Chapter 23 #2
"No." Artem shook his head. "You were smelling your mates. That's why your body reacted. Not Finn."
"You met with Finn in Prague," I said. "Why?"
"He wanted access to the Russian border. The meeting was"—he paused—"interrupted by a scent."
"Me."
"You."
I bit my lip until I tasted copper.
"When my father finds out I'm here, Finn will come for me too."
"Let him." Ivan was already on his feet, already crossing the room, already kneeling in front of my chair and taking my face in his hands. "He will never get close enough to touch you again."
"You all smell like me."
Artem smiled.
"I only realized it when I got back to Edinburgh. Presley made me see it. I was so sure I wasn't in heat in Prague. I genuinely believed my body was reacting to Finn. But Presley pointed out that if I wasn't in heat, there was only one way to get pregnant. Because you were my mates."
Gregor crossed the room and knelt beside Artem in front of my chair. Two massive alphas, both of them looking at me like I was explaining gravity and they'd been floating their whole lives.
"We matched you," Gregor said. "We could smell it in the cigar bar. We could smell the same truth on Henry's sofa."
"Why didn't you say anything in Prague?"
Ivan's hand found mine. "We knew you'd been hurt. Claiming marks shouldn't be that brutal unless—"
"He wasn't mine."
"We know."
I told them the rest. The transactional love. The cage. The final escape and the years of running that followed. The threats from my father that had followed me across three countries and four identities.
They listened without interrupting. The pheromones in the room got so thick my head spun, but they kept the lethal anger banked. They let me finish.
When I did, the silence stretched.
"Should we cancel tomorrow?" Gregor asked.
I thought about it. Three Bratva enforcers looming over my father while he sweated through his expensive coat. It would be easy. Satisfying and I'd enjoy it.
But it wouldn't be mine.
"No," I said. "I need to do this before anything else. I need to say things to him alone." I met each of their eyes in turn. "But be nearby."
"We'll be in the hall," Ivan said. "Right outside the door."
"Not pressed against it with a glass."
Ivan looked offended. "I would never."
Gregor said nothing.
I pointed at him. "You would."
"I would use surveillance equipment."
"Thank you for the honesty. Horrifying but efficient."
Artem's eyes warmed. "We'll give you privacy."
"Russian mafia privacy or normal privacy?"
"Define normal."
"A lack of armed men in decorative plants."
A pause. Ivan looked at Artem. Artem looked at Gregor. Gregor looked at the window.
"Fine," I said. "One decorative plant. But if it rustles, I'm leaving."
I looked at them. My pack. My alphas. They didn't look at me like a broken thing to be fixed or a prize to be guarded. They looked at me like a center of gravity.
Like I was their world.
The heat that uncoiled in my belly had nothing to do with phantom bonds or old fear. It had been weeks since Mac was born. My body was healed. My mind was clear. And the way they were looking at me with patient restraint, waiting for me to come to them, made something in my chest crack open.
I stood up from the armchair.
I reached for Artem first. My fingers threaded into the dark hair at his nape and I pulled him into a slow, deep kiss. His hands landed on my hips, heavy and certain. He made a sound against my mouth that was half relief and half hunger.
I broke the kiss and turned to Ivan. He was already there. I stepped into his chest and he claimed my mouth with the same desperate heat he brought to everything, hands sliding into my hair.
When I pulled back, breathless and dizzy, I found Gregor watching us with eyes that had gone nearly black.
I put my hands on his chest. "I don't want to sleep tonight," I said. "I want my pack."
Gregor's control didn't shatter. It bent, carefully, the way he did everything. He scooped me up and carried me out of the den with Artem and Ivan flanking us through the dark hallways to the master bedroom.
Gregor laid me in the center of the nest like he was returning something precious to its proper coordinates. Three pairs of hands stripped my clothes away. Then they shed their own.
Artem kissed me slowly, filthy, his tongue stroking against mine while Ivan's hands spread my thighs and Gregor's palm settled warm and steady against my ribs.
"Missed this," Ivan murmured, lowering his head.
His tongue dragged up my slit, tasting every inch before he sealed his mouth around my clit and sucked. My hips bucked. Two thick fingers pushed inside me, curling hard while he ate like he'd been starved. The wet sounds of it filled the room.
Gregor bent to my breast, teeth grazing the side. "That's it. Let him taste you."
Artem moved lower, taking the other nipple into his mouth while his fingers stroked down my stomach. Ivan added a third finger and the combined assault had me coming with a sharp cry, thighs clamping around his head.
They didn't let me recover.
Artem flipped me onto my hands and knees and thrust deep in one stroke. The stretch of him split me open and I moaned into the sheets. He fucked in long, deliberate drives, letting me feel every inch.
Gregor knelt in front of me. "Open."
I obeyed. He pushed past my lips, feeding me his thick length until he hit the back of my throat. I relaxed, took him deeper, saliva dripping as he began to thrust.
Ivan knelt at my side, one hand braced on my hip, the other finding my clit again. The second orgasm crashed through me so hard my arms gave out.
They moved around.
Ivan on his back, pulling me down onto him in one motion. I sank until I was moaning at how deep he reached. Then Gregor behind me with cool slick covered fingers circling my forbidden hole, one pushing in, then two, stretching me with the same methodical patience he applied to everything.
"You can take us both," he murmured. "Relax."
The blunt head of his cock replaced his fingers. He pressed forward slowly, inch by inch, until both he and Ivan were buried to the hilt.
I whimpered from the sheer fullness and at how good it felt.
They started moving in sync. One pulling out while the other pushed in, fucking me senseless between them.
Artem moved to Ivan's shoulder . His cock in hand.I leaned forward to take him into my mouth, sucking greedily, moaning around his length every time Ivan and Gregor drove deep.
Our scents filled the air as did the low growl of three alphas working me toward the edge.
Another orgasm tore through me so hard my vision whited and my pussy clenched in rhythmic spasms, milking them both.
“Knot me,” I begged. “I want to come on your knot.”
“Together?” Ivan asked.
I looked between my legs, at Ivan’s engorged knot and then thought about how that would feel. Two inside me, filling me, being owned by my two alphas.
I nodded.
Ivan growled as he gripped my hips, holding me and working his knot inside.
“Oh my god!” I cried out when his knot breached my entrance.
Ivan grunted. His hips bucked against me as he came with a guttural groan, flooding me with thick spurts of heat.
My pussy spasmed around him, but I held my final orgasm. I wanted to fall apart with him and Gregor inside me.
I tapped Gregor's leg. “Please.”
Gregor held my waist as he fucked me.
“Please knot me,” I was trying to hold on, but the fullness was too much. I went back to sucking Artem’s cock, and licking around the rim.
Gregor’s arm wrapped around my waist, dragging me against him as his hips pounded against me. And then he roared and buried himself to the hilt, pumping me full until I felt it leaking around his cock.
My vision whited as I cried out.
Artem pulled out of my mouth, stroking himself and then he came with a low curse. Hot ropes painting my face, my throat, my lips. I licked him off and tasted all of us.
We collapsed in a sweaty tangle. Arms around me. Hands stroking my skin with lazy reverence. Soft kisses pressed to my shoulders, my neck, the scar I didn't hide anymore.
"I love you," I whispered. "My pack."
Gregor's voice rumbled against my back. "And we love you. Our center."
"Our queen," Ivan added, and kissed the top of my head.
Artem pulled the blankets over us. Outside, the darkness pressed against the windows.
Tomorrow my father was coming, but I was ready.