Dad chuckles. “Of course, should we go see if mommy and gran want some too?” he asks me in his very happy voice. I love his very happy voice. My smile grows even wider, and I scrunch up my nose.
“Let’s hunt them, daddy, and then when we’ve caught them, we’ll ask them if they want ice cream,” I suggest.
He laughs his play evil laugh and then we race up the stairs.
“Don’t forget Princess, dad!”
I sit up, disoriented and still trying to struggle out from under the veil of sleep. I have no idea where I am, but I can tell it’s early morning from the dawning light surrounding me. My heart thumps with adrenaline as my mind wraps itself around the details of the dream.
“Holy shit,” I mumble, my voice brittle and dry.
Was that really it? The key to all of this lies in a forgotten memory of Princess the pig and ice cream. I run my focus over the words that I spoke, and a tingle rips through me.
Holy fuck.That was it. My dad said I knew the words already, and he was right. Princess the pig had disappeared weeks later, and I was heartbroken yet completely forgot about all of this…until now. I run my hands over my face and look around, shock and excitement racing through me.
I’m in a tent, but it doesn’t look familiar. A rough blanket scratches against my legs, and I’ve woken up naked enough in the last handful of months to know that’s exactly what I am now. Strong arms wrap around my waist and pull me closer. My ass is suddenly being hugged like it’s a beloved stuffed animal. Zeph nuzzles me, and his scratchy morning beard rubs against the soft skin of my hip. It feels like sandpaper and I squeal a little and try to pull away.
My skin warms with a blush as I take in my surroundings again. I’m naked, sitting next to an equally naked, and oddly cuddly, Zeph, in a tent with…yep, Ryn and Treno, and I can’t immediately figure out how the hell I got here.
I think back on the night before. The last thing I remember is me and Pigeon racing Zeph and the sky shadow around, Pigeon eating a—I cringe at the thought—large worm-walrus looking thing, and then falling asleep in our gryphon form in one of the big trees. I pinch myself just to make sure I’m actually awake and here, but I feel it, so that must mean I somehow ended up in here naked, with my sort of mates.
I check in with my vagina, because if I got hot and heavy last night, she and I need to talk. I do a couple Kegels, but Lassie doesn’t start barking like I should be worried that Timmy fell down the well again. I go fullCSI. I’m not sore. There’s no evidence of orgasms. I check my hips and waist, no hot-sex injuries of any kind. I touch my lips, nope, not sore from kissing too much.
Strangely, none of this makes me feel overly relieved. Because Zeph is hugging on my hips like I’m his favorite lovey, my lady bits are very aware of this fact, and yet here I am, untouched in any way.
Pigeon rolls her eyes at me and shoves her face back under her wing. I shoot her a glare.“You know my confusion over this is your fault, right?”I tell the back of her head, because she’s completely ignoring me.“I told you they were a bad match for us, but you had to go and pump me full of hormones, and now my brain is fucked up. You fucked up my brain, Pigeon. This is a good thing, and yet my brain is sending me all kinds of signals telling me that lying naked in a tent with your mates, unfucked, is the opposite of a good thing.”
Pigeon flashes me an image of my vagina and then promptly replaces that image with one of a desert, tumbleweed and all. Then she shows me a watering can watering flowers.
I stare at her incredulously.“I do not have a dusty vagina, Pigeon,”I snap at her, but a loud snore leaks out from under her wing. My mouth drops open, and indignation falls right out.
A sexy man-groan fills the tent out of nowhere, and I freeze. Maybe the lid for the can of worms my naked ass might have just opened is lying around on the ground somewhere. And if I can just sneak out, I could possibly frisbee-throw that lid right back into place, and no one will be the wiser.
Of course, that’s the moment that sleepy Zeph decides he wants to lie on his other side. The only problem with that is, his arms are wrapped around my waist, and he takes me with him WWE body slam style. I squeal in shock midair, which serves to wake everyone in the tent up immediately. Thankfully, Zeph doesn’t go full Undertaker on me. But the next thing I know, my back is gently meeting the mattress we’re lying on, and he’s crawling on top of me protectively, growling, “What’s wrong? What happened?”
Well, fuck me, this just got infinitely worse.
Pigeon takes that moment to once again flash me an image of a watering can and some now drenched flowers, leaving me no choice but to flip her off.
“What is it?” Ryn asks, shooting to his feet and scanning the tent for a threat.
Treno also pushes up out of bed, but he has one of thoseChronicles of Riddickswoosh blades in his hand.
Zeph’s weight settles on me slightly, and I ignore all the parts of my body that light up in excitement because his parts are touching them. He blinks the sleep from his eyes and looks down at me, his honeyed gaze filled with heat and then confusion.
“How’d we get back here?” he asks groggily.
“I thought you did it,” I confess, and Ryn’s and Treno’s heads both snap over in my direction.
“What the rut?” Ryn asks, his features shifting from shocked to salacious in less than two blinks. “How in rutting Cynas did I sleep through that?” he asks no one in particular.
I try to sit up, but Zeph takes his sweet time getting off me. I’m pretty sure he’s playing some kind of game that involves seeing how many things he can rub against before I implode.
“You didn’t sleep through anything. We shifted last night and woke up here. I have no idea how. We have to seriously start working with Wekun in figuring out these runes,” I announce as I get to my feet and head to the entrance of the tent. “I’m just going to go get cleaned up and do exactly that,” I tell them, offering them a salute as I turn to leave.
Really, Falon, a salute?
I grab for the tent flap, but I don’t take another step before I’m being pulled back against another hard body sporting some serious morning wood. “What do you think you’re doing?” Ryn asks incredulously.
