Chapter Nineteen
Edris
As my mate got bigger, his confidence soared.
I’d heard omegas sometimes were afraid they lost their sex appeal as their pregnancy advanced.
They thought they were no longer attractive to their omegas, but mine had never had that problem.
Maybe it was because our triplets were a honeymoon pregnancy, but our sex life blossomed more and more.
My mate was not only sexier by the day, but he believed me when I told him so.
We’d spent months defiling every flat surface in the house and a few that weren’t flat.
But one day in his eighth month, everything changed.
I didn’t know how or why, only that when I got home from work, Zac didn’t come to the door, arms outstretched to hug me.
He was getting pretty big, and standing up had gotten to be more of a process, so I didn’t take it personally, simply went and flopped down onto the sofa next to him.
“Hello, omega mine.” I went to kiss him, but he gave me his cheek. An accident? “Did I do something wrong?”
“No. Not at all.” He gave me a little smile, but it did not reach his watery eyes. “Everything is perfect.”
Oh, not good. He was generally a sunny person, but he was also swollen, with achy ankles, a sore back, and various other symptoms depending on the day. Nothing was perfect. And from his tone, I was ready to take the blame for whatever had him upset. Heck it probably was totally my fault.
“Good. You are perfect.” I wasn’t going to call him a liar. “But since I am far less than perfect, I have a feeling I’ve let you down somehow.”
“Oh, that’s just silly.” Another watery smile. “I’m glad you’re home. Let’s have dinner.”
“What are we having?” Dinner seemed like a safe topic. “I saw you thawed out some chicken this morning, didn’t you?”
“Yes.” He struggled to sit up straight and gave up, sinking back down into a slump.
“And then I forgot about it and by the time I remembered, it was room temperature and probably toxic. You don’t want me to cook poisoned meat, do you?
” Then he burst into tears. “So”—he sniffled—“there’s no dinner, and I’ve disappointed you.
You’re working all day and I’m on paternity leave and the only thing I had to do all day was cook dinner and I couldn’t even get that right.
So, go ahead and judge me. I don’t blame you at all. ”
My head spun around three times. Not really, but it felt like it had. My omega had gone from a confident happy father-to-be to someone who was disappointed in himself, afraid he’d disappointed me, and was now sobbing in my arms, soaking through my shirt with tears I had no idea how to stop.
If he’d done it before, I’d have a play book, but his smooth good humor all these months while growing three babies had given me nothing to go on.
“It’s okay, omega.” I patted his back. “It will all be fine.”
He pulled away and glared at me. “You think so? It’s fine that our babies will have nothing to eat, that I’ll have no protein to send their way? Fine?”
I parted my lips to say things, ran one after another through my mind, and then stood up and reached down to lift him to his feet as well. “That’s it, omega. I’ve upset you and I have to make up for it. Go wash your face and meet me at the front door. We are going out.”
“But I don’t want—”
I turned him toward the bathroom. “Go. It’s lucky dinner didn’t work out because I have a surprise for you.”
“A surprise?” He wiped his face with the back of his hand. “Okay.”
While he was in the restroom and I was trying to sort out the mood shifts, I called the diner and ordered dinner to go.
Hopefully, I had the solution to helping him feel better, at least this time.
Would he feel this way again? No idea, but if he did, I was there for him.
My mate was doing something so hard, I couldn’t even imagine what it must be costing his body.
Three little beings using up all the vitamins and minerals and other nutrients in his body every day.
He was eating like a horse, but his weight was not going up more than the healer wanted.
It was just barely enough. Which was why I also ordered dessert.
Then, when my mate came out of the bathroom, I guided him to the SUV and helped him into the front passenger seat.
“Where are we going?” he asked, but I just kissed him and helped him with his seat belt. Getting it around a belly filled with three growing babies had required an extension recently. “Alpha!”
“Can’t tell you,” I chided before closing his door and going around to the driver’s side. “Because it’s a secret.”
“You’re mean.” But he was smiling.
“I probably am.” I grinned back. “But you love me.”
At the diner, I left him in the car while I went in for our food, put it in the back, then climbed back behind the wheel.
“The surprise is takeout?” he asked, calmer, but still sounding upset. “See what happens when you have cubs?”
“That’s not the surprise.” I kept an eye on the sun as we drove toward the hill where we’d first watched the sunset.
“This is.” I parked facing away from the sun.
Helping him around, I opened the hatch and pulled out the camp chairs I kept there.
Opening them, I helped him to sit, ignoring his comments about being likely to break the chair then laid out our picnic on the tailgate. “This is.”
Just as I spoke, the sun flared on the horizon, flooding the sky with reds and oranges and yellows, a beautiful sunset that had him gasping. “Alpha, this is like our first date.”
“I thought about taking you back to the same restaurant, but I thought this might be nice.”
“It’s better than nice. It’s…it’s perfect.” And the tears this time were happy ones.
After we finished, we realized that with the back seats down, we had plenty of room in the SUV to make love. One more flat surface defiled. Would need detailing. Worth it.