Chapter Twenty-Two

Clay

"How about you put him in this one?" Jeremy held up a little sleeper set covered in dragons. It was absolutely adorable and, if it was half as soft as it looked, I wanted one.

"Where did we get this?" It definitely wasn't something I'd seen before. I'd have remembered it, for sure.

"Oh, Uncle Mav." Made perfect sense his dragon uncle would give him a dragon pair of pajamas.

Dean had so many adoring uncles. All of the kids in his generation did. It was such a joy to watch the way the alpha uncles melted at the sight of the cubs. The omegas, too, but it was different with the alphas. Their jobs, the ones they were doing long before any of us arrived, were so very much the opposite of the playful and downright silly guys they were when one of the cubs toddled over or they were asked to hold a baby for a minute.

"Of course, it was Mav." I took it from him. "You ready for this one, Dean?" He was too busy yawning to pay attention.

When they said newborns slept a lot, they weren't kidding. He was either sleeping, eating, or pooping. That was pretty much it, but that was exactly what he should be doing because he was growing like a weed and was the happiest baby I'd ever met. He'd already moved up a size in clothing, which was why Jeremy was pulling out some new pieces.

"I'm gonna take that yawn as a yes," I said, as I zipped him up in the little dragon jammies. He looked so adorable I had to take a picture…or five. Fine, it was ten, but to be fair, he was that adorable.

"What are we gonna do with all those?" Jeremy asked, indicating my phone.

I'd been a bit obsessed with capturing every minute I could on film. He was already changing and growing so quickly, and I didn't want to forget any of it. It started as a picture-a-day challenge and now was a had to upgrade my cloud storage twice challenge. I had zero regrets.

"I saw somewhere that you can make books out of them." I shrugged. "It'll be fun."

"You see that, Dean? You're gonna be our little star." He picked our son up and placed him in the baby carrier he wore. It was officially Dean's favorite place. He loved being wrapped up against one of his fathers. I got it. What safer space was there than with the people who loved you most?

"Ready?" My mate held out his hand, and I took it.

"You're not going to tell me what we're doing?" I'd indirectly asked earlier, when he said where we had to be and when. I was trying to get more direct information about it.

"I don't know what we're doing, but I promised Hammer that we'd be in the conference room by noon, and it's almost noon." He started forward and looked back at me just in time to catch my side-eye. "Really. I promise."

"I hope it's not another meeting."

They really weren't that bad, but now that we'd incorporated, I had to give a spiel every time about finances. As much as I loved working with the books, I wasn't a huge fan of talking about the money. I was never quite sure how much to share—not because Hammer ever held anything back but because some of it was just so boring. The first day I did my report, I swore at least three people needed nudges to stay awake. I'd learned to be more concise, but not concise enough to avoid a few yawns.

"He didn't say meeting, but I didn't ask. I was heading for coffee." Which, after having night duty, he needed. I loved how he stepped up like that, letting me get sleep every other night instead of leaving all the night feedings to me. I never thought I'd be a pumping kind of guy, but when I found out pumping meant sleeping, I jumped on that right quick.

"All right. let's go."

I didn't know why I hadn't pieced things together. It wasn't that anybody was being exceptionally subtle, but still, when we walked into the conference room, everyone whispered "Surprise!" so as not to wake the baby, a huge cake in the middle of the room, and presents all around, I was shocked.

I shouldn't have been, but yet there I was.

And because my hormones were still leveling out from Dean's birth, I immediately started to cry, my heart full of emotion. All these people to celebrate our baby.

"You guys didn't have to do this." My voice cracked.

"Yeah, we did," Sloan said, cuffing my shoulder. "You deserve it. Besides, we love spoiling babies."

And spoil Dean, they did. By the time we opened all the presents, I was pretty sure we had enough diapers to last a decade. We also had more adorable outfits than the local mall and so many cute stuffed animals. It was too much and yet somehow simultaneously perfect.

"Cake time!" Jack announced.

I thought he meant the cake on the table—the one that said, "Welcome Dean" with little blue bears and wolves around the edges. But the next thing I knew, he was putting a cake shaped like a Pop-Tart in front of my mate, who nearly fell out of his chair laughing.

"You made me a Pop-Tart cake?"

"Yep." Jack grinned.

Hammer put a little cake in front of me, shaped the same way. "This is for little Pop-Tart. Only probably you should eat it, Clay, since you're the one providing him his food—it's almost the same thing."

I wasn't going to argue with any logic that gave me an entire cake.

Everyone took huge slices of the big cake, while we ate our personal ones, and I looked around, so amazed by the family I'd found here.

I met the most amazing alpha in this world, the one I thought held my whole heart. Funny how fatherhood changes you. When our son was born, the two of them carried my heart together and it had somehow grown, the love I had multiplying.

And I had friends—friends who loved me more like a brother than just a random person to hang out with. The people in this room, they were more my den than the actual den I'd grown up with, and I couldn't be happier about it.

"I love you, mate." I leaned into his side. "Thank you for stumbling into my office that day."

He kissed the top of my head. "It was my best wrong turn ever."