Chapter 8 - Dane
Two months.
That’s how long it had been since a screaming, wrinkled, red-faced baby had upended Dane’s entire life.
And somehow, against all odds, it was…working.
Mostly because of Lola.
She was nothing like he’d expected a nanny to be.
Then again, she’d never really claimed to be one.
She was still awkward, still prone to talking in anxious little rambles when she got flustered.
. Still blushed every time he walked out of the shower without a shirt, even though she tried to pretend she hadn’t noticed.
But when it came to Sam, she was steady. Caring. Warm.
That’s what he’d named his baby. Samuel. It seemed like a good name. A solid name.
When he had told Lola, she had nodded once with definite approval, and even though he knew he shouldn’t care what she thought…how could he not?
She talked to the baby like he was the only thing in the world worth talking to, read him stories with all the serious focus she gave to her research, sang lullabies under her breath while she rocked him, even when she was exhausted and her voice cracked.
And Sam, his son, lit up whenever she entered the room.
Dane should’ve felt threatened by that.
Instead, he just felt…grateful. And completely, utterly overwhelmed.
He blew out a breath and kicked open the back door of the Pine Shadow Club, wincing as his shoulder clipped the frame. His shirt was torn, there was dried blood on the side of his neck, and his hands were sore from where he’d caught the pavement mid-roll.
The fight had been brief but messy—three teenage shifters, all alphas in the making, high on hormones and ego, deciding they didn’t have to wait until training hours to start swinging at each other.
He’d pulled them apart before anyone got seriously hurt, but it had taken all his restraint not to knock a few skulls together.
Now all he wanted was food, a shower, and eight minutes of silence before Sam inevitably woke up for his late feed.
The main floor of the club was quiet in an early afternoon lull, with the bar wiped clean and chairs still tucked in. A few of the bar staff were behind the counter, prepping for the evening rush.
Dane headed toward the side hallway, intent on grabbing a clean shirt from his locker, when a voice stopped him.
“You look like shit.”
Dane turned.
Rick leaned against the far wall, arms crossed, expression unreadable.
Dane gave a humorless snort. “Appreciate the concern.”
Rick’s gaze swept over him. “Run-in with trouble?”
“Some of the kids are getting into it. They’re all testosterone. Barely needed a shift to knock them out of it.”
“And yet you’re limping.”
Dane didn’t bother replying. He kept walking toward the hallway.
Rick fell into step beside him.
“How’s the kid?” he asked, voice casual.
Dane’s shoulders tightened. “Fine.”
“And Lola?”
That made Dane pause.
He glanced sideways. Rick wasn’t looking at him. Just walking, like this was small talk. But Dane knew better. Rick didn’t ask questions unless he already suspected the answers.
“She’s…good,” Dane said eventually, “better at this than I am.”
“That’s hard to believe,” Rick said lightly.
“It’s not,” Dane muttered. “I’m gone half the week. Missing feeds. Missing naps. Missing him.”
He didn’t mean to say it out loud. It just slipped. Along with everything else lately.
Rick looked at him then. No teasing this time. Just a level, quiet look.
“You didn’t ask for this,” he said.
“Doesn’t matter. He’s mine. That’s all that counts now.”
Rick nodded slowly. “And Lola?”
“What about her?”
“You trust her.”
It wasn’t a question, but Dane answered anyway. “With his life.”
They reached the end of the hall. Dane stopped at the supply cupboard, pressing his fingers to his temples for a moment before muttering, “If she hadn’t offered…I don’t know how I would’ve handled it.”
Rick tilted his head. “Funny how people walk into your life at just the right moment, huh?”
Dane didn’t like his tone. Didn’t like the glint in his eye, either.
“Is there a point to this conversation?”
“Of course not,” Rick said, “it’s just an observation.”
He walked away without another word, leaving Dane standing there with a shirt in his hand and a head full of static.
Rick wasn’t wrong. That was the worst part.
Lola had come into his life like a storm he hadn’t prepared for. And now she was part of the rhythm of it, quiet mornings, shared coffee, Sam’s midnight cries, the hush of her singing drifting down the hall.
He didn’t know what that meant.
He just knew he couldn’t afford to lose it.
And that was starting to scare the hell out of him.
***
By the time Dane reached his apartment, the sun had dipped behind the ridge, casting long shadows through the streets of Silvermist. His body ached, his shoulder throbbed, and his mood was hanging by a thread.
He opened the front door quietly.
The baby monitor’s faint static met him first, followed by the gentle creak of Lola’s footsteps somewhere down the hall.
“Dane?” she called, soft and uncertain.
“Yeah,” he replied, pulling the door shut behind him, “it’s me.”
She appeared in the hallway like a ghost; oversized hoodie, messy bun, socked feet, silent on the floorboards. Her brows drew together the moment she saw him.
“You’re hurt.”
“It’s fine.”
“That’s not fine.” She stepped closer, nose wrinkling. “You’re covered in mud. And…is that blood?”
He glanced down. “Some of it’s not mine.”
“That doesn’t make it better!”
He opened his mouth to deflect, but she was already turning on her heel, marching into the kitchen. Cupboard doors opened. The clatter of a bowl. She returned with a damp cloth and a disapproving scowl that made her look like someone’s irritated librarian.
“Sit down,” she ordered.
“I’m not—”
“You are bruised, Dane. You’re limping and you smell like…well, like a wet dog. Sit.”
He obeyed. Not because she sounded particularly threatening, but because it was kind of funny. And because her hands, when they touched his cheek to dab at a scrape, were warm and soft and very, very distracting.
“What happened?” she asked, voice quieter now.
“Bunch of hotheaded shifters got into it behind the club. I broke it up.”
“With your face?”
“With my fists. They just fought back.”
Lola huffed, but her movements slowed. She was focused. Gentle.
“Sam’s napping,” she murmured as she worked. “He took the bottle early today and passed out like a drunk sailor. I was going to wake him soon for the next feed.”
Dane nodded, watching her out of the corner of his eye. Her face was pinched with concentration. There was a smear of something on her sleeve, baby spit-up or mashed banana, probably, and her hair was coming loose in frizzed wisps around her face.
She looked exhausted.
And absolutely beautiful.
Shit.
“I’m fine, you know,” he muttered.
“I know,” she said. “Doesn’t mean I’m not allowed to worry.”
His chest tightened.
She didn’t say things like that, not usually. She deflected, huffed, snapped. But the way she said it now, gentle, a little breathless, like she hadn’t meant to let it slip at all…
He looked down at his hands.
“He smiled this morning,” Lola said suddenly, “a full gummy grin. Just for me.”
He smiled faintly, “He’s been doing that more lately.”
“He’s getting chubby.”
“He’s eating better with you around.”
Lola hesitated, and Dane continued, “He’s always better with you around.”
He looked up. Their eyes met.
And for a second, just a second, he forgot how to breathe.
She looked away first, cheeks turning pink. She busied herself wiping at a non-existent smudge on his jaw.
“I saved you some leftovers,” she said, voice too fast, “there’s lentil stew. And those rolls Daisy made. The ones with the seeds on top that I know you like.”
He blinked. “You didn’t have to—”
“I know. But you don’t eat proper food after patrols, only that junk from the club, and someone has to make sure your body doesn’t fall apart.”
There it was again.
That soft, sharp truth nestled in her rambling sentences. She cared.
And she didn’t even realize how much.
That scared him more than any rogue wolf ever could.
“Thanks,” he said gruffly, “I’ll eat in a bit.”
“Good.”
She hovered for a moment, then turned to go.
He caught her wrist gently. Not tight. Just enough to make her pause. “Hey.”
She turned.
“Thanks. For everything.”
Her mouth parted slightly, eyes wide. She looked like she had no idea what to do with that: his gratitude, his touch, or the silence hanging between them.
“I’m just…trying to help,” she whispered.
“I know. And you’re doing a hell of a lot more than that.”
She swallowed, then nodded once, and slipped away. He heard the front door close with a soft click, then exhaled, sitting for a while in the quiet of his apartment.
Sam was stirring faintly on the monitor. The low static crackled, then gave way to a soft sigh.
He stood, moving toward the nursery with slow steps.
The moment he opened the door, the scent of his son wrapped around him—powder, milk, warm blankets.
Sam was wriggling in his bassinet, fists tucked under his chin, little face scrunched.
Dane bent over, scooped him up carefully, and held him against his chest.
He breathed him in.
And just like that, the ache in his ribs, the sting of his scrapes, the noise in his head…it all softened.
He loved this kid. Fiercely. Wildly. Stupidly.
And the more time passed, the more he feared it wouldn’t be enough.
Because the world didn’t stop for fathers.
And his heart was starting to split between the job he was born for…and the family he’d never expected to have.
Sam settled easily into his arms, warm and weighty and entirely real in a way Dane still couldn’t get used to.
He walked the boy slowly around the room, pacing like Felix had told him, something about rhythm helping with digestion. He wasn’t sure it mattered, but Sam didn’t cry, so he kept going.
The house was quiet. A kind of peace he rarely got to feel.
Dane had lived in chaos for years: battlefields, border patrols, pack politics, and the constant low-level threat of being one mistake away from bloodshed. But this?
A dim room, a sleeping baby, and the faint hum of the baby monitor?
It was disarming.
And dangerous.
He sat down in the rocker and adjusted Sam in the crook of his elbow. The baby blinked up at him, one hand curled against Dane’s chest. His eyes were darker now, not quite blue anymore. They’d shift to something else soon, maybe something that looked like Dane’s. Maybe not.
It didn’t matter.
“Hey, bud,” Dane murmured, “you’re getting big.”
Sam gurgled sleepily in response.
“You smiled today. Lola told me. Said it was a full one, no gas involved. Guess you’re trying to make her fall in love with you.”
He paused.
His own words lingered in the air.
Because that was the problem, wasn’t it?
It wasn’t just Lola falling for Sam.
It was him…falling for her.
For the way she knew Sam’s cues already.
The way she’d memorized feeding intervals and tracked sleep patterns and bought little socks with cartoon bears because “his feet get cold and it’s statistically relevant to comfort.
” The way she muttered to herself when she cooked and never ate enough, and got this stunned, fragile look whenever someone complimented her.
She was in his house. Every day.
In his life.
And now, in his chest.
He was getting attached.
And that was a problem.
Because Dane didn’t do attachment. Not like this.
He’d had flings, sure. Hookups, the occasional weekend of ‘no strings’ that ended as soon as someone brought up the future. He had his pack, his duty, his role. Emotions got complicated. Emotions got people killed.
But this wasn’t casual.
They hadn’t even slept together.
This was her reading him better than he liked. This was her making his house smell like cinnamon and baby powder. This was her buying two different brands of tea and reorganizing his spice rack alphabetically without saying a word.
This was her holding Sam like he was the most important thing she’d ever touched.
He was in trouble.
Dane looked down at his son, who was now fully asleep, breathing in shallow, even puffs against his chest.
“She’s too good,” he whispered, “and I’m not sure I can ask her to stay.”
Because that was the other thing. The clock was ticking. This arrangement, temporary, always meant to be temporary, was working better than it should.
Which meant it couldn’t last.
And the idea of that, of waking up one morning and finding her gone, her scent fading from the hallways, her laughter no longer filtering through the kitchen, hit him like a body blow.
He hadn’t even kissed her.
Hadn’t dared.
Because if he did, it would mean something. And once it meant something, there was no going back.
Dane rose carefully from the rocker and laid Sam back in his bassinet, tucking the blanket around him with more tenderness than he’d ever admit aloud. The baby shifted once, then stilled.
Dane lingered for a second, then stalked quietly out into the hall.
The kitchen light was still on. Lola had washed up, of course, every bottle dried and put away, every towel hung. The table was wiped clean. His leftover stew was in the fridge, labeled in her neat little handwriting with ‘DO NOT FORGET TO EAT THIS ACTUAL NUTRIENT-DENSE MEAL’ in block capitals.
He stood there a moment, staring at it.
For a moment, he had a wild urge to go to her apartment, to knock on her door and demand she come back. Insist she stay with him and never leave his side.
But he didn’t.
Instead, he turned away and went to his own room, stripped off his ruined clothes, and collapsed into bed.
He stared at the ceiling for a long time.
Trying not to imagine a future with her in it.
Trying even harder not to imagine a future without.