Page 37 of Dark Dragon’s Wolf

Xander snorted. “Good luck with that. He doesn’t even get an allowance yet.”

“I’m writing it down,” Flynn said. “So far, he’s in debt until he’s nine and a half.”

“Nope-er,” Brandon said, leaning against Flynn’s leg. “Keep my ‘lowance.”

Flynn grabbed Brandon and turned him upside down as the little boy shrieked with glee. “Got any money in your pockets? Let’s see what we can shake out.”

“No take ‘lowance!” Brandon yelled, laughing hysterically.

Flynn turned him right-side-up and perched him on his knee. “Nothing? Guess you have to work it off, then. You gonna help me put in the new window tomorrow?”

“Yesss. I work hard. I yike putty.”

Jenny said, “You’re a brave man, Flynn. Because you know where that window putty’s ending up. In his hair. And yours.”

“Peanut butter gets it out,” Kira said. She gave Brandon a mock dragon scowl. “Ask me how I know.”

Flynn tousled Brandon’s hair. “Rule number twenty-three. No putty in the alpha’s hair.”

Tristan had been watching this whole thing, an odd expression on his face. Now he got up, kissed Mayah’s shoulder, and said, “I’ll be back.”

Mayah watched him head toward the main cabin. She could feel that there was something bothering him, some old sadness that was touched off by being back with his friends. Maybe because they were settled and happy?

She sighed and turned to Caitlyn, who was bouncing one of the twins in her lap. They really were adorable. “I don’t know anything about shifter babies,” she told her. “Or any babies. When do they Change?”

“As young as a year,” Caitlyn said. “Or as late as four or five, but that’s usually only when a cub is raised away from other shifters. We’ll have to wait and see.”

“Is there any way to tell which they’ll be? Owl or leopard?”

Caitlyn winked at Sloan, and then raised her voice so Xander could hear. “They’re going to be winged leopard babies.”

Xander gave a theatrical sigh. “I keep telling you that’s not a thing.”

“But it would be so cool!” Caitlyn held the baby up, almost touching noses with him. “You can do it, Colt. I know you can.”

Colton burped in her face, and then he smiled.

When Tristan didn’t come back from the bathroom, Mayah went looking for him. As she passed the reinforced wooden shed the Bad Bloods called the ‘crazy shed,’ she saw him sitting inside in the shadows.

The shed had been their desperation move, in their early days. To contain them when one of their animals got so out of control that they were a deadly danger to themselves or others. From what she’d heard, that used to happen a lot when they first escaped from Alexander Grant’s lab.

But she didn’t know why Tristan would want to be in there now. Just the idea of being locked up in that tiny space—or anywhere—gave her the willies.

“Hey,” she said softly, walking inside. “What’s up?”

He was touching the wall with his fingertips, tracing one of the many deep claw gouges in the wood. “I spent a lot of time in here,” he said. “Do you know, they almost never use this anymore? Not even for Xander.”

“That’s good, right?” But looking at Tristan, she got the feeling that somehow it was making him sad.

“Having mates, having families, it steadied them.”

And he wasn’t steady, she thought. He was still messed up.

She ventured, “So, maybe it can happen for you too.” Because having a little wolf or dragon baby with Tristan someday—that would be awesome. And if it calmed his wolf, that would be even better.

Tristan shook his head. “It’s different for me. With all these fucked-up white wolf genes—my kids would probably have that too. Not to even mention people like Gen-X targeting them all their lives. I could never do that to a cub.”

His words gave Mayah a sinking feeling. Did that mean he didn’t want a mate either? That he was closing down on her because he thought he was bad for her too?