by T. Cobbin
“Oh, wow, another one,” Ollie said in awe.
They all watched the Ollie open up his gift to reveal brand new Paw Patrol bedding, and another map that Leo had made. Excited squeals filled the air.
“Another map,” Ollie declared. He automatically showed Gracie, seeking her help.
“The cross is on the…playroom, I think,” Gracie said.
The two children ran off down the small hallway.
“Be careful on the stairs,” Danielle warned, picking up the new bedding.
Leo placed his hand on hers. “He won’t be needing that right now, it’s a spare.”
“You’re spoiling him already.”
“He is ours, right?” Leo watched Danielle’s shoulders deflate, and her eyes looked suspiciously like she was going to cry. Placing a finger underneath her chin, he planted a quick, light kiss on her lips before urging her forward. “Come on, or you’ll miss the unveiling.”
“Thank you,” she said quietly.
“For what?”
“For being you. For loving us. For…everything.” She smiled at him.
“Sweetheart, I would move heaven and earth for my family. Now, let’s go. I hear more squealing.” He chuckled.
Ten minutes later, after hunting high and low around the house, Leo followed Ollie and Gracie into the lad’s new bedroom. High-pitched squeals had all three adults covering their ears.
“Look at this,” Ollie screamed.
“Look at that. That’s Rubble,” Gracie excitedly cried out.
“And here’s Chase, and Marshall.”
“You did all this in two days?” Danielle asked Leo, her voice full of shock.
Leo glanced around the room. In the right-hand corner were two small bookcases with an abundance of both toys and books on them. Beside them, underneath the window, was a child’s blue, wooden desk. In the left-hand corner was a single bed in the shape of Chase’s police car—Ollie’s favorite character. In the other two corners, and lining the walls, were beanbags, a chest of drawers, and a wardrobe, amongst several other new toys. Over the walls were huge stickers of each Paw Patrol character. The glee on both Danielle’s and the boy’s face told Leo he’d made the right decision.
“Now he’s on the same floor we are,” Leo whispered in Danielle’s ear. “Will you stay with Gracie and I and make this a home?”
“What are you asking me?” Danielle turned to face him.
“Marry me, Danielle Knight. Become a mother to Gracie, and let me be a father to Ollie. Be my mate and wife?”
Danielle stared into his eyes. Although he noted the room had become silent, he only had eyes for his soul mate in that instance. She looked toward her son, then Gracie, then Prue. Returning her gaze to his, she licked her lips in a nervous gesture.
It seemed like forever before Danielle finally answered. “If it’s okay with Ollie and Gracie, I would love to.”
Again, the room was filled with excited squeals. Leo wrapped his arms around his mate’s waist and hauled her up against his body. His lips were on hers in a flash. Danielle had accepted to become his mate and wife ‘for real’, as Gracie would put it. His life had never felt as complete as it did in that moment.
Leo felt two pairs of small arms wrap around both his and Danielle’s legs. He looked down to see two beaming faces staring up at him.
“Pops?” Gracie tugged at his t-shirt.
He lowered Danielle back to her feet before turning to his ward. “What’s up, honey?”
“What do I call her? I can’t call her Mummy because I has one. I wanna call her something nice, like I do you.” Sad eyes stared back at him.
Leo swallowed with sudden panic; he had no idea what to say.
Prue came to the rescue. “Well, there are all kinds of titles,” she said, and began reeling them off while counting on her fingers. “Momma, Mim, Mom, Momma, Mam, Mammy. You could choose one of them if you wanted.”
“Gracie.” Danielle knelt in front of the little girl and placed her hands on the child’s waist. “Sweetheart, you can just call me Danielle if you want. But anything you choose, I’d love. I know I’m not your real mummy, and darling, I wouldn’t want to take her place. She will always be your mother. But I want to love you like she did, is that okay?”
Gracie nodded, a tear slowly dripping down her cheek. Danielle wiped it away with her thumb before placing a kiss where it had been.
There and then Leo vowed he was done with city work. He had enough money to live the rest of their lifetimes and more. And that included a decent college and university for all of their children. He could work from home as he’d been doing until he sold his companies, but he would concentrate on his family. He wasn’t going to miss another day of any of his children growing up.
Chapter 11
“Three, two, one. Happy New Year!” Shouts from all three adults and the two children filled the warm sitting room. Hugs and kisses were shared after.
Danielle hugged her son tightly. This was the first year he’d stayed awake. Other years she’d kissed him on the head, wished him happy new year, and gone to bed and cried, wondering how long she could stay on the island before having to run again.
Leo hugged her next. “Happy New Year, mate. I hope we have many, many more.”
Danielle hoped they did too. “Happy New Year, husband-to-be. Maybe this year I will get to see your gorilla?” she questioned.
“Hold that thought.” Leo released her and walked over to the sitting room window and opened the curtains.
Danielle frowned, wondering what the hell the man was up to.
“Prue, will you watch the children for a moment?” he asked.
When Prue nodded, Leo grabbed hold of Danielle’s hand and pulled her toward the kitchen.
“Leo?” she said.
He didn’t answer, just turned his head and winked at her. Once they stood before the mudroom door, Danielle guessed what was coming.
“Oh hell.” She shook her head, pulling her hand from his. She knew he had let her go, because as sure as she was standing there, if she wanted to be free and he hadn’t voluntarily released her, then her hand would still be in his grip. “You can’t go outside now, not in the freezing cold!”
Leo leaned forward and kissed just below her ear. “Shifter,” he simply stated.
“And that will stop you from freezing your balls off?”
Leo frowned. “You keep mentioning my balls.” His eyebrows rose. “Are they that memorable?”
“Geeze.” Danielle’s cheeks heated. “You know what I mean.”
He chuckled. “To answer your question, being a shifter won’t stop me from freezing, but I do have a higher tolerance for the cold. My gorilla, however, for some reason, loves the snow.”
Leo turned to open the mudroom door and began stripping. Danielle couldn’t help her own chuckle when he shimmied his hips while taking his jeans off. She sighed wistfully when his gorgeous butt was revealed. Leo twisted his head back and gave her a knowing look.
“I don’t want you to be scared seeing me shift, so go back to the living room and watch out the window.”
Danielle was hesitant at first. Seeing him shift couldn’t be that bad, could it? But seeing the look on his face, she shrugged and followed his suggestion. Turning, she walked back to the sitting room, knelt on the settee underneath the window, and waited.
“Does it hurt to shift?” Danielle asked Prue who was standing behind the children. They had their noses pressed against the icy window.
“To be honest, I’ve never really felt much pain in it. It kinda just happens now. But they say the older you are the first time you shift, the harder it is to forget the pain from that experience.”
“It don’t hurt me,” Gracie added.
Danielle glanced at the young girl. What must it be like to change…shift so young? To grow up in a world that is so secret you can’t tell a best friend unless they can do the same.
Ollie gasped. Danielle looked out the window, following
his gaze. What looked to be a five-hundred-pound adult silverback gorilla was coming toward them. Danielle couldn’t recall ever seeing a beast this large before. She’d visited zoos as a child and seen gorillas, but this one looked quite a bit bigger than those.
The primate strolled along in the snow, dragging his knuckles in the white stuff, and came to sit on his butt in front of the window. He opened his mouth and smiled, showing off two rows of long, white, huge teeth. He then promptly stood on his hind legs and spun around in a circle. Once. Twice. Three times, and more. Until Danielle was sure the beast would be dizzy. He dangled his arms in the snow, his fingers gathering the powdered white stuff up and flinging it high above his head.
Again and again, the gorilla found fun in the snow. He rolled head over heels. He lay in the snow, making massive, gorilla-type snow angels. He danced, then threw snowballs toward the house, making the children screech. Danielle had never seen an animal enjoy the snow as much as this ape did. The children laughed so hard they complained their tummies hurt.
I’m starting the new year off by watching a silverback gorilla play in the snow. When the gorilla strolled up to the window and kissed it she giggled just as hard as the children did. He walked off and started playing in the snow again, leaving behind huge, creased lip marks on the windowpane.
Danielle made a run toward the back door. Throwing her winter boots on her feet and a coat over her body, she ran around the house to where Leo’s shifter half was. The beast turned, catching Danielle in his eyesight. She had no fear, because Leo had already told her that his other half wouldn’t hurt her. It was him who knew first that she was his mate.
Tentatively, she walked up until she had to strain her neck backward to look up at him. “Talk about King frigging Kong. You’re huge.”
Leo stood, stepped backward, and slammed his fists against his chest and roared. A deep, booming noise, which sounded oddly like huge coconuts shells knocking together, echoed around Danielle. She stood her ground. She wasn’t scared. She’d been through shit that frightened her. This beast? Nope, she knew what was inside of it.
“Can I touch?” she asked once he stood still.
She started stamping her feet as the cold crept into them. Leo’s animal stepped forward once again and copied her. Plumes of powdery snow filled the air around the gorilla’s feet, legs, and thighs.
Danielle laughed at the animal’s antics, which only made the gorilla dance more. Finally, he dropped, twisting his body in the snow, his head at her feet. Before Danielle could move or say anything else, he raised his arms above his head and pulled her ankles. She fell backward and was left watching snowflakes fall from the white sky onto her face.
“Oh. My. God.” She snorted. A laugh slipped from between her lips as the huge beast appeared over the top of her, a grin on its face. “That is so not cool.”
The gorilla sat back and offered her a hand with a wide smile. Without any thought that the beast would harm her in any way, Danielle slipped her hand into the rather huge one of the gorilla’s that made hers look tiny. As he pulled her back to her feet she marveled at the difference in the size of their hands. The primate’s palm and digits felt like a pair of warm, leather gloves. Once Danielle was standing back on her feet, she placed both hands over his large hands and stroked her fingers around. She stroked her fingers up the large primate’s hairy forearm. She had to stand on her tiptoes to reach up to his shoulder.
“This is amazing,” she said in awe.
A deep, rumble-like purr sounded low from his chest. She walked around the large animal, amazed. Her head barely met the gorilla’s chest. She moved around his back, reaching out with her hand. Wide, broad shoulders tapered down to a thin waist. Silver, coarse hair ran around the back of the beast’s waist and up some of his spine. She ran her hands down his spinal column, feeling nothing but muscle. She carried on right down to his large butt cheeks. Leo’s beast suddenly whipped around and lifted Danielle off her feet and cradled her in his lap as if she were a small child. He lowered his head and pursed his lips. With a calm gentleness, he placed a kiss on her lips.
Danielle wasn’t sure how to take that. She knew Leo was inside, and both he and his gorilla counted her as his mate, but for his beast to kiss her like he did…
“You aren’t going to do anything else, right? Like want to…” She swallowed.
The gorilla immediately snorted and shook his head.
“Phew. I mean, I know you both consider me to be your mate, but that would be so wrong.”
To Danielle’s amazement, the gorilla’s fur started to recede, his black, leather-like skin paled, and the huge muscle bulk diminished until finally Leo held her in his arms instead of his beast.
“Now that was…outright amazing. You changed—shifted—while holding me.”
Leo’s smile filled his face, and his eyes sparkled with amusement. He lowered his head until his lips met hers in a brief kiss before he stood with her still in his arms.
“You weren’t scared at all. My beast loved that. He isn’t remorseful for kissing you either.”
Danielle scrunched her nose. “For a moment, I honestly thought he might want more.”
“That’s why I shifted back. We could scent your fear. Beast and human in our society is just as wrong as it is in yours. Now, when you change—if you do,” Leo corrected himself, “then that’s a different matter.”
Danielle gulped. “You mean...” Their primates would mate in their animal form? “Could I… She… My animal…” Danielle blew out a breath. What would she call her other half? Gorilla, primate, animal...they all sounded cold.
“Why don’t you come up with a name for your potential other side like Gracie did?” Leo asked as if he read her mind.
“Ooh, that’s a good idea. Okay, for now I’ll call her…” Danielle ran a few names around her brain. “Gem will do for now. Anyway, what I was trying to ask before was if your gorilla and mine mated in their animal form, could Gem become pregnant?”
“Yes and no.” Leo started walking while he spoke. “We shifters can live as either man or beast. In fact, I know of a safari park that’s maintained and populated by shifters. We can get our mate pregnant in either form. But for us gorilla shifters that only works for our soul mates, and only when the partner is changed.” Leo kicked open the outer mudroom door and entered it. Pushing it shut, he walked through the open inner mudroom door and closed that one too.
“So, what if you don’t find your soul mate?” Danielle asked, concerned. If she hadn’t managed to escape Master, Leo might never have met her.
Leo lowered her to her feet and helped her take off her coat. “We can imprint on a female if we choose to, but we could never have infants. We can only do that with our soul mates.”
Danielle felt faint for a second. “You were so close to never meeting me.” Her voice came out as a whisper. She was shocked to see a small smile on Leo’s face when she looked up.
“The Goddess has a way of helping us find our mates. For instance, you told me once you escaped you found somewhere to shack up briefly and bought what...one newspaper from the area to find somewhere to live?”
Danielle nodded, wondering where Leo was going with this.
“Well, normally, the letting agency I use places ads in every newspaper in the area, but due to an error, it was only placed in one.” Leo stopped and watched her as if waiting for her response.
Danielle frowned, putting everything he just said into order in her mind. “So, you’re saying the one paper I bought was the only one your ad happened to be in it. How many applicants would you have received if the ad had gone out in all papers?”
“A good twenty to thirty maybe.” Leo shrugged.
“In other words, my application could have become lost in all of them. I mean, I was pregnant, I might have left, or—”
“It didn’t,” Leo interrupted her.
“So you think that just because that happened, your Goddess, or fate, had something to do with i
t?”
Leo nodded, his belief clearly written on his face. “Yep.”
Danielle refused to answer. She had given up thinking there was a God out there when she’d been kidnapped and held for a year. But she didn’t want to dis his beliefs, so she stayed quiet.
Leo continued to walk toward the living area even though Danielle was still in her coat and boots and he was butt naked, until he reached the living room. It was incredibly quiet. Prue was sitting beside the fire reading a book. The two children were sleeping head to tail on the couch.
Leo lowered Danielle to her feet.
“Gosh, don’t they look peaceful? They fell asleep quickly. It seems a shame to move them,” Danielle said, taking her coat off and handing it to Leo with a look that told him to cover his junk.
“Why don’t we leave them here?” Leo suggested. “They should be okay for tonight.”
Danielle was immediately taken back to previous years where she and Ollie had spent many a night sleeping in front of the fire.
“Fancy joining them? We could lay on the rug in front of the fire,” Danielle said, tugging her boots off. The expression on Leo’s face told her his answer before he spoke.
“I’ll get a quilt and pillows,” he said, heading upstairs.
“I’m going to sleep on my lovely soft mattress. Enjoy your night on the hard floor.” Prue stood and gave Danielle a hug. “Goodnight.” Prue waved as she went upstairs.
Danielle wished her goodnight, then proceeded to take off her now damp pajama bottoms. “I can’t believe I’m wet through because of a gorilla that loves snow. If I were to tell anyone, they’d think I was nuts,” she murmured to herself.
“That’s a nice sight to walk upon.”
Danielle turned her head, surprised to see Leo watching her, holding two pillows and a quilt.
“You move fast, gorilla man. I’ve only just taken my pants off,” she whispered, not wanting to wake the children. She noticed that he wore a pair of shorts that didn’t hide the extensive bulge inside of them.
