Delivered to My Elves (Mail-Order Matings #18)

Epilogue

Misty

The snow decorated the village like frosting on a cake as my elves fitted the tall pine tree into the stand. If not for the remodeling they’d done since Carrie’s arrival, it would never have fit in the house at all. But adding a second story and leaving the front living area open to the rafters allowed for a sixteen-foot pine.

“I still think it’s too big,” I fussed, cuddling our daughter on my lap while enjoying the show. Her daddies considered nothing too big or two wonderful for their little girl. And their mate. To think I’d come here a year ago to be a breeder, to give them children and nothing more. But I should have known that two elves who yearned for family would also be the best mates in the whole world. I’d been ready to settle for…what was his name again? Seriously, I remembered it, but he didn’t deserve that kind of space in my mind. Imagine if I’d ended up with him. According to the few coworkers I’d stayed in touch with, his mating had completely fallen apart once his “fated” had realized he was more than willing to screw anything that moved on any piece of furniture that would bear their weight, and a few that would not.

I shuddered at the thought.

He hadn’t even been that good-looking, in comparison to my elves, but that was the least of the characteristics at which he fell short and they excelled. Right now, as they tightened the screws on the tree stand and stepped back to admire their work, they were the most outstanding examples of males I had ever had the pleasure to meet. They dragged in a ladder and strung lights from the top to the bottom of the fragrant tree then draped garland over the branches. Setting the sleeping baby in the cradle next to my chair, I joined them in decorating the tree with the ornaments they’d already owned when I met them. Most had been on the tree last year, but there was one special one I wanted to have pride of place. Well, two.

Each of the decorations we had hung were antique and beautiful, and I had a feeling we might have to put them away for a few years after this one when little fingers might be a danger to their delicate beauty. Or maybe we would use them but only high up and place more kid-friendly types on the lower branches. Plastic or wood, something like that. The tree was covered with blown glass and hand-painted tin, crystal and delicate woven fans. Had there ever been a prettier Christmas tree?

I opened the box holding the Baby’s First Christmas globe. It glowed from within, just like my loves had, so brightly I saw them across the train platform, even if I didn’t understand it at the time. “Will you hang this right up under the star, Callon?” I pointed to the spot where I wanted it.

“Of course, mate,” he said, climbing the ladder. “Here?” He held it in place.

“Perfect.”

He fastened it to the branch and climbed down. “We’re all done, then. Shall we put Carrie to bed and come sit by the tree for a while?”

“I don’t know, Callon.” Aerin came to stand beside me and slipped an arm around my waist. “Santa can’t come unless we are all in bed. Maybe we should get all tucked into ours and let the visions of sugarplums dance in our heads.”

I giggled. “You just want to get me naked and have your wicked ways with me.”

Neither looked guilty. Just eager.

“And I’m all for that, but first we forgot one ornament that needs to go high, too, before you put the ladder away.”

They looked at all the empty boxes then back at me, a question in their eyes.

“It’s not one of your heirlooms.” I reached into my robe pocket and retrieved a second box. “Here, Callon, you open it.”

He took it from me and lifted the lid. “Misty, what is this?”

It was poured glass in the shape of a stork holding a baby in a sling. Totally cheesy, but it had made me weepy.

“What do you think?”

Aerin picked up the ornament. “Are you telling us…are we having another baby?”

“Well, that was what you asked me to do.” I threw my arms around both of them. “Are you glad?”

We did tuck the baby in and then ourselves, but Santa had come and gone by the time we were asleep. We heard him downstairs, but we were far too busy celebrating our Christmas presents to one another to go down and say hello.