Free Scorch: M/M Gay Shifter Mpreg Romance (Dragon's Destiny: Fated Mates Book 2) by Wolf Specter, Angel Knots Page B

regretted the circumstances by which it had come about. Luke’s loss was still painful, but I loved being a father, even if it wasn’t real.
    I knew my marriage to Sarah and the little family we’d become weren’t going to be forever. Even though I was determined to stay as long as she needed me, I did hope, for her sake, that she would find love again someday.
    And, if he was really willing to wait, I needed to be with Maks.
    I still didn’t know how we would make that work, but whatever happened, Sarah would always be my best friend. Even if there came a time when she didn’t need me as her husband, I had no intention of disappearing from her life, or Holly’s. I loved them both.
    Some of the guys I worked with who also had kids complained about getting bored with how their little ones liked to do the same thing over and over and over again, but I thought it was cute. I loved Holly’s high energy and enthusiasm. Watching her figure things out and discover the world around her always gave me a thrill, and she was exactly the distraction I needed right now.
    I had to stop thinking about Maks. I tried to tell myself that my feelings for him felt so intense simply because he was the first guy I’d ever been involved with, but even thought that explanation made sense, I couldn’t make myself believe it. There was something more between us. Something I had no name for, something I was a little scared to let myself believe in, but something that felt like forever.
    I couldn’t let myself think about that now, though.
    I’d decided from the first that I wouldn’t get involved with him while I was still married to Sarah, and here I was, just a month later, practically throwing myself at him, ready to break my word if he gave me the chance. I was ashamed of myself, even though an unreasonable part of me insisted that nothing I felt for him—nothing I did with him—could possibly be wrong… but I knew that looking for reasons to justify breaking my promises would start me down a slippery slope. It was a path I’d seen others take, and one that I knew wouldn’t lead anywhere I wanted to go.
    “Ball,” Holly said now, picking up my finger and using it to point to the picture while she giggled.
    I was on the couch, Holly on my lap, and we were flipping through a brightly colored board book called First 100 Words. I pushed thoughts of a future with Maks aside and let her cheerful enthusiasm ground me in the present.
    “What color is it, honey?” I asked her, pushing my glasses up higher on my nose with my free hand and kissing the top of her head.
    “Blue!” she said. I loved how she got so excited about everything, and it wasn’t much of an effort at all to give her my full attention. She was exactly the reminder I needed to get my mind back on what was important. We flipped through most of the book, talking animatedly about fish and bears and socks and frogs, but before we got to the end she started to yawn.
    “Sleep,” she said, patting my cheek. “Holly go bed.”
    “Are you sure you don’t want to look at more pictures?” I asked a little desperately. I knew that getting her to sleep before she got cranky was a good idea, but if I didn’t have her to distract me, I was afraid that my mind would just end up spinning in circles of frustrated wanting for something I couldn’t have. I pointed at another picture in the book, hoping to spark her interest. “Look at the pink flower.”
    “ No . Sleep,” she insisted, rubbing her eyes.
    “I’ll take her, Dev,” Sarah said, yawning herself as she walked into the living room. “Thanks for letting me nap.”
    When Sarah took her daughter, I was left alone with my thoughts of Maks. We didn’t always make plans—we hadn’t made any for the next day—but ever since the first time he’d taken me to lunch, we’d spent time together every day. Based on the pattern we’d fallen into over the last few weeks, I trusted that one way or another, Maks would be