Chapter 404: Chapter 404

Chapter 404

Zane

“They’re all on the way. I was finally able to get your mother through our mate link.” I paused, looking at my now-adult daughter. “Can you still hear us when we talk through that?”

Stella had helped herself to some cut-up fruit from the fridge in the kitchenette. She paused in pouring

herself some hot water for tea, then nodded.

“I can hear everyone’s thoughts. All the time. Even when I don’t want to. But yours and Abba’s and Daddy’s and Mother’s are indistinct when you’re talking through the bond. I can hear you, but I usually can’t decipher what you’re saying. Which, honestly, I prefer.”

Stella laughed, sounding a little embarrassed. She poured us both mugs of tea and sat at the table. I took the chair across from hers and pulled my mug closer to me, even though I really wanted something much

stronger than tea.

“That must be hard,” I told her. “Hearing thoughts all the time.”

She shrugged and frowned a little bit, and in that expression I saw very clearly the little girl she’d been.

This was going to take me some time to get used to…

and I had to wonder how hard this was for her. One minute to be a child, the next an adult in the span of mere hours.

Could she hear what I was thinking just then?

“I try not to,” she said aloud. “Sometimes, like just now, what you were thinking was so loud and so strong, and it was about me. I heard it before I could stop myself But mostly, Papa, I try to be polite and not listen in.”

“Has it always been like that for you?”

She nodded after a moment and lifted the mug to her lips. She winced at the heat, then pursed her lips and blew lightly. I could feel the cold breeze from all the way across the table, and I let out a mutter of surprise.

Again, my daughter looked embarrassed as she set down the mug. “I can make things cold if I need them

to be. Or hot.”

“Stella…” I trailed off, not really even sure what I meant to say. “You are extraordinary. I always knew that,

of course. That you’re so special. But…”

“But now you can see it right in front of you, and you can’t deny it or pretend it away. I understand. I’m sorry it’s such a shock to you, Papa. I didn’t mean for it to be.” Stella paused, tilting her head as though she was listening. “They’re almost here. Then I’ll be able to tell you everything. I’d like to do it when we’re all

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Chapter 404

together, if you can be patient enough for that.”

“Of course, I can. If that’s what you need,” I told her.

Stella smiled, but tears gleamed in her eyes. “That’s why I had them call you first, Papa. Because I knew

you’d be able to wait without demanding everything from me right away. Daddy is going to be a little more

difficult, I think.”

We both laughed at that, shaking our heads. She was right. Xander was going to flip his lid when he saw her. That was why I hadn’t simply told him what happened through our mind link.

“He’s got to see it for himself,” I told her. “But he’ll be okay. He’s your father, Stella. He’s going to love you,

no matter what. We all will. Were you worried about that?”

Her hesitation showed me that was true. She might be adult-sized with a grownup’s maturity, but there was another glimpse of her childhood in that expression. A little girl’s fears that something she’d done would

take away her parents’ love.

“People don’t like those who are different, Papa.”

“Oh, Stella.”

“The teachers at school didn’t like me. They might have told you otherwise,” she cut in with a sharp look at me. “But I could tell, even before I grew up, that they really didn’t know what to make of me. I tried hard

never to show them what I could do, but it was hard.”

“We aren’t people. We are your family. Your pack.

We’ll stand by you no matter how big you get,” I told her fiercely. A sudden thought slammed into me about supernaturals I’d heard about but hadn’t yet met. I had to assume they were real, though, since all the others turned out to be. “Are you going to get any bigger?”

She burst into laughter. “Papa!”

“You could be part Giant, for all I know,” I teased, but there was a real question in my voice.

Stella shook her head. “I promise not to outgrow you”

That hadn’t answered my question about if she could get bigger or not, but I accepted it. We both chuckled a little bit. Then her head tilted again, and her eyes narrowed.

“They’re here,” she said.

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