Chapter 12 Ben
Chapter twelve
Ben
Iwas mated to two alphas. It still didn’t seem possible that they could want me…
that I could satisfy them, but they swore that I did.
Back at Gleesa’s, whenever I would go into heat, I’d felt ashamed.
David had felt the same way, but he’d also told me that his heats with Maddox were totally different from what he’d experienced without an alpha.
Now I knew he was right. But down the road, would both of my alphas continue to be satisfied by just me?
That question plagued me for the next couple of days until Carter, Jackson, and their daughters arrived at the ranch.
We’d been cleaning and cooking all day, and when Jackson texted that they were on their way from the airport, we all went outside on the porch to wait.
Then Ollie started fussing and David had to take him inside.
“He missed his nap today, and now he’s overly tired,” Maddox explained, leaning against the porch railing.
When the rental car came rolling up the driveway, I jumped up from the porch swing and took a running leap off the front steps. Jackson climbed out of the car and I jumped into his arms, hugging him hard while everyone around us greeted each other and started moving the baggage inside.
“I’ve been so worried about you,” Jackson said into my ear.
“I know,” I said. “I’ve missed you.”
“We’re brothers. You and me and David. That’ll never change, no matter where we are.” Jackson hugged me harder as I nodded into his shoulder.
After all the hugging and maybe a little sniffling, we headed inside, our arms around each other’s waists.
“You look so good,” I told Jackson as we walked.
“So do you. You look different, but I can’t put my finger on it.”
David was waiting inside and hugged Jackson fiercely when he walked in.
“It’s taken you way too long to come visit!” he admonished.
“Sorry. I hadn’t expected to get pregnant again so fast. Where did Carter go with the girls?” Jackson looked around.
“Maddox is showing him the house and the new renovations.”
Jackson approached the baby swing gently rocking side to side with Ollie in it gurgling happily.
“Is this Oliver?”
“Yep. Cute, isn’t he?” David asked proudly.
“He’s adorable! Hi, little man!” Jackson bent and touched Ollie’s blond hair with two fingers.
Carter, Maddox, Colt, and Angus appeared from out of Angus’ wing—our wing—and David and I rushed over to see Alisanne and Serena.
Alisanne, who was eighteen months old, had a shock of dark hair and big blue eyes like Carter’s. Carter set her and Serena on the floor, and Alisanne toddled into the living room, curious about everything she saw.
“No, Alisanne,” Jackson called, rushing over to stop her from poking Ollie in the face. David plucked him out of the swing.
Serena’s hair was also dark and curly like Jackson’s, but she favored Carter.
Although her eyes were the same dark gray as Jackson’s, they were shaped like Carter’s, and she had the exact same serious expression he habitually wore.
Carter had put her on her bottom when he’d set her on the floor, but she’d quickly shifted to her hands and knees and speed-crawled a few feet before maneuvering to sit on her bottom again.
Carter handed her a rattle, which she promptly began to pound on the hardwood floor.
Luckily, it had a fabric top, or we wouldn’t have been able to hear anything over the noise.
“Laura’s back,” Maddox announced, looking out the window.
Laura had taken the older truck used for odd jobs early that morning for a medical emergency.
When she walked into the house, she looked exhausted.
David must have thought so, too, because he handed Oliver to Maddox and walked over to her where she was greeting Carter and Jackson.
“Laura, are you okay?” he asked when she turned to him.
Smiling wanly, she said, “Yes. Just a little tired, thanks.”
“Where was the emergency?” Angus asked from where he was sitting on the sofa holding Serena.
“At the Borders’. Nova called me at 4:30 this morning and said Jeremiah had a high fever. She and Eric were worried. They don’t know any doctors around here.”
“Oh, no!” David said. “Is he okay?”
“We got his fever down a little and he’s sleeping. Can you give me the number of your pediatrician so I can send it to her?”
Turning to Maddox, who was putting Ollie back in his swing, David said, “Maddox, will you send Laura Dr. Humbard’s number?”
“Sure.” Maddox pulled his cellphone out of his pocket.
“I hope Ollie doesn’t get sick. He was over there yesterday,” David said.
“He didn’t go near Jeremiah, though,” I reminded him.
“Yeah, but now I wish I hadn’t put him in their bedroom.”
“If you hadn’t, you would have had him with you at lunch with Jeremiah right there,” I reasoned.
David let out a breath. “You’re right. That would have been worse.”
Colt had gone to his cabin after we woke up that morning, and I missed him. It was kind of embarrassing how the absence of either of my alphas made me so ill at ease. I wanted to talk to Jackson and David about it when we got some time alone.
I sat down next to Angus on the couch and listened as everyone caught up. Every so often, Angus would rest his hand on my thigh, and the action would center me when I hadn’t even realized I needed it.
When I glanced out the window and saw Colt’s green Subaru Outback pull up in front of the house, I hurried out to greet him.
Colt chuckled when I threw myself into his arms. “I’ll never get tired of your welcomes,” he said, giving me a squeeze before letting me go. He looked at the rental car. “They’re here, huh?”
“Yeah, come meet them!”
I pulled Colt by the hand into the house and introduced him to Carter and Jackson.
“Nice to finally meet you,” Colt said. “I’ve heard a lot about you from David and Ben.”
“Likewise,” Carter said. “You’re an old friend of Maddox’s, right?”
“We grew up together, but I guess you’d say I’m more of Angus’s friend.”
I looked past Carter to Angus, who was watching Colt with a proprietary look on his face.
Jackson looked confused, and I realized no one had told them about me and Angus and Colt.
The three of us went into the kitchen and I began setting the table while David checked on the food on the stove.
“What am I missing?” Jackson asked.
David looked over his shoulder at me.
“What do you mean?” I asked Jackson, because I wanted to hear what he’d picked up on.
“Well, I might be wrong, but it kind of feels like you’re with Colt, but it also kind of feels like you’re with Angus. David told me a while ago that he thought you’d formed a partial bond with Angus.”
“Did he tell you that Angus and Colt had something going on?” I asked.
Jackson glanced at David. “He might have said something like that.”
“He was right. What you don’t know is that Colt and I were getting close, too. They told me they wanted all three of us to be together. So, we mated.”
Jackson’s eyes widened. “Really? You’re an omega with two alphas?”
“Is that weird?” I asked.
Jackson shrugged. “Who knows when we barely know anything about omegas? If it feels right, it must be.”
I smiled. “I agree.”
Later that night, after everyone got settled in their rooms, Jackson, David and I went into David’s sewing room to talk.
Throwing some pillows and blankets on the floor, we made ourselves comfortable for a chat.
Jackson and David both had a lot of questions about what it was like being mated to two alphas.
“It hasn’t even been a week yet; how would I know?” I asked. “I’m the one who is newly mated, you so two have to answer my questions. I want to know how long I’m going to feel all weird when they’re away from me.”
“It gets better, although if Carter’s gone more than a day or two, I feel pretty bad,” Jackson said.
“Yeah. All squirrelly. And no appetite,” David agreed.
That sounded awful.
“At least with two alphas, if only one is gone, you probably won’t feel too bad,” Jackson reasoned. The sound of a baby crying had David getting to his feet. “I need to go feed Ollie. Sometimes he has trouble getting to sleep.”
“Goodnight, David,” both Jackson and I said. I was suddenly reminded of the years we lived together in Gleesa’s house.
Jackson leaned close to me and whispered, “Have they any clue about Oliver’s biological character classification yet?”
I shook my head. “Maddox thinks he acts like an alpha, but who knows?”
“I hope he isn’t an omega,” Jackson said.
“Maddox would never let the government take Oliver.” I knew that.
“Yeah. They’d all have to go into hiding. We’d never see them again.”
“I’m hoping the government will be exposed before it comes to that.” We sat in silence for a few minutes, listening to David singing to Ollie down the hall. Then I asked, “Are you happy, Jackson?”
“Very,” Jackson said. “You?”
“Yeah. I think I am. It’s only been a few days, though. I keep waiting for the other shoe to drop.”
“It won’t. I’m glad you have two great alphas to take care of you. I was really worried when you were on the run.”
“It was scary. And after I got here, I was afraid I couldn’t stay.”
Turning his head to look at me, Jackson said, “What do you mean? David would never kick you out!”
“When the government came looking for me, they’d have to hide me. But Angus and Colt said they wanted to mate me, and it was just in time. Those guys from the government looked so mad about it. It seems like they enjoy taking omegas away.”
“You have to wonder why,” Jackson said. “Are they just sadists? Or is there a real reason they don’t want us around?”
“Maybe the betas are jealous. You know, because they can’t have awesome heat-rut sex,” I said, and we both broke into laughter.
“I can’t believe you just said that,” Jackson said, wiping his eyes. We laughed and talked some more, trying to keep it down so we didn’t wake anyone. I was thinking we should get up to go to bed, but before I could do it, I must have fallen asleep.
Sometime later, I felt Colt lifting me from the floor to take me to bed and Carter whispering to Jackson.