Chapter 24 Dylan

Chapter 24 Dylan

“Bert?” I answered the phone quickly, tension vibrating through me. “What’s wrong?”

“Nothing, Dylan.” My Beta’s voice rumbled reassuringly. “I was just phoning to check in,” he explained, sounding surprised at my troubled tone.

I unclenched my jaw, feeling my shoulders relax too. I didn’t know why, but I’d been on edge the last couple of days like I was waiting for something to happen… something bad.

I was sitting in the study of my townhouse, having come over here to work in my study on a bit of pack business. I generally only used the townhouse for my work. I’d basically moved into Cherry’s apartment, knowing it suited her and Fern best to stay there. It was Saturday, so Cherry was doing overtime in the store. The gentle whisper of Fern’s voice soothed me, her tones stirring from the living room where she was playing.

“Are you all right?” Bert asked.

“Yeah, I’m fine,” I answered mechanically. I think. I wondered if I should try to unpack the uneasiness I was feeling. I sighed. “I guess I’m just feeling a bit frustrated that I can’t do more for the pack from here.”

In fact, there was very little that I’d been able to help with remotely. Bert had sent me various community emails and phone calls that I’d been able to deal with from Berlin. These were things that my mom, as the old Luna, had dealt with. She’d already said she was happy to continue, but I knew it would be another source of contention between her and my father if I allowed her to. Yet, until there was a new Luna, any in-person events still fell to my mom to attend.

But my Beta replied supportively, “What you’re doing from there is great.”

Guilt swirled through me. The majority of the pack jobs were very hands-on jobs. I knew Bert and the other guys were up to their eyeballs in cutting the hay and transporting the silage orders ready to go out for the fall. They were a man short, too, on the forestry side of things. The copses I usually tended would be giving the other guys more workload.

I knew my Beta would be picking up the slack and carrying the rest of the pack. I worried that I detected a weary note in his voice.

“Bert, when was the last time you slept?”

“By Nuu-Chah, Dylan, stop fussing. You sound like my mother. Next, you’ll be asking if I’m eating enough!"

As if it was a back handed comment and completely unrelated, he asked, “So, any word on when you might be heading back?”

A mixture of guilt and frustration churned through me. But I knew I couldn’t yet leave. As much as Fern and I were getting on, I worried that I hadn’t been a part of her life long enough for her to fully accept me.

My shoulders tensed again, and I leaned forward in my desk chair. “I need to stay a little longer.” My voice fell to a hush, keen not to have Fern overhear me. “I need to make sure Fern accepts me as her father. I’ve been absent for such a huge part of her life, and I feel like I owe her more time.”

“I hear you,” Bert said simply. “And how are things with Cherry?”

Suddenly restless, I rose from my chair and started to pace the hardwood floor of my study. Cherry and I had been leading a blissful existence the last few weeks, nurturing our mating bond. I was certain that she was more in love with me than she ever had been, but a note of unease ran through me as I contemplated what I had to do next and soon.

“I love her, Bert, and I know she loves me, but… I just don’t know what will happen when I ask her to come back to Seattle and the pack with me.” The thought of her choosing her life here in Berlin over me had my heart ricocheting off my chest.

I ran my hand tiredly down my face. “I don’t know if I’ve done enough to convince her to come back.”

“Then stay, Dylan. We’re all fine here. Stay, and when it’s time, you’ll bring them both home. I know it.”

As my Beta said bye to me, the overpowering sense of uncertainty kept me in its grip, and I wished I had Bert’s confidence that the future would play out as he said it would.

As fall rolled in, so did Fern’s birthday. Cherry and I had decided that it was the perfect time, having taken a long weekend off of work, to tell Fern that I was her biological father.

After clearing up our breakfast of pancakes, which had become a staple at weekends, all three of us sat down in the living room. Cherry’s smile was a little strained, and I knew she was as nervous about telling Fern the truth as I was.

“Are you giving me a present?” Fern asked, looking between us suspiciously as if she expected us to pull out a gift from somewhere.

“You said you wanted your presents in the park,” I reminded her.

We’d invited a few of Fern’s friends to a party in the local park. A handful of her friends and their parents were all going to attend in the afternoon. I’d arranged for a group of caterers and a party planner to set up for us.

“I thought you might have a special one or something,” Fern said, still looking between us curiously after we’d asked to talk to her.

“Well, it is a sort of gift, Sweetie,” Cherry began. “I think it’s the best kind of gift, actually. It’s a truth that I’ve not been able to share with you. But I think now that you’re a big girl, it’s time.”

She looked intrigued and serious at her mom’s referring to her as a “big girl.”

“Fire away,” Fern said, doing a very good impression of me on the phone to Bert.

Both Cherry and I stifled a smile as we held each other’s eyes amusedly. Then Cherry’s silver stare grew serious, waiting for me to take the lead.

“We wanted to check that you liked me first, Fern, before telling you this,” I said. “Because your happiness is the most important thing to your mom and to me.” My heart thumped furiously as I said, “Because you see, I am your real dad, Fern.”

My daughter’s dark eyes skimmed my face seriously, and I felt the quiet weigh me down as I waited for a second time to see if this little girl that I already loved would accept me.

“I like you very much,” Fern said decidedly. “So I’m pleased you’re my dad.” With that, she hugged me, and I squeezed her tight. She asked excitedly, “Can I put on my party dress now?”

Cherry had designed and made her a special princess dress just like Elsa’s, her favorite Disney princess, and she’d been desperate to put it on since waking. But Cherry had rightly said she could wear it after pancakes. The syrup stains on Fern’s pajamas showed what a wise decision that had been.

“Go ahead, Sweetie,” I said, borrowing Cherry’s endearment for her. Because she was mine too, and she now knew it.

As Fern rushed off excitedly, I collapsed back into the sofa, feeling flattened by the huge wave of relief that hit me. Cherry stroked my face, smiling at me tenderly.

“You’re a great dad, by the way,” my mate whispered, and my contentedness lapped at me even more.

But despite Cherry’s tender words, I knew that I needed to broach more with her concerning Fern. Our daughter had mentioned a special gift earlier, and I did have one I intended to give her. But I needed to talk to Cherry about it first. And I knew it would start a whole other conversation. One I didn’t know we were ready for. Yet, if we weren’t ready for it, I feared we’d never be.

Taking a breath, I said, “Incidentally, I do have another gift for Fern later.” I pulled a necklace on a leather strong out of my pocket. I’d retrieved it from my house earlier in the week.

Cherry stared at the crescent moon and wolf pendant. “The Alpha-in-training necklace.” Cherry’s voice was quiet. Subdued.

“I want to give it to her later today,” I explained. “I want to tell her it’s a special family heirloom that it belonged to her grandparents. And all those in the Starsmoon line. I’d like us to tell her together when the time’s right about her shifter heritage. I know we’ve dropped enough on her plate for now. But in the future, I want her to know all of herself.”

Cherry was attuned to every word I said, her expression growing increasingly strained.

I hated seeing my mate look so tense, but I forced myself to ask the other question I’d been concerned about. “I need to ask; why doesn’t Fern have our pack’s scent?”

Cherry’s gaze dipped down as if she couldn’t face looking at me. “I went to a witch in the Mitte District here in Berlin to get a scent blocker,” she confessed. “It conceals Fern’s shifter scent from other preternaturals.”

“Is it permanent?" I asked. Not just thinking of myself and how I wanted our daughter to have her whole heritage open to her but also of how Fern might feel when she was older if that part of her had been taken away by her mom.

“By Nuu-Chah, no,” Cherry exclaimed. “We can get a spell to reverse it. I’d never have made a decision like that for Fern.”

I laid my hands comfortingly on her shoulders. “I know that, love. It’s just I also know now how scared you must have been that if the pack and I knew that Fern was my daughter, we’d insist on her being raised as part of Starsmoon.”

Cherry sighed and admitted, “I did worry. I mean, I used to,”

“I’d never take Fern away from you,” I held her silver eyes, needing to reassure her and show her that she could trust me completely.

But I knew I also needed to be honest about how I felt. I loved my mate and my daughter more than anything in the world, but I was the Alpha of Starsmoon. I would eventually need to return to my pack.

And besides that, I wanted to tell Fern about her heritage. I wanted to tell her she was my heir and next in line to be the Alpha of Starsmoon. Like Cherry said, that wasn’t something she had the right to take away from her.

So I said, “But I hope with all my heart that both you and Fern will come back to the pack with me.”