“You were wrong, baby; she looks like you. Just look at those big, brown eyes.” Tessa pushed the curly, black hair off her baby’s face and caressed her cheek with her fingertips. A gummy grin curled up under the newborn’s cheeks, and Tessa leaned in to rub the tip of her nose against her daughter’s.Leaning back on his hand against the dock’s old wooden boards, Rafik peeked down into his daughter’s face then glanced to Tessa. “But that smile is yours, my darling one.”After she inhaled a deep breath of the sea air, she moaned as she opened her eyes. She squinted while the boats in the harbor went out of focus and the sky beyond the horizon began to melt like ice cream into a smudged pink and orange sunset. “This isn’t real, is it?”Shaking his head, he joined her in watching the ships move back and forth on the water. “Not yet, but someday. I promise you.”Her eyes pinched

“It’s impossible.” His fingers bounced between the bars on the door as King Eli peeked through at his granddaughter. Just a shell of a woman, Tessa lay catatonic facing the wall humming to herself.He shook his head and drew up his face in disbelief as he motioned to the blackened spaces Rafik and the guard once inhabited. “Look at her. She’s pathetic. She couldn’t have caused all this.”“Don’t overlook her abilities for what you see before you now.” With her arms crossed in defiance, Isoke rolled her eyes and shook her head. With one child lost to her husband’s unending grudge, she would hold on to Tessa, no matter the cost. “She is cleansed of her mate completely. Eventually, she will come to her senses and yield.”He cupped her cheeks in his hands and kissed Isoke’s forehead as he reminded her of their past errors in judgment. “We thought the same of Isabelle, but she wo

The storm beat against the infirmary window as Teddy glared down at the street below. He stood cross-armed against the cool, damp metal frame as he watched the beads of water bounce up off the street under the orange glow of the lamps. When he glanced back over his shoulder at Tessa, he choked out the guilt and shame of it all as he slapped his hand over his mouth to keep quiet. Bent over in agony, Teddy hiccupped back the soft sobs of his contrition for what he failed to do and what he was about to do.Tonight was a blurry mess of chaos, but standing there by her bedside now, Teddy realized he had no one to blame but himself, and it broke him. Everything that followed this moment resulted from sheer panic.

The shrill noise of Tessa’s drunken cackle ricocheted through the second floor like a stray bullet that hit him right in the head as Teddy straightened his tie in the foyer mirror. The little monster he created was making him crazy, and he rolled his eyes at the sound of her voice.Too frustrated to work his fingers, he clenched his jaw and ripped the fabric from his neck. “Fuck!”The old Viking appeared behind him and motioned by bending his fingers. The tension building between the twins was at the boiling point, and he hoped a distraction might bring them back to baseline. “Turn around; I got this.”

With the weight of all those eyes burning through him, it made it a bit hard to chew, but Teddy simply gave his signature grin and enjoyed the homecooked meal. Growing up with Haldir’s poor attempts at cuisine and a string of paid chefs made having a sweet, loving mother like Kathy Hexom fix his dinner so much better.The Lycan mate he found himself failed to mention she had twin fathers and twin brothers and, despite his charms, they all stared straight through him without an ounce of mercy.“So, where are you from?” The father with reddish-blonde hair, Robert, crossed his tattoed arms as he pushed himself back in his seat and waited for an answer.Knowing that his past would undoubtedly come back to haunt him someday, Teddy took a second to clear his throat and set down his fork as he readied himself. “Savannah, sir.”Ready to take his turn at making Teddy uncomfortable, Warren, the father with pale blonde hair and the same