“Nah. We’re on a break while we help raise some great grandkids. Yours is. I know that look on a dragon anywhere.”
“What?” Mori groaned. “Ni’s keeping me in the dark too?”
“Whoops,” Canton frowned at me.
“No, Mori,” I sighed, sitting up so that he could see me. “We were waiting for a better time to tell you. Ni figured you’d want to visit, and things are so up in the air with Crilus and London.”
“You’re going to be fine, but you already knew that,” the bear doctor said to Mori. “Eat. Drink. Maybe a bubble bath or whatever you do to ground after expelling that much magic.” The bear patted his pockets and came out with a protein bar that he unwrapped and handed over to Mori who nodded gratefully. “Let’s see those toes.”
I stretched my foot out toward him and tried to ignore Ni’s panicked voice going off inside my head. Somewhere along the way I’d ripped my shirt and lost my shoes and socks. Probably when I shifted back from dragon form.
“Eh, he got the worst of it, I’d say,” Philip squatted down to look at my foot. “You knocked the bastard’s teeth out with your wing. These are already healing up. I’d say stay on your ass until they finish and don’t try to be a hero and walk it off.”
“She went through a gateway!” A tall blonde guard panted in the doorway.
“She’ll be back,” Philip said. “They always come back. We’ll keep eyes on the house and on Venal’s too.”
Sharon Claudis had slipped out of the GGB again and I prayed she wasn’t on her way back to torment Preston. Next time, I’d just kill her. Hopefully, Preston had come around to feeling the same way by now.
Chapter Twenty-Five
Pierce
I woke up with Crilus curled into me with his beautiful head of hair resting on my chest and some nagging voice in the back of my head saying that I really should check my phone. I ignored it for as long as I could, willing it to shut the hell up. Between Crilus and me we were on enough links that should someone need us they could get ahold of us easily enough.
“Check it! Check it!”Crilus’s crow cawed.
I couldn’t ignore Crilus’s inner beasts. It was a big thing with shifters that sometimes their inner beasts knew more than they did. Crilus and his wolf were out cold, but his little crow was hopping around and demanding that I check my phone. I did and found nothing. I was about to go back to sleep when it occurred to me that if something had happened Crilus was more likely to receive a text about it than I was.
“Crilus?” I whispered. “Mate?”
We’d discussed children and family trauma, but we hadn’t discussed where we draw the line at ‘invading’ the privacy of the other. Checking his phone without his permission felt like crossing a line but he was out cold from heat. He needed his rest and his bird was him, right? Was his permission enough?
Sighing, I grabbed Crilus’s phone off the nightstand to see dozens of missed texts from Mori, Preston, and Teddy. Yep. Shit had gone down while we were out of touch. I could’ve just turned his phone off and not mentioned it until his heat had passed but Preston was on his own unless Mori and Teddy had made it back to London. I opened the texts from him and prayed that he didn’t need a ride. I was a bit too far out to swing by and pick him up easily, but I would if I was his last resort. Leaving a pregnantman who asked for my help stranded wasn’t something I could live with myself if I did.
Preston had been in touch with Mori. He and Teddy had gotten in a huge fight with Sharon and her son. Mori was staying overnight at Glitter Bomb, but Teddy was heading back to London. His parents were trying to make him return home since hearing about his pregnancy, and he was hoping he could stay with us instead. I swallowed a groan. We’d never get to claim every room in the house if Preston took up residence in my kitchen, but I doubted Crilus would forgive me for turning him away.
I called Mori but he didn’t pick up. He was probably asleep. Then I tried Teddy who answered on the first ring.
“Just got back, Cri,” he sighed. “She—”
“It’s Pierce. Crilus is asleep,” I said, wanting to give him a head’s up on who he was talking to straight away.
“Tell them to stay in a guesthouse here. I want to—Well, you know,” Crilus mumbled in his sleep and grabbed my dick. It came to life in his hand, and I swallowed hard not to give away what just happened over the phone.
“I thought you said he was asleep?” Teddy asked, his voice tense like he was looking for a fight.
“He is. Mostly.”
“Put him on,” Teddy said.
“He’s resting.”
“Humor me.”
“Give it here. He’s being a scaley dick, huh?” Crilus said, groping for the phone with his free hand. “Teddy don’t be a dick. I don’t want to beat you up and get everyone mad, but I will.”
“Glad to know you’re okay,” Teddy’s muffled voice came through the phone. “Just be on guard, okay? They didn’t catch her.”
