Mark’s POV

Waking up next to your mate is something I have longed for so long and finally had the chance to experience. After the incident with the rogues a week ago, I thought Jinyoung would have freaked out and I’d be rejected. Thank the goddess I didn’t.

After that long honest talk to Jinyoung, he said he couldn’t bring himself to fear our kind especially with the fact that his uncle is one of us. He couldn’t turn his back and fear the only family he had left and the people who took care of him despite his issues and of him stubbornly pushing them away.

Thankfully I have convinced him to come live with me and Luke in the pack house. I told him I need him near me and that he needs to be more comfortable with me and the only thing we can establish that fast is when he will constantly feel my presence thus it is better if he stays with me. Luke was very happy when the next day Jinyoung came home with me.

For a week now we have established a routine with our daily activities. I would spend my morning in my office doing some much needed reports while Jinyoung plays with Luke. We would eat lunch together then in the afternoon I would have my appointments and Jinyoung would be working with his book while Luke is taking a nap. After dinner and when Luke is finally knocked out for the day I make sure to spend some alone time with my mate. Wed talk about anything while having a cup of tea – about our likes, our dreams, the stupid thing we have done, or any random topic. This way we would get to know each other better and slowly, I can feel him opening up and letting me in his life as his other half. It felt really wonderful.

This morning though is different. Jinyoung has spent the whole night till almost dawn finishing his manuscripts and printing them to be delivered to his editor. I wish there was something I could do to help him but I guess I would only be distracting him so I only prepared him something to eat while he was working and slept.

I woke up and stretched my limbs only to stop halfway when I realize Jinyoung was snuggled up next to me. Not wanting to wake him up, I carefully shifted till I was lying sideways facing him. I stared at his handsome face and his jutted lips. How I wish I could kiss them but alas since that time a week ago I was scared to do anything other than hug him coz I don’t want him to feel awkward around me.

I found myself reaching for his hair and gently it. He must have found it rather calming coz he let out a satisfied sigh then moved closer to my chest.

*Alpha are you awake? Yugyeom and I are on our way to your office. We have documents we need you to look into* It was Bambam talking over our pack link. Damn it, I don’t want to leave the bed yet.

*Good morning Bam, yes I just woke up. Just proceed to my office. I’ll be there in few minutes* I replied. I kissed Jinyoung on his forehead but that seemed to have woken him up.

“Morning,” he sleepily greeted while cutely rubbing the sleep off of his eyes.

“Morning baby. Sorry to wake you up,” I apologized while some fringe out of his face. When he finally opened his eyes I can’t help but worry about those dark and heavy bags under them. “Go back to sleep, you must be tired,” I told him while running my thumb on one of his eye bags.

“You getting up?” he asked then yawned loudly after. I chuckled before sitting up on the bed.

“Yup. I don’t want to but Bambam and Yugyeom are already in the office waiting,” I told him and I saw him frown. “Sleep some more, okay? I’ll have something ready for you to eat when you wake up.”

“Mmm, ‘kay,” was the only reply he gave before his eyes closed again. I gave him one last kiss on the forehead before getting out of the bed to freshen myself.

The morning went on like normal days for me. I made sure to finish as much work as I can so I can take the afternoon off and take care of my tired mate.

Luke woke up when I was in the middle of a skype conference call with the other Alphas in the alliance. He was in his room across from my office and I could hear him crying and calling ‘daddy.’ I had no choice but to excuse myself to pick my son from his crib and bring him to my office. For the remainder of the meeting, Luke was sitting on my lap drinking milk from his baby bottle. I got teased by the other Alphas of course but I know for a fact they adore Luke so much.

When the meeting ended I put my work aside and decided to go downstairs and see if the lunch was already prepared. I found food set on the table with a note from the omega who cooks for us saying to enjoy the food she prepared.

I was putting some food on the tray so I can bring it up to Jinyoung when all of a sudden the door to the pack house opened widely and a bunch of chattering people came in. I don’t have to go out to the living room to know who came in. Only one family comes in here in such a loud and rough way. My family.

“Mark! Oh my god I miss you!” My eldest sister called. She suddenly jumped on me and hugged the living daylights out of me.

“Hey calm down sis! And you saw me a week ago, I know you don’t really miss me!” I playfully retorted making her glared at me.

“Oh it’s Luke! Hi there lil’ guy! Did you miss granny?” My Mama cooed. She picked up the laughing kid from his baby chair and carried him in her arms.

“Hi Ma,” I greeted and kissed her cheeks. Papa came into the kitchen as well and I caged him a hug. “How have you guys been doing?”

“Shouldn’t we be the one to ask you that? We heard what happened a week ago after your visit with us,” Papa said, both he and Mama looked at me worriedly. Just then my two nieces, my second sister, and my younger brother came into the kitchen.

“Dada!” my nieces screamed. I squatted on the floor and opened my arms wide to welcome them. They gladly ran to me and hugged me, showering my cheeks with their kisses.

“Hello sweeties, I see you got prettier!” I told them and they squealed and thank me for the compliment. I also gave my brother and sister a hug. After the greetings, my parents shooed them to the living room on the second floor and we followed. Before we even get to settle in my private room, everyone suddenly got quiet when the door to my room opened and a sleepy Jinyoung in his pajamas came out.

“Hyung…” Jinyoung called cutely while rubbing his eyes with the heel of his palm. However, he froze on his spot with his eyes wide when he realized there were many people in front of him.

He looked at them then he looked at me in panic. My family was frozen too and they kept staring at Jinyoung. The silence only ended when Luke shouted ‘daddy.’

Jinyoung was on the verge of running back to our room in panic so I instantly approached him.

“Good morning, or good noon rather,” I whispered as I hugged him, covering him with my body from my nosy family. “Did you sleep well?”

“Still sleepy but yeah, I slept well. Uhm, I can go back inside if you want. You seem to have visitors,” he replied, clinging into the front of my shirt to hide his flustered face.

I kissed the crown of his head. “It’s okay, it’s time you meet them anyway.”

“M-meet them?” he stuttered. I nodded and pulled away from his hug to face my family.

“Guys I’d like you to meet Jinyoung, my mate. Baby, meet my family.” And so I introduced him to each member of my ecstatic family. Jinyoung apologized for his appearance and excused himself to freshen up. I excused myself as well and told them I’d bring up the food since I and Jinyoung haven’t had lunch yet and my two sisters decided to help me.

“Oh my gosh he’s so cute! Damn you lucky bastard!” Tammy stated then she playfully shoved me.

“Spill it Mark! Have you mated? Did you mark him already?” Grace asked.

“No we haven’t mated yet. I’m still trying to make him comfortable around me,” I told them while piling the food to a bigger tray.

“He seems comfortable enough for me,” Tammy commented and my other sister agreed. “You plan to complete the mating this full moon?”

“I’m not telling you,” I scoffed and sauntered back to the stairs holding the heavy tray. There’s no way I’m telling them when I will complete the mating process with Jinyoung. They would tease me to no end!

When we got back upstairs I placed the food on the coffee table and my sisters did the same. Not even a minute after Jinyoung emerged again from our room wearing a striped sweater and some sweatpants.

“Hi Jinyoung-ah, sorry we seemed to wake you up from your sleep,” Mama apologized.

“It’s okay Mrs. Tuan, I was about to wake up anyway so it’s fine,” Jinyoung replied. He smiled at my mom before sitting on the carpeted floor next to me.

“Oh enough with Mrs. Tuan. Call us Mama and Papa, you are part of our family now,” Mama responded making Jinyoung blush. He didn’t say anything after that and proceeded to eat his food.

Jinyoung remained quiet while we talked about a lot of random stuff. I bet my family could feel that I don’t want to talk about the incident a week ago in front of Jinyoung so they avoided the topic and instead they humiliated me by telling Jinyoung my childhood stories. Jinyoung smiled throughout the conversation but he never said a word. He isn’t that keen on meeting new people so I understand of course.

Grace and Joey volunteered to do the dishes after and the kids along with Luke followed them to the kitchen leaving us with my parents and older sister. Not even five minutes later I noticed Jinyoung was about to fall asleep on the floor.

“Baby are you okay?” I asked, putting my arm around his shoulder to prevent his drowsy self to slump from where he was sitting.

“Sleepy,” he yawned. I stood up and helped him onto his feet too. I led him to the rocking chair which my younger brother vacated and sat. He blushed scarlet when I pulled him to sit on my lap.

“It’s okay,” I assured him. He bit his lip and complied. It didn’t take long for him to curl into my lap sideways with his head resting on my shoulders and ready to fall back to sleep again. When I looked at my parents and sister, they have this loving smile on their faces and I know that they are happy for me. They know how desperate I was to find my mate and all the difficulties I had when I found him but can’t even get near him. And now that I have him in my arms, I am happy. Now I understand that amazing feeling they have been talking about when you hold your mate.

“Is he okay son? He looks tired,” Papa said a few minutes later. Jinyoung was already knocked out of consciousness in my lap.

“He’s fine Pa, just sleepy. He barely slept last night coz he was finishing his book,” I told them while I caressed Jinyoung’s cheeks. He looked like a baby all curled up like this.

“How are things here in the pack after last week’s incident with the rogues? Did you have any more attacks?” Papa asked. I know they must be worried because of the recent events that took place.

“Nothing has happened since then but I heightened the security around the territory. I’m also glad that Jinyoung finally know about us being werewolves so he didn’t freak out when he see wolves patrolling all over the town.”

“Does he know about Leon?”

“No. Jinyoung has already a lot to think of and I don’t want him to worry if he found out our situation with that bastard. I’ll just have to make sure Jinyoung’s stays with me always so Leon won’t have the chance to attack him like what he did last week.”

Truth is, I don’t want to tell Jinyoung about our conflict with the other pack because he will surely think he had caused us bad luck again. His uncle advised me not to tell him yet coz he might retreat to his old self back. I don’t want that to happen especially now that he’s finally learning to let people be part of his life again.

“Everything will be fine son. Leon won’t get away with this. You have the alliance to support you and we’ll always be here for you,” Mama encouraged. I smiled thankfully at her.

“I know Ma and I will make sure Leon won’t get away. The rogues were so close on getting Luke and Jinyoung last week. If I got delayed for a minute more he must have taken them.” I remembered the look of fear on Jinyoung’s face and Luke’s cries when I found them on the lake that time. I promise not to let that happen again.

Jinyoung woke up about an hour after but remained snuggled on my lap. I bet he’s shy to face my family that’s why he’d rather hide his flustered face on my shoulder and pretended to be asleep. But my son had a different plan in mind. He must have missed Jinyoung coz he wasn’t able to spend some time with him for the entire day so he began to cry. My parents tried to soothe the poor boy but he wouldn’t stop.

“Daddy! I want daddy Jinie!” Luke wailed.

I leaned down close enough to Jinyoung’s ears. “Baby, Luke misses you,” I said. “Stop pretending to be asleep and come out from hiding on my neck,” I added playfully. And I was right, he was indeed awake already.

Jinyoung opened one of his eyes and peeked at my face which was only centimeters away from his. I raised my brow while smirking knowingly at him and in return he pouted. I so badly want to kiss those luscious lips but I held myself knowing that he’d be embarrassed if I do that. Jinyoung hastily jumped out of my lap and went straight to our crying child on my Mama’s lap.

“Daddy!” Luke cried harder when he saw his daddy. Jinyoung only smiled and reached for the sobbing kid.

“Daddy’s here baby, why are you crying? Did you miss me?” he cooed. Luke immediately clung onto Jinyoung and hugged him tightly. “Sorry, daddy was tired and sleepy. Want to eat something? Daddy’s hungry too.”

Everyone was quietly watching the two interact. Jinyoung who barely said anything during our earlier conversations talked nonstop with Luke. I know my family found this amusing. So did I when I first saw my son and Jinyoung interact. Indeed, Jinyoung could never resist the charm of kids.

While Jinyoung was still crouched down in front of my mom whilst holding Luke, my youngest niece also approached him.

“Are you our Dada?” Leila asked. Jinyoung was confused for a moment so he glanced at me. I simply smiled, not offering any help so he pouted and returned his gaze to my talkative niece.

“Why would you be calling me Dada, sweety?” he asked sweetly while taking Leila’s tiny hand in his.

“Coz he’s our Dada,” she pointed at me, “and you are Dada’s mate, right? That makes you our Dada too, right? Can I call you Dada? Pleease~” Leila explained and cutely pleaded.

Jinyoung blushed but smiled at the kid. “Of course you can. I’d be happy to be your Dada,” he smilingly replied and both Leila and her older sister Kylie squealed and hugged Jinyoung. “Now, do you want some cookies too? C’mon, let’s raid the kitchen. The monster on my tummy won’t stop complaining.”

And Jinyoung with the three kids excused themselves and went down to the kitchen to hunt for food. They were all giggling and laughing and we can’t help but smile.

“So he’s good with kids,” Joey pointed out. He was smiling widely too.

“Yeah. Kids are his kryptonite,” I replied while chuckling. “Sorry if he doesn’t talk to you guys much. He’s still trying to get used to having people around him again.”

“It’s okay Mark, what’s important is that he’s accepting and he’s adjusting to all this. That means he’s willing to be with you,” Grace commented.

Mama then stood up and approached me. She hugged me tight and said, “I’m happy for you Mark.”

I hugged her back just as tightly.

“I know, I am too.”