Chapter 37 - The End.

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I stared at the coffee in my hands not having drunk any of it at all since I poured it into the cup. I stood leaning against the couch, my focus on the sounds outside as I listened for a car. Karabo's mom seemed incredibly social; I was alone because she had headed out. It would take my dad some time to get used to her because of that, but he had gotten used to Paps who was his polar opposite so they would eventually get along great. I immediately set the cup down on the console table beside a vase as the sound of the car I had been waiting for came from outside and moved towards the door. I considered opening it but decided against it as I heard the car door shut, didn't want it to look like I had been waiting for him to show up. If he walked in with me just standing there in the living room, it would look like I had come to the door because I heard someone open it.

I listened to the footsteps making their way over from the driveway, my heart picking up in both anticipation and anxiety as I stared at the brown wood of the door. My eyes moved to the handle as it turned before the door was pushed open and I immediately hugged him, forgetting about not seeming so eager. For a few seconds, neither of us spoke until he cleared his throat.

"I... I'm... still mad at you..." he said slowly as he dropped his bags.

"I don't care. I'm going to keep holding you." I replied.

I heard him chuckle before he lifted his arms around me. I smiled shutting my eyes as I let myself feel the relief of knowing he was safely back with me. Neither of us moved for a few seconds, both seemingly just savouring the moment but eventually, we had to let go.

He turned around to shut the door before reaching for his bag but I caught his wrist. I pulled him out of the living room and into the kitchen figuring that he might want something to drink.

"I need to greet my mom first or she'll be really mad at me," he said.

"She's not here," I replied taking a seat at the island. He grabbed a bottle of water before he sat right beside me. Even if he was mad, he clearly wanted to be near me or would have sat across the table and not directly beside me. I was relieved and happy because I desperately wanted him to stay close to me too.

"I'm not sorry, Babe." I could sense his confusion as soon as the mumbled words left my mouth. He opened his mouth but I held up my hand, "Let me finish... I was angry they didn't believe in you and I wanted to shut them up. I just wanted to defend you. I accepted because it didn't matter who they chose, I knew I wouldn't lose a fight against anyone if it meant you would lose it as well, Karabo." I said.

I watched his fingers tap the water bottle and wished I had one too so that I wouldn't have to keep my nervous hands clutching each other on the table. Where was my coffee? I was sure I had some a few minutes ago... Had I finished it?

I raised my brows slightly watching him as he gave a slight nod to himself before he spoke.

"I know... I was just really angry you didn't stop to talk to me first. I mean, does this happen every time we receive a threat to the pack?"

"No, it won't happen again," I said taking his hand before I frowned, that was a lie. "Well, it-it might happen again if I receive a threat to you though – probably, probably will happen if I do..." I added quickly.

I smiled as he began laughing.

"I understand," he said. "Rich says it was impressive watching you handle Trevor even after the fight..." he mumbled, "Kind of wish I got to see it. Good job." My gaze moved up to his eyes, he was staring at our hands and I felt an immense sense of pride fill me. I was ridiculously glad knowing he was proud of me, it was weird. I smiled as he lifted out hands. "This is nice," he stared at our hands as he began to play with my fingers. I was content just watching him do that, it made me like my hands more because he seemed to like them a lot.

"What is?" I asked.

"Even with Richard, I never felt like I could take a break or be afraid. I always felt like I was a shield for the pack by myself... I'm actually happy I didn't have to fight Trevor... I wouldn't have killed him..." he bit his lip. He looked at me. "Thank you." I gave a slight smile before it wavered.

"I don't think I would have killed Nicholas if you weren't there. He just... got to me." Nicholas was really good at making me question myself, but it didn't matter how weak I felt, I wouldn't let Karabo get hurt or turn himself into someone he wasn't.

"Well, he's not a problem anymore. You fixed it," he said grinning.

"Because of you." I kissed his cheek. I chuckled seeing his eyes gleam happily. "I guess sometimes even though we don't want help, we're going to get it... It's weird... but I like it."

"Yeah. Me too. It's good that we're both really stubborn." He nodded. We laughed. "I love you, Alpha," he mumbled.

"Pffft, you're going to have to say that louder if you want to keep touching any part of me." I rolled my eyes as I pulled my hand from his. He laughed jumping up and back-hugging me tightly. I felt his chin lean on my shoulder as I placed my hands on the arms around my neck.

"I love you," he repeated loudly into my ear making me shove him away from me. It's wasn't a shout but it fricking hurt.

"Asshole." I grabbed his arms and pulled him back to me so his back was against my chest now before I locked my arms around him the way he had done to me. "I love you too, Alpha." I chuckled.

I let him go slightly so he could turn around and he lifted his hands to my face as he smiled. I could feel that my grin was just as big as I stared into his brown eyes. I shut my eyes in despair for a moment hearing a knock from the front door and Karabo shook his head at my reaction as we heard the door open.

"Alpha?" someone called.

"She's looking for you, Love," I said immediately.

"No. They don't know I'm here yet, they're looking for you," he replied.

"We're looking for the both of you." Karabo and I turned towards the kitchen opening as a young woman walked in. "Council meeting."

"Again?" I asked. 'Can't they just email us?' I linked to Karabo. I was pretty certain whatever they wanted to speak to us about were things we had already been told with the Betas and they just wanted to repeat it with us together. He began laughing and the girl stared at us confused.

"We'll be right there, Vanessa." Karabo smiled.

She gave a nod and left. I let out a sigh dropping my hands onto Karabo's waist. He chuckled taking hold of my hands and leading the way out of the kitchen.

"The first thing we're going to change after we officially merge is having council meetings about things that can be emailed to everyone," I said as we headed out of the house.

"I agree," he said with a yawn.

I chuckled watching him groan as he drank more water. Karabo's pack never let anyone sleep on arrival, did they?

-----

"Eli, look at him. He's so adorable. We have to take him." Karabo said. I refused to look at it.

"No," I replied sternly.

Both packs' elders had come to the conclusion that even though the Betas had lost, they had put up a great fight and so proved their abilities. We had merged successfully and a few people from our packs had immediately migrated to the other to see what it was like. Of course members from my pack found Karabo's pack's mating traditions weird, and his members found our lack of hunting weird, but we were all learning from – and sometimes offending – each other. It was fun.

"But he's just a little puppy. He's all alone, he needs a family."

"We're not getting the goddamn puppy, Karabo. He has the other puppies to be friends with." I snapped as I turned around but froze seeing Karabo knelt on the ground with the little black and brown Doberman held up against his cheek. The puppy looked cute but the sight of him against Karabo's cheek was just fricking adorable. Goddamnit. "I'm naming him," I muttered.

"What?" He looked up at me and grinned widely. I definitely didn't regret what I had just said after the smile I got in return.

I avoided his eyes as I took the little dog from him. "Hey, buddy. How's Lance? No? Eli Jr." I heard Karabo scoff but laughed as the puppy licked my face. "You're right, his opinion doesn't matter. Right, Jack?" I spoke to the dog.

I heard the pet store helper laugh.

"He's my dog, I wanted him first," Karabo said.

"He's our dog if he's going to live in our house," I said back. I saw Karabo glare at me from the corner of my eye and laughed as I handed the puppy to him.

"Hey, Jack. You're mine, we'll just pretend you're ours so he can buy food more than I do and pick up your poop until you're house trained," he whispered loudly.

I glared at him before we laughed. We got some accessories and food and he paid for the dog before we began making our way home. Karabo refused to put Jack down for even a second.

"Hey, I thought we were getting dinner," he said.

We were supposed to, but Karabo and his attention span – well, lack thereof – led us in the opposite direction we were supposed to be going in and somehow we had ended up with two board games, some glow in the dark paint and now, a dog. The board games were mine but he took us off track...

"Jack can't eat alone on his first day with us; we'll make something at home," I replied.

He nodded and I smiled taking his hand so I could pull him against my side to kiss his temple.

"Do you think we should check up on the Betas?" he asked.

"Nah, they can handle it," I replied.

Ashton and Richard were currently at the Galaxy part of our pack, I had no doubt they were dealing with some conflict as now that we were bigger, more packs were trying to get rid of us. Here at Letsela, we were fine because we generally got along with most of the packs in the country so if anyone was even making their way towards us we would know well in advance. Hopefully, that would happen to Galaxy soon. We kept the pack names the way they were to differentiate them instead of using one new name in case we got another pack in the same area to join us.

"Is your Corey's laziness rubbing off on you?" he asked. Karabo had been quite surprised by the way my paps and Sean acted, they were a pair of incredibly laid back leaders.

"No... Maybe a little." I shrugged. He laughed.

"You realise we have to go back in a few months?" he said.

"Of course. I won't get too lazy. It's going to be so much fun not being this bored every day." I said. I actually did miss pack conflicts, it kept me busy and gave me a reason to keep getting stronger, at Lestela I didn't feel like it was needed so had been slacking on my training just a bit.

"You say that now," he chuckled.

"Well, it doesn't really matter. I don't care what I'm doing as long as you're not too far away."

"By not too far away, you mean a few feet away?" he asked.

"Can't it just be a couple of centimetres? Or millimetres?" I said leaning closer to him.

"Whoa, you're so cheesy." He faked a cringe moving away from me. I laughed putting my arm around his shoulders to pull him back against my side. He suddenly stopped in his tracks making me stumble to a stop.

"Karabo! I told you not to do that!" I yelled. We always ended up bumping into each other or almost falling over when we walked together because of his random stopping, he did it with other people as well.

"But look!" I looked to where he was pointing and snorted seeing a vendor selling plastic inflatable hammers.

"No." I grabbed his wrist to pull him away.

"I'll pay for it." He said holding his ground. I tried to pull him with a little more effort but he fought back.

"I don't care, you're not getting it," I said.

"But I thought you wanted to be millimetres close to me?" he said seriously. I swallowed as he licked his lip while running his eyes over me suggestively. I watched him step up to me. "How about... no space?" he whispered into my ear.

I held my breath feeling my heart pound as his hand rested on my waist gently. I hated him so much.

"How about no?" I replied. I saw his act drop immediately, replaced with shock and I smirked.

"Fine. But you need to get rid of your stupid knife collection; it creates unnecessary danger for Jack," he said. I almost rolled my eyes.

"It's locked up." I countered.

"In a glass cupboard that he could smash."

"He's not going to smash it, because he won't be allowed to jump against it."

"He isn't going to care what he's allowed to do, he's a puppy," he responded.

"My knives have nothing to do with your inflatable toy addiction," I said.

"My 'addiction' isn't harmful, whereas yours is."

"I don't have an addiction; I have a collection that is worth a lot of money," I said.

"I don't care. I am getting the hammer that is a lot less dangerous than your knives," he said sternly.

"Fine, get your stupid hammer." I let his wrist go immediately taking our dog from him.

I ground my teeth annoyed as I watched him sprint up to the vendor at human speed. He bought two hammers and a ball and I shook my head as he waved the ball at me.

"Is that Jack's?" I asked.

"Yes!" I growled as he hit a hammer against my head making it let out a squeak and Jack let out a surprised but excited yelp. "It squeaks!"

"I swear to God, I will stab a hole in that..." I muttered. Karabo rolled his eyes.

"I'll just take the squeaker out... after this." Karabo laughed as I glared at him as he hit the toy against me again making it squeak, Jack seemed to absolutely love it.

"It's fine." I rolled my eyes. I guess I could endure it since they both loved it so much. I had two puppies now.

"You can keep your knives." Karabo smiled.

"I wasn't going to get rid of them anyway," I replied.

His reply was another tap with the hammer before he kissed my cheek grabbing my hand.

"I'm hungry." I fought the urge to start an argument about how it was his fault we had not gotten food in the first place and instead leaned my head against his.

"I'll cook," I said.

"I'll help," he said.

"It's not like you had a choice..." I mumbled. Karabo opened his mouth to protest but I shoved Jack into his face, "Aw, he's so cute, isn't he? He's kind of like a child that you adopted without telling me and then proceeded to guilt me into keeping because of how cute he is. Daddy owes me. Doesn't he, Jack?"

My jaw dropped as Jack barked in excitement and I turned to look at Karabo. My mate shrugged.

"I'm only helping 'cause Jack agreed."

We laughed.

THE END.

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Thank you for reading :D