Chapter 26
Chapter Twenty-Six
Leif
“You’re late,” Emily says before the screen door has even swung shut behind me.
She’s standing at the doorway to the kitchen, a wooden spoon in one hand, her silver hair still damp at the temples from what I’m guessing was a shower taken before we arrived.
“There was traffic on Harbor Street.” I kick my loafers off beside the doormat.
Grady follows, sitting on the bench Emily had placed by the door to remove his own shoes. Rosemary and roasted chicken perfume the cottage, with the warm, yeasty scent of fresh bread underneath, and steam fogs the windows.
April in Pinecrest means the air outside still carries a bite, but inside Emily’s cottage, the baseboard heaters have turned the living room into a cozy nest.
Jared appears from the hallway, a bottle of red wine in one hand and three glasses pinched between his fingers. His light brown hair is pushed back from his forehead, and he wears a gray T-shirt that I’ve seen him sleep in.
“Took you long enough.” He sets the glasses on the table. “I was about to start without you guys.”
“You say that every week.” I hang my jacket on the hook by the door and step into the kitchen to kiss Emily, and the brief contact sends the bond fluttering behind my ribs.
I pull back to find her cheeks flushed and lift the back of my hand to her forehead to check her temperature. “Are you feeling okay?”
“Just hot from the stove.” She turns her head to nuzzle my palm. “Dinner is almost ready. Go join the others.”
I go back out to the dining room to find Grady settled into his chair at the dining table, a glass of wine between his fingertips.
Jared holds the wine bottle up in question.
“Yes, please.” I lean over to flip back the towel that covers the basket on the table to reveal a golden loaf still steaming from the oven.
“Don’t touch the bread!” Emily calls before I can grab a slice.
With a sigh, I flip the towel back into place and settle into the chair next to Grady. “I’m going to start demanding my own loaf on Saturdays so I can enjoy it all week.”
“Aww, don’t let Holden catch you saying that.” Grady takes a sip of his wine. “You’ll hurt his feelings.”
“His bread is good, but it’s not as good as Emily’s.” I hook a finger into the basket and drag it closer.
Jared smacks my hand away and returns it to its proper place. “No one’s bread is as good as Emily’s.”
Emily walks in from the kitchen with a ceramic dish in her oven-mittened hands. Roasted chicken, golden and steaming, rests nestled among potatoes and carrots.
She sets it on the waiting trivet and pulls her mitts off. “Keep talking like that and Holden will rescind their offer to let us join the pack.”
“The others will outvote him,” Grady says. “Chloe will make them let you in just to ensure I join, too.”
“I like having leverage.” Jared relinquishes the bread to me now that the rest of dinner is on the table. “Let’s use it in our negotiations.”
We fill our plates, Jared claiming the drumsticks. I load up on potatoes, while Grady holds his plate out for the slice of breast meat that Emily holds out to him.
Dinner is filled with conversation, catching each other up on our week.
Jared regales us with a story about spotting an orca while running the water taxi, and Grady talks about a new article he’s playing with but isn’t sure there’s enough evidence to push forward with it.
Emily updates everyone on the progress of the Phase Two site, while I entertain everyone with the gossip from the PTA.
Sometimes, I feel as if the parents of the students should also be back in elementary school.
When most of our plates are cleared, Jared sets his fork down and tops off everyone’s wine glasses, giving Emily sparkling water instead. “So, we should talk about the paperwork.”
I grab my glass and take a gulp. I knew tonight was going to be about this topic, but I thought we’d at least clear the plates first.
“Nathaniel emailed the forms this morning,” Jared continues. “There’s a lot of it. Mostly legal stuff, but the family structure section needs our input.”
Emily pushes her plate aside. “Dominic said we have three options for filing. The simplest option is for us to register as a single-family unit under the Wright Pack umbrella. It’s only one set of paperwork, with one primary Alpha listed, and the rest put down as bondmates and dependents.”
“Dependents.” Grady’s mouth quirks. “I’m twenty-eight.”
“Legal term,” I say. “Not a value judgment.”
He reaches for his wineglass. “So Dominic wasn’t kidding when he said it was similar to adoption.”
“Nope.” Jared grins at him. “We’ll be brothers, in a legal sense.”
“Incestuous,” Grady mutters into his glass.
Jared waggles his eyebrows. “You got a crush on me I’m not aware of?”
“Not at all. But I assume…” He flushes and lowers his head, muttering, “There will be times when we’re both…” He clears his throat. “At the same time…”
I reach over to squeeze his arm. “We can figure it out as we go. There’s no one way to form a pack.”
“Option two,” Emily continues, clearing her throat, “is we file as a sub-pack. We’d still be under the Wright name, but with our own designation.
Wilson-Masterson-Hollis-Finch. Or a different name of our choosing.
” She licks her lips. “It’s more complicated, and involves a lot more paperwork, but it gives us our own identity within the larger structure. ”
“Option three?” Jared asks.
Emily shrugs. “We don’t join at all, and we figure out another way to form a pack. But I think we’re past that.”
“I vote for a single-family unit under the Wright Pack,” Grady says, quiet but sure. “I’m okay with being adopted.”
“I’m already a Wright,” I add, “so that’s the easiest for me, too.”
“I’m sure Kyle will understand me giving up the family name,” Jared says. “He might even decide to join up, too. As a Beta, it’s not as if he’s on good terms with our familial pack.”
When Grady casts him a questioning look, he elaborates, “They only like perfect Alphas and Omegas.”
“Ah.” Sadness fills Grady’s eyes. “You didn’t deserve that.”
Jared waves it aside. “At least they let me stay and put me through tech school before sending me on my way. Others have had it worse.”
A beat of silence follows before Jared pulls out his phone, thumb scrolling. “Next up is emergency contacts. We need to decide on our medical decision-making hierarchy. Who calls who if something happens.”
“Emily first,” I say without hesitation. “For all of us. Then Jared, me, and Grady, in that order.”
Grady nods. “That works.”
“Finances.” Emily reaches for the breadbasket and tears off a chunk of sourdough. “How do we want to handle money? Joint accounts? Separate with a shared household fund?”
“Household fund,” Jared says. “For living expenses, groceries, kid stuff eventually. We should keep our individual accounts for now. No reason to merge everything at once.”
“Agreed.” I reach for the wine bottle and top off Grady’s glass before my own.
We talk through the rest, going down the list, and it’s as extensive as Jared warned.
Medical insurance plans. Life insurance beneficiaries. School districts, though that’s years out. I expected there to be arguments, but there’s no drama as we sit at the dining table, dividing up responsibilities.
Emily gets up at some point to clear the dishes and brew coffee. She still appears flushed, which worries me. She works outside all the time. It would be just her luck to come down with a bug just as the cold season is ending.
When the conversation turns to parenting philosophies, Grady leans his elbows on the table and describes the summer reading program his mother ran for charity, and how every child who finished five books got a homemade cookie and their name on a construction paper star.
Emily listens, leaning toward him with a tender look.
“We should do that,” she says when he finishes. “The foster home I grew up in was always trying to spark our interest in learning. I would have loved my name on a star.”
The coffee beeps, and Jared gets up to go into the kitchen. When he returns with a tray of mugs and creamer, he drops the big ball. “So, where are we actually going to live?”
Grady and I straighten in surprise, while Emily rakes her fingers through her hair and drops her head, but she lets him continue.
“The cottage won’t fit all of us,” Jared says as he passes out mugs. “And it definitely won’t fit our pups.”
Grady turns to Emily in alarm. “Are you expecting twins?”
“He’s talking about my future pregnancy,” I reassure Grady. “And that’s not happening yet.”
Emily leans back in her chair. “Jared and I talked about adding a second story to the cottage and expanding the footprint into the garden. But it would be a lot.”
“How much?” Grady asks.
“Eighty, ninety thousand. Maybe more with permits and foundation work.” She rubs her fingers over her temples. “I could do most of the labor myself, with a second pair of hands for the heavy lifting. We’d need electrical contracted out.”
“Timeline?” I ask.
“Six months if we’re lucky. Longer if we hit permit delays.” Her fingers drum once on the edge of the table. “And we’d be living through construction with a newborn, so it’s not ideal.”
Jared shakes his head. “My vote is still on us moving to the island.”
“That might not even be an option,” she protests. “We can’t demand a mini-Homestead for all of us.” She turns to Grady and me. “And that’s assuming you want to cohabitate?”
“I do,” I say before she even finishes asking. “Anywhere you want me to move, I’ll be there.”
Grady stays quiet in thought, and no one pushes him.
“Running Wilson Construction from Misty Pines isn’t practical.” Emily rubs the back of her neck. “I can’t ask a homeowner to take a boat every time they want to discuss a kitchen remodel.”