The voice was tiny, high-pitched, and bursting with a joy so pure and free that it felt like the tension in the room had dissolved like butter in fire.
“Daddy?” Beta Raphael muttered under his breath, his tone laced with disbelief.
He couldn't believe what he had just heard.
The little girl ran with everything she had, her small legs pumping. Her pigtails, flying out behind her, and her arms already stretched wide before she even reached the Alpha.
Alpha Jackson dropped to one knee and caught her just as she got to him.
He caught her and pulled her into his chest, with his arms wrapped around her small frame completely, and the rigid set of his shoulders dissolved like it had never been there at all.
"Hey," he murmured into her hair, his voice silky and softer in a way Raphael had ne
