Total pages in book: 59
Estimated words: 54742 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 274(@200wpm)___ 219(@250wpm)___ 182(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 54742 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 274(@200wpm)___ 219(@250wpm)___ 182(@300wpm)
“There we go. That’s your boy,” Dr. Duncan told them.
The nurse brought him over and laid him in Jo’s arms, against her chest. He was beautiful. He had her blonde hair, but his father’s deep brown eyes.
A short time later, they were wheeled down to a private room where special nurses were assigned, per Dr. Duncan’s instruction. Whether they were shifters or merely people in the know who had been paid to maintain secrets that most humans had no need to become aware of, Jo wasn’t sure, but they were kind and efficient.
She wasn’t there long, heading home the following day after the doctor cleared her to do so. It was such a thrill to be taking their new baby home and starting such an exciting new chapter in their lives. She looked down at their son, named William Thomas Wilson and knew that her heart now belonged just as much to this young man as it did to King.
She couldn’t imagine how her life could possibly be more complete than it was in this moment.
Though she was tired, she appreciated the throng of people that greeted them there with gifts for the baby and food for them, everyone willing to help out in any way possible while she got back on her feet from the birth.
Jo looked around at all their happy excited faces and felt something she couldn’t remember having felt for years, a sense of family. This was what it was like to have a large, loving family. How fortunate some people were to have this all their lives and how lucky she was to have it now.
CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE
Time was funny, Jo thought as she looked out over the backyard at Will. He was giggling as he chased after his father, who was chasing after their new dog, Ben.
She smiled out at them, adoring every single moment of being here with the both of them, the two most special men in her life. She put her hand on her belly, feeling the gentle swell as the beginnings a new life stirred there.
They had discussed it at length, whether to have another child. In the end, they had decided that they didn’t want him to grow up as an only child as both of them had done. Though their backgrounds had been vastly different, that was the one thing they had in common, the loneliness of being a single birth family.
Now, as they were older, and their parents were gone, it seemed especially more noticeable. There were no siblings to share thoughtful family stories with or cook Mom’s old recipes for, sharing in the enjoyment of the tastes they knew as children. King came closer to this experience than she did, as his clan was much like a family to him, much like having brothers, but it still wasn’t quite the same.
Jo had other things going on in her life now too. She had taken the magic she had felt with hell house and put it into some new endeavors, working with Trevor to build a business that flipped houses. Her passion was finding them and his was recreating them to show off a new glory. They made a good team and he had been able to leave the realtor’s office, where horrible Holly was employed, after some time.
On a whim, she had ridden with him down to the old neighborhood where her ill-fated house had stood, only to find it barricaded off. All of the houses on the street were gone now, either swallowed by subsequent cave-ins or demolished. The holes had been filled, forcing a city-funded filling of the quarry space beneath.
“What a shame,” Jo observed. “What about Sarah? What became of her?”
“Oh, I found her a proper little A-frame over near the senior center. She has less upkeep and can now walk to bingo on Monday nights. I hear she has taken up with a nice widower there named Bob.”
“Well, I guess this quarry saw at least one person right in the end,” Jo mused.
“It would seem so.”
They made their way back out of the neighborhood and headed into town to look at a new block of flats on the market. It was promising as less of a flip venture and more of a landlord situation.
“I don’t know if I want to be in the slumlord business,” Jo quipped.
“You don’t have to be. That’s the beauty of it. You hire a live-in super to handle all the headaches and just count your money at the end of the month.”
“That sounds not so nice for the tenants. What if he’s a shitty super?”
“Trust me, if he is, they’ll let us know.”
“Exactly what I’m afraid of.”
“Consider it?” he asked.
“Let’s look at them and see.”
And that was the way her life went now. She juggled business, a husband and a child, soon to be two children. She couldn’t be happier about it, either. As far as she was concerned, these were the best days of her life, so far. She was looking forward to watching the kids grow up and have kids of their own.