Chapter 11

Chapter

Eleven

J ake felt like his bad mood had finally broken.

Which was amazing, because he'd sure been sick of growling and snarling at everyone.

He got up the morning after bringing Samuel home—to his house—and made coffee, then stood at the kitchen window, watching it snow.

Again.

He wondered if the wild weather was due to Samuel. He was a weather talent, after all. Right? Maybe his nerves were—Hell, he had no idea. Maybe it was just going to be a good year for the drought relief.

Maybe he would make pancakes.

Grant began crying restlessly in his crib, and Jake started to go to him when he heard the crying stop and then the happy sound of, "Ammu Ammu!"

Oh, that was a pleasant sound—that little cry of enjoyment and excitement. Someone did love his Ammu.

He wasn't sure if Samuel drank coffee or not. In fact, the things that he didn't know about Samuel were sort of vast.

Jake knew Samuel liked spicy food. He knew that he liked pizza. He knew that he loved Grant and books. That was really it.

That was basically his entirety of knowledge about the man he was now living with. Honestly, he should do something about that.

Samuel came down the stairs, his long, snowy hair in a messy braid. He carried the wriggling Grant in his arms, and they were dressed remarkably the same—in big fuzzy pants, fuzzy socks, and a huge sweatshirt each. Grant was gonna smother.

"Say good morning to your dad, Grant," Samuel said.

"Da da." Grant wiggled and struggled to get down, so Samuel put him down on his feet and he ran over, grabbing Jake's leg. "Da da da da da da da da. Ba. Ba. Ba ba ba ba ba. Ammu!"

"Well, that was clear."

"Someone's hungry." Samuel had paid good attention because he went right to the cabinet where the bottles were and began to fix one up, not even having to ask any questions about where things lived. It was actually impressive.

"Good morning," Jake said. "Would you like some coffee?"

"Good morning to you and yes, please, if you don't mind. My rooms are beautiful. Thank you. The view of the moon was absolutely spectacular."

It had been a huge full moon last night. His bedroom had windows to the east as well. "How do you take your coffee?"

"Light and sweet, please." Samuel assembled the bottle, and Grant, finally figuring out what he was doing, tried to climb up his leg, dragging his pants almost down and off. "Grant, sweetie. I don't think that your dad wants to see my backside."

Well, that was the first thing that Samuel had gotten wrong this morning because the peek he'd just gotten was sort of breathtaking. Wow.

Samuel handed Grant the bottle and dragged the pajama pants back up over the pert little round ass that was going to give Jake palpitations.

He got busy making coffee. "What's your position on pancakes?"

"There's a position? I mean…they're fluffy and yummy and come with butter and syrup. There's no bad there. Sometimes, they come with spicy meat. Also good."

"Excellent. I'm craving pancakes. I'll make them." He grinned, grabbing eggs and heavy cream out of the fridge. He used pancake mix unashamedly. Oh, he needed sausage too. Spicy meat and all. He would warm the syrup up when everything was ready. He was going to do this and not mess it up. Surely he could make pancakes.

"Yum." Samuel gave him this warm look that he felt all the way down to his toes. "It's very pleasant to have someone to breakfast with, and to have Grant. Thank you."

"Like I said, I was being an ass." Now he felt as if a bubble had popped and he was back to being himself.

"Well, yes, but I suppose if it were my job to protect Grant like you do, I might feel the same way."

Hey, that was the first time Samuel had unbent enough to give him some slack there, and he would take it.

"Thanks." He cut the sausage off the log of meat, then plopped the slices in a pan he'd warmed up so it could cook while he mixed up pancakes. "I'm still so new to both dad stuff and guardian stuff that it keeps me up at night sometimes."

"It's gotta suck. They say you haven't been a guardian for very long…"

Jake shook his head. "No, I'm the newest."

"And Lars said that soon after you were promoted, Grant came to you. Very soon after that." He got a sympathetic look. "That had to have been very hard… I mean, one of those things is very hard. And it wasn't just one thing, right? You had to learn how to be a guardian. You had to move house. You had to take a new position in the wing. Your sister died, and your sister-in-law died, and you became a new father of an infant, which you didn't expect and didn't have nine months to prepare for. That's a lot of hard things. In a row."

It was as if Samuel actually got it when no one else did. Like Samuel actually saw that this was awful.

And wonderful.

But it was a lot no matter what.

"I wasn't sure I was going to make it through the days then. I'm not one hundred percent sure now."

"That I can understand. I've been here a few weeks, and I'm not one hundred percent sure where I fit in." Samuel offered him a little half grin. "So do you have another job? I know that Logan has to go away for business, and I know that Lars does…something. It's all very amorphous."

"Most of our wealth is in our hoards, of course, just like everyone else. Logan has a number of going interests. Lars, I think, is mostly just searching for new things for his hoard and calling it work."

That seemed both fair and reasonable for him to say. Everyone knew Lars wasn't actually working, but the man did have amazing adventures and managed to find a lot of things on his travels.

"Ah." Samuel nodded. "Lars is a force of nature. He adores you, you know."

"Yeah, like a sibling you want to whack in the face." He grinned. "I love Lars, but we butt heads."

"I can understand that. He's very different from you."

What did that mean?

"Well, he is particular, very…not fussy, but he does appreciate having things a certain way, whereas you seem to be a bit more rustic."

"I am. I do a lot of hand work. I like to chop my own wood. I'm just…a guy." He sighed. Way to recommend himself to someone. Which was a weird thing to think, because was he recommending himself to Samuel? The thought stirred something in his gut. And below it.

Samuel grinned at him. "Exactly! You are very much a guy. I imagine Lars worries you'll think he's rather floofy."

"He is. I adore him." He tilted his head. "What do you think of Lars?" He wanted to know where Samuel's interest lay.

"He's super fun and so very kind. He is an amazing friend. It's so nice to have a fellow omega to hang out with."

Jake blinked. "Lars is a guardian."

"Mmmhmm." Samuel put Grant to his shoulder to burp him.

"Guardians aren't omegas. I mean, I know Lars is kinda fussy…"

"It's a family job, isn't it?"

"Guardian? I mean, Lars and Logan are family, but if that was the case for all of us, Bea and I would be right out." Jake snorted softly. "And Jason isn't related to anyone."

"Ah. In my keep, it's all family." Samuel did seem a bit confused, though.

"So omegas are guardians?" That seemed… Omegas were generally smaller. Gentler.

"Absolutely. Like Lars. Guarding can be a growing sort of thing…"

"It can. But I don't think Lars…" Well, whatever. If Samuel thought Lars was an omega, so be it. He would tell Logan, though, because that was an odd assumption, Jake thought. "I have to run into the wing today. Want to go see the library?"

"Absolutely!" There was a happy warmth in Samuel's eyes now.

Jake poured pancake batter into the pan. "Don't get too excited. It's not much."

"That's okay. I'm ready to get started. I want to combine the public and school collections and make something the whole wing can use. Lars says there needs to be so many more books. I want to catalog everything and get started ordering."

"What's your favorite thing to read?" He was so curious about Samuel now, so interested in his likes and dislikes.

"What do I like to read or what do I like to collect? Those are two very, very different questions. And what I like and what I do are also another set of two different questions." Samuel gave a self-deprecating little laugh.

"Okay, give me both."

"I mean, if I'm just going to be lazy and read for pure pleasure? I like romances. Also murder mysteries, but cozy ones, not scary ones. I spent an enormous amount of time collecting history and science books. Different philosophical texts from every given time. And dragon books. There are just not enough books out there about us. Especially children's books. Children deserve to read. All sorts of things from all sorts of universes. So I'm very committed to a very solid children's section."

That was probably the most words he'd ever heard out of Samuel, and Jake found that he really liked it.

"What about you? What do you like to read?" Samuel asked.

"I haven't really thought about it. I mean, I do know how, and I do read for pleasure, but a lot of times, I do audiobooks because I can do my craft while I'm doing my reading. I know that's probably not the same."

He didn't know why he felt weird saying it.

"Why not? Words are words are words. We're going to start Grant here on the written word simply because we want him to develop that part of his brain. But when he grows up, he can do it as he will. The important part is that he learned to love the story."

"I can see that." He told Grant stories all the time.

"Yes, little love." Grant held his arms up and Samuel lifted him to kiss his cheek. "Don't the pancakes smell lovely? Yes, and the sausage is yummy. It's so rare to get it."

Rare? Jake cast Samuel an astonished glance. "Why on earth would it be rare?"

Samuel shrugged. "We just weren't allowed it often. I imagine Mother thought it was déclassé or too fatty or not fishy enough or something? Fish was very big with my family."

"Ohh. Do you like fish?" He went trout fishing now and again.

"Sure, just not for every meal. And really not for breakfast. I like to eat. And I'm going to learn to like to cook. I hope."

Jake laughed, because there was something remarkably charming about Samuel today. Something gentle and kind and funny.

"Well, today we'll go and retrieve the rest of your things. So that you can be home for good. I hope that's all right."

"Yes." Samuel's cheeks went pink.

"Also, you'll need to look at some bookshelves. Because your hoard is coming."

Samuel just beamed, nodding enthusiastically.

"Then if you want, we can go to the bookstore, pick out a few books for Grant. And a couple for us and have a coffee in the coffee shop."

"Together. I would love that. I mean, yes, of course." Samuel's blush went darker. "I know I must seem like such an idiot, but this is very exciting. My own rooms. Beautiful home. You. The baby. Friends. A library and my hoard. It's almost too good to be true."

Then Samuel sobered. "I would give it all back for Susan to be here. For Susan and Jolie to be here together with Grant. I would go back in a second."

"I believe you. But that's not going to happen. So we have to work with what we have and make our lives good and Grant's life amazing. Fair?"

"That's more than fair. I just didn't want you to think—At all." Samuel shook his head, looking a little green around the gills. "That I would ever wish."

"Of course not. None of us would ever wish this on anyone. And if they did? Well, we would not allow them in the wing." No way, no day. No one that selfish need apply.

Samuel nodded, wiping the tear from his cheek. "Yes. Yes. Of course. Turn over your pancake. It's burning."

"Shit." He winced, because Grant immediately started singing.

"Shi-shi-shi-it-it-it!"

"Whoops." Samuel danced him around. "It's okay. We need some fruit, hmm? Let's see what there is."

"There's some canned peaches?"

"Peaches will work." Samuel started singing something about peaches and distracted the baby, making him laugh and giggle as he moved toward the pantry.

It was a bit of a mess really. Jake just threw cans in, and it was sort of random. He could almost feel Samuel clicking his teeth.

Someone needed things in order.

He understood, but he just didn't have that urge to clean shit. With Grant, it was more about just keeping his head above water.

Maybe Samuel would help with that. He sure hoped so.

That was part of them making each other's lives better.