Chasing Cristabel (Ashland Pride Six) Read online

  “Thank you. And thank you for helping me set up.”

  “Well, Danielle was crying, so I thought, ‘Why not help my wife?’”

  She laughed. Their daughter, who was fifteen months old, was going through a phase when she cried about everything. That morning she’d been fussing because she didn’t want to wear the dress that her grandpas had sent for her birthday, a pretty, yellow gingham outfit complete with a matching fabric headband.

  Glancing at the clock, Cris said, “I think we can start putting out the food.”

  Cris had been happy to host the party to celebrate Lachlyn, Alek, and Jericho’s first child, Brileigh, who had been born a week earlier. Chase headed into the kitchen to get the platters of food that she and Dylan had prepared the night before just as a knock sounded against the front door moments before it swung open.

  Cris walked swiftly to the front door and greeted the new parents. Lachlyn glowed with happiness, and so did her mates. Jericho cradled the little girl, who looked even tinier in his muscular arms.

  “Oh, it looks so nice in here. Thank you, Cris!” Lachlyn said as she hugged Cris.

  “You’re welcome. Not everyone is here yet, so go make yourself comfortable. I made sure to save you the comfiest seat.”

  Dylan walked down the stairs carrying Danielle, whose red face and pout told Cris that she still wasn’t happy about the dress, but she was wearing it so that was a win in her book.

  “See? Mommy’s wearing a dress,” Dylan said as he joined Cris and kissed her cheek.

  Cris took Danielle and hugged her. “You look so pretty.”

  She gave Cris a watery smile and rested her head on her shoulder with a yawn.

  Hunter came down the stairs, and Cris noticed he was wearing the yellow headband wrapped around his wrist. He shook his head. “She would only wear the dress if I wore the headband.”

  Cris’s heart melted and she laughed. “That’s so sweet.”

  Dylan answered the door as Hunter joined her, wrapping his strong arms around her and their child and kissing Cris on the top of the head. “How are you feeling? Do you want to go lie down?”

  “I’m only three months pregnant,” she reminded him, but the thought of lying down made her yawn. “I don’t want to miss the party. But feel free to offer to lie down with me after it’s over.”

  He purred softly in her ear, his arms tightening around her. “I will so do that.”

  Two more pride trios walked into the house with their kids. Ray, Wesley, and Scarlett with their one-year-old daughter, Caralynn, who squealed in happiness to see Danielle. Cris put her daughter down, and the two little girls hugged and babbled at each other. Then Tristan, Micah, and Melody came in with their nearly one-year-old son, Bradley.

  After greeting everyone, Cris led them into the family room for the party. Gifts were overflowing around the big chair that Lachlyn sat in with her daughter, while her mates hovered around her, happily protective the way that all pride males were.

  “Can we get started?” Chase asked, coming to stand next to her. “I got all the trays on the buffet.”

  “Jilly and her guys aren’t here,” Dylan said after a quick head count of the attendees.

  John piped up from where he stood with his mate Rue. “She just texted to say she was running late and not to wait for them.”

  “Okay,” Hunter said. Everyone quieted down, and he motioned to James, who was the unofficial head of the pride.

  James cleared his throat. “This is a wonderful day. Not only do we get to welcome our newest granddaughter, but we also get to welcome her into the pride. Brileigh, along with the other littlest pride members, is part of the next generation of the pride. As their parents, grandparents, aunts, uncles, and adult pride members, it’s our job to ensure that they understand the value of family and pride, so that they can carry on our traditions.” He paused and looked around the room with a smile. “When we followed Eryx, Ethan, and Callie here from King, I had no idea what a wonderful thing had been started. To see you all here, your families growing and the pride stronger than ever, I’m humbled.” Lifting his pink plastic cup of punch, he said, “To Brileigh. Welcome to the pride.”

  The group cheered, and Brileigh opened her eyes, yawned, and closed them, which made the adults laugh.

  Lisa slipped away from Rhett and came over to Cris. “It looks so wonderful. I love the diaper cake you made. You could sell them online. I bet you’d make a fortune.”

  “Thank you for helping with the food. Dylan and I were wiped out last night after assembling all those sandwiches and cutting veggies.”

  “My pleasure. Between the two of us, we put on a pretty great party,” Lisa said. “How are you feeling?”

  “Well, after we figured out that the smell of dill pickles was what was making me sick yesterday, and, therefore, none of the sandwiches have them, I’m feeling pretty good.”

  “Aw, I’m glad you discovered what it was that made you feel yucky.”

  Dylan said, “I love dill pickles. It’s quite a hardship for me to go without.”

  At his wink and teasing grin, Cris elbowed him. “Be nice to me. I’m having your baby.”

  His grin slid into a sweet smile. “I promise to always be nice to the love of my life.”

  Chase slid his arms around Cris from behind and nuzzled her ear. “I promise that, too,” she said.

  Hunter, who had been watching Danielle play with the other kids, looked up from where he was squatting down to play blocks with them, and said, “Me three.”

  “I’m the luckiest lioness around,” Cris said, resting her hands on top of Chase’s and smiling at her mates. In another six months, their family would grow once more, and whether they had a boy or girl didn’t really matter to her. Her motherly instincts told her she was carrying a boy, and they’d already decided to name him Colin.

  As Lachlyn began to open the gifts that the pride had brought, Cris thought back to how much had changed since she’d arrived in Ashland and taken the job at the were-clinic. Her relationship with her parents was stronger than ever, and her dad had decided to review all pride laws to make sure that he wasn’t oppressing anyone else the way he’d done to her. Lily was pregnant with her first child. Cris and her family had traveled to St. Louis in the fall for a visit, and Cris and Lily had spent the time planning their kids’ futures, very certain that at least one set of their kids would end up being truemates, which both of their mates called romantically silly. And here Cris was now, pregnant with her second child, throwing a party for another pride baby.

  “We’ve got a wonderful life,” she said, looking at her mates.

  “Because of you,” Chase said, kissing her ear.

  “I think it’s because we all fit together so well,” Cris said. When she’d come to Ashland, she never thought she’d find one male to share her life with, and she’d ended up with three very different but perfectly amazing males to call her own. As their family grew, her love for her mates deepened and sweetened, and she couldn’t wait to see what the future would bring.

  * * *

  With the baby gift tucked under one arm, Jilly Fallon walked with her mates, Wyked and Fate, up the front porch steps of the home belonging to Cris and her mates. She could hear the laughter and talking from inside even with the front door shut. The pride loved a good party, and they especially loved one that celebrated a new baby.

  “You know we can’t stay long,” Fate said.

  She let out a sigh. “I know. I’ve got that report for Hanai he wants tomorrow, but honestly…he’s family. He’ll let me turn it in to him late.”

  “No, he won’t, because you made him promise not to give you too much slack when it came to this,” Wyked said.

  She looked at her twin mates. They were nearly identical, and to most people who didn’t know them, they were impossible to tell apart. Wyked’s hair was slightly longer, and Fate’s eyes were slightly paler green, but more than those physical differences that she could spot a mile aw
ay was that she instinctively knew which one was which. Even the time they’d played an April Fool’s Day prank on her by dressing up in each other’s clothes, they hadn’t fooled her.

  She’d been apprenticing as clan healer with Wyked and Fate’s Uncle Hanai. She’d started off in community college studying nursing. Then she’d had occasion to watch Hanai deliver a clan baby, and she’d been entranced with the idea of holistic healing the way that Hanai healed. He used herbs, minerals, and other natural remedies to help the clan. She’d spent many long hours talking to him and looking through the volumes of healing guides he had in his trailer. Becoming an apprentice to him had made perfect sense to her, and it had helped her to make a larger, more important choice for their future: whether they would stay in Ashland or join the clan and travel the country.

  She and her twin mates were forbidden by clan law from becoming mates in the physical sense until she turned twenty-one, which was eighteen long months away. After she turned twenty-one and she was able to mate her guys for real, then they would have to make a decision on whether to stay or go. She’d waffled on the idea for a long time. Either way, someone would be hurt – her dad and brother if she left, her in-laws if they stayed – but she’d opted to do the best thing for herself and her family and that meant becoming nomadic. Someday Hanai would retire, and Jilly would take over. In the meantime, she had a crapton to learn, and Hanai, while a wonderful uncle and friend, was a serious teacher and expected great things from her.

  “I promise not to pout when you say it’s time to go,” Jilly promised, going onto her toes to kiss Fate.

  “I like when you pout,” Wyked said, waiting for his kiss, which she willingly gave, “it means I get to kiss you until you’re happy.”

  She rolled her eyes with a laugh. Fate opened the door, and Jilly stepped into the foyer. The sound of rushing feet coming their way made her give the gift to Fate and brace herself for the onslaught from her niece and nephews. Five-year-old twins, Eliot and Evan, rushed at her, with their three-year-old brother, Cameron, close on their heels. The littlest one, adorable Sophie, toddled after her big brothers, her chubby baby legs moving as fast as they could.

  Jilly squatted and held her arms out to the children, and they rammed into her, nearly taking her to the ground if it weren’t for Wyked’s steadying body behind her. She kissed each cheek and smiled as they made room for Sophie who wiggled her way in between her brothers and made kissing noises at Jilly.

  “Hi, pudding pop,” Jilly said, giving Sophie a big kiss. “You guys are getting so big!”

  “You see us all the time,” Eliot reminded her.

  “I know. I think you grow a foot every time I see you!”

  Wyked helped her up with a laugh. “In another few years they’ll be too big to do that to you. It’ll be like getting hugged by three semis.”

  “It already feels like that.”

  She picked up Sophie and followed the young boys into the large family room which was brimming with pride members, who were welcoming Brileigh to the pride. Jilly’s father, John, shared his mate Rue, with his brother, James. When they mated together, Jilly got not only Eryx, Ethan, and Alek as step-brothers added to her own brother, Henry, but she also got a step-brother in Rue’s son, Domino. She didn’t think of them as her step-family, though. She thought of them simply as her family.

  “Hey, welcome!” Alek said from where he hovered near his mate and their precious little one.

  After setting Sophie down on Callie’s lap, she made her way to him, stopping to hug and kiss her family and pride members along the way, until she reached the trio and their baby. Handing the gift to Jericho, she hugged Alek. “Sorry we’re late. We were upstate gathering supplies and got stuck in traffic.”

  “No worries,” Alek promised.

  Lachlyn smiled at Jilly from where she sat on an overstuffed recliner. “You want to hold her?”

  “Of course!”

  Jilly accepted the sleeping little bundle from her sister-in-law and held her breath as she gazed down at her. She and her mates had visited Lachlyn and the new baby in the hospital when she was born. She couldn’t believe how much she’d grown in just a week. “She’s beautiful,” Jilly whispered.

  “Runs in the family,” Alek said.

  “Not to be rude, but I have to pee. Like right now,” Lachlyn said. Jericho helped her up from the chair, and they disappeared from the room.

  Jilly looked at Wyked and Fate and wasn’t surprised to see the look on their faces, as if they were envisioning her holding their own cubs in the future. “We’re halfway there,” she said to them.

  “What?” Wyked asked.

  “To being mated.”

  “We’re already mated,” Fate said.

  “You know what I mean.”

  Wyked wiggled his brows. “I would so like to say something very naughty right now, but since you’re holding a baby, I’ll be good. For now.”

  She chuckled softly and brushed her lips across baby Brileigh’s head. “You are going to be so well protected and loved in this family, little one. I’m sorry I’ll miss you growing up, but no matter how far away I go, I’ll always have your back. That’s what family does.”

  For just the briefest blip of time, Jilly thought about her biological mother, and wondered – not for the first time – if the female had ever held her and lovingly looked down at her. Of course she knew that was a romantic fantasy. Even though her biological mother had been poisoned and cursed and wouldn’t even recognize Jilly if she saw her, she’d always hoped someday that things might be different.

  She rocked slowly back and forth, watching Brileigh slumber, wishing for the moment to stay that way forever but also desperately hoping for the time to speed up. Each day that passed brought her closer to leaving with the clan, closer to saying goodbye except for yearly visits when the clan would pass through on their travels and stay for a while. So much time would pass between those visits, and her heart broke a little bit. She’d miss a lot. More than she could even imagine. But looking up at her mates as they lovingly watched over her, she knew she also wouldn’t change anything about her destiny.

  If Wyked and Fate hadn’t kissed her, biting her lip and their own and mixing their blood together, she would have remained an emotionless, unattached female. She never would have known what it felt like to love, to have family, to live each day with a crazy group of people who loved her no matter what. She never wanted to go back to that emotionless time. She was happy to stay in Ashland, and in this moment, she decided she would savor every day with the pride so she’d have lots of good memories when it was time to leave.

  Fate, who always seemed to know just what she was feeling, slipped an arm around her shoulders and kissed her temple. “You’re worth the wait. When we get to start our lives together, these three years are going to seem like a drop in the bucket.”

  “You guys are worth it, too,” she said.

  Turning to Alek, she handed him his daughter. Brileigh was promptly lifted from his arms by Rue, their step-mother, who said to the baby, “I can’t wait to spoil you rotten.”

  “You already have,” Lachlyn said. “You, James, and John.”

  “She’s the newest addition,” Rue pointed out. “And a total bundle of love.”

  Domino called from across the room, “You better spoil my kids as much as you’re already spoiling the others, Ma.”

  Rue stuck her tongue out at her son, and he laughed. Giving a wink to Jilly, Rue said, “I promise to spoil all the grandkids.”

  Wyked joined her and Fate as Alek handed Lachlyn the gift Jilly and her mates had bought for them. She ripped the paper from the box and lifted the lid, revealing the adorable pink ruffled dress, complete with matching bloomers.

  “Oh, Jilly, it’s perfect!” Lachlyn said. “She’s going to be such a girly girl.”

  Jericho said, “You better hope she doesn’t end up being a tomboy like you, sunshine.”

  Lachlyn smiled. “I’ll just hav
e to go nuts with all the frilly stuff before she can actually talk back to me.”

  “That’s a good plan,” Alek said. “Plus, we can use the photos for embarrassing family get-togethers in the future.”

  “Thank you so much for the beautiful dress,” Lachlyn said.

  “You’re very welcome.”

  She watched her dad and James ooh and aah over Brileigh. It was so wonderful to see her family enjoying the addition of a new member. It wasn’t only the Fallon clan that was growing, but also the Ashland Pride.

  “We’re going to need a big mobile home,” she said, turning to lean against Fate. Wyked stepped behind her, resting his hands on her hips.

  “Oh?” Fate asked.

  “For lots of kids,” she said.

  Wyked chuckled. “I love how you think, kitten.”

  As she rested in the embrace of her mates, she watched the party. The pride was so different from what it had been when she’d returned before her eighteenth birthday. Then, Grant’s and Aaron’s kids had been the youngest in the pride. Now, all the mated groups in the pride had kids, and the boarding house had become a hive of activity. She would miss it, but she couldn’t wait to move on to the next chapter of her life.

  With Wyked and Fate by her side.

  The End

  Contact the Author

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  * * *

  Also from R. E. Butler

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  A Price for a Princess

  A Bond of Brothers

  A Bead of Blood

  A Twitch of Tail

  A Promise on White Wings

  A Slash of Savagery

  Awaken a Wolf

  Daeton’s Journey