"That will be fine," Ethan muttered. "Now breathe through the pain."
"Come over here," she grunted. "I'll show you how to breathe through my fist."
All the men in the sitting area outside of Astrid and Ethan's suite winced in solidarity. The Vampyre compound had been restored by Mother Nature as a gift for the arrival of the baby. Plus Ethan had threatened her with baby visitation rights. Now that the danger had passed, everyone had come home.
The ornate sitting room was filled with those who loved Astrid and Ethan. The Kev and Gemma sat close to each other and held hands. Pam, Astrid's strikingly beautiful and foul-mouthed Guardian Angel, and her mate, Ethan's father, paced the room with excitement. Satan and Sloth sat in a corner and quietly played cards. Astrid's cousins, Heathcliff and Cathy, along with their father smiled at everyone as they passed around refreshments. Mother Nature held court with the baby Demons as Grandpa looked on approvingly. Janet and Myrtle were folding a pile of onesies they had brought and Carl was bejeweling a tiny baseball cap. I sat on Hayden's lap as he traced little circles on my back and we waited.
And waited.
And waited.
"This baby is not coming out," Astrid ground out. "I will be pregnant for a thousand years." Her breath came out in spurts and she cried out when it became too much.
"Oh my God," Gemma said. "Does it always hurt like that?" Her face was ashen and she clung tightly to The Kev.
"I just squatted in a field and they fell out," Pam informed the room.
Her announcement was greeted with appalled silence.
"Everybody in here. NOW," Astrid demanded. "If I have to go through this, you do too."
The men held back, but the women rushed forward.
"Guys, come up here by my head," she instructed as she stiffened and groaned. "I have no problem with nudity, but I'm fairly sure Ethan will lose it if everyone gets a peek at my hooha. Ladies, I don't care where you stand, but watch out. If he ever comes out, he's liable to eat all of us."
"Get your shit together, asshead," Pam said as she lovingly pushed Astrid's hair from her face. "You ain’t the only woman in the world to blow out a baby."
"Yeah? How many women do you know that blow out eight-headed babies?" she grunted and tried to punch Pam in the nose.
"I thought it was six heads," Mother Nature added unhelpfully.
"It's twelve," Gemma chimed in, and then ducked as a vase of roses came flying at her.
"It's ten heads," Astrid snapped, and then screeched in agony.
"Darling niece," Satan said calmly as he approached the bed. "You can take down armies. I don't really see the problem here."
All the women in the room gasped and went for cover.
"He does have a point," Grandpa backed up his son. "Pam said she squatted in a field and dropped it right out."
"Should we take her outside to a field?" Ethan's father inquired politely. "Maybe if she stood up and jogged around a bit it would fall out."
"Outstanding point," The Kev agreed.
"Get out." Astrid's voice was murderous. "If you don't leave right now I will magic a fifteen-headed baby into the stomachs of all the penis-owning bastards in this room."
I'd never seen men move so quickly in my life.
"Not you, Ethan," she hissed at her mate as he tried to make his escape on the tail end of the exodus. "You will experience every joyous moment with me."
"Of course," he mumbled as he slunk back in the room.
"He's coming," she wailed as her grip on the bedpost snapped it in half.
We gathered around my cousin as she pushed with all her might.
And he came.
"Sweet baby Moses in a mesh tracksuit," Pam squealed as she took the baby and cleaned him. Ethan cut the cord and Pam placed the screaming child in his hands. His look of astonishment and joy brought tears to my eyes.
"What?" Astrid asked. "What's wrong with him?"
"Nothing," I said as I gazed at the small perfect bundle in his father's trembling arms.
"How many heads?" she demanded.
"One head, my love. One beautiful head," Ethan whispered reverently as he gave the little baby boy to her.
Astrid was silent for once as she gazed at her child. Her lips quivered and her magic swirled through the room. "He's ours?" She spoke in a voice so soft I barely heard her.
"He's ours," Ethan replied as he sat on the bed next to his mate and child.
"He has one head," she murmured as she traced the tiny lips, toes and fingers of her child.
"That doesn't mean he won't sprout a few more in the next couple of days." Pam snorted as she kissed Astrid and then the baby. "Put that little son of a bitch on your boob. He's gonna be hungry," she instructed.
"Vampyre-Demons can nurse?" Astrid asked, surprised.
"No clue, dumbass. Try it and see," Pam said.
Vampyre-Demons could nurse. The baby suckled with delight from his mother and Ethan watched rapt with a dreamy expression on his handsome face. He stroked the back of his child's head as the boy drank from his mother.
"What shall we call him?" he asked.
Astrid looked down at the baby and sighed happily. "Samuel. We will call him Samuel."
Samuel stopped drinking for a brief moment at the sound of his name, looked up and smiled a gummy baby smile.
"Did that just happen?" Myrtle asked, shocked.
"Yes, it did," Mother Nature said knowingly. "This is no normal child. Samuel will. . ."
"Stop," Astrid cut her off. "I don't want to know. Right now I have a perfect one-headed baby boy and I love him more than I thought possible. I can feel he is special and different, but I just want to hold him and be with him. I don't want to know his future. . .yet."
"Come on, let's leave them alone," Gemma said as she ushered us out.
The last thing I saw as I left the room was the passionate and loving kiss Ethan gave Astrid and two tiny little hands resting on the chins of his parents.
Hayden's arms were open and I ran into them. "Is that something you would like to do?" he asked as he pressed his lips to my hair.
I paused and considered. "Yes, but not yet."
"Should we go practice until we're ready?" His smirk made me tingle.
I giggled and took his precious face between my hands, then whispered in his ear. "I think that is a very good idea. . .a very good idea indeed."
THE END (for now)
###
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~ Robyn Peterman
KEEP READING in this ebook to read an excerpt from “Ready To Were”, now available in the Three Southern Beaches anthology
Excerpt from READY TO WERE
Chapter 1
“You’re joking.”
“No, actually I’m not,” my boss said and slapped the folder into my hands. “You leave tomorrow morning and I don’t want to see your hairy ass till this is solved.”
I looked wildly around her office for something to lob at her head. It occurred to me that might not be the best of ideas, but desperate times led to stupid measures. She could not do this to me. I’d worked too hard and I wasn’t going back. Ever.
“First of all, my ass is not hairy except on a full moon and you’re smoking crack if you think I’m going back to Georgia.”
Angela crossed her arms over her ample chest and narrowed her eyes at me. “Am I your boss?” she asked.
“Is this a trick question?”
She huffed out an exasperated sigh and
ran her hands through her spiked ‘do making her look like she’d been electrocuted. “Essie, I am cognizant of how you feel about Hung Island, Georgia, but there’s a disaster of major proportions on the horizon and I have no choice.”
“Where are you sending Clark and Jones?” I demanded.
“New York and Miami.”
“Oh my god,” I shrieked. “Who did I screw over in a former life that those douches get to go to cool cities and I have to go home to an island called Hung?”
“Those douches do have hairy asses and not just on a full moon. You’re the only female agent I have that looks like a model so you’re going to Georgia. Period.”
“Fine. I’ll quit. I’ll open a bakery.”
Angela smiled and an icky feeling skittered down my spine. “Excellent, I’ll let you tell the Council that all the money they invested in your training is going to be flushed down the toilet because you want to bake cookies.”
The Council consisted of supernaturals from all sorts of species. The branch that currently had me by the metaphoric balls was WTF—Werewolf Treaty Federation. They were the worst as far as stringent rules and consequences went. The Vampyres were loosey goosey, the Witches were nuts and the freakin’ Fairies were downright pushovers, but not the Weres. Nope, if you enlisted you were in for life. It had sounded so good when the insanely sexy recruiting officer had come to our local Care For Your Inner Were meeting.
Training with the best of the best. Great salary with benefits. Apartment and company car. But the kicker for me was that it was fifteen hours away from the hell I grew up in. No longer was I Essie from Hung Island, Georgia—and who in their right mind would name an island Hung—I was Agent Essie McGee of the Chicago WTF. The irony of the initials was a source of pain to most Werewolves, but went right over the Council’s heads due to the simple fact that they were older than dirt and oblivious to pop culture.
Yes, I’d been disciplined occasionally for mouthing off to superiors and using the company credit card for shoes, but other than that I was a damn good agent. I’d singlehandedly brought down three rogue Weres who were selling secrets to the Dragons—another supernatural species. The Dragons shunned the Council, had their own little club and a psychotic desire to rule the world. Several times they’d come close due to the fact that they were loaded and Weres from the New Jersey Pack were easily bribed. Not to mention the fire-breathing thing…
I was an independent woman living in the Windy City. I had a gym membership, season tickets to the Cubs and a gay Vampyre best friend named Dwayne. What more did a girl need?
Well, possibly sex, but the bastard had ruined me for other men…
Hank “The Tank” Wilson was the main reason I’d rather chew my own paw off than go back to Hung Island, Georgia. Six foot three of obnoxious, egotistical, perfect-assed, alpha male Werewolf. As the alpha of my local pack he had decided it was high time I got mated…to him. I, on the other hand, had plans—big ones and they didn’t include being barefoot and pregnant at the beck and call of a player.
So I did what any sane rational woman would do. I left in the middle of the night with a suitcase, a flyer from the hot recruiter and enough money for a one-way bus ticket to freedom. Of course nothing ever turns out as planned…The apartment was the size of a shoe box, the car was used and smelled like French fries and the benefits didn’t kick in till I turned one hundred and twenty five. We Werewolves had long lives.
“Angela, you really can’t do this to me.” Should I get down on my knees? I was so desperate I wasn’t above begging.
“Why? What happened there, Essie? Were you in some kind of trouble I should know about?” Her eyes narrowed, but she wasn’t yelling.
I think she liked me…kind of. The way a mother would like an annoying spastic two year old who belonged to someone else.
“No, not exactly,” I hedged. “It’s just that…”
“Weres are disappearing and presumed dead. Considering no one knows of our existence besides other supernaturals, we have a problem. Furthermore, it seems like humans might be involved.”
My stomach lurched and I grabbed Angela’s office chair for balance. “Locals are missing?” I choked out. My grandma Bobby Sue was still there, but I’d heard from her last night. She’d harangued me about getting my belly button pierced. Why I’d put that on Instagram was beyond me. I was gonna hear about that one for the next eighty years or so.
“Not just missing—more than likely dead. Check the folder,” Angela said and poured me a shot of whiskey.
With trembling hands I opened the folder. This had to be a joke. I felt ill. I’d gone to high school with Frankie Mac and Jenny Packer. Jenny was as cute as a button and was the cashier at the Piggly Wiggly. Frankie Mac had been the head cheerleader and cheated on every test since the fourth grade. Oh my god, Debbie Swink? Debbie Swink had been voted most likely to succeed and could do a double backwards flip off the high dive. She’d busted her head open countless times before she’d perfected it. Her mom was sure she’d go to the Olympics.
“I know these girls,” I whispered.
“Knew. You knew them. They all were taking classes at the modeling agency.”
“What modeling agency? There’s no modeling agency on Hung Island.” I sifted through the rest of the folder with a knot the size of a cantaloupe in my stomach. More names and faces I recognized. Sandy Moongie? Wait a minute.
“Um, not to speak ill of the dead, but Sandy Moongie was the size of a barn…she was modeling?”
“Worked the reception desk.” Angela shook her head and dropped down on the couch.
“This doesn’t seem that complicated. It’s fairly black and white. Whoever is running the modeling agency is the perp.”
“The modeling agency is Council sponsored.”
I digested that nugget in silence for a moment.
“And the Council is running a modeling agency, why?”
“Word is that we’re heading toward revealing ourselves to the humans and they’re trying to find the most attractive representatives to do so.”
“That’s a joke, right?” What kind of dumb ass plan was that?
“I wish it was.” Angela picked up my drink and downed it. “I’m getting too old for this shit,” she muttered as she refilled the shot glass, thought better of it and just swigged from the bottle.
“Is the Council aware that I’m going in?”
“What do you think?”
“I think they’re old and stupid and that they send in dispensable agents like me to clean up their shitshows,” I grumbled.
“Smart girl.”
“Who else knows about this? Clark? Jones?”
“They know,” she said wearily. “They’re checking out agencies in New York and Miami.”
“Isn’t it conflict of interest to send me where I know everyone?”
“It is, but you’ll be able to infiltrate and get in faster that way. Besides, no one has disappeared from the other agencies yet.”
There was one piece I still didn’t understand. “How are humans involved?”
She sighed and her head dropped back on to her broad shoulders. “Humans are running the agency.”
It took a lot to render me silent, like learning my grandma had been a stripper in her youth and that all male Werewolves were hung like horses…but this was horrific.
“Who in the hell thought that was a good idea? My god, half the female Weres I know sprout tails when flash bulbs go off. We won’t have to come out, they can just run billboards of hot girls with hairy appendages coming out of their asses.”
“It’s all part of the Grand Plan. If the humans see how wonderful and attractive we are, the issue of knowingly living alongside of us will be moot.”
Again. Speechless.
“When are Council elections?” It was time to vote some of those turd knockers out.
“Essie.” Angela rolled her eyes and took another swig. “There are no elections. They’re appointed and serve for life.”
“I knew that,” I mumbled. Skipping Were History class was coming back to bite me in the butt.
“I’ll go.” There was no way I couldn’t. Even though my knowledge of the hierarchy of my race was fuzzy, my skills were top notch and trouble seemed to find me. In any other job that would suck, but in mine it was an asset.
“Good. You’ll be working with the local pack alpha. He’s also the sheriff there. Name’s Hank Wilson. You know him?”
“Yep.” Biblically. I knew the son of a bitch biblically.
***
“You’re gonna bang him.”
“I am not gonna bang him.”
“You are so gonna bang him.”
“Dwayne, if I hear you say that I’m gonna bang him one more time, I will not let you borrow my black Mary Jane pumps. Ever again.”
Dwayne made the international “zip the lip and throw away the key” sign while silently mouthing that I was going to bang Hank.
“I think you should bang him if he’s a hot as you said.” Dwayne made himself comfortable on my couch and turned on the TV.
“When did I ever say he was hot?” I demanded as I took the remote out of his hands. I was not watching any more Dance Moms. “I never said he was hot.”
“Paaaaleese,” Dwayne flicked his pale hand over his shoulder and rolled his eyes.
“What was that?”
“What was what?” he asked, confused.
“That shoulder thing you just did.”
“Oh, I was flicking my hair over my shoulder in a girlfriend move.”
“Okay, don’t do that. It doesn’t work. You’re as bald as a cue ball.”
“But it’s the new move,” he whined.
Oh my god, Vampyres were such high maintenance. “According to who?” I yanked my suitcase out from under my bed and started throwing stuff in.
“Kim Kardashian.”
I refused to dignify that with so much as a look.
“Fine,” he huffed. “But if you say one word about my skinny jeans I am so out of here.”
I considered it, but I knew he was serious. As crazy as he drove me, I adored him. He was my only real friend in Chicago and I had no intention of losing him.
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