Hedgehog for Hawke by Fel Fern
River
“Finally,” I said, looking at my cellphone. Reece finally returned my call. I finished my ice cream cone and answered. “Reece, thank God you got back to me. I just came back from an awful interview—”
Reece’s sob stopped me cold.
“What’s wrong? Did something happen?” I asked, concerned.
Stop it, I told myself. Reece always did this. My selfish brother wanted everyone to focus on his personal problems. I didn’t mind being his sounding board most of the time, but we had more important matters to talk about.
“Daryl and I just had our first real fight. It was so awful,” he said. “Yesterday, everything was going fine and—”
“Reece, just shut up for a moment. I tried to reach you this morning because we seriously need to talk about Michael’s future. Can you quit talking about your love life for a second?”
I seldom snapped. I prided myself on being a calm and logical guy, but Michael and I had a very stressful and awful morning.
Reece said nothing for a few moments. “How can you be so callous? You’re the only person in the world I could go to for advice.”
“Don’t you even care about Michael? Your son?” I demanded. It was time I stopped letting my brother string me around. I had to take charge.
“Of course I care about Michael but—”
“No buts. You were supposed to visit him this weekend, remember?”
Reece then did what he did best. He started crying. I wasn’t the least bit swayed. Reece had used this trick plenty of times when we were growing up. As a teenager, I’d seen him jerk many Alphas around with his tears. He should know that it wouldn’t work on me. At least I think it didn’t.
I swore I wouldn’t break down and take pity on him. Think of Michael, I told myself. I looked across the playground. Michael was playing with boys his age. Safe and sound.
My kid was better off with me. I had a stable job. A home. I could provide for him. What did Reece have to offer him? For crying out loud, Reece and Daryl lived in their car. Reece could never raise a kid on his own.
“I’m a bad dad. Say it, River,” he said in between sobs.
“Can I even call you Michael’s dad? Sure, you gave birth to him but you’ve never been there when it counted, when he needed you.”
There was silence on the other end for a few seconds. I wondered if Reece ended the call, but he spoke again.
“What’s gotten into you? Why are you being such an asshole, River? If you hate taking care of him, fine. Daryl and I can pick him up. We’ll take him off your hands.”
His words chilled me to the bone. I drew a sharp breath. Reece always knew how to twist the knife in my gut. My bastard brother understood Michael meant the world to me.
By threatening to take Michael away—he knew it would break me. Even worse, I couldn’t imagine what kind of life they’d be able to give Michael. They certainly wouldn’t care or know what a growing boy needed.
“Don’t you dare,” I whispered in a fierce voice. I had no intentions of letting Reece hear me beg. “Because I will fight you til my last breath. I’ve been looking after him ever since he was a baby.”
“I just wanted to tell you about my breakup. It was a joke, River,” Reece said in a petulant voice.
I sucked in a breath. I lost this round, and I knew it. Reece’s threat still hung over my head. I endured his rants about Daryl. It went on for fifteen minutes, but it felt like hours.
Finally, Reece said, “Oh, I got to go. Daryl’s back and oh, he bought me roses. I think he’s ready to apologise. Catch you later, River.”
I let out a frustrated growl. What did I expect? Some kind of resolution? I was so sick of my brother calling the shots. I glanced at the playground where three boys were playing. No Michael.
“Michael?” I called out loud.
I frantically started searching for him. This was bad. Michael loved to play hide-and-seek, but looking for him in the apartment was easy. The park was huge. My kid could be anywhere.
Don’t panic, I reminded myself. In situations like these, I needed to be calm. Patient. A hard thing to do, especially when I kept envisioning horrible scenarios. What if there was a creep out there? I waded through the bushes and searched high and low for him.
“Michael? Please come out. Let’s get some ice cream,” I said in a loud voice.
Maybe I could pick out his scent. I was a shifter after all, except hedgehogs weren’t exactly trackers. I tried to zero in on Michael, but other scents assaulted my nose.
I finally came across Michael’s discarded pile of clothing near a tree. I scooped them up and swallowed. Looking for him in human form was hard enough, but in his animal form? What if a big animal saw him and decided he was good to eat?
“This is a park, River. There aren’t any wolves or bears here,” I whispered to myself.
How could I lose sight of him right after reminding my brother I was the responsible one? That Michael was the world to me? I blindly ran around the park, calling out his name. I asked people if they saw Michael, even showed them pictures of him both in his human and hedgehog form.
“I think I saw a hedgehog shifter playing with two other shifter kids over there,” said an Alpha with his young daughter.
He pointed north of the park. I jogged towards the direction and took deep breaths. I was spent from running around the park. Oh yeah. Regular exercise would definitely be a priority from now on.
A meow made me look down. If I wasn’t in a such a state of panic, I would’ve been floored by the cute kitten pawing at my shoe. Not a stray cat, I told myself, examining her closer. A shifter kid.
Didn’t that Alpha tell me Michael was playing with two of them? Hope filled me. Michael had probably just wandered off. Once I found him, there was no reason to get mad at him. Kids were kids, curious by nature. However, I needed to remind him to be careful. Michael should let me know he wanted to explore.
“Hey, do you know Michael?” I hunkered down and showed the shifter kid pictures of Michael.
She meowed at me and ran off in the opposite direction. I had no other option but to follow her. She led me away from the park’s main walking paths. She slowed down occasionally so I could catch up.
In the back of my mind, I wondered if she was luring me into some kind of trap. We stopped in a middle of a small garden.
Michael, in his hedgehog form, curled into a ball as a bear cub lunged for him. My heart was in my throat. I began to intervene, but the bear cub only pounced on him playfully. Michael uncurled.
“They’re just playing,” I told myself.
“Liz, Meg, there you are. Never do that again, please. You guys led me on a merry chase,” said a familiar voice.
Hawke appeared, looking all sweaty and delectable in a plain white shirt, faded jeans and a dirty pair of running shoes. Hawke scooped the bear cub in his arm. I winced when she bit his arm with her tiny teeth. The kitten meowed at him, and he picked her up as well.
“You two scared me,” he told them, not noticing I was there at all.
I swear, my heart melted into a puddle. Hawke never mentioned he had kids. I never imagined an easy-going Alpha like him being good with them, either.
Hawke blew kisses at the girls. The bear cub tried to wiggle out of his arms while the kitten settled in his arm, meowing at him contently. Hawke noticed Michael first.
“Hey, isn’t that Mike?” Hawke asked with furrowed brows.
“Yeah,” I finally spoke up for the first time. I picked Michael up. Hawke looked me up and down. I flushed, unsure why my heart was beating so quickly. “I guess both our kids ran off on us.”
“Liz and Meg nearly gave me a heart attack. One second I wasn’t looking and whoosh. They’re gone,” Hawke said with a sigh.
“I didn’t know you have daughters,” I pointed out. “Michael, let’s get you back in human form.”
“Good idea. Girls, let’s get you guys back in your dresses,” Hawke said.
Once we convinced the kids to return to their human forms, I glanced at his girls. They certainly had his gold hair.
“Twins?” I asked. Raising twins couldn’t be easy.
“Identical twins,” Hawke corrected. “Liz and Meg aren’t my kids, by the way. They’re my nieces.”
“Uncle Hawke, ice cream?” One twin asked, tugging at his arm.
“In a little bit, Liz,” Hawke said. He fished out a pink ribbon from the pocket of his jeans and put it on Liz. Meg tugged at his other arm and stomped her tiny feet. “Don’t worry Meg, I got your ribbon too.”
I watched the big Alpha fix their hair. It was clear he hadn’t done this before.
“Stay still please, Liz,” he grumbled.
“Let me help,” I offered.
Meg looked at me suspiciously as Hawke handed me her ribbon. Huh. On closer examination, I realized Meg probably had inherited her Alpha father’s genes while Liz took after her Omega father.
Interesting. I didn’t know genetics worked that way with twins. Anyone could make the error of thinking Liz and Meg were Hawke’s kids. He seemed pretty close to them even though he didn’t know how to do their hair.
“River’s a friend, Meg. You can trust him,” Hawke assured Meg.
“Uncle Hawke’s Special Friend?” Meg asked.
She let me tie up her hair. Meg quickly lost interest in me as she caught sight of Michael. The two chatted. I was pleasantly surprised, because Michael was usually shy around other kids.
“Meg and Liz’s names ring a bell,” I mused out loud. Hawke finished doing Liz’s hair, and she joined Meg and Michael. I finally pieced the puzzle together. “Hunter mentioned the twins go to First Steps Academy. He said he’d talk to Walker about getting me and Michael an interview with the principal.”
Our little group left the area and returned to the main path. Hawke and I sat down together on a park bench while the kids raced towards the playground.
This time, I kept a close eye on all of them. I was betting Hawke was doing the same. Earlier, he looked so relieved when he finally tracked down his errant nieces.
“I hear good things about their school,” Hawke said. The Alpha paused, as if considering his next words. “I shouldn’t be saying this without Manny or Walker around but the girls hadn’t had it easy.”
“What do you mean?”
“Liz and Meg are actually Sam’s, my younger brother’s kids. He died in a car accident and left the twins to Walker’s care. They were so wild during those days that every school Walker tried to put them in, they were kicked out.”
I looked at Liz and Meg, laughing at a joke Michael just said.
“That’s horrible. Why would those schools do that? They’re just kids,” I said.
“Michael would be in good hands if you put him in First Steps,” Hawke said.
“Well, that is, if we passed the interview,” I said a little darkly.
“I recalled you mentioning you went to an interview with another pre-school?”
I didn’t know why it pleased me to hear that he paid attention. “I did.”
“Your crestfallen face tells me everything. It went sideways?” he asked.
“You have no idea. The principal was a dick and I seldom call people names.”
“Tell me all about it.” Hawke must’ve read the apprehensive look on my face, because he said, “I’m a good listener.”
I believed him. It wasn’t the wisest idea, telling a complete stranger all my troubles, but Hawke felt like a stranger I’ve known my entire life. Talking to him was easy. Comfortable.
I never felt that way with anyone before. Back in the city, I didn’t have friends, just work colleagues, and my dating life had been non-existent. All I’ve ever been focused on was work. Then Michael came into my life and gave it meaning.
I complained about caring for a kid during the first few months I took care of him, but deep down? I was happy to do it. Work was no longer my number one priority, but God. Going at parenthood alone hadn’t been easy.
“… Principal Walden basically said I was wasting his time because he could be interviewing parents from good and stable families,” I finished.
“That asshole said those exact words?” Hawke’s face darkened, and I glimpsed a side of him I knew existed, but never thought I’d ever see.
Hawke’s eye color changed to yellow and I could see the deadly beast that lived inside his skin. When an Alpha got riled up like this, they became unpredictable. Why was I pleased Hawke was angry for Michael and for my sake?
Who was I kidding? I knew the answer to that question. No one had ever taken my side before, and it felt nice. Even when my parents were alive, they always took Reece’s side, never mine. Then again, my brother was always good at targeting an individual’s weakness and using it against them.
Hawke cracked his knuckles and let out a breath. “That pretentious school rejected Walker’s application, too.”
“What?” I asked, stunned. “But Walker’s co-CEO of Claws Inc. Hunter’s also mentioned he’s great with his mate and kids.”
“He applied before he mated Manny,” Hawke explained. “That school doesn’t like single parents, apparently. You know, if you ask nicely, I can pay that principal a visit.”
“Don’t joke around.” Hawke wasn’t smiling or laughing, and I had to admit. That scared me a little.
I cleared my throat. “It’s fine. Michael and I just want to move on. Maybe for my next interview, I could pay for someone to pretend to be my mate. “I scoffed and went on, “Which century do we live in any way? I’m perfectly capable of providing for Michael.”
“I can see that,” Hawke said. “You somehow raised him on your own. You’re amazing, River.”
I preened at his praise. Oh no. I couldn’t let my walls down around this Alpha. He was a threat to me but I had to admit I also misjudged Hawke.
I dismissed him as a good-looking, self-centred guy who wasn’t capable of caring for others. Seeing him with his nieces showed a different side to him. Hawke had been nothing but nice to me. He even listened to my problems.
“That gives me an idea,” Hawke declared.
He had a mischievous glint in his eyes that I automatically distrusted. This Alpha had so many facets to his personality. I had to admit; I was intrigued.
“What idea?” I asked.
“If you need someone to play your pretend mate, I’m available.”