The Moon Goddess Brought It To You

*Eli*

My heart hurts so much that I can barely concentrate on the road ahead, but I know it's the only way to get to Kamila. I feel like she should jump and change shape, and it would be faster, but I know that's not possible right now with my hand injury.

In fact, it's hard to even handle the van with the way my hand is wrapped right now. I just have to hope this shit takes me there. If it does, I'll have every mechanic in my pack work on this to restore it to brand new condition, then I'll put it away forever. I'll pay Pete, or whoever owns it in his group of renegades, good money.

It will be my lucky van.

—How are you holding on?— Kelly's voice invades my thoughts and almost makes me turn the wheel in surprise. We're going pretty fast, so I'm glad we don't.

"I don't know," I say. "I just need to get there."

She nods. “We all need it,” she says. —And we will do it.

"I know, but that doesn't make 'getting there' any easier," I say.

“I've never been down this road,” he says, looking ahead, perhaps trying to change the subject.

Now we've reached the highway, so we're going faster, thank the Goddess, and that means we're closer to a place where I can communicate with everyone on the mental link. Not knowing has been a nightmare that's almost worse than having Kamila kidnapped in the first place. Well, not really, of course, but this whole idea of ​​not knowing where he is gives me an unbearable level of anxiety that feels like stones in my stomach.

I just need to know that it's okay. She has to be fine.

“She's going to be fine,” Kelly says as if she's reading my mind.

“I keep telling myself that,” I say. —But the worry is unbearable. I mean, it's hard enough for a woman, right, to have a baby? She is having four. And on top of that, she's kidnapped, just when she's practically ready to have the babies, all alone without us in some strange castle with some maniacal ET1 who's using her for... who knows what! That's stress on stress on stress. Is she really going to be okay?

I look away from the road for a second to look at Kelly, and the expression on her face is blank. She's trying to be strong for me. Sisters can be annoying, but I need her so much right now.

"Look at the road," he says.

Annoying again. She almost makes me laugh.

“Kamila is a very strong woman,” he says. —Look at everything she's been through in her life. Her parents treated her like trash and made her work like asla... for them. She had to do some of the worst jobs possible in her home pack...and look at her. She is strong, resilient. She was supposed to be a breeder. Do you know how scary that is for a young woman? But she got on that train and did everything she was supposed to do to make it happen. Now, I'm sure the Moon Goddess played a huge role in that. But still, it was Kamila's strength that brought her to that point. I have a lot of faith that she will be fine, and so will the babies.

I nod, tears starting to run down my eyes.

“Now, don't start with that,” he says, reaching into his pocket for a handkerchief. I can't believe she has a scarf in the middle of nowhere. "You won't be able to see the road." She laughed and I tried to smile. -Here we go. It's really going to be fine. Do you think the Moon Goddess would bother to make Kamila such a strong woman, then have her come to you as your mate, and probably everyone else's mate too, and get pregnant with your cub and the others, just to What happens to him?

He has a point.

“Of course not,” he says, answering his own question. “This,” she says as she gestures around the van and the road in front of us, “it was all meant to be.”

There's a strength in his voice, a determination that everything is going to be okay, and it ignites something inside me. She is right. The Moon Goddess brought me the most perfect woman in the world for a reason. She's going to be fine. We'll be fine.

“Now, I'm going to talk to my new friend, Heather,” he says, tapping me on the shoulder. —There is no crying and driving, so concentrate.

“I'm not crying,” I say, as the tears continue to stream down my cheeks.

“Mmhmm,” he says and goes to sit next to Heather.

I focus back on the road and the long journey ahead. I have hope in my heart even through all the pain. I'm going to get to her. I step on the accelerator a little and increase the speed, knowing that I am getting closer.

***

*Adam*

'Does anyone have a watch there?' Shelby asks in the mental link as she flips through pages.

The ET1s have brought us all into a single mental link so we can consult all of Kamila's birthing books as they rush her to ET1 Mark's pack hospital, which is the closest to ET1 Kane's castle. Well, I guess it's not her castle anymore, since he's dead. Thanks to the Goddess.

'Why do we need that?' ET1 Tristan asks.

Shelby looks at me, exasperated, as if I'm the one who just asked the question. Even I know that a woman has to time her contractions, but she doesn't really blame the ET1s for being in panic mode right now, because Kamila is already in labor.

Instead of yelling at him and calling him an idiot, which she would probably do to me, she calmly says, 'We need to time your contractions. Now, are you sure your water didn't break?'

'No,' replies ET1 Reece, who somehow seems to be the calmest of them all and probably still remembers how to time contractions. 'But I have a watch. I should time the minutes between them, right?'

'Yes,' Shelby responds with composure. Since when can my wife be so relaxed in a crisis? I'm pretty impressed with her right now, and she's frankly turning me on. 'Next time she has one, time the distance between them. And if your water breaks, let me know.'

Dr. Pendergan entered the room we are in, which is right across from where Malena Milly is currently arguing with Gene, since I need to keep an eye on her. "What's the news?" asks the doctor. The ET1s wanted her to meet them at ET1 Mark's castle, but Dr. Pendergan has a very serious patient here and she was unwilling to leave when she knows that ET1 Mark's healers can take care of this.

'ET1s, I have Dr. Pendergast with us. Add it,' Shelby says.

They continue to have a conversation about minutes and timekeeping and water or no water, and the doctor speaks directly to Kamila for a moment, which is a relief instead of having the ET1s try to interpret for her. I don't know why they didn't do that from the beginning.

They're not too far from ET1 Mark's place, so I expect Kamila to be in a hospital bed with the healer there very soon.

Meanwhile, Malena Milly's argument with Gene is getting louder. I swear, all that woman does is argue.

"What the hell do you mean?" Gene shouts. He's pretty good at arguing himself. I think they both really enjoy it and would be bored if there weren't any arguments. "I've spent a fortune on your damn clothes and you're still not happy?"

—The future Luna of this pack can't walk around in a rag!— says Malena Milly. -It doesn't matter. "I'll take care of this myself!" She leaves angrily, and Gene leaves the room and looks at me through the open door, then bursts into this room.

"What's going on here?" he asks. -Doctor? Is anyone sick?

We hadn't told him at all what was happening. He doesn't know that ET1 Kane is dead, or that Kamila has been rescued, or that the kits are about to be born. The less he knows about all this, the better. The ET1s wanted it that way.

“Oh, yeah,” Shelby says, and coughs and hits her chest.

The doctor, being wonderful, catches it instantly and pretends to be examining her. “I definitely think you need bed rest,” he says.

Gene walks over and looks at her. "What's wrong?" she asks.

"He has... he has a Russian cough virus," the doctor says. It sounds like something made up, but I nod anyway. "And I'm trying to examine this patient, Her Majesty, if she allows me," he adds.

Gene looks at her. -Oh yeah. “Go on,” she says. "But get this sick woman out of my wing." We can't have sick women in my wing!

“Right away, Your Majesty,” I say, and thankfully Gene leaves, muttering to himself about women and illnesses and clothes.

The doctor and Shelby go back to their argument with the ET1s, and now I have to go find Malena Milly and find out where the hell she went. Again, I have a job, and I better do it right.

I'll leave the matter of childbirth to the experts.