Chapter Text
2 years later
Lando turned his face to the other side, allowing the warm Mallorca sun to wash over the neglected skin as the sound of waves crashing against the shore echoed in the background. The squeals of toddlers accompanied by humored Spanish filled his ears more than anything, but he’d checked on what exactly was occurring on the beach only moments ago.
“Is it bad?” Charles asked beside him.
Lando lolled his head back to where it had been and pulled down his sunglasses to look at the Omega laying next to him in the lounge chair. The five month bump Charles sported was covered by an oversized shirt, but still noticeable to anyone who spared a glance.
“Is what bad? Labor?” Lando tried to clarify.
“No, the twos. Is there not something about the terrible twos?” Charles corrected. Lando laughed softly once he understood and turned his attention back to Carlos who was currently chasing Léana and Elias around where the ocean waves met the sand.
“No,” Lando admitted with a sigh. “Each month is different from the one before it, and each one has its struggles, sure, but it’s not bad. I wouldn’t trade it for the world,” he murmured.
In the distance, Daniel and Max swung a little boy of their own between their bodies, hands holding on tightly to assure their now five-year-old son didn’t get hurt. Lando smiled at the sight and pushed his sunglasses back up on his face to watch everything secretively.
His own Alpha had just picked Elias up and tossed him over his shoulder before running after Léana who shrieked in delight at being followed. He knew he’d have to get up at some point to join them, but it was nice to watch for a moment.
So much had changed in the two years since Lando had left his home in England.
He’d met the love of his life, escaped the pursuit of an ill-intentioned Alpha, made a family outside of just his fathers, became one half of a mated pair, and had two toddlers running around that he loved more than anything in the world.
Daniel and Max had become fathers themselves after adopting the little boy that the Aussie had mentioned when they brought Léana and Elias home for the first time, and Charles was expecting a pup of his own with Pierre in two months.
A daughter. Fitting, if anyone asked Lando.
George and Alex had gotten married only six months ago while Lewis had gotten another dog for himself, one of the pudgy bulldog types he absolutely adored.
Senior and Reyes took a much needed vacation after taking charge of the Pack for months when Carlos and Lando were on the run hiding, and Lando’s own fathers had settled down in a new countryside home like they’d been planning to do when Lando was still with them.
Life had ultimately been pure bliss for everyone.
To top it all off, Lando had created something he was proud of that every single person he was close with also supported—a safehouse in Madrid for male Omegas from all over the world. It didn’t matter where they were from, why they were running, or how old they were, all were protected and welcomed with open arms
Lando had sectioned off a highly secured apartment building for any male Omega who needed safety with Carlos’ and the Pack’s help. They currently had five in their residence, which was more than Lando had honestly anticipated, but he was happy to help all of them and their families.
Two of them had even sparked up relationships themselves with trustworthy Alphas in the Pack that Carlos could swear by. It wasn’t their goal to have all of the boys mated off by any means, but it was nice to see that some of them had found what Lando had with his own Spaniard.
Max and Daniel had agreed to help out as well if anything ever went wrong, willing to open up spaces in Amsterdam like they’d done for them, and Lando had never found himself so thankful to have friends like he did.
“Alright, I better go join them,” Lando sighed when Léana fell a minute or two later in the sand and immediately started to cry. Charles just chuckled and waved him off as Lando rose from his lounge chair and padded through the shifting landscape towards his little girl.
“ Lo que está mal, ¿cariño?” Lando cooed when he approached the toddler still sitting down in the sand with the waterworks in full effect.
“Me caí, ¡papá!” she wailed back at him.
“Oh, my poor baby. Come here,” Lando soothed. He reached down and pulled Léana from the beachy ground, perching her on his hip while Carlos jogged over with an apologetic look on his face. Elias was giggling like mad on the Alpha’s shoulder.
“Everything is okay?” Carlos asked nervously as he took in his daughter’s tear-stained face.
“Yeah, she just fell. That must have hurt, hm? Do you want to come make a sand castle with daddy and feel better?” Lando questioned his little girl softly. She wiped her wet face, hand all balled up and dirty, and nodded with a sniffle.
“Okay, sí, let’s go make a sand castle,” he agreed. Lando raised an eyebrow to Carlos and jerked his head in the direction of where they’d be sitting to invite his Alpha to come along with them.
“You look good in these pink swim trunks,” Carlos murmured in his ear behind him. Lando swatted at the older man, twenty-nine now, and shot a playful glare at him with a blush. Later, he mouthed. Carlos just wiggled his eyebrows and smirked.
They played for a while in the sand together, laughing as a family and teasing one another whenever a turned over bucket revealed a terrible, crumbling structure when lifted. Carlos tossed sand at Elias to make the little boy laugh and Lando tugged down Léana’s sun hat over her eyes just so she could push it back up over and over again.
When Daniel came over and asked if he could take the twins off their hands to play with Levi, their boy, Lando gratefully handed them over.
He leaned back into Carlos’ hold on the sand and watched their toddlers splash water with Levi just at the waterline. Both of them laughed loudly when the three little ones latched onto Max’s legs and tripped the poor Alpha until he fell into the waves, back first.
“I’m glad we came,” Lando sighed as the beach returned to a somewhat calm state. Carlos wrapped his arms around Lando’s shoulders with a hum and rested his chin in the crook of the Omega’s neck.
A sweet kiss was placed on the scarred mating gland there after a moment or two of silence passed between them. “Any news about the boy coming from England? Callum?” Lando asked, twisting his head a little to glance up at his Alpha.
“They’re arriving on Friday, I think. That was the last I heard from his parents,” Carlos informed softly. Another male Omega—six then when he arrived. Lando was prepared like he had been for all the others to welcome them with open arms, but he knew better than anyone what it was like to leave home and start over in an unfamiliar place.
“You know, we talked years ago in The Netherlands about what went through my head when you found me in the apartment’s closet, but you never told me what went through yours,” Lando stated when he thought about his own experience.
Carlos chuckled into his skin and shrugged. “You are wanting me to tell you what I thought?” he asked.
“Yeah, what were you thinking? Wait, actually, don’t tell me if it was something bad,” Lando warned. Carlos just grinned and shook his head, sighing as he recalled that memory from what felt like ages ago.
“I remember this smell as soon as I got in the elevator… and it was strong on the floor as well. Apricots, cream, lemons… that was you,” he said gently. Lando could feel the fond emotions from Carlos pouring through their bond and he couldn’t help but bite back a smile as Carlos painted an imaginary picture for him.
“I remember stepping into the apartment and feeling my breath be stolen from me, this is how strong your scent was to me. And I heard this sound from the closet—a whimper or something of the sort—and knew you were there…”
Lando was hanging onto every word when Carlos trailed off. It was clear to the Omega that his Spaniard was visualizing it all in his head while he spoke.
“You were so scared, cariño. You looked at me with these eyes… so scared of me, like I was going to hurt you the second I found you when that could not have been farther from the truth. I think I was in love with you the second I set my eyes on you, if I am honest.
“You smelled like everything I had loved growing up and your eyes, as frightened as they were… oh, Lando, I wanted to look at them forever. It was hard not to love you as soon as I met you,” Carlos revealed in hushed awe.
Lando wasn’t even aware he’d started to tear up until the view of his pups playing in the distance became blurry and his throat closed up with emotion. Carlos nuzzled his nose into the back of Lando’s hair and took in a deep breath.
“I didn’t want to scare you. I wanted to keep you safe, to have you close… Look at where we are now, eh? Mated, fathers, helpers to others? Has been a good two years, no?” Carlos asked lovingly.
Lando sniffled and nodded, reaching up to wrap his fingers around Carlos’ forearms and keep the Alpha’s embrace steady. “Yeah… it’s been a good two years, Carlos.”
“¡Papá! Look!” Elias cried only a few seconds later, disturbing the little moment they’d created for themselves as the toddler came racing over with one outstretched hand holding something unidentifiable. Lando reached out to accept the present once he realized it was a shell that his little boy had brought him and gasped in exaggerated happiness.
“¡Oh, cariño, es perfecto! I love it, baby, thank you. Will you go find me another? I’ll make a whole collection when we go home,” Lando encouraged. The little boy excitedly wheeled back around and returned to the other couple that was now scanning the shore for shells with the kids.
Lando turned the white and burgundy treasure over in his fingers and smiled down at it. “Your Spanish is getting better,” Carlos teased.
“Oh, sod off,” Lando huffed with a toothy grin. He smacked the tanned leg beside him and handed off the shell to the Alpha so that he could admire it as well. They’d have work to return to in a few days once their vacation to Mallorca came to an end, but Lando was happy that all of them were able to come together for at least a week to reconnect and enjoy one another’s company.
Roscoe charging across the sand to catch a frisbee thrown by Lewis caught Lando’s attention one second, then a conversation in French between Charles and Pierre the next. The reflection of George and Alex’s gold wedding bands captured Lando afterwards as they floated in the waves with cocktails, but the giggling from his pups alongside Daniel and Max eventually won over everything.
“You know, I think this is the first gift we’ve gotten from one of our peanuts,” Carlos acknowledged from behind him as he examined the oceanic object given to them by their son.
“It’s not like they can exactly make anything proper that sticks together anyway,” Lando agreed. He accepted the shell back from Carlos and curled his fingers around it to press the sandy grooves into the palm of his hand. “That’s pure love right there,” he sighed.
“How so?” Carlos asked languidly. Nimble fingers ran through Lando’s curls as the Omega closed his eyes and let the hand holding the shell fall over his steadily beating heart.
“Well, I mean, that’s what love is, isn’t it? He didn't do it intentionally—show us that he loves us by giving us a shell—but through his actions, you can see just how much he has to offer another human being. Out of all the people in the world he could’ve given a silly shell to, he gave it to us. That’s pure love, I think,” Lando confessed.
It was quiet for a few moments, only the sound of waves crashing and seagulls cawing drifting through the warm summer air, until a kiss to the side of Lando’s honey-brown curls pulled him from the beauty of it all.
“Hey,” Carlos whispered in his ear.
“Hm?” Lando hummed back.
“I love you, Lando,” the Spaniard murmured.
Lando closed his eyes, grinning to himself in absolute euphoria, and breathed back, “I know.”