29. Louise
I wake in yet another unfamiliar place.
It takes me a moment to realize where we are, the sound of water lapping against the hull of the boat, entirely different from the sound of water breaking on the rocky shore around the cottage.
Tomorrow, we leave for the island and assimilate into the crew of a large cruise ship bound for Jamaica and the Eastern Caribbean.
While all of us have an incredibly varied skill set, none of us can actually captain a yacht or navigate the open seas to get us where we need to go.
Luckily, Quentin was able to get a hold of the crew the yacht owner typically employs. For enough money, they have agreed to transport us safely, no questions asked.
Tonight will be our last chance to gather supplies and make our preparations.
I emerge from the cabin to the observation deck, where Seb, Caz, and Quentin sit with their heads together, speaking in hushed voices.
Caz is the first to catch sight of me, his icy blue eyes sliding away from mine as he sits upright—the others falling silent.
“Tell me you're talking about me without saying outright that you're talking about me.” I smile, but my stomach lurches with fear.
Caz looks to the others, their expressions impassive, then turns to face me.
“Louise, there’s something we should talk about…”
I look at the table, noticing Dennis’ handkerchief laid out between them.
“Alright then, start talking,” I hedge; my eyes unable to leave the snowy white square of cloth.
“Sébastien hasn’t run the tests yet, Louie, but we’re almost certain of what we’ll find,” Quentin begins, his tone too soft—too placating.
They want something, that much is obvious, but what?
“It almost goes without saying, yeah, Dennis is another of my— our fated mates.” I lift my chin, looking appraisingly at the trio of Saints, still seated, down my nose.
I know what Quentin’s angling at, though I don’t know why.
“While I understand it might require some suspension of disbelief after a lifetime of not knowing fated mates are real—there are some serious considerations to make now that we know the truth,” Quentin continues.
Now, this I did not see coming.
“You can't possibly be suggesting…” I laugh, unable to continue the preposterous thought.
“Yes, Loulu. We are most absolutely suggesting that we bite—we bond,” Sébastien interjects impatiently.
“What!?” I begin indignantly, but Quentin rushes in before I can finish my objection.
“We've started to experience just a glimpse of the connection that we could have once properly bonded. Not to mention, a mating bond provides a sacred and secret method of communication available only to those bonded by bite, blood, and soul,” Quentin reasons.
“There have already been more than a few dangerous situations where this connection would have been useful,” Sébastien backs him up.
Caz sits silently, his eyes fixed on his ragged cuticles as he tears them apart in his anxiety.
“Moreover, as we begin to dig deeper—to find our path toward creating a lasting cure for the Zeitnot virus—we will be making our way through some of the slimiest parts of the criminal underworld. As much as my pride hates for me to admit it, there's no question that things will be safer for you and I, Louise.” Quentin’s words sting with their truthful ring.
“Omegas and sigmas already bonded into packs have far less to worry about in the places where we're going.”
Sébastien is in the process of echoing Quentin's sentiments, but I don't really hear his words. I've stopped listening. My attention is focused on Caz; his legs shaking nervously—his thumb beginning to bleed where he gnaws at a hangnail.
“And what do you think, Cazzy?” I lay a hand gently over his pinched fingers, guiding them away from his mouth.
He turns his face up to me, the morning light catching the close cropped golden buzz of his hair, his pale blue eyes brimming with tears.
“I think we've got no right to ask you anything,” he simpers, his lower lip trembling as he pulls his hands out from beneath mine before closing his palms back together over my hands protectively, as if in prayer.
“If you ask me what I want? I want us to be a pack.”
Quentin and Sébastien shift, regarding him with a tenderness that they hadn't before.
“I don't want us to be pack because we've threatened you, or because you think it's the only way you can survive, or because it was cosmically preassigned—I want to be pack because we've chosen to.
Maybe that isn't possible—maybe we've never had the choice, but that's what I want.” Caz falls silent again as I raise my eyes to Quentin and Sébastien.
“And what about you two?”
Sébastien leans back in his seat, his arms reaching out over the cushioned backrest of the built-in sofa, turning his gaze to the rising sun.
“Someday, if it's possible, I'd like to be happy with you Cazimer, Quentin—and yes, even that bastard Frank.” He scrubs a hand over the stubble on his jaw.
“I've been in the life so long, I’ve never known a real ‘home’ that wasn’t made on the run.
So I'm not entirely sure what happiness would look like, but…” Sébastien shrugs, but I can see the wetness of affection in his chocolate brown eyes.
“I think it's something that I would want—to settle down somewhere away from it all, with a good kitchen and space for a garden, put down roots. Let Quentin feather his nest.” His eyes drift closed as he imagines it. “Yes, a quiet, good life.” Sébastien nods to himself before his eyes flutter open and meet Quentin’s, giving him the floor.
“I suspect that part of me has known for longer than I'd care to admit,” Quentin begins coolly.
“Certainly, there were times in the past where I had glimpses of the Saints becoming something more—becoming family, but something had always felt as if it was missing.” He looks pointedly at me, those golden-green eyes brightly lit in the morning sun, twinkling beneath a toss of his copper brown hair.
“I've never experienced a more perfect harmony than our bodies in that snowy cabin by the lake. I've never felt more desire.”
I can almost feel the heat rolling off of Quentin in waves as his words increase in emotional intensity. I find myself reaching for him as his voice falls quiet, my body obeying his law of gravity.
The two of us are leaning across the table, our faces nearly touching, when I sense Frank in the doorway behind us—watching, breathing heavily.
“And what about you, Frank?” I ask, my hand suspended midair—my fingertips just grazing the point of Quentin's perfect marble chin—my lips a breath away from his.
He says nothing, only watches with those cold steel-blue eyes.
As the golden sun warms us, I am wrapped in our scents—and my sense of reason begins to slip through my fingers.
My eyes drift closed and I feel my lips press against Quentin’s—Caz's fingers caressing the outside of my arm, Seb’s hands finding their way to the tumble of hair at my shoulder.
From Quentin, my lips find Seb—allowing him to slowly guide me to my feet, passing me off to Caz, who begins to ferry me toward the bedroom.
In a haze of lips and limbs, our clothes seem to melt away—the mid-afternoon light illuminating everything, putting all out in the open.
The Saints lay me down on the expansive bed. Seb crawls up toward the padded headboard, built curving away from the wall beneath the sheer curtained windows—the light diffusing beautifully over our bare bodies. Seb and Quentin bracket me—their fingers in my hair, their lips at my neck, my breasts.
Caz strokes his hard cock—silver and gold against the livid rose of his flesh.
As Caz lowers himself onto all fours to stalk toward me, I can see Frank standing just at the edge of the bed, circling as he watches us; his cock hard and thick in his grip—his knot swollen beneath his fist. I watch him eyeing us, like a big cat stalking a gazelle at a watering hole, waiting for his moment to pounce.
Just like that first day in the bath, he crawls between my knees—using his own thighs to part my legs wide; giving him access to my slick pussy.
“Are you ready?” I ask Caz sweetly as he lowers his face to mine—our lips just barely touching.
“Always ready for you,” he purrs back, sliding his cock against my slickness—each gentle stroke of his Jacob’s ladder strumming my buzzing clit as he runs himself up and down my wet slit.
I give an approving whine, and then he’s inside me.
Q and Seb pull back their hands—cradling my head, caressing Caz’s shoulders as he sinks an inch or two deeper.
Caz kisses his way along my jaw to my neck, and once again Frank fills my vision—he’s drawn closer, almost side by side—at the edge of the mattress, his knees bent ever so slightly as he leans against the bed fucking his fist.
I let out a low moan as Caz sinks into me up to the hilt—that golden ring kissing my cervix in the most delicious of ways.
Seeing my reaction, Seb encourages Caz to make another deep set of strokes, his hand gripping Caz’s muscular ass—practically pushing him to new depths.
All of this is proving to be too much for Caz—who’s growing increasingly short of breath—little desperate whines escaping him as he brings his face back to mine; the two of us joining in a deep kiss, our tongues twining.
Caz’s hands cup my face as he increases his speed—bottoming out each time at a record pace.
His face pulls back from mine as my legs begin to shake—his thumbs just barely touched together on my bottom lip.
Looking into Caz’s ice-blue eyes, I see his plea.
I dip my chin—taking his right thumb between my lips—I suck gently, allowing my teeth to sit ever so gently against the tender flesh below the first joint of his thumb.
Cazimer gives me the slightest of nods before he shudders forward—breaking over me like a wave.
I bite down, my teeth piercing the delicate skin—his blood spreading sharp and coppery in my mouth—the scent of poppies at the back of my palate.
Tenderly, I lick the wound as he pulls his thumb from my mouth.