The Golden Griffin's Baby (Shifter Dads, #3)

by Chant, Zoe

  “That makes good sense,” Malachi said. “Lila, if you don’t object, I can’t see any reason not to share it with her. Or maybe have her come by and look at it while you’re there, so you can see what she’s after.”

  Lila nodded. “All right.” Then she remembered the other thing Elizabeth had said. “She also said she saw one of the shifters Victor’s cultivating as allies.”

  The whole room seemed to snap to attention. “Does she know who they are? What kind of shifter? Where they’re from?” Malachi said instantly.

  “No—yes—no,” Lila tripped over her tongue to say. “She said the man she saw was a dragon, a dark red color, and he was called Elijah.”

  “Oh, no.”

  That was a deep, quiet rumble, and it had come from Ronan.

  The whole room turned to look at him. He cast an anguished look over at Katie and their baby, and said, so low it was almost hard to hear him, “Most of you know that I came from another shifter town. A violent one. Where anyone who wanted power had to fight to get it.”

  Lila had a sinking sensation in her stomach.

  “My father was the alpha of that town,” Ronan said. “He’s a red dragon, and his name is Elijah.”

  The room was silent, the silence that comes from an indrawn breath.

  Then Katie reached over and took Ronan’s hand. “Well,” she said, sitting up straighter, “he’s made a big mistake, then, hasn’t he?”

  It was like they all collectively let out their breath once again.

  “He sure has,” Malachi said confidently. “If the town’s as warlike as you say, what are the odds they’re all going to show up pointed in the same direction? We’re united. We’ll be stronger.”

  “You can’t know that,” said Flynn.

  Silence fell again, and everyone looked at him. Flynn was standing behind the couch, and as they looked at him, he turned and started pacing.

  “We’ve been pretty relaxed about this whole fight so far,” he said. “Because all Victor has on his side are lions, and any one of us can take any three of them without hardly breaking a sweat. But if there’s a whole town of dragons coming after us—that’s going to be something else. That’s going to be war.”

  “Then we’ll fight,” Malachi said, grim.

  Flynn spun around and looked at him. “But you don’t know—none of you know what war is like.”

  “I know,” Lachlan said softly. “Flynn, I was there with you.”

  “Then I guess you’ve forgotten what it’s like,” Flynn said, his voice rising to an angry bark, “because I don’t see you running for the hills at the thought of it coming to our home—”

  “Flynn,” Lila said.

  Flynn’s mouth snapped shut and he turned to look at her.

  “You’re going to wake the kids up,” she told him.

  He took a slow breath. Then he nodded. “Sorry.”

  “Maybe Ronan could tell us a little more about his town, about how many dragons they have and what kind of opposition they’d be?” she asked tentatively. Before we get all worked up, she didn’t add.

  But Flynn seemed to hear it anyway. His mouth twitched a little, wry. “I suppose so,” he said. “That would probably—be logical.”

  He turned to Ronan, eyebrows raised.

  “Well,” Ronan said slowly, looking back and forth between Flynn and Lila. “Well. I don’t think—I don’t think it’ll quite be all-out war. Unless the town has changed a lot in the last few years, the custom is to find an opponent and challenge them individually.”

  “Single combat?” asked Malachi, his eyebrows raised.

  “That’s right. And they’re definitely not going to be on board with the sort of underhanded tactics that Victor’s using. Stealth, kidnapping—that’s not,” Ronan’s mouth twisted, “honorable.”

  “That’s good,” Lachlan said encouragingly. “If they have an honor code, maybe we can negotiate with them.”

  But Ronan shook his head. “Not with my father. If he’s decided he wants to move in on this town, nothing’s going to stop him.”

  “But what does he want?” Lila asked, frustration overwhelming her. “He’s not Victor, he doesn’t have any prior claim on us as his pack.”

  “He wants more people under his thumb,” Ronan said grimly. “If he defeats a male dragon, he’ll see that dragon’s mate and children as his property.”

  “My mother’s going to love this,” Reid said, rolling his eyes.

  “Ours too,” Lachlan said.

  “This mother isn’t too happy about it,” Katie said tartly.

  “This one either,” Lila added.

  “It’s medieval,” Ronan said fiercely. “Violent and medieval and a terrible way to try and live in the world. But he doesn’t see that.”

  Katie leaned into him, and he put his arm around her, pressing a kiss to the top of her head.

  “Well, we’re not going to let him bring his medieval ways to our town,” Lachlan said. “So let’s figure out how to stop him.”

  Chapter 10: Flynn

  The strategy session went on into the night. Ronan spent an hour just going over every member of his family, all the dragons he could remember from his hometown, and their potential strengths and weaknesses as enemies. Malachi took careful and copious notes.

  Lila listened attentively, asking the occasional question, and Flynn was struck by how much she seemed like a part of the town, one of them, even though she’d only been here for a couple of weeks.

  That’s my mate, he caught himself thinking as he looked at her fondly. He clamped down on the thought and looked away.

  “Tell me more about your cousin,” he said to Ronan, focusing on the matter at hand. His feelings weren’t important right now; the safety of the town was.

  Eventually, they’d picked Ronan’s brain clean. Reid had his own set of notes to take to the mayor, and Malachi exchanged a look with Flynn: they’d be meeting at the sheriff’s office later to go over it all again. Flynn nodded.

  Lila was rubbing her eyes. “Are we sleeping here?”

  We. She meant her and Flynn, it was clear—even though if she stayed here at Lachlan’s house, there was no reason Flynn shouldn’t just go home to sleep, since Lachlan and their mother would be here for protection.

  Home. That was an odd thought. His tiny, empty house didn’t seem like home at all anymore.

  “You’ve had a rough day,” Lachlan was saying. “No need to add to it by sleeping on a couch. Why don’t you and Flynn go back to your house and come get the kids in the morning?”

  Lila hesitated. Then she said, “How I about I take Grant, at least. Sophia will be happier staying over with Aidan, but I don’t want to make you take my baby overnight.”

  Flynn was expecting Lachlan to protest, but instead he just smiled. “Sure. We’re happy to take Sophia.”

  Lila’s shoulders relaxed a little, and Flynn understood: she didn’t want to be without her baby overnight.

  He put a hand on her shoulder. “Let’s go up and get him, then.”

  The words were out of his mouth before he thought about it, and he realized belatedly that he’d done the same thing that Lila had when she said, Are we sleeping here? He’d treated the two of them as though they were a unit.

  Like they were married.

  Or mates.

  This isn’t fair to her, he told himself furiously as he went up the stairs after Lila. He couldn’t keep this a secret from her and then still act as though it were a done deal. She wouldn’t have any idea what was going on.

  Even though she seemed to be very solidly on the same page, for someone who had no idea what was going on.

  Lila peeked into Cam and Lachlan’s room, and then shook her head and strode on in. Grant was standing up in the crib, his face just screwing up to cry; when he saw Lila, he reached out desperately.

  “Are you stuck in a strange place, baby?” she asked him, lifting him into her arms. “You want to go home?”

  He pressed his f
ace into her shoulder, and she held him close. Flynn had to physically take a step back to keep from coming forward and wrapping the both of them up tight in his arms.

  “I’ll get his stuff,” he muttered instead, and collected the diaper bag. Then he started stripping the bedding off the crib; he’d have to ask Lachlan where he stored it.

  It was always easier to be doing something than standing around like an idiot while feelings rose up to overwhelm him. If he had a task, then all of that useless energy got channeled into accomplishing it.

  The problem was, this time, no task was enough. Every time he finished making dinner or scrubbing the bathroom or stripping the sheets off the crib mattress, the hollow sensation in his chest, the yawning want that opened up whenever he saw Lila and didn’t go to her and hold her in his arms, rushed right back in, as strong as ever.

  Stupid, his griffin hissed at him. Why avoid our mate? She needs us. We need her. That’s how mates work.

  That’s not how humans work, Flynn snapped back at it, and went to find Lachlan and ask him where to put the crib.

  Downstairs, almost everyone had dispersed; it was just Lachlan and Cam, talking quietly to each other. Lachlan looked up when Flynn came down, and touched Cam on the shoulder, then came to the foot of the stairs.

  “Just wanted to know where to put the crib,” Flynn said gruffly. “Attic?”

  “What’s going on, Flynn?” Lachlan asked. His voice was low, and his eyes had that impossible soft, compassionate look that Flynn hated. Especially when it was directed at him.

  “I don’t know what you mean,” he deflected.

  “You do know what I mean. What’s going on with Lila? I saw how you looked at her. And in there—you were about to go off. I’ve seen you get angry like that a thousand times, and I have never, ever seen anyone calm you down with a word like she did. If I tried that, you’d bite my head off.”

  “Damn right I would,” Flynn said automatically.

  “Last week you thought she was a spy for Victor and you were determined never to trust her. What changed?”

  Flynn cast a glance up the stairs, then looked back at his brother, who could never understand the conflict that Flynn was feeling.

  “She’s just a good woman,” he said shortly. “I’ve basically been living in her house the last couple of days. She’s not spying for anyone. She’s a good woman.”

  Lachlan spent a minute just looking at him, with his unfairly perceptive blue eyes.

  “Okay,” he said finally, quietly. It was obvious that he had more to say, but he let it go with another, “Okay.”

  Just then, Lila came down the stairs with Grant on her hip. “Ready to go?” she asked Flynn.

  “I’ll put the crib away,” Lachlan told Flynn. “Go on.”

  Flynn hesitated, but he didn’t really want to stick around with Lachlan’s thoughtful understanding anyway, so he just said, “Thanks,” and followed Lila out the door.

  ***

  Back ho—at the house, they unpacked the baby and went inside. Grant had started to fuss in the car, and now he was working his way up to a full-on wail.

  Lila bounced him on her hip. “Hey, baby, it’s okay. Are you hungry?”

  Flynn stowed the diaper bag by the stairs and went into the kitchen to investigate possible baby food options.

  But Grant wasn’t hungry; he turned his face away from the offered food. He didn’t need a diaper change, either.

  “I think he’s just tired and cranky,” Lila said finally. “He’s had a busy couple of days, and I don’t know how much he napped, over at Lachlan’s earlier.”

  “Poor kid,” Flynn said. Grant’s blue eyes were wet with tears, his dark hair half-standing on end, his cheeks pink with the exertion of crying. He looked miserable.

  Flynn held his arms out. “Want me to take him for a minute? Give you a break.”

  “All you do is give me breaks,” Lila said. “I can take care of him—he’s my son.”

  The words could have been harsh, but she didn’t sound combative at all, just—quiet. Almost curious. Like she was wondering what Flynn would say in response.

  Well, that was easy. “I want to. You’ve been taking care of him and Sophia alone for a year, you don’t think you deserve a few breaks?”

  Lila hesitated a moment longer, and then said, “All right. I have to pee anyway.”

  That was an element of single parenting that Flynn remembered Lachlan talking about when Aidan was younger. Showering was even harder, especially with an active toddler.

  “Hand him over,” he said, holding out his arms.

  Lila had to detach Grant’s little fingers from her shirt to give him the baby, but once he figured out what was going on, he reached for Flynn without hesitation. Flynn held him close, stroking his hair.

  “Hey, kiddo,” he said. “Life’s tough sometimes, huh?”

  Grant sobbed into his shoulder, and Flynn met Lila’s eyes. She had a soft expression on her face.

  “Thank you,” she murmured, and turned towards the bathroom.

  “My pleasure,” Flynn told her honestly.

  And it was. He hadn’t just wanted to give Lila a break—when he’d looked at Grant’s upset little face, he’d wanted to take the baby, hold him close, soothe him as best he could.

  Protect the baby, his griffin agreed. Keep him safe. Guard him from the enemy. Help him grow up strong.

  Flynn could only agree, although he’d add a couple of human-world stipulations to that agreement, like Play with him, and Read to him and so on.

  “Are you tired?” he asked Grant, who was still sobbing. “Do you wish you could just sleep?” He bounced him a little, summoning up muscle memory from when Aidan had been a baby. “Let’s take a little walk, maybe.”

  He walked slowly around the downstairs, hallway to kitchen to dining room to living room to hallway, bouncing a little as he went. Grant was still crying, but slowly it was starting to lessen in volume.

  Lila came out of the bathroom on his second pass, meeting him in the kitchen. “How’s it going?”

  “We’re making progress, I think,” Flynn told her. “Just taking a walk right now.”

  “Good,” Lila said. “He looks like he’s calming down. You ready for bed, honey?” She smoothed a hand over Grant’s hair.

  “I truly don’t know how you did this alone,” Flynn said as he kept walking. “Lachlan had a hard enough time with Aidan, even with me and our mother to help. You were really all alone, and with twice as many kids.”

  “It was hard,” she acknowledged. “But it was—good, to have so much to do that I couldn’t just collapse after Michael died. He was—he wasn’t perfect, but I loved him, and he loved me and the kids so much. Without them to keep me up and moving, I would’ve been—I don’t know. It wouldn’t have been pretty.” Her smile quirked a little. “Not that parenting an infant and a four-year-old is pretty, either.”

  “Looks like you’ve managed it pretty well,” Flynn said.

  She shrugged a little. “I hope so. I worry about Sophia—she really runs wild, and I think that’s probably because I just haven’t had time to spend as much time with her as I should. She’s already gotten in trouble at school for hitting a boy.”

  Flynn’s eyebrows went up. “What’d the boy do?”

  “Tried to kiss her,” Lila said grimly.

  “You point me at that teacher who disciplined her, and I’ll give them something to think about,” Flynn said with feeling. “Those are good instincts she’s got.”

  Lila smiled a little. “That’s what I wanted to say.”

  “Well, then, I think you’re doing just fine and so is she.”

  Lila let out her breath. “I hope so.”

  Flynn reached out the arm that wasn’t holding the baby and tugged her in to his side, holding her close. “You are.”

  She sighed, leaning in to him. Grant’s sobs were dying down, his breath hitching now and then. “Don’t look now,” Flynn whispered, “but I think h
e’s falling asleep.”

  “Oh, good.” She didn’t move—trusting him, Flynn thought.

  Of course, his griffin said. You’re mates. You trust each other.

  She shouldn’t, said the part of Flynn’s brain that remembered his own father. Think about what could happen.

  We would never hurt our mate! his griffin said, inner voice rising to a shriek. Never!

  “Flynn?” Lila said into his shoulder.

  He shook off the inner musings. “What?”

  She pulled back; he immediately missed the weight of her against his side. “I wanted to tell you something,” she said, looking at him with a serious expression in her dark eyes. “Ask you something. No, tell you something.”

  He could feel his brows drawing together. “What is it?”

  “I—since we were—together—” She blushed.

  Flynn had been determinedly not thinking about it too hard since it had happened, because if he let himself, he lost sight of everything else. Nothing mattered but the scent of her, her taste, the feel of her naked body against his. The delicious heat of her.

  If he thought about it, he had to also think about how desperately he wanted to do it again. And not just once, but every single day for the rest of his natural life.

  So he hadn’t been thinking about it.

  He cleared his throat. “Yes?”

  She bit her lip and went on. “And not just that, but with—how you’ve been. Making dinner. Taking care of the kids. The way we’ve been able to—talk. I feel like I’ve known you for so much longer than a couple of days.”

  She hesitating, looking up at him. And he couldn’t let her stand there, having said something so brave, made herself vulnerable, and leave her hanging.

  “Me, too,” he said.

  It felt dangerous. The second the words were out of his mouth, that little voice in the back of his head was saying, Take it back! She can’t know that! What’ll happen now?

  What happened now was that she lifted her chin and continued, brave and vulnerable still, “We haven’t talked about what it meant, or what we want. I know that you said that you don’t think you’d be a good partner or parent, but I’ve seen you be both in this house, and you’re—you’re so wonderful, Flynn. You’re everything I never even realized I could want. And so I wanted to tell you that I do want you. I want you to stick around. I want to be with you. I want to give this—” She waved a hand around, indicating the house, the almost-asleep baby—”a shot.”