“But we’re not. We have those three bringing us up to speed, and time to make a plan. Worst case scenario, we go for the jugular, then make a break for it. I’m actually pretty decent off grid, even if I would weep every day I had to spend without WIFI.” Letting out a long breath, she finishes, “Ultimately, though, it’s not me they’re after. I’m merely a consolation prize, or a threat to their reputation. They want Mom, and I know where she is, so we have leverage.”
Gently tugging on her hair, I point out, “You gave Kaige the address. He’d have memorized it before washing it off, which means they could lure us into a trap where they’d have back up waiting to overpower us. Then they’d have you right where they want you, plus your mom’s location.”
She rolls her multicolored eyes before sarcastically drawling, “Yes, because I’m really so dumb that I’d give away our only bargaining chip. You think I gave him a real address? My mom may be a bitch, but I’m not actually that heartless, sheesh. Well-” she cants her head, mulling it over. “Maybe I am. If it’s between them threatening to kill one of you or give her up, it’s not even a debate on my part. Guess we’ll have to wait to see and hope it doesn’t come to that. You know, so you don’t realize the full extent of the monster that you accidentally married.”
"Speaking of," I hesitantly broach the forbidden topic, "we never got to have that conversation you planned to come back for."
She worries her bottom lip. "I suppose we did sort of skim over that dealing with more pressing issues."
After an awkward pause, I roll us over again, climbing off of the bed. “Face down for me.” Her cheeks tint, breaking the tension as I chuckle. “So I can crack your back, remember?”
“Obviously.” She coughs to cover her embarrassment, stretching out on her stomach. “Why else?”
Settling my knees on either side of her hips, I place one hand atop the other at the middle of her back with my fingers splayed. “I could think of a couple of good reasons.” Pressing down to save her from responding, I work my way down her spine, working out tiny pops until she’s bonelessly slumped beneath me.
She drags out a long sigh of relief, appearing two seconds away from falling back asleep. “So.” As she begins to speak, I swing my leg over to flop on my back beside her, otherwise we’ll be shoving this already long overdue conversation aside yet again. “What’s something you like?”
“You.”
Snorting in amusement, Sabrina turns her head to face me, folding her arms beneath her cheek. “Seriously. If we’re actually giving this whole mate thing a shot, I should know far more about you than I currently do. It’s pretty embarrassing that if anyone were to ask, I don’t know what sort of things you love or hate.” Grimacing, she pushes herself up, carefully sliding to her feet. “Actually, one second.”
I move to help her, but she’s already snatched the small notepad off of my nightstand before I’m upright, settling back on the edge of the mattress. As she opens to a clean page and clicks the pen, I wrap an arm around her waist, tugging her back far enough on the bed that her leg can be elevated in front of her at the very least.
“What are you doing?”
“Making a cheat sheet. I’ll organize it more efficiently when I have my laptop back, but this will work in the interim. One relationship is hard enough, but four? I’ve apparently got two husbands now and I don’t even know their full names, or if either of you are allergic to anything. What if I mix up facts and accidentally poison one of you? I’ll look like a jackass, and the others will never let me live it down. Pros and cons of having a few backup husbands, I suppose.”
Bursting out laughing, I settle more comfortably on my stomach so that my head’s beside her hip. “You’re so much like the twins that it’s genuinely creepy. In the same breath you go from analytical and awkward, to picking fights with alphas like you want to watch their heads implode simply because you’re bored.”
She sighs, scrawling all four of our names at the top of separate pages to flip between. “Yeah, not my best plan, I’ll admit. I’ll try to watch my temper from now on unless I check-in first that you’re in the mood to beat someone up for me.”
My grin splits my face. “I beg to differ, it was delightful to behold. You were confident enough that we had your back to go poking angry wolves in the face with a stick. And for the record, I'm always happy to beat someone up for you.”
As she adds that as a bullet point beneath my name, my abs burn and I get a stitch in my side from how hard I laugh. The next half hour is spent with me rattling off facts about me and my brothers, and I whip out my phone to follow her lead, getting a leg up on the others with a personal cheat sheet into her good graces. It ends up being far more fun than something this clinical should be, and eventually we circle back around to what started us on this path to begin with.
"I'd managed to wrap my head around everything and make my peace with it by the end of my run," she declares, stealing my phone to add more things to my ‘Ways to convince Sabrina not to poison me’note to keep herself busy while she talks. "And we were all on board with bypassing the awkward new dating stage to save ourselves the stress, so it wasn't even the multiple husbands thing that made me shut down. I was already dating three of you, for fucks' sake."
She pauses, thumbs hovering above the screen. "Loads of people fantasize about discovering that they're something other than human, for their boring lives to fade away in favor of something magical, or some hot guys to show up and whisk them away to somethingbetter." Sighing, she finally faces me, the look in her eyes causing me to grow restlessly agitated with the need to fix everything so that she’ll be happy again. "I had a crappy human life, and it was looking like my magical do-over was going to be even harder. Of course I was upset and needed some time to process all of that."
Setting my phone on the bed, she scrubs a hand down her tired face. "I wasn't coming to discuss whether or not I was going to give this relationship a shot, or let you know I was running away in the middle of the night so you should go shopping for a new mate. It was about hammering out the logistics of where we were all supposed to go from here. Hell, I didn't even know if Slade was interested before he kissed me that night. I wasn't sure where things stood between all of us, or expectations. If I was mated to you and Cinjin, was I not supposed to date Reid anymore? Were you guys expecting me to just bang him and Slade so everything was fair? Are we supposed to all share a room now, or keep on like we've been where I bed hop when I'm not at my apartment? I figured we could tackle the things we actually had some control over, was all."
Palming the back of her neck, I kiss her. "We don'texpectjack shit, Sabrina. Gods, we certainly didn't expect you to be one of us, let alone want to stick around after you found out what we were. This is completely uncharted territory for us, too. But I can absolutely swear that the only thing on our minds is worrying about how to give you the life you deserve when being withusis what puts you in danger. Yet we’re too fucking selfish, and have no intention of ever letting you go; it’s maddening.”
Kissing her once more, I sigh. “You're not the only one that was thrown for a loop here, babe. I'mthrilledthat you chose me, but I was in no way, shape, or form mentally prepared for this. Most people go into matings either knowing for years who their mate will be, or anticipating the very slim chance that they might be chosen if pursuing someone that isn't already promised to a pack. What we had with you? It was easy. We could move at whatever pace we wanted because there was no pressure on the situation. We thought that we only had to worry about the others having a casual interest in you because they like fucking with us, and you were human. With you being one of us? Now we need to prepare for an all-out war that I don’t know if we can win, but we’re damn well going to try."
Picking up the notebook, I close it and set it back on the end table. "Every job that I go on, I'm aware of the very real possibility that I might not come back. Sure, we pick and choose carefully, research the situation to the best of our abilities, but we can never plan for every possibility, or if the client putting the bounty on their head is leaving out a crucial piece of information. And nine times out of ten, if they’re willing to pay what we charge, it’s personal, so they always paint themselves as the injured party. That risk was fine before, because I didn't have anyone waiting for me here besides my siblings, and a miserable existence. Now? Ihaveto make it home, because I don't trust anyone to take care of you the way that I can. It's terrifying. Amazing, everything I never allowed myself to hope for, but terrifying.”
Swallowing, Sabrina nods, some of the anxiety fading from her eyes. “One step at a time?”
Smiling softly, I rearrange our position so that we can go back to the way we were, with her tucked securely against my side where she belongs. “One step at a time.”
Gently scratching her back, now that all of this is finally out of the way, exhaustion slams into me like a freight train. We lay there for a few minutes in peaceful silence before she tosses out in an attempt at humor, “At least I won’t have to hyphenate my last name. Wait-” pushing herself up, she turns to look at me. “If there’s no marriage certificate filed, then is it only recognized among you guys, but on the human side nothing changes?”
Kissing her shoulder, I ask, “What would you prefer?”
Pausing to mull it over, she eventually decides, “If I’m doing this, I’d rather be all in than keep one foot out the door and complicate things even more. There’s already enough chaos to juggle right now.”
Pulling out my phone, I update my calendar. “Then I’ll take care of it tomorrow. I’ll swap off with Slade, so don’t be startled if you wake up beside him instead of me, because I’d prefer to get an early start.”
