Chapter 8.

The baby woke her up.

She had retired to her bed after pumping and snugged into the covers with the baby monitor to sleep.

Lori didn't think she caught a wink of sleep, then the sound of Emilia crying blasted into her ears.

She was out of her room in a minute.

Forgetting she was only wearing a night shirt and panties.

She got to Emilia's room in a flash and picked up the crying baby.

She started shushing her by rocking her back and forth and that seemed to work for a while before she launched into another wail.

Oh God. Lori thought as she paled, she was going to wake up everyone at this rate. She thought as she hastily set her down on the changing table to check if she needed a diaper change.

No, no diaper change needed.

Just a very fussy baby who might be very hungry.

There was no milk in the nursery, Lori had transfered it all to the kitchen downstairs, which now seemed like a bad idea since she would have to go down and get it.

Doing that, she might risk waking everyone up or only annoying the baby more.

Either option meant a lot of crying involved, because Emilia was impatient.

Lori stuck a pacifier in hee mouth and Emilia sucked on it ravenously for a while before spitting it out.

Oh no.

She continued pacing round the nursery with the baby while wondering what she would do to pacify her when a strange idea popped in her head.

Oh.

Wait.

There was nothing wrong with her feeding Emilia from her breasts.

No. That shouldn't be a problem.

She thought as she settled on the couch and raised her shirt.

She tried to prop up Emilia's head as much as possible while guiding her to an exposed pink nipple.

She was surprised by how fast Emilia latched on. And just as quickly as she latched on she stopped crying.

Lori sighed, relieved that her crying was over.

She settled in more comfortably on the sofa as she nestled the baby in her arms. A warm feeling spread across her chest and Lori was surprised by it.

She reached out and stroked the baby's head gently, unconsciously humming. For the first time in weeks, Lori felt at peace, totally and fully at peace.



Breakfast was early in the Caine household, Lori could smell the eggs and bacon all the way from the stairs. She had been awake for the rest of the night, snuggling Emilia in her arms and dozing off. Emilia seemed to sleep better when she was in her arms. But it was tiring, after about hours in one position, her arms were tired and heavy.

Luckily, Emilia decided to sleep some more in the morning and it had given her time to freshen up and get changed for breakfast.

The baby monitor became her new best friend, she carried it everywhere, even to the bathroom.

She walked into the kitchen and found Mr Caine already seated in an impeccable dark blue suit. There was a plate of breakfast in front of him, and cup of black coffee, he was also on his phone.

"Good morning Mr Caine."

She said and he slightly turned and smiled at her. Oh he was so handsome she almost blushed.

"I'd prefer if you called me Gabriel."

"Good morning Lori "

He added and Lori nodded.

It would take some practice to call him Gabriel, he was her boss.

"How was your first night?"

He asked as she slid into the stool next to him. The maid in front of the oven across from them was cooking bacon.

"I think it went well."

Gabriel nodded. He recalled Emilia crying in the night and he was almost tempted to go and soothe her himself till he realised that Lori had gone in to see her. It took a while, but she stopped crying.

"Yes. It takes time. And practice."

Lori nodded, yes he was right, with time and practice she would be better.

"How do you like your eggs?"

The maid asked as she turned to Lori and Lori answered her.

"Scrambled."

Gabriel raised an eyebrow but he didn't say anything else.

After a moment of them seating down in silence, Gabriel finished the rest of his coffee and stood up.

"I have to go to work. If you need anything, you can call me on this phone. It has my number, Gregory's number, Grace's number and Emilia's paediatrician already in it. If anything happens, you call me first."

He said as he slid an iPhone towards her. Lori picked it up gingerly and almost audibly gasped.

The phone was better than any shitty phone she had ever used in her life. In fact, she had never used an iPhone in her life.

"Do you understand?"

Gabriel asked and Lori nodded.

"Good. Goodbye."

He said as he left.

Lori turned the phone around and found the notorious three cameras that showed that the phone was an 11 pro max. And relatively new too.


She dropped it carefully back on the counter and waited for the maid to serve her her eggs. She couldn't remember the last time someone had cooked for her, it was probably a long time ago, maybe when she was a child.

People stopped catering to her needs a long time ago, if she had needs, they didn't care about them.


After a while her breakfast was ready, she ate fast, fearing that Emilia would have woken up and she wouldn't have the chance to finish off her breakfast.

Shortly after she was putting her dirty plates in the sink she heard the sound of Emilia waking up from the baby monitor.

She turned to the maid who smiled at her.

"I'll finish up here. Why don't you go get the baby."

She said and Lori nodded, racing up the stairs with her new phone and the baby monitor.




Gabriel's office was at least ten miles away from home and he always got to work earlier than a majority of his employees. He liked to be punctual, he liked starting the day early too, it gave him a good headstart, made him plan out everything he was going to do in advance.

Besides, Gabriel was in a very competitive industry, he had to take it serious.

Draco was already waiting for him on his floor when the elevator opened.

Gabriel nodded at him. Draco had been his second in command for eight years and he had been his friend for longer. Ever since he became his beta and second in command things changed. Draco had withdrawn as his friend, he became more formal, more respectful. Gabriel didn't know what to do with the loss of one of his oldest friendship, but he understood.

He was an alpha, the only friends he would be able to have was someone equal to him, not a subordinate, it was one of the lessons his father had taught him.

Be friendly to your employees, be good to your werewolves and everyone else under you but let there be a line and do not cross that line. It was what made his father such a great alpha.

Revered even. The people loved him and feared him equally, it was interesting to watch.

Draco was a little on the huge side. He towered over Gabriel, who himself was quite tall, at 6'4 inches, Draco's form was nearly as terrifying as his wolf was.

He was tall and heavily muscled, with dyed grey hair that he kept in a bun on top of his head.

Big, strong and very intimidating, but Draco could also be a big softie. Gabriel had seen him with his mate Leia. The way he doted on the woman, many would never see that side of him.

"Any updates?"

He asked and Draco shrugged.

"The usual. We filed a case with the Werewolf Council. They said they take three days to reply but I think that's just them being annoying."

Gabriel sighed.

"Then we wait. We'll give Sabine enough time to worry about the consequences of her actions."

Draco nodded, a small smile on his face.

"How is Emilia?"

He asked and Gabriel shrugged.

"She's good. She's healthy. Do we have any other agenda for today?"

He asked as they finally walked into his office.

Gabriel just remodeled the office a few days ago and it took some getting used to. He had remodeled it because of Emilia, knowing that there might be days she would have to be with him in the office, so he had to put away some of the sharp things that had once existed in his office.

The pretty glass figurines were great, but he couldn't imagine Emilia starting to crawl and picking up one of them and have them shattering.

The glass table also needed to go, for some reason he wondered why he had gone for the cutting edge stone cold modern architectural design that looked like something out of a futuristic sci fi movie.

"A couple of wolves are claiming to be part of our pack. They said they were displaced by Sabine's wolves and they lost everything they had. They are pleading for refuge."


Gabriel raised his eyebrow.

"How do we know they're ours?"

Draco stretched his hand and showed the symbol on his forearm, the same one every wolf in his pack had, three red talons on the forearm, a symbol of the Moon fang pack.

"They have our symbol. But we cannot be too sure, we have no records of them."

Gabriel sighed.

"Bring them in. Send over transportation to get them to Colorado. In the meantime, check the records, do another count, we'll see if they're really from our pack."