Chapter 10 With My Mates #2
The wolf shifter’s lips curled in what might have been a smile or a sneer; it was hard to tell the difference.
“The twins are a gold mine of information, particularly when they think they’re the ones mining you.” He chuckled, a sound like gravel underfoot. “Eluned especially is easy to manipulate. Crazy-ass girl’s an open book with half the pages on fire. Reckless and emotional.”
Zane’s arm tightened around my waist, a subtle gesture of comfort I wasn’t even sure he was aware of making.
“And the other one?” Casimir asked.
“Amabel’s more careful,” Foster replied, shifting slightly.
“Calculating. Thinks she’s playing chess while everyone else is playing checkers.
But she has her tells.” He paused, eyes flicking to me, before cautiously adding, “She’s been spending time with one of the new servants.
Guy named Austin Cho. You might want to look into him. ”
Austin Cho. I remembered him. He’d arrived just two days before I left.
A polite young man with a ready smile and curious eyes.
Unlike the other staff Arabesque had hired to replace me, Austin had actually been kind to me.
On my last day, when I’d been worried about getting everything out to the car, Austin had appeared out of nowhere to help.
I hadn’t thought much of it at the time, too consumed by terror and uncertainty about my arranged marriage. But now, knowing what I did about Arabesque’s plans, his presence felt less like coincidence and more like another piece on the board.
“Also, not sure if you know this already, but your daddy has a mole in his court.”
“We’re aware,” Casimir murmured. “Father and Sebastian are handling it.”
“Good. Because whoever it is, they’re feeding information directly to Arabesque.”
A cold knot formed in my stomach. I knew little about vampires in general and nothing about anyone’s politics, but I’d quickly learned that King Lucian ruled the North American vampire territories with absolute authority.
The thought of someone betraying him to my stepmother made me wonder what she was offering them for the risk they were taking.
“Skip to the good part,” Zane interrupted, leaning forward slightly. “What did dear old stepmommy do when she opened our gift? Did she scream? Please tell me she screamed.” There was a gleeful malice in his voice I’d never heard before.
“Gift?” I whispered, confused.
“Yeah. Claudio Kane’s head in a wooden box. Man, I wish we could have seen her face!”
“Zane!” Koa turned to glare at his brother before pointedly looking at me.
I stared at Zane, my heart stuttering in my chest.
“You sent her his head?” The words felt unreal on my tongue.
“Shit. Sorry, sweetheart. That wasn’t smart of me to bring up.” Zane’s arm tightened around me, pulling me closer to his chest. “We should have told you. It was… ”
“A message,” Casimir finished coolly. “A very clear message about what happens to those who threaten what’s ours.”
I swallowed hard, torn between horror at the violence and a shameful flicker of savage satisfaction. Claudio Kane had been a monster, a predator who made my skin crawl. And my husbands had killed him. For me.
“If it’s any consolation,” Foster interjected, clearly amused by the exchange, “the head wasn’t what really got to her. It was the signature.”
“Signature?” I asked, curiosity overriding my shock.
Foster’s eyes flicked to Casimir, then Koa, then Zane, a knowing smirk playing at his lips.
“They made sure Arabesque knew they’re your mates, your protectors. She was counting on them being cruel to you, or at the very least neglecting you. Claudio’s head told her otherwise. That you’re loved, treasured. That’s why she sent the twins to spy on you.”
Something warm unfurled in my chest at his words. Loved. Treasured.
“Well, that worked in our favor, didn’t it?” Zane pointed out, his usual cockiness returning. “Ko got to launch his little buggy toys.”
“Spy eyes.” Koa tapped a few keys to bring up a secondary screen showing what looked like a map of the Bell homestead, with tiny blinking dots scattered throughout.
Earlier, he’d explained how the spy eyes had attached to their clothes while they were flouncing through our hedge maze. Once they returned home, the eyes deployed throughout the house and grounds, and my husbands had been monitoring them ever since.
“Which reminds me,” Foster said, his tone suddenly casual in a way that set off warning bells in my mind, “you might want to avoid watching any footage from the east side of the forest. Specifically, anything involving me and Eluned.” His grin turned wolfish.
“Not that I mind an audience, but I doubt you’d enjoy it. ”
My face flamed as I realized what he meant, and I buried my face in the crook of Zane’s neck, embarrassed.
“Sleeping with one of the women you were sent to spy on,” Casimir tsked. “Not your wisest move, Foster.”
“Sex with any willing woman is always a wise move. Besides, her pillow talk is illuminating.”
Zane’s hand rubbed soothing circles on my back as I processed what I’d just heard.
Foster was sleeping with Eluned. Eluned, who had once forced me to eat ashes while she giggled, who had dumped boiling water on my arm, who had mocked my tears when Arabesque siphoned me.
That girl was sharing her bed with this wolf, doing what my husbands did with me?
The thought was wrong. Just wrong. I couldn’t imagine Eluned experiencing anything like the tenderness, the passion, and the connection I’d found with my mates.
“Anyway,” Foster continued, pulling me out of my thoughts, “Arabesque is meeting with some witch cronies next week. Planning session for whatever she’s cooking up.”
“Where?” Casimir asked, his voice businesslike again.
“Chicago. Tuesday through Friday. She’s not stupid enough to invite that many practitioners to her current hideout. Too many variables, too many ways it could go wrong.”
“Are the twins attending this meeting as well?” Koa asked.
Foster shrugged, his wide shoulders rising and falling with casual indifference.
“Unclear at this point. They’ve been pushing to go, but Arabesque seems reluctant to bring them. My guess? She doesn’t trust them not to screw something up. She pits them against each other and…”
“And?” Zane coaxed.
“Look, I ain’t itching to get my head busted in by a Cimmerian, but, uh.
” Foster rolled his lips inside his mouth for a moment, then those dark eyes fixed on me.
“She keeps them focused on you, Serafina. Hatred for you unites the twins faster than anything. It’s almost laughable how Arabesque encourages them, keeps them too occupied to challenge or question her. ”
I nodded. I’d figured that out long ago.
My husbands didn’t like hearing that, though, judging by their quiet growls and clenched jaws or fists.
Zane’s muscles tightened to steel under my thighs, and I pried his fist open to thread our fingers together, lifting our joined hands to kiss the back of his until he relaxed again.
The conversation continued for several more minutes, with Foster providing details about guard rotations and other information. I listened, trying to absorb it all, but my mind kept circling back to the image of my stepmother opening a box to find a severed head and a note of some kind.
These were the men I’d married. Men capable of such calculated violence, of sending such brutal messages.
And yet, they were the same men who held me through nightmares, who protected my heart and body as well as my mind and soul, who made love to me like I was water and they’d spent a lifetime in the desert.
I wasn’t sure what that said about them, or about me for loving them despite, or maybe because of, all they were willing to do to keep me safe. What I was sure of, though, was that we were meant for each other, because I’d protect them just as fiercely as they would me.
I let out a small squeak of surprise as Zane scooped me into his arms the moment Foster’s face disappeared from the screen. I gave Zane a questioning look, but he merely grinned and carried me out of the security room, Koa and Casimir following us like shadows.
“We need to talk about something,” Zane said as he navigated the hallway toward our bedroom.
The seriousness underlying his playful tone made my stomach tighten, but these were my husbands, not Arabesque. They wouldn’t hurt me. I knew that.
I was learning to know that.
Our bedroom was bathed in the soft gold of early evening light, filtering through gauzy curtains before Casimir pulled the drapes closed for the night. Zane set me gently on the edge of our enormous, comfy bed, then settled beside me, the mattress dipping under his weight.
Koa claimed the space on my other side, while Casimir remained standing, hands clasped behind his back in what I’d come to recognize as his “discussion stance.” It made my heart skip a beat.
“Am I in trouble?” The question slipped out before I could stop it.
“No, darling, never.” Zane took my hand and curled it up to kiss along my knuckles.
“We just realized something important that we should have addressed sooner,” Koa said with a soft smile. “Alpha Jace Beaudreau reminded us of it while he was visiting.”
“We haven’t been using protection,” Casimir said bluntly.
“Protection?” I glanced between them, thoroughly confused. “Like wards?”
Zane made a strangled sound that might have been laughter, and Koa’s lips twitched. Even Casimir’s stern face softened a bit.
“Not magical protection, dingbat.” Zane flicked my forehead with his free hand. “Baby protection.”
“Birth control, beloved,” Koa clarified.
“Oh.”
My cheeks heated as understanding dawned.
Papa had explained the basics when I got my first period, and I’d read enough books to understand the mechanics, but the practical part had never been part of my life before I married, and my stepmother certainly hadn’t bothered to provide anything when I left for my new home.