Desert Heat (Complete)

{Dorian’s P.O.V.}

The moment Dani and I landed in the lobby of the pack hospital I took off in search of Allie at full throttle. I was so wrapped up in Jed’s dilemma that Dani’s words had nearly knocked the wind out of me. I was trying to be optimistic for Allie’s sake and hoped that this wasn’t too serious, but I knew better than to get my hopes up. If Heather had attacked her, then it was because she was aiming to kill her. As much as I wanted to go out there and rip Heather into pieces for coming after Allie, I knew that my place was to be with her while she gave birth. But come to find out, I would be denied that luxury.

“Dorian, she’s in surgery!” Sin called out to me as she came running from the waiting room.

“What!?” Dani exclaimed before I could. “She was fine when I left to go find him!”

“Not long after you left, she started to hemorrhage, so Dr. Quinn took her back about five minutes ago for an emergency cesarean,” Sin explained calmly. I don’t think she would have been even remotely calm had Mikey not been behind her holding her shoulders. When he knew she was okay, he came over to me and gave me a bro hug.

“Gizmo is going to be okay,” he whispered to me. I nodded my head. When he let go, I walked over to the hallway outside of the operating room to wait for Allie. It was killing me inside, not being able to be in there with her, but I also would never want Allie or our pup’s lives to be put in danger on account of my absence. As I waited, that was when I remembered it was Heather that put her in this predicament.

“What the f**k happened?” I asked Mikey after noticing he was standing not too far off.

“I don’t know, man. Sin and I were getting ready to tell Allen that he was going to be a big brother when Simba came rushing into the packhouse carrying Allie. They were both severely injured, and it looked like someone had used Gizmo as a punching bag.

“What?” I gritted my teeth.

“Simba had burn marks all over his body too, but mostly on his back. I assume that he was trying to shield Gizmo from whoever was attacking them.”

“What? Burns? I thought Heather attacked Allie!?” I was getting more irritated by the second at the lack of clarity.

“We don’t have all of the details. Just before Simba had to be put under to receive treatment, he made sure to tell me that it was a woman named Heather. I’m not sure how she was able to injure them both like this, but we won’t know the full details until Simba wakes up or Giz comes out of surgery,” he explained while rubbing the back of his neck. It looked like he was also just as frustrated not having answers.

I waited and waited; nearly an hour had already passed by. My mind was focused on Allie and our pup, but I was also worried about Jed and the others. I had left so abruptly without even thinking twice about it, and I realized I never got to formally introduce myself to Jed’s biological parents. I had quite a few questions for them myself, but it wouldn’t be my place to ask them. They were his parents, and I’m sure that he would have his own set of questions to ask, though I was a little concerned to see what Jed would do about Seth rejecting his little sister.

As I was pacing back and forth up and down the hall waiting for Allie to come out, Dani came running over and told me that Simba was awake. I hated to leave—just in case Allie came out—but I needed answers on what happened, and he was the only one who could give them to me right now. I looked at Mikey, who had been waiting with me the entire time, and he also agreed that we needed answers. Given her injuries, I knew that it would still be a while before Allie was moved into a recovery room. We went to Simba’s hospital room and saw that Katie was there with him. She was kissing him fervently and crying. I cleared my throat, and she immediately stopped.

“Alpha,” they said in unison and bowed their heads.

“Simba, how are you feeling?” I asked him with utmost sincerity.

“I’m healing. Dr. Boyd’s treatments for the burns are helping with the pain. Most of my wounds have started to close, and new skin is coming through. He said I’ll be okay to leave in two days.”

“I’m glad that you’re on the mend. I really am, but I need you to tell me what happened. Are you up for it?”

“Of course, Alpha.”

“Good. Please start from the beginning.”

“Well, the Luna came to me and asked me to escort her on her daily walk. Because of her upcoming due date, she wanted to get some exercise rather than be cooped up in the packhouse all day. So, as her guard, I escorted her. We walked all the way to the koi pond, and she spent a few minutes feeding the fish and talking to Lavender, telling her that she had another baby sister coming and how she wished she could be here. She sat on the large boulder as she kept throwing in pellets and also spoke to the other fish. She said the same thing she always does. She thanked them for their sacrifices during the war three years ago and that she will never forget them.”

“What happened after she fed the fish?”

“We talked as we normally do, no formalities or anything. She asked if Katie and I were planning on having more pups, then she asked about Savannah, Ava, and the guys. You know, the usual stuff we talk about. When she was ready to leave to head back towards the packhouse, I stood in front of her to give her my hand and help her to her feet when something blasted me from the side. I went flying and rolled a few times when I landed. I looked up and saw a group of three men and a woman. The Luna shouted her name—Heather.” Simba paused a minute to gauge my reaction before he continued. “Heather made threats to the Luna and told her that she would never get away with conspiring against her to take a man named Gideon from her, that she had already robbed her of the Yellow Moon Alpha. She told her that she would never fall for her fake personality, that the Luna was the cause of her losing everything in her life, and that she would take everything she held near and dear to her heart, starting with the unborn pup.” After hearing those words, a snarl automatically came out of my mouth that shook the entire room.

“Dorian. Breathe, man. Simba’s not the enemy,” Mikey told me as he was pushing me against the door. I had to reign in Bandit. He wanted b***d—Heather’s b***d.

“Gamma, it’s fine. I know he’s not angry at me. If I was the Alpha and someone did that to Katie or threatened Matthew and Madison, I would be angry too,” Simba maintained. Mikey made sure I was good before letting me go.

“Continue, Simba,” I said while breathing heavily, trying to stay calm.

“When I heard those words, and I saw whoever those men were summoning fireballs in the palm of their hands, I shifted as fast as I could but was a fraction of a second too late. One of the fireballs hit the Luna in the stomach, but she had covered it with her arms. Her forearms ended up taking the brunt of the burns. Only one hit her, and I took the rest on my back.”

“Why didn’t you mind link the others for help!?” Mikey shouted at him.

“With all due respect, Gamma, my first priority was keeping the Luna and the unborn Alpha pup alive. When I felt the fireballs stop, I pushed through the searing pain and attacked the three men, who I had realized were demons. But in my attempt to kill them, Heather had a hold of Allie and started to beat her. Because of the Luna’s pregnancy, her reflexes weren’t fast enough to block everything, and her main concern was protecting her stomach. So, rather than fight back, I saw she had curled into a ball to protect the pup. After killing all three of the demons, I charged at Heather, but when she saw she lost her men, she turned back to the Luna and told her that this wasn’t over. She said that all of the Luna’s children would die, one by one and that she would feel the pain of losing her children all over again, just like she had lost Lavender. Then she smashed a glass bottle on the ground and disappeared just as I was about to bite down on her. I hated the fact that I lost my chance, but when I saw the Luna’s condition, I didn’t think twice before shifting back, picking her up, and running to the packhouse. When I got there, I screamed for help before collapsing. Please forgive me for failing, Alpha.”

I didn’t even hear his plea for forgiveness because the only thing I repeated was, “SHE THREATENED MY PUPS!?!?!” I roared, completely having lost any sense of self-control. I watched as Simba and Katie both froze in fear. I didn’t even wait for a response before turning around and grabbing Mikey by the collar. “WHERE ARE THE TWINS!?”

“With your parents.”

“Go find them, and you make sure that they have guards around them 24/7. Then I want you to call every bounty hunter we know or have contracts with! Find anyone that knows a demon that can get us into the underworld! I WANT HEATHER FOUND AND KILLED ON SIGHT!”

“What about her bounty?”

“Open it, and raise it to thirty million! Thirty million to the man or woman that BRINGS ME HER HEAD!” I roared in his face. He nodded his head, and I let him go. He scurried out of the hospital, and as he was leaving, Dani came into the room.

“Dorian, Dr. Quinn is looking for you.” My anger quickly subsided, and I followed her to find Dr. Quinn. We found her outside of the VIP room.

“Dr. Quinn!?”

“Oh, Alpha, there you are,” she sighed in relief and then smiled at me.

“How are they?”

“See for yourself,” she said and opened the door to the room. I quickly walked in and saw Allie lying on the hospital bed. Her face was slightly bruised, but it was her arms that seemed to be worse off than anything. When she sensed my presence, her eyes opened, and she looked straight at me. I took three large strides before reaching her bedside and pressed my forehead to hers.

“Are you okay, baby?”

“I will be. Dorian, it was her. It was Heather,” she said to me while holding onto me.

“I know. Simba told me everything.”

“Simba!? How is he!? Dorian, he took so many fireballs to the back!” she started to cry, and her b***d pressure skyrocketed.

“Shh, shh, calm down, Allie. Simba is fine. He’s on the mend, and he’s going to be released in two days,” I consoled her as I tried to calm her down. “Katie’s with him now, so he’s in good hands.”

“Dorian, he saved my life. He risked his life to save mine,” she sobbed.

“Not only yours, but our pup too,” I responded.

“Oh my god! Our baby! Dorian, where’s—” Allie was about to freak out when we heard a small cry. We both shot our heads towards the corner of the hospital room where we saw a bassinet. “Oh my god,” Allie cried. I went over and saw the most perfect little angel wrapped in pink with a bow on her head. I picked her up, and she weighed next to nothing. I brought her to Allie, who already had her arms outstretched for her.

“Allie, she’s perfect,” I said as I gave her to Allie. Allie didn’t even say anything as she brought our newborn daughter close to her and kissed her tiny cheeks.

“Luna, please don’t worry,” Dr. Quinn reassured her as she entered the room. “She’s in perfect health. She’s a little smaller than Daisy was but not by much.”

“How much does she weigh?” I asked.

“She weighs a little under 11 pounds. For an Alpha pup, she’s on the smaller side, but overall still healthy.”

“And Allie?”

“The Luna will need time to recover, but given her genes now, she should heal within a few days, if not less. I was able to find the source of the hemorrhage and put a stop to the bleeding,” Dr. Quinn explained with a touch of disappointment in her voice. Allie didn’t miss a beat either and looked at Dr. Quinn questionably.

“What aren’t you telling us?” Allie demanded.

“Luna, in order to stop the hemorrhage, I had to perform an emergency hysterectomy.” Both of our jaws dropped.

“Are you saying that I’ll never be able to have another baby? Ever?” Allie asked, and Dr. Quinn nodded as she bowed her head. Allie looked like she wanted to break down, but I stopped her.

“Hey, don’t do that. Allie, it’s not the end of the world. We have the twins, and we have …” I paused and looked down at our new baby girl. “Are we going to settle for the name we discussed?”

“Yeah, I want to keep the name we settled on—Katrina Lilian Shaw. But there’s something I want to ask you,” she said, looking up at me.

“Anything.”

“Can we make Simba her godfather?” I was taken aback by this request, mostly because we had already agreed to make Jed her godfather. “I know we agreed on Jed, but Dorian, Simba risked his life to save ours, to save hers. We wouldn’t be here if it weren’t for him,” she explained as tears streamed down her face.

“Okay, baby, we’ll ask Simba to be her godfather,” I replied and wiped her tears. Though I was bummed that I wouldn’t get to ask Jed, I completely understood where Allie was coming from. I owed Simba a lot for putting himself on the frontline to protect Allie. Regardless of whether he was doing his job as her guard, what he did went above and beyond the call of duty, and I was grateful beyond words.

After Allie fed and burped Katrina, I set her back down into her bassinet, and Dr. Quinn whisked her away to perform her newborn tests. While she was gone, my parents came in with the twins and four pack members behind them.

“What’s going on?” Allie asked as they came in while the four pack members waited outside. They put the twins on Allie’s bed, and the kids happily played amongst themselves with the toys they had brought along.

“Allie, Simba said that Heather threatened the twins while you were unconscious,” I told her. Her eyes turned black almost instantly, and her claws came out.

“What did she say exactly?” she gritted her teeth. I repeated what Simba had said, word for word, and Allie ended up ripping her nursing pillow into shreds, shocking the twins. But they were soon giggling, seeing all of the goose feathers flying everywhere. “Darn it, that was my favorite nursing pillow!”

“I’ll buy you another one, baby. But first, I need you to calm down,” I told her, grabbing her hands.

“Calm down!? You want me to calm down when you just told me that … b-i-t-c-h threatened to kill each one of our pups!”

“What horrible woman! I cannot believe someone as sweet and pure as Corrinne gave birth to such a wench!” my mother ululated with her own claws coming out.

“Now, honey, you need to calm down too,” my dad told her.

“Benjamin, that foul young lady is making threats against my grandbabies!”

“Our grandbabies, and yes, I heard. But our job is to keep our grandbabies safe, not go picking fights. This is their fight,” he said, pointing to us.

“Is that why you have four guards?” Allie asked.

“We weren’t sure what was going on. They just showed up at our doorstep and said it was Dorian’s orders. We didn’t think much of it until Michael came and told us what happened. That’s when we came to see you, and they followed us here,” my dad answered.

“I want her head, Dorian. I WANT HER FREAKING HEAD ON A DAMN PLATTER!” Allie shouted at me. My mom didn’t even scold her for using profanity in front of the twins.

“I know, Allie, and I already have Mikey working on it,” I answered.

“Oh, I’m already done!” We turned to the door and saw Mikey and Sin.

“What do you mean you’re done?” I asked him.

“Dude, I didn’t have to make calls. The moment I switched on her bounty again and changed the payout, I got calls left and right. And you’re not going to believe our luck.”

“What?” I asked.

“Persephone and Sinbad apparently know someone who can willing to help.”

“You’re kidding!?” Allie exclaimed.

“Nope, and you’re not going to believe who it is,” he said directly to me.

“Who?”

“Abaddon.” My eyes widened in shock, and so did my father’s.

“Who is Abaddon?” Allie asked.

“Abaddon is a demon bounty hunter,” I answered.

“Do you know him?” she checked.

“No one has ever met him, sweetheart,” my dad answered. “Even Ethan hasn’t.”

“Why do you look as if you’re scared of him?” my mom asked.

“What kind of name is Abaddon?” Allied asked.

“The literal translation of his name is Angel of Death.”