Say My Name

by R K Knightly

Blake shrugged. "Was just with the enforcers," he excused. "They cuss like a bunch of sailors. You know that."

  "Well, tamp it down for now," Liam urged. "Little ears and Arsen is like a dang mockingbird. Anything he hears, he repeats at full-volume and at least three hundred times before he gets bored with it. Just got him to stop saying the 'C' word last week. And that's not even that bad."

  "What's the 'C' word?" Caleb asked quietly.

  "Ends with a 'P'," Elle told him.

  "Gotcha." Caleb nodded. Yeah, “crap” wasn't that bad, but it wasn't that great either. And at least it wasn't the word “cunt”.

  "So, what's the verdict on the food?" Blake asked, not to be deterred. "A man's gotta eat, and I think I just lost ten pounds in water weight training with those pri- uhm, I mean, persons."

  "Cool it, Daddio," Colleen said, coming up from behind Blake to kiss him on the cheek. She had the two little girls at her side, both wearing almost identical sundresses. If one of the tots hadn't had Colleen's fiery red mane of hair, they might have almost been identical. Serena had gotten her father's blackish-blue locks and cobalt eyes. "You can swear all you want when the kids go to sleep. I know you need to release some of that aggravation somehow. Punch a bag, go to the basement and cuss up a storm, just keep a lid on the bad words until little ears aren't listening."

  "We're getting the kids fed first," Elle told Blake after he looked over at the grill longingly while listening to Colleen's spouting off at him.

  "Thank God they're still little," Blake muttered. "If Arsen's going to grow as tall as his father, that kid'll eat you out of house and home before long." His gaze flickered over to Elle. "Good luck with that by the way."

  Elle went off to find Arsen who had wiggled out of Caleb’s arms at some point, while Colleen got the girls situated at the picnic table, napkins and Wet Ones at the ready. Barbecue was always messy, though the girls were a little neater than Arsen who wore as much food as he ate.

  Once all the kids were settled and quietly munching on hot dogs and tiny bites of hamburger, Elle went off to breastfeed Knox in the house, leaving the others to wait for Trace and Helena. They were just coming back from out of town and should have been home an hour ago. Their little one was probably being cranky. One-year-old Damon was the exception to every baby rule. He hated sleeping in the car, loved noise to go to bed to, and preferred staying awake at night over sleeping. Trace swore the kid must've been part vampire.

  The parents began to eat food and Liam placed a cheeseburger off to the side for Elle for when she got back from feeding Knox. He made himself two cheeseburgers and made sure everyone was fed before starting on his first.

  They were halfway through eating when Jillian stopped, looking away from her plate of food.

  "Overcooked?" Liam asked anxiously. He prided himself on his newly found grilling skills and took into account everyone's preferred temperature for their beef. Since they were wolves, almost all of them liked their burgers rare to medium rare.

  "No, it's good," Jillian assured him, looking at Caleb. "I've...my stomach's been bothering me some a bit lately."

  "Babe, just tell them." Caleb said quietly as he nodded at her with a smile, gesturing the people around them.

  She looked back at him, practically whispering, "Not yet. Elle's not here."

  "You knocked up?" Blake asked loudly, taking a huge bite of his burger before chewing and effectively stealing Jillian's thunder.

  Caleb and Jillian blinked back at him before she nodded her head slightly.

  “Yeah, we’re going to have a baby,” Caleb said, his face flushed with pride.

  "Congrats!" Colleen said, grinning like a lunatic at the news.

  "I hope iz anuvah boy," Arsen said before spearing a piece of hot dog with a baby fork and jamming the food into his mouth.

  "No! Girl! We need anodder girl," Serena said, her high voice squeaking near the end.

  The kids went on about what sex the baby would be while the grown-ups congratulated the expectant couple and hugs were given, mostly between the females.

  "What's going on? What did I miss?"

  Knox was passed out in Elle's arms, comatose from being fresh off the tit, as always.

  "Auntie Jill's knocked up!" Serena piped up before going back to her food.

  Elle's eyes narrowed.

  "Who taught her that phrase?" Her eyes immediately went to the fun, bad uncle. Blake. She was sure her children would be cussing up a storm by the time they were 8.

  "Guilty," he admitted with a smile. The bastard didn't look guilty at all.

  Elle took the time to admonish him for a minute before congratulating Caleb and Jillian, putting a sleepy Knox in his carrier and walking over to Liam to get her food. She knew he would always save her some. He always did.

  There were a number of grills that had been pulled over to the area between the Packhouse and Liam and Elle’s home, and many other families were getting down to their dinner. It was relatively quiet for a while as people finished eating and were slowly starting to clean up.

  Once they were all done, some of the females set up some games for the kids and mayhem ensued. Arts and crafts for the little ones and sack races and other sports for some of the older kids. They would play until the smaller ones took a nap and would be woken up just before fireworks lit the sky.

  "You've done this twice, Elle," Jillian said as they watched the kids play from afar. "On a scale of one to Armageddon, how screwed am I?"

  "The twins were difficult," Elle admitted. "When one woke up and cried, they always roused the other. Knox is easier. Serena and Arsen just sleep through his nightly feedings and changings. Thank God they're deep sleepers. You seen Doc D'Amato yet?"

  Jill nodded happily. "Yesterday, just to confirm it. Only one baby she can see in there. Thank God. I don't know how you did it with two."

  "Liam helped, as did Colleen," Elle said. "At least until her little monster came and was eating up all my time with my best friend. Then she decided to bring the little munchkin over and we shared the load between us."

  "I'm afraid I'm going to trip and drop the baby," Jillian admitted. "I mean, we're shifters so we don't get hurt easily, but it's still scary as hell to think of him or her being dropped on their head."

  "I always thought I would trip up the stairs when mine were first born. I think every new mom goes through that," Elle said. "That and thinking they don't need to be 'on it' when changing a baby boy's diaper. With the number of times Arsen’s 'baptized' me with pee, I should start taking up a collection plate and call myself a minister."

  "You having any more?" Jillian asked. "You got three, but you aiming on adding to the family again someday?"

  "Don't know yet," Elle said, looking over at Liam who was laughing and making silly faces at Knox. The baby was wide awake again and blowing saliva bubbles, completely riveted by his own salivary gland’s prowess. "Haven't had that discussion yet on whether we want more. I know Serena wants a little sister though. I heard her at Colleen's talking to Nicole about having a baby sister. I'm pretty sure she just wants a real live 'doll' to dress up in pink sparkly dresses, though. It may be just a phase."

  "She won't like it so much when she's dressing up her baby sister and that baby sister decides to drop a load in her diaper." Jillian snickered a little and laughed.

  Many of the toddlers got tired about an hour before the fireworks were set to start and thick blankets and soft pillows were placed on the ground so they could nap until the grand finale commenced. The grown-ups kept the older kids away from the small ones with a movie being shown in the Packhouse's basement while the teens decided to head off in another direction and play pranks on some of the less fortunate adults. They were smart enough to leave the Alpha and his entourage alone.

  They all made it back to the clearing about 15 minutes before the show was set to start and took seats on the grass or laid back on blankets to look up into the stars. A comfortable, mumbling hum spread throughout the crowd unt
il the first of the fireworks lit the sky and effectively shut the crowd up.

  Liam came up and sat behind Elle, his legs spread and bringing her back into his arms. Knox was looking up sleepily at the vibrant colors on display with a thumb tucked into his mouth.

  "Want another one?" Liam mumbled into Elle's ear in between loud explosions of fireworks being rocketed into the sky and going off one by one.

  "Another kid?" she asked.

  "Yeah, another kid," he answered, amused. "We make some pretty great ones, if I do say so myself, so I was wondering if you wanted to have another."

  Elle just smiled, thinking back to her conversation with Jillian.

  "I think we do, too," she told him and nuzzled her head deeper into his neck. "And I'd love to have more kids with you."

  "Kids? As in plural?" Liam asked.

  "Hon, we had twins once," she reminded him. "It could always happen again."

  Liam groaned. "They were twice the trouble, though I love them to death."

  "Hey, you asked," she told him. "I can't predict if you're going to get another twosome or not."

  Liam was quiet for a while as he watched the fireworks display overhead. Elle felt it when he moved his head in a slow, firm nod.

  "Okay, let's do it," he said finally. "Let's have another one, even if your ovaries decide to give us another set of mouths to feed."

  He went to stand, but Elle jerked him back.

  "The fireworks aren't over," she told him. "You think you're going to convince Arsen and Serena to go to bed when there's still bright colors and loud noises in the sky? Not to mention sparkly ones? Have you not met our children?"

  "Okay," he said and settled back again, relaxed. "But as soon as we get those three into bed, we're going to start trying again. Real hard, baby. Real mother-flippin' hard."

  Bonus Chapter 1

  The wind on the high plains was heavy as Caleb’s medium-sized sedan swerved through torrents of rain and the occasional pelt of wayward hail. His gaze flickered from the south side of highway to the north. The scenes were as different as night and day and threw him for a loop as he saw something completely out of the blue. A funnel cloud.

  It looked like it was moving fast, and Caleb swore a blue streak as he urged his car forward to beat the inclement weather.

  Growing up in the northeast, he had never experienced a tornado. Well, it was a year of firsts, but this one beat all the rest.

  “Move, car, fucking move!” he gritted out, his foot to the floor over the gas pedal. The mangy car protested weakly and he wished he had thought to trade in the hunk of junk before he had made his way west in search of his fabled second chance mate.

  The pang he felt whenever he thought of Sheila had lessened over the months since her death, though it never truly went away. Every time he thought of it, he found it hurt less and less until it was only a gently tug in his solar plexus, just a hint of a reminder of what could have been.

  The car sputtered and a puff of smoke drifted up and away from the hood before Caleb slammed his fists on the steering wheel, cursing.

  “Motherfucker!”

  He eased over to the side of the straight road and put the car into a reluctant park. His eyes flickered over to the north again, taking in the scene. The funnel cloud had widened, hit the ground, and was now tearing up dried vegetation and debris. His keen eyesight could see the top of a silo tear apart and scatter, and he muttered a few well-chosen words to God.

  “You couldn’t at least fucking have me breakdown near an auto repair shop?” he asked the roof of his vehicle. It didn’t answer back and Caleb opened the door before unlatching the front hood and taking in the damage.

  He had no clue what was wrong with the vehicle – didn’t even know where to begin to look – and stood there feeling utterly at a loss as to what to do. He wasn’t sure how far he was from the nearest town, but he had seen a sign a while ago that said he was fifty miles outside of Pratt, Kansas. The problem was that he didn’t know if that had been ten or forty miles ago. He had been too eager to beat the storm the weather forecasters had been going on and on about on the radio.

  He kept the hood open before glancing north again, the funnel cloud slightly nearer, if his eyes told true. Closer and…turning his way.

  Shit.

  Caleb could hear the far-off whinny of a horse to his south, hooves beating hard on the ground as a voice called out a “hyah!’ and whistled. Well, at least there were people around, which meant that there had to be shelter from the storm. Shelter and help.

  Completely out of his element, Caleb followed the noises of hooves until a cloud of dust upon the horizon lifted into the air like the dust devils he had seen in Arizona and New Mexico. He had been in awe of them, though they had been a bit scary. The cloud to the north, inching ever closer, was fucking terrifying.

  He broke into a jog before it became a full-on sprint, the wind picking up at his back and hurrying him to move forward. Some debris flew and a small branch hit his back, causing him to wince at the sting.

  “Fucking nature,” he grumbled breathlessly as he ran up to and over a whitewashed fence like a hurdler in the Summer Olympics. The wood shuddered from the wind and the telltale creaking of the it made him sure the storm was working its way toward him.

  Caleb had stopped at many different packs on his search for a mate and was on his way to one outside of Pratt just before the storm hit and his car decided to take a dump on him. It was a smaller but docile community, full of farmers and blue-collar men and women, real downhome folk there ever was. He could do much worse finding a second chance mate amongst the hard-working people of Penalosa Pack.

  As he had made his way across country, each stop was a dead end, his hopes being dashed before his very eyes until he almost wanted to give up. Every time, though, he would get a call from Liam or Elle and their encouraging words would spur him on further until he had made it to the west coast in Washington.

  After that, he traveled south through Oregon and California and turned east to trek the southwest states, stopping by known and lesser-known packs alike, and always being welcomed with open arms and a sympathetic ear. It was both heartening and depressing. Each pack, each visit, took a little something out of him until he was sure he would never find this fabled female that was made for him.

  A nearby whinny drew him out of his thoughts, and a gelding with a white star on his face and a luxurious chocolatey coat galloped past him before rearing back and almost taking Caleb out with his front hooves. It had been startled by a wayward piece of fence as it flew past them both, heading in a southeasterly direction.

  “Hyah!”

  The voice was female and close by, and Caleb looked over from his position to see a young woman with dirty blond hair tied back in a messy ponytail. There were smudges of dirt on her face, probably from wrangling the horses, and a determined air surrounding her. It was etched on her face as well.

  And what a lovely face it was.

  “You!” The woman looked over at him, startled. “What are you doing here?”

  “Car.” Caleb breathed out heavily. “Broke down. Looking for shelter.”

  She studied him, doing a circuit over him as if to tell if he was friend or foe. His panic-stricken face and foreign accent must have spoken to her of his status as a visitor to the state, and she nodded her head before her chin jutted upward and she breathed out a sigh.

  “Come with me,” she told him before turning heel and walking off into the distance.

  Caleb ran up to catch up to her, dirt and dust clogging his nose and throat. He coughed a bit and covered his face with his flimsy t-shirt, trying to stem the particles from entering his nasal passages and mouth.

  “Name’s Caleb,” he told her, voice muffled. “Not from around here if you couldn’t tell.”

  The snort she gave told him that she knew all too well he was an outsider. And the woman had a slight mid-western accent from what he could tell, though she hadn’t spoken much yet.<
br />
  “Jillian,” she returned. “You’re on my parents’ farm and trespassing. Since it seems you did so to get away from the storm, I’ll turn the other cheek. This time.”

  She covered her mouth with a soiled bandana and picked up speed, the wind hollering and whooping through scattered copses of trees and brush.

  “We got a storm cellar about half a mile from here,” she told him. “Can you run? That twister is making its way swiftly.”

  Caleb nodded. “Yeah. I can do that.”

  They started at a slow jog, the air behind them flowing faster, Jillian’s ponytail whipping around and stinging her face. It seemed to take forever to move that half mile, but there was soon an old outbuilding that looked worse for wear and a slanted storm cellar at the base of it.

  “Used to be part of our old house before an EF5 tornado came and blew it away a few summers ago,” she told him, pulling the handle up so they could climb inside.

  They both skinned down the steps quickly, Jillian waiting at the bottom to close the doors behind them and secure it with a heavy chain and several pieces of thick wood.

  “You can never be too careful,” she explained as she placed a third piece of sturdy wood between the handles. “The wind from a tornado can wreak havoc even on the strongest of chains. Had to replace the doors once because I’d only chained them. Near got sucked up into the sky.”

  Caleb coughed and swore he saw dirt fly out of his mouth. The roar of the wind assaulted his ears as the dust from the loose soil clogged every hole in his face. He looked around, hoping to see a box of tissues or some paper towels he could blow his nose into. All he could smell was the earthy scent of soil. He found a paper towel in one corner on a small beat-up side table and cleared his nose with it.