Harris narrowed his eyes. “Really?”
It wasn’t like Mom was entirely bad. Better than Dad, at least. “I mean, if it were Sam’s entire family moving in, I wouldn’t mind,” Valen said. “But not my parents. You know how Sam’s really quiet? My mom told him to speak up. Then she said he wasn’t good enough for me.”
Harris’ lips thinned. “Yeah, we don’t need that here.”
Was nice, Harris understanding him. Valen buried his face in Harris’ chest. “I want to do all the good things for Sam,” Valen said.
“Yeah.” Harris ran his fingers through Valen’s hair. “We should get off our asses. Start cleaning before Sam thinks he needs this place spotless five months before the baby gets here.”
“Five months?” Valen winced.
“Yeah, that’s what pregnant omegas do.”
Valen leaned away from Harris, looking at the come-stained bed sheets, then the floors. They weren’t filthy, but he couldn’t expect Sam to see to all that. “Yeah, we gotta step up on the cleaning.”
“Glad you’re around.” Harris grinned, nudging Valen. “Next thing you know, we’ll both be in aprons cleaning up the house.”
Valen snorted. “Get a set for Sam, too. We’ll be the cleaning trio.”
He closed the text message on his phone, glanced at the other tab he had open. Baby clothes. An ad had popped up on his screen earlier, and he’d clicked on it.
“Baby clothes?” Harris asked.
“Yeah. I was thinking of getting some for Sam as a surprise.” Valen raised his eyebrows. “I mean, it won’t go to waste. We don’t have to get that many at first.”
A smile crept along Harris’ lips. “Do that, and he’ll climb on you and fuck your brains out.”
Valen punched Harris’ thigh. “See! I’m not the only one thinking about sex. You just don’t say it.”
Harris laughed, kissing Valen on the lips. “Okay. Baby clothes. You picked any out?”
“Just these rabbit ones. And there’s this one with a cow, and a giraffe.”
“What about stuffed toys?”
Valen thought about it. He’d seen some in Sam’s bedroom years ago, but Sam hadn’t brought any with him when he moved in. “Yeah. I think Sam likes them.”
“Get a couple of those, then.”
“Gods, it’ll end up being a huge box,” Valen said. “You wanna get in there naked, too? So it’ll be a giant surprise.”
Harris broke into a grin. “Nah, you can go in the box.”
“We both can go in the box. Shuffle up the driveway. He’ll be real glad to see us.”
Harris rolled his eyes. “We’ll do a small parcel,” he said. “Maybe if he likes that one, we’ll do a bigger box.”
“We’ll need video footage, too. Gotta see his face when you do that.”
“If we ever do that naked-box thing, your mom better not be around.”
“Gods, no,” Valen said. Cringed when he thought about it. Then he realized that Harris had just agreed to get in a box with him, naked. Valen grinned. “Anyway, we need to clean the house. Surprise Sam when he gets home.”
“Sure,” Harris said, swinging his legs off the bed. “Race you to the vacuum.”
“Like you ever race!” Valen said, but Harris was already out of the room, bare-assed.
This? Valen could definitely live with.
24
Harris
The month passed quickly. When Sam had first shared his plans for the wedding reception, Harris had looked at the list, skeptical.
None of the food was something he cooked on a regular basis. They were mostly Asian—noodles, broth, dumplings, things from the drive-in—but with a twist.
Instead of mushrooms as a garnish, they were using truffles. Instead of regular cuts of pork belly, they were going with pork shoulder. The dumplings would be filled with minced pork and truffles, and each cube of tofu would come with a towering mountain of dried fish flakes.
Stacking translucent fish shavings on tofu? That, Harris could do. Making dumplings, and folding their edges perfectly? That had taken hours to perfect.
Valen had spent days learning to make noodles by hand. Sam had supervised while Valen prepared the broth—skimming off the bits of cooked blood and oil, rinsing the meat, boiling it again.
By the end of a month, he, Sam and Valen had loaded the fridge and freezer with all the food they’d practiced with, and what remained, he’d brought to the station to share with his staff.
They’d perfected a method of working together in the kitchen, the three of them, preparing food for fifteen. Sam would sharpen the knives, and Valen would wash the ingredients. Harris would clean the countertops, get the herbs and spices ready.
Once a week, in the mornings, Sam would bring them to the drive-in, get them familiar with the kitchen there.
Harris almost felt like a chef. He knew how to turn on an industrial stove. He could slice cucumbers into matchstick lines.
He looked at the bowl of finely-shredded radish curls in front of him now, the bowls of cherry tomatoes, and the raw salmon Sam was in the middle of slicing.
“I can actually cook,” Harris said.
Next to him, Sam laughed. “You’ve always been able to cook. I just taught you more ways of doing it.”
“Me too, Big H,” Valen said across the simmering pots in the drive-in’s kitchen. “Didn’t think you’d be cooking up a banquet when you first hired Sam, huh?”
They’d received far more than the ten lessons he’d hired Sam for. They’d gotten an omega and a baby, and that had been priceless.
“I’m almost done on my end,” Sam said. “Which of you needs help?”
“I’m doing fine,” Harris said.
“Me,” Valen said. “I’m not done with the dumplings. Gods, Sam. I’m nervous.”
“About the wedding, or the reception?”
“Mostly the reception,” Valen said. “Crap, people are gonna be eating my food. In a few hours! Did I mention how Big H and I were feeding off frozen pizza before you came along?”
“And mashed potatoes,” Harris said. “I can make that.”
He pulled out the small decorative plates, cut his
