more in the past few days than the entire previous year.
“I’d like to see you,” Sophia continued. “Perhaps in a few weeks? We could meet in Faerie. Fly together. It’s been too long since you stretched your wings properly.”
Emmy could feel her wings wanting to extend, and she told her mother, “Yes. I’d like that.”
“Wonderful. Let me know when you can be gone for a day. There’s a portal about a twenty-minute drive from the coterie house, and I can wait for you there and then teleport us to the Swan Castle.”
After they disconnected, Emmy sat in the quiet, phone still in her lap, and let herself feel the bone-deep satisfaction of having proven she could do this.
The routine settled back in quickly. Classes, lab work, monitoring the kits. They grew rapidly, fuzzy and active, and Emmy documented every stage with meticulous care.
The graphics work continued on weekends. The flock meals and friendships deepened. And the sex was better than ever.
One evening, she was working on the wording for her thesis defense when Spence appeared with a plate.
“BLT,” he said, setting it beside her keyboard. “Extra bacon.”
Because that’s the way she liked it, and he knew how she’d want it. She spun around to thank him, but her body reacted immediately at the sight of him — posture relaxed but attentive, eyes soft with affection.
Her clit throbbed with sudden, fierce interest, and she asked, “Do you have five or ten minutes?”
“I do. What do you need?”
“Strip,” she said quietly.
His pupils dilated. “Yes, ma’am.”
He moved immediately, pulling his shirt over his head, and she crossed to the armoire to get what she needed.
He was nude before she returned, and she stripped out of her clothes and settled the harness around her hips so the base of the dildo would press just right against her clit. She adjusted it, testing the angle, then turned to find Spence watching her with barely restrained hunger.
She lifted a brow. “Why aren’t you already bent over the back of the loveseat?”
He took four steps to it, bent over it with practiced grace, and told her, “Just waiting to see where you wanted me, ma’am.”
Spence is required to keep himself lubed at all times when Zander is up and about, and she loved this rule. No stretching him. No prep.
She admired the view — strong back, muscular ass, and thighs spread just enough to be inviting.
She put the edge of the dildo to his ass and pressed. “You’ve been so good,” she told him. “Taking care of me. Bringing me food. Being exactly what I need.”
“Thank you, ma’am.” His voice was already rough.
She pushed a little harder, going slow, taking her time, and felt him relax into it. “I think you’ve earned this.”
Spence loves being fucked hard and fast, so pressing slow and gentle wasn’t necessarily a gift, but it was the energy she wanted, and she was setting the pace.
Every fraction of an inch drew a low, broken sound from his throat that was half moan and half plea.
His muscles clenched and fluttered around the intrusion, begging for speed, for depth, for anything that would let him chase the edge instead of hovering on it.
His cock jerked untouched, leaking steadily now, the scent of his frustration thick and heady in the air.
He rocked forward on his toes, hips twitching in tiny, helpless pulses, trying to fuck himself deeper without breaking her rhythm.
“No moving,” she ordered, and he froze in place, so she added, “Breathe, Spence. Everything below your chest stays still.”
She could feel his need coiling tighter with every careful press deeper, a live wire of want stretched to breaking, and the knowledge that she could keep him aching and needy sent a dark, sweet thrill curling through her.
This was the real gift she was giving him: not the fuck he wanted, but the one he needed.
The slow burn of surrender until there was nothing left but her pace, her rhythm, her mercy.
When she finally pressed inside him, he groaned low and desperate.
And the pressure on her clit had her making her own sounds.
Once she was in, Emmy gripped his hips and set a steady rhythm, the base of the dildo grinding perfectly against her clit with every thrust. Pleasure built quickly, and she chased it without shame.
This was meant to be a quickie, and she worked herself fast and hard until she came with a series of gasps, grinding hard against him, waves of pleasure pulsing through her while she pressed deep, deep inside him.
And then finally pulled out and took a few steps back, trying to regain her equilibrium.
“You can touch yourself,” she said. “Turn around and jack yourself off, but don’t come unless I say you can.”
She didn’t always allow it. Spence needed the threat of denial, and that meant he often left a session needy and wanting.
The visual of Spence standing, his hand going to town on his cock, his eyes closed, nearly made her need to pound him all over again.
She knew when he was close, but she waited, then waited a little more, and finally told him, “Don’t you dare make a mess, but open your eyes and come for me. Let me see inside you while you find pleasure.”
He looked down a second, to make sure his hand could catch his come, and then he met her gaze and let her see him come undone, pleasure pulsing through him, not hiding any part of himself, a sob escaping near the end as the final spurts came out.
And when he finished, he licked his hand clean without her having to tell him.
Emmy caught his wrist, licked the very last of it from his hand, and then pulled his head down so she could kiss him, forcing his mouth open, tangling her tongue with his.
When she pulled back, he was hard all over again, and her clit was throbbing.
She chuckled. “I’m sure you’re needed elsewhere. Get dressed and go, and I’ll eat my sandwich. If I fuck you again, we may never stop.”
His laugh was breathless. “Yes, ma’am.”
He gathered his clothes and disappeared into the bathroom, and Emmy settled back at her desk with her BLT, contentment settling warm and heavy in her chest.
The genetic data still waited on one screen, her thesis text on another, and she considered her options while she ate the sandwich.
Later that night, after the sun went down, Emmy walked to the stables with Zander.
The moon hung nearly full overhead, painting everything in silver, and Zander’s hand was cool in hers as they crossed the grounds.
“Spence goes with the security wolves to run in two nights,” she commented.
“He does. It’s a little like losing my right hand, when he’s gone.”
Dave had gone home hours earlier, but the night staff nodded respectfully as they passed.
Emmy led Zander to the three nursery enclosures, where the moms were settled with their kits. The babies had grown noticeably in less than two days.
Zander stood silent for a long moment, watching them with those blue eyes that missed nothing .
“Remarkable,” he finally said.
“They’re just … rabbits. They look like normal kits.”
He turned to her, one hand cupping her cheek. “They’re proof that you’ve figured out how to rewrite the rules. That impossible things become possible when you refuse to accept failure.”
Emmy’s throat tightened. “It’s just the beginning. I still have months of work—”
“I know.” His thumb brushed her cheekbone. “And I’ll be here for all of it. Whatever you need.”
She leaned into his touch, letting herself be held by his steady presence. Around them, sheep bleated and deer moved around, while inside the enclosures, eight tiny impossibilities nursed and grew.
Emmy closed her eyes and let herself believe in the science, in the future, in the two men who’d somehow become her entire world.