Winds of Change

by Kat Keppeler

  Lee pulled free, blood still on his lips. He smiled at Finn and begged, “Again…”

  Chapter Twenty-One

  Lee had decided to take up with Finn, Skye knew the depth of their antics as she shared a full bond with each but Lee’s sorrow never left him except when he sought escape in passion. Everyone knew Lee was grieving, because one morning they found him painting a mural on the outside wall of the doctors office. It was a lovely, if depressing abstract work, the lines were sharp and harsh but the colors were dark and grim. Finn walked out when Lee was mostly done, his hands on his hips, looking at the mural.

  “Well done, well done. Now everyone who comes will know they’re probably leaving in a coroner’s bag or getting super bad news. But I think we can just set up a new motto. ‘Barrowman’s, you try and you die.’ How’s that sound?” Lee made a rude noise even if Finn was smiling at him broadly.

  “I’ll whitewash it in the morning.” Lee said with a frown, looking up at the dark and sharp shapes with a critical eye. “Looks like shit anyway. Belongs in a hotel.”

  Finn gave Lee an incredulous look.

  “I want to know what kind of hotel’s you’ve been to that have… that? Is that a… human heart there?” He pointed at something resembling a heart shape.

  “Yeah… Well its in the impressionist style… What? Is it badly done?” As Lee leaned closer to look at it Finn had taken the opportunity to scoop a handful of paint from the tray that Lee had set down. When the smaller man turned to look at Finn the giant smeared a handful of paint in his face.

  “OH MY GOD!” Lee said, gasping. “What the fuck, Finn?” Finn was backing up laughing when Lee grabbed a bucket of white and flung it. It spattered across Finn and the passing Micah.

  “Paint fight!” Screeched the young man and pretty soon they were all squirting or smearing each other with paint. The commotion drew the rest of the pack out of their hiding places, staring at the three men flinging paint like it was the most fun they had ever had.

  Laughter wasn’t something Skye had heard in far too long, so she padded out to see what the noise was and smiled a little, although sadly, as they played. She had a cup of coffee in her hand, diluted with milk and sugar until it was just pale brown. Wearing leggings and a loose sweater with her hair up in knot at the crown of her head, Skye sat down on the porch to watch them play. After a long moment, Chance joined her on the stoop, easing himself down with care as he was still sore.

  Chance wasn’t smiling, his dark brow was creased in concern as he took in the mural although his expression softened as Skye rested her blonde head against his shoulder gently.

  “He’s afraid of me,” Chance said softly, to Skye as the men threw paint and drew more into their free for all. Thankfully, it was well away from the cars.

  Skye said nothing but she dropped one hand onto Chance’s thigh in mute support, her body tucked against his side companionably. “You want him to be an equal with you in the relationship, you have to treat him like one, Chance.”

  They were all soaked with paint, all of them laughing and carrying on until Betty came out of nowhere and hit them with the hose. Paint rolled off wet bodies and making colorful swirls in the grass. Lee had paint everywhere, even as Betty hosed them it was clear it was deep in his hair. Finn was caked in it too, he tossed Lee over his shoulder and began heading toward the two on the porch. He came to a stop before them, Lee suddenly silent as he was set down.

  “He’s going to need help getting paint out of his hair. Chance?” Finn glanced up, as if the idea had only just occurred to him. Clearly this had been some clever ruse by Finn, even though his chestnut hair was going to have paint in it for weeks.

  Finn winked at Skye, bending down to pucker up and offer her a kiss.

  “Oh come on it’s a little paint. It isn’t going to kill you.” He said to her soft laugh.

  “It looks like you’ll need some help, too,” Skye said as she touched Finn’s cheek with gentle fingertips and then kissed him, even if some paint might end up smeared on her skin.

  “Unfortunately, that hot tub that Lee calls a bathtub isn’t available yet, so we’ll just have to make do. Do you want a shower or shall I just hose you off like Betty is doing to poor Micah?” Skye teased with a ghost of her good humor finally sneaking back into her blue eyes.

  Chance sat there, looking up at Lee with a somber expression on his handsome face and held out one hand.

  “I can’t toss you over my shoulder - well, I could, but I’d probably hurt myself. What do you think, Lee, you willing to let me pamper you just a little bit?” Chance offered in a neutral enough voice that would have passed muster if the people around hadn’t known him quite so well.

  Lee looked nervous but sighed. Betty had turned the hose on the side of the building and the depressing mural was running into the rocks and grass.

  “Sure.” Lee said quietly, looking over Chance with concern he’d been bottling up.

  “You’ve never taken so long to heal a shoulder wound before, how the hell did they manage that?” Asked Lee, following Chance. That was until he got to the door.

  “Clarence Lee, don’t you track paint all over the carpet!” Betty demanded, her hand on her belly. Lee just frowned, and then began stripping right there. At least Chance could guide a mostly nude Lee to the shower and as long as he didn’t touch anything it wouldn’t track on the walls. Lee disappeared followed by Chance to the bathroom where Lee started the shower. Chance closed the door behind him and no sooner than he did there was a nude and paint smeared Clarence Lee throwing himself against Chance.

  Lee pressed a heavy kiss to Chance’s lips, paint smeared hands on either side of Chance’s face.

  “I swear to god if you ever, ever run off to some damned witch town without telling me the truth, William, I won’t speak to you again.” There was a sigh of relief as Lee gave into his worries instead of bottling them down. “You didn’t call! You didn’t text me for days. I was so scared.”

  “I know, I’m sorry,” Chance said wearily. He didn’t even complain about the paint on his skin or clothes as he often did, just to tease Lee. He finally managed a slight half smile as Lee helped him out of his shirt carefully. There were still bruises all over Chance’s skin. His shoulder was especially livid and his ribs were still taped up. “I know I’ve scared you when you dredge out the name on my birth certificate, Clarence Lee.”

  Chance dropped his hands to his jeans to unbutton them and shed them as he leaned one tanned arm in to test the water.

  “Honey, if I had felt the time to tell you what was going on, and do it proper, I would have but I didn’t want you to have to tell Skye alone with no support what little I knew and had put together about her parents. I wanted to have answers but I am sorry. I’m sorry that I scared you. I’m sorry that you had to deal with it alone.”

  “You didn’t answer my question,” Lee said, flicker of sorrow darkened his features at the realization Chance had dodged it across his features. “I am stronger than you think, Chance. I’m also not stupid. I love you, I have for a very long time. But I’m not a piece of glass and you’re either going to start treating me like I’m not or… Or….”

  He furrowed his brows and let the threat fall flat. Could Lee even go there? He let Chance go, turning to get into the shower and begin scrubbing paint out of his turquoise hair.

  Chance followed him in, laughing and strong hands caught Lee before he turned the smaller man to pin him against the shower despite his many bruises.

  “Because I was trying to apologize before I got sidetracked by explaining the nuances of the spell work I used,” Chance replied, giving Lee that bemused smile. “I’ve been waiting a good hundred years for you to want to be treated like an equal, I’m not trying to keep you in the dark but you’re changing the rules of our encounters after decades and decades… give a man half a breath to catch up?”

  Chance leaned down to steal a kiss from Lee, his mouth slanting over Lee’s in mingled relief
and possession before he let his brow rest against Lee’s.

  “My father, it turns out, was a warlock. I have had… some small suspicions, off and on, but nothing I wanted to look all that deeply into. It’s less well documented; I don’t think that it happens terribly often and I don’t know if it usually gives the child odd quirks or if it’s some combination of my connection to Skye and my blood or who knows. It’s very undocumented. I worked a spell, with some help, that rendered me more or less human. Or, I suppose, a warlock. It was just my father’s birthrights that I could draw upon while I was in Fairfax. It was effective but the injuries I sustained while I was under the effects of it are healing as if I wasn’t a shifter at all, even with the spell broken. All things have a price, sadly. Anything else that you’d like to know, Lee?”

  Lee let his eyes travel over Chance’s face, uncertainty there and questions that he had, but he asked nothing and simply nodded.

  “Are you going to be alright, Chance?” Lee finally managed, pushing Chance back just a little so that he wasn’t pinned any longer. Lee gave Chance his back for just a moment, trying to finish rinsing the paint from his hair. A new bite mark adorned Lee’s shoulder, one he hadn’t yet told anyone about but it was vivid and healing against his pale flesh. Reds and blacks were mixing to form an ugly brown color in the drain, Lee turned with paint still running down his face. “I’m never going to get clean am I?”

  “You’ll be clean again. You always get filthy when you get into murals,” Chance replied as he went to gently tip Lee’s head back into the water and carefully scrub. He was still favoring that left arm but Chance was nothing of not good at making do. “Head back, sweetheart.”

  Lee put a hand on Chance’s chest, and sighed. “You didn’t… hurt yourself permanently did you? By doing all that, you didn’t…”

  He didn’t know how to describe it, but clearly Lee was worried that Chance would be human and start aging the same as they did.

  Once he was sure the paint wouldn’t run into Lee’s eyes, Chance’s fingers worked through his scalp before sliding down over the new mark in his flesh without comment although his fingers lingered there, gently stroking over the upraised skin and the clear impression of Finn’s teeth on Lee’s fair skin.

  “No, I didn’t hurt it. My wolf hated it a whole lot and is itching to get some time out to play but it’s there, you can reach for him if you want…” Chance’s fingers lingered on the mark. Finn’s, he suspected but he didn’t ask before his fingers traced the older marks from the bite he’d left on Lee’s skin so very many years ago. “Do you want to mark me, Lee?”

  Lee almost jumped at that, his eyes wide. Even Skye hadn’t asked Lee to mark her, he’d just been driven to it by instincts Lee didn’t fully understand. Finn had invited but he’d always gone his own path and bucked tradition. Lee, however, bore the mark of each of those who called him theirs. Lee swallowed, turning to look at Chance over his shoulder.

  “I don’t really know what to say. I don’t know what marks really do except I can feel you guys once you’ve done it to me. I don’t know if it will work the same way, I’m not like the rest of you. I’m just an omega.”

  Chance laughed. Not his usual soft snort but a full on laugh that had him throwing his head back and showing even white teeth. “Yeah, not so much anymore. I don’t even think that omega is a real term honestly, just something the council made up and taught as fact but that’s neither here nor there at the moment. Lee, clearly we make our own rules in this pack.”

  He gently turned Lee in the water until the smaller man was facing him and tipped his head back to rinse off the last of the paint. Chance’s shoulders were broad and leanly muscled. Chance bore only Rory’s mark on one shoulder from when he’d been claimed into their pack; their version of branding that was more traditional than any of them had suspected at the time.

  Chance braced his good arm on the wall behind Lee while the one he had trouble lifting rested on Lee’s hip.

  “I love you, Clarence Lee Walls. If you want me, I’m yours. I plan to make the same offer to Skye when she’s feeling a little less raw and a little more centered,” His gaze dropped to the newest marks on Lee’s shoulder.

  “Finn, well, we’ll see how that goes.” His grey eyes twinkled and although he wasn’t physically fully himself, he was much more so than Lee had seen in a while. “One step at a time. I’m still a little irked at Skye’s pet moose but I’ll get over it.”

  “He’s really not as bad as you two think he is.” Lee said in clear defense of Finn. “I dunno, I like him.”

  Lee shrugged off talking about Finn though and sighed. “I told Skye when she first shifted and you left me to watch her that I knew how much Rory loved her. I knew because if I could love anyone that way it would be you.”

  Lee made a face, an embarrassed expression at the confession, before he laid his head against Chance’s uninjured shoulder. “Don’t pay attention to me. Of course I want you, Chance.”

  And as if he needed to do it before Chance could change his mind, Lee turned his face in and administered a bite. His teeth went deep into Chance’s shoulder, tasting the hot blood flow into his mouth Lee shut his eyes against it. There was a moment of dread that he’d hurt Chance when he was so vulnerable. He pulled his mouth free and looked at Chance, his blood stained lips. Lee pressed a deep kiss to Chance’s lips and sighed against it.

  If anyone wanted to make Lee any happier just now they had better have the hope diamond, he was utterly content.

  Chance had groaned when Lee bit him but it wasn’t a noise of pain. Instead his good hand came up to cup the back of Lee’s head as he took control of the kiss and deepened it. If he’d not been dealing with a bad shoulder and busted ribs, there would have been some seriously noisy sex that used the house’s hot water up but instead, Chance grumbled when Lee finally broke away and prodded him towards their bed to ‘take it easy’.

  “Maybe I should take back what I said about equals,” Chance told him, clearly teasing before he smacked Lee’s bare ass and let the ‘omega’ put him to bed to hopefully mend.

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  Skye led Finn down to the shower in the smaller basement bathroom, her hand lightly in his, “I’m glad they’re making up. Lee’s been so stressed,” she murmured to Finn as she gave him a nudge towards the toilet where he could sit down and take his leg off. “We should get you one of those waterproof prosthetics to have as an option when you need it. I’ve been doing some research…”

  She turned away, very careful to keep to more neutral topics than all the fighting, or his dead wife or his unmentioned son… or her parents. Really, there was so much. Skye turned to get the water on before she went to strip her clothes. Since her trip with Rory had been interrupted, Skye’s wardrobe of things she could wear had been steadily shrinking as her waistline had expanded. When she pulled off her baggy sweater, she wasn’t wearing a bra under it. She didn’t have a single one that was still comfortable with the way her breasts had grown. Worse, they were sore enough that she wasn’t willing to wear something tight. Without the baggy clothes that still fit, Skye’s belly swelled out in a gentle curve. Triplets meant much quicker growth, which while Skye had intellectually known, it was very different to experience that first hand.

  Nude, she turned back to offer her hands to Finn as a steadying force since he’d have to hop the few feet to the shower, “And we should get a stool for this bathroom too. I’m sorry, I didn’t think to snag it from upstairs.”

  “Can I have your hair dryer?” Finn asked before she got too far and when she handed it over he began to use it to dry out the joints in the prosthetic. Clearly this was not his first rodeo in getting it wet.

  “Chance said I can buy another but I think I’m just going to hang onto this one til the smoke clears.” He said and once he was satisfied with the level of dryness he set the leg to the side and sighed. Finn stared at her, the way her belly swelled out and the way her hair fell over one shoulde
r… He found her the most beautiful this way. “They are growing pretty fast, I’m going to have to stop fucking around and get that new machine ordered, hm?”

  Finn smiled and then stood up to hop himself into the shower and prop up against the wall, letting Skye begin to rinse his hair and get the splattered paint out of the long strands.

  He tried to help but it really was a two person job. “Chance told me about the blueprints for the new place. I get my own room off the master room…” He talked about it, apprehension growing in the pit of his stomach. “Do you think that they’ll want me in your little huddle after all this Skye?”

  “Technically, there are two rooms off of the master room for when people want space but the main bedroom is massive. If I could have all four of you in there all the time, I would,” Skye said simply as she stretched up on her toes to run her fingers through his thick hair and work out the paint. Water speckled her skin and Skye felt her belly brush against Finn’s stomach as she leaned into him to get all the paint out of his hair before it got stiff. Skye loved his hair and she didn’t want him to have to cut it off so her brow furrowed with concentration.

  “But Lee said that you’d want your own space to retreat to, and it’s nice to have the extra space when we need it, I suppose. The bathroom is ensuite and then along the hall there are enough bedrooms for children that I find myself personally a little daunted especially since when it was pointed out, the phrase ‘this nursery will be for this litter’ was said to my face.”

  A rueful smile quirked her lips, “Don’t get me wrong, I’m grateful with the history of our kind to be able to have children at all but I’m hoping we’ll get at least a few years before we have any use for the other kids’ rooms… I think, though, it’s really up to you as to whether or not you’ll be wanted in the big room. I mean, by the others. You’ve won Lee over, I’m relatively certain, with how he went to your room the last few nights?”