Chapter 34
CHAPTER 34
S era
“You’ve already eaten your share,” Montgomery’s voice says, angrily.
“There’s an entire spread on the table,” Noah counters.
“She’s going to be hungry when she wakes up,” Montgomery shoots back. “If you touch a bite of it, I’ll rip a hole through your leg.”
“Mm,” I twist, making water splash around me. I open my eyes to discover I’m in the bathtub with Montgomery behind me, his arms protectively wrapped around me.
“You’re awake,” he says. The sound of his voice is a warm welcome back from whatever dreamland I’d just been in.
“Was I out for a long time again?” I mumble, trying to sit up.
“Almost a full day.” He chuckles, but then holds me to keep me from slipping around in the white porcelain tub. “You can’t move too much here, baby. I’m trying hard not to take you again since your body can’t handle that right now, but if you keep moving …”
Realizing that I’m not the only one who’s naked, I giggle. “It’s your fault for bringing me into the bathtub while I was out cold.” I peer over my shoulder at him and tip his chin with my finger.
“You’re not sneaky. You wanted me all to yourself anyway.”
He kisses my hand. “ True, but you were out for hours and I didn’t want you to wake up sore.”
I blink and blink again. The second time I open my eyes, I realize that, no, it wasn’t my imagination. I heard Montgomery speak loud and clear, but his lips didn’t move once.
His lips twitch until he smiles.
I pull away and stare at him. “We’ve mate bonded.”
“We sure have.”
My attention shoots to the bathroom door where Ronan stands in a pair of jeans and nothing else.
“How does it feel to know you wholly belong to us now?” No, his lips don’t move either, but his voice is in my head.
“Not that there was ever a moment when she didn’t belong to us,” Noah adds, moving from the window of the bathroom where he was standing.
I narrow my eyes on all three of them. “ Am I going to have all three of your voices in my head all of the time now?”
Ronan chuckles, moves to the tub, and lowers to cup my face. “ All of the time, Serafina,” he tells me before pulling me in for a kiss.
Of course, I melt into the kiss, my freaking wolf purring and purring like the wanton hussy she is.
“She wants to go for a run,” Ronan says against my lips. “ Your wolf,” he adds when I give him a curious look.
“We just woke up,” I reply, rubbing my hand across my chest.
“After you eat, we’ll take her out for a run.”
“After you eat,” Montgomery insists at the same time he stands, lifting me from the tub.
I don’t bother protesting because my stomach starts growling.
Minutes later, we’re at the table, all three of my mates watching me eat with goofy grins on all of their divinely handsome faces.
“You guys aren’t hungry.”
“Always.”
“Mhm.”
“For sure.”
They say in unison, staring at me with hungry eyes.
“For food.”
“We ate while you were asleep,” Noah says. “And Montgomery refused to let us touch a bite of this massive amount of food he prepared for you.” He looks over at Montgomery, his eyes narrowing.
Montgomery chuckles.
“Yeah, like you could,” he says as if in response to a comment Noah just made.
I look between the two of them.
“You two can hear each other now? I mean, without speaking like you and Ronan?” I ask Noah.
He blinks and then looks over at Montgomery who’s moved to the kitchen. They both stop. They don’t speak, but I can tell they’re communicating.
Montgomery looks over at Ronan, who looks just as stunned as his brothers.
“Apparently, we can,” Ronan says slowly. There’s an underlying tone of satisfaction in his voice.
I giggle before slapping my hand over my mouth.
“What was that laugh about?” Noah asks.
“My pussy is a miracle worker. It not only solidified our mate bond but also restored the bond between you three after decades apart.”
All three of my mates burst out into full-on laughter.
Ronan pulls me in for a kiss before pulling back to say something but there’s a knock on the door.
All three of them sniff the air. I, too, find it impossible not to sniff the air, in an attempt to figure out who’s knocking before opening the door myself.
“It’s Emery,” I exclaim, jumping up from my seat.
“Hey,” Emery says, looking surprised by how quickly I yanked the door open. “I’m sorry to bother you guys during dinner but I tried calling a few times.”
“It’s no problem at all. Is everything okay?”
She nods. “Yeah, I mean after yesterday …” She gives me a sympathetic look. “Things have calmed down, and Reese finally came home from the clinic. She and the baby are resting, and Alpha Chael keeps hovering. It’s so cute.”
I laugh. “I can imagine.”
“But, um, I know you guys might be headed back to Colorado soon and Ms. Elsie told me you needed to speak with me.”
“Oh, yes, but—” I cut myself off from lying. The decent part of me wants to tell her it’s okay and what I wanted can wait, but the truth is, I don’t want to wait.
I glance over my shoulder, unsurprised to see my mates standing behind me.
“You belong to us.”
Ronan’s words reverberate in my mind. Yes, I do now, especially after mate bonding with them. Yet, I still have to find out if I’m a threat to the three men I love and the pack they were raised to protect.
“Good,” Emery says, breaking into my musings. “Because there’s something I’ve been wanting to show you. It might be the key to the answers you’re looking for.”
“Show me? Here?”
She nods. “It’s not far outside of Nightwolf pack territory.”
I jut my head back. Have the answers I’ve sought for so long been right under my nose this entire time?
“Serafina,” Ronan calls my name in that unyielding voice.
I turn to them. “ I need to go with Emery. Alone,” I add.
“No,” he says out loud while Montgomery and Noah look just as stern.
“It’s not far from here and it’s safe,” Emery adds. “She won’t be in any danger.”
All three of them look unbending in their decision.
“We’re going with you,” Noah says. “How far is this?—”
“I need to do this alone.” My instincts tell me that whatever it is Emery wants to show me, I need to see it for myself and by myself. “ You heard her. It’s not far and it’s safe. Nothing is going to happen to me. I need to do this alone.
“Please.”
Ronan and Noah growl out loud.
“We can’t turn you down when you say please ,” Montgomery informs me.
I smirk. “ Is that all it takes?” I ask through our bond.
“Don’t even think of using it more often now that you know that,” Ronan warns, his eyes narrowing.
“I won’t.” I move to him first and lift on my tiptoes to give him a kiss. Then I move to Noah, followed by Montgomery.
“I’ll be back soon.”
Though I feel their eyes on me, I don’t turn back to give them another look as I quickly make my way out of the door, shutting it behind me.
“We can walk on two feet or travel on four,” Emery says with a wink and a smile. “Which do you prefer?”
I bite my bottom lip. My wolf is raring to get out, but I still don’t know if I can trust her. The last time she got out, she burned the ground. What if she does worse this time?
I can already feel her energy pulsing through me. It’s stronger since completing the mate bond.
“Two feet,” I reply. “Definitely two.”
My wolf growls inside of me.
Emery nods and points me in the direction of the trail that lies just beyond the field where the Nightwolf pack holds the Supermoon Ceremonies.
“So, what’s it like?” Emery asks as we walk.
“What?”
She gives me a sideways smile. “Having three mates? I have one, and he’s more than enough. I couldn’t imagine having three. And they’re alphas no less.”
I run through the memories of the past couple of months with my three mates.
“You’re ours.”
“It … it feels like … home.”
Emery gives me a serene expression. “That’s how it feels between me and Chance. He’s the home I always yearned for.”
She said it perfectly. Now, I just have to figure out if the home we’ve found with one another will be burned to the ground by my wolf.