Temptations

Epilogue

"Here." I planted my foot in Ian's lap and shot him a cheeky grin. "For you?"

Ian frowned at me, taking my leg and setting it down on the side of the bed. His attention returning back to whatever papers he had in his hand. "Keep your leg to yourself. I'm not massaging it for you right now. I'm busy."

I pouted. "Please? Look, they're all swollen and fat. You can even see the veins starting to pop out. I don't even look eighteen anymore, Ian. I'm going through mid-life crisis. I feel like I'm forty years old. This is all your fault. You just couldn't keep yourself away, could you?"

"Can you just calm down? Besides, if I remember correctly, you were the one who came to me, remember? This is all your fault, not mine." Ian retaliated.

I narrowed my eyes at him. "How dare you? If it weren't for you, I wouldn't be going through all of this. I wouldn't have a child inside of me, who finds it enjoyable to constantly kick me in the middle of the night. My feet wouldn't be two sizes bigger. And I wouldn't be stuck in these--" I yanked at the oversized dress I was wearing. "Ugh!"

"You're overreacting." Ian said, calmly.

My jaw dropped. "Overreacting? Overreacting? Ian, you're under-reacting. You're Alpha. I get it. But come on, you're not the one everyone expects to pop a baby out any day." I rubbed my belly, which was huge. Ian and I had been constantly visiting the pack doctor for the past few days. The baby was due any day. I would go into labor any time, according to the doctor and the anxiety was killing me. Ian and I had opted to not learn the baby's gender in advance.

The whole pack was excited. I felt a little like Kate Middleton, who was about to give birth to the new heir to the throne of England.

I was about to give the pack their young Alpha, and frankly, it scared me to death. Everyone in the pack was being very nice to me. We already had a nursery set up in the house for the baby, right next to mine and Ian's room. Joanna had helped me a lot in getting it ready.

I felt really weird, though. I never thought I would end up being a teenage mother, but I was. I'd somehow gotten pregnant at eighteen.

I'd started showing symptoms a few weeks after shifting for the first time. It made me realize that I'd probably already been pregnant during that whole ordeal with Michael. It still gave me nightmares, and what scared me more was that if Michael had somehow gotten away with killing me, he would have killed my baby, too. It drove my mama wolf instincts crazy.

Somehow, Ian and I had managed to move past that incident. The truth was, the rogue attack that night was what saved me in the end. When they'd attacked, Dominic had moved all the women and children into the pack house and sent all his enforcers, fighters, and trackers into the woods to keep them from coming in.

Having so many wolves outside had somehow foiled all of Michael's plans. Cole and Callie were connected stronger than I'd initially thought. When Michael hurt Callie, Cole had felt it. That was why he'd come running. He'd been a wolf and the other wolves sensed it and had come to support him, led by Ian and Dominic.

Callie was devastated, though. We never told her about Cole's betrayal, but there was no way we could hide his death. She'd come running out of the room like she just knew. And she did. The tears were already there, even though she had been unconscious when Cole showed up. She didn't know.

After the initiation ceremony, Joanna had sent her to stay with one of her college friends in California. Once the baby was born, Ian and I planned to go visit her there. We weren't sure how she was doing, but Joanna's friend told Joanna that she was happier than she was when she'd first come, and that made us all happy.