All Over Again (Sequel to Wanted Man)

Chapter Twenty-Six

CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX

Snow still blanketed the ground with several inches of white powder, and the moonlight spilled across the backyard as McKenna stood in the nursery, rocking Aislinn after her midnight feeding.

Loki had been gone for almost three weeks. In those three weeks, McKenna finished what needed to be done in the nursery (fortunately, Loki had already taken care of making furniture appear, so really all she had to do was go and get bedding for the crib and other things for the walls and such.)

Aislinn cooed and McKenna smiled down at her. “Go to sleep, little girl,” she whispered. “Morning will come very quickly and I have to get your brother to school in the morning.”

Aislinn blinked at her and yawned, but her eyes remained open. “You are a troublemaker, little bit,” McKenna murmured, bending to kiss the tip of the infant’s nose. “Sleep is a good thing, you know. A good thing.”

She moved closer to the windows overlooking the backyard. Aislinn's room was next to Selig's and she gazed down at the pool, the dark green cover peeking through the snow in places. Although it was only the beginning of February, she was already impatient for spring to arrive, for warm weather to come. Last summer, when they weren’t in Asgard, they spent lazy days around the pool. Selig loved splashing in it, loved leaping off the diving board. He learned to swim within hours of his first venture into the water, although neither she nor Loki liked to have him too far out of reach. But like his father, he was fearless, always trying to find new ways to frighten his mother half to death and give her gray hair.

“And now you will probably do the same, won’t you?” she whispered to Aislinn, whose eyes were finally growing heavy. Her eyelids fluttered, then closed, her lashes thick black crescents resting on her cheeks.

McKenna smiled, rocking her ever so gently, patting her backside as she did. She gazed out the window, unable to see the Bifrost site, but since she knew where it was, it didn’t matter that she couldn’t see it. As she stood there, snow began falling again, softly swirling past the windowpanes.

She always loved snowy nights, when the world was so quiet and peaceful. When she was a kid, she loved to take walks in the woods behind her mother’s house, loved to just look up at the night sky and watch the snow fall all around her. Her mother always teased her about it, saying she must have been a snow elf in a former life.

When she was certain Aislinn was asleep, McKenna carefully set her in her crib and tugged a light fleece blanket up to her chest. She sighed in her sleep, scrunching around until she was comfortable, and then McKenna breathed a sigh of relief.

However, she was still wide awake, so she went down into the kitchen to make a cup of hot chocolate, her go-to drink for sleepless nights. As she stood at the stove, heating the milk, she thought about the last time she stood there, making hot chocolate, when Loki lifted her up onto the counter and they would have made love, except for Selig's nightmare.

She sighed, lifting the saucepan off the stove to pour into a mug, added the Hershey’s, and slipped a spoon into the cup. Stirring, she moved to the French doors, where she sipped the hot chocolate and watched the snow fall.

“Mommy?”

She spun away from the doors, sloshing hot chocolate over the cup’s rim and onto the floor. “Selig?” She set the cup on the counter and reached for a paper towel to wipe up the floor. “Why’re you up, little man?”

Selig stood in the kitchen doorway, rubbing his eyes. He held Cap by one leg, the dog’s face dragging on the floor. “I had a bad dream.”

“What was it, sweetie?” She tossed the crumpled towel onto the counter and crossed over to scoop him up. “Do you remember?”