A Guardians Passion (3 page)

“Laugh all you want, but I actually wanted to give that to you earlier. I mean, I value my neck, and so I wasn’t going to even try to draw down Fenris’s wrath. But I really think that it would benefit you. It would also give you some time to relax, as no mates are allowed. Registration is probably full, and it, well, it is short notice, but I could get you in, being a
fucking Sohon
and all.”

No way, Freya told herself, although the food was always phenomenal. She had only attended their events in the capacity of a warrior, at least until meeting Fenris and Rayne at the Sohon debutante pageant. Her battle card was only on hold. To be seen in a gathering of waddling, joyous females who had probably never known what it felt like to rip the head off a demon was near frightening. And at the Sohons… There would probably be roses and moss and gift bags, no doubt.

Freya could practically hear her mother’s voice echoing in her head.
“A real bitch handles her business and her males,”
Geraldine had told her on the phone the day Freya mentioned that Fen and Rayne were getting a bit too bossy. She dreaded what her mother would say if she jumped on the Sohon coddle ship. “Right. No way am I gonna do the hippie, earth-mother bonding thing with a bunch of other tubby, moody, swollen, cranky-assed bitches. Three more months, and Bun will be ready, and shit will get back to normal.”

“You think so, hmm?” Benna crossed her arms over her chest. She pressed her lips together in disgust before cocking a brow. “Have you known any pregnant shewolves? Do you? You got some female friends who’ve been through a birth or two?”

“No.”

“Well, you have a mother and a mother-in-law. What did they tell you to expect?”

Freya got the point, hanging her head in defeat. Both of her matrons were good for utterances but nothing of sympathy or even support. They seemed to be clutching their own experiences to them like coveted badges of honor from some battle. Gaea looked upon her with pity, and Geraldine always had a sharp comment whenever Freya called. They were no help at all. For once Freya didn’t know how to attack an issue that had no limbs to yank out. “They’re not really females.” She sighed. “Just two dudes who happen to have pussies.”

“Oh. Hmm. That’s unfortunate,” Benna replied with her worst attempt at empathy. She sat back down on the floor close to Freya and picked up the pricing gun Freya had set on the floor. She began pricing all the items that Freya hadn’t been able to. “But you’re a fighter, and well, maybe you could luck out.”

Thoroughly exhausted, Freya scooted back and allowed Benna to take over her task. Benna was right. She was a fighter. Then it occurred to her what else Benna had said. “What do you mean by that? I could luck out?”

Benna stopped pricing and gave Freya a thorough gaze, an honestly sympathetic one it seemed. “Well. Some males get jealous. Some get more protective. Some grow distant—which you might actually want, but somehow I don’t think Fenris or Rayne will be that type.” She waved the gun to punctuate her point, adding, “Your life is going to change, Freya. Once your cub is born. You have to be prepared for that. Sohons aren’t gonna birth the baby for you, but we will give you the knowledge you need to make things less hectic. That’s all we do: bring weres into the new age.”

Freya looked down at the brochure in her hands and saw the slogan Benna had so expertly used. It was a good one. She could use a bit of knowledge. “So I need a fucking conference?”

“Vacation. Spa and information.”

Rest
, a little voice in Freya’s mind suggested before Geraldine’s rambling came back to the forefront. The Sohons offered the easy way out, not the warrior’s way. If anything, she should just butch up, stomp into the bedroom that she shared with her mates, and demand to be left the hell alone rather than taking a flight to be treated like some spoiled princess.

“You can keep that new-age bullshit. I’ll be fine. I don’t need seminars and panels for something that has been going on since time fuckall began. I can handle my mates.” She tried to hand the pamphlet back to Benna, but the girl shook her head.

“I don’t need it either,” Benna said as Freya managed to get to her feet. “You keep it. And sleep well tonight.”

Freya swayed as she stood and looked at Benna. “Oh, I will,” she vowed more to herself than to Benna. It was time for her to put her foot down and stop acting like a hounded rabbit. She didn’t need a seminar to get a peaceful night’s rest; she just needed to roar a bit.

Chapter Two

Many women might have swooned at the sight before her. In a spacious room with a crackling fire in the hearth, two drop-dead gorgeous males lounged upon a bed the size of boat. One was a symbol of Nordic legend and power: seven feet of naked, tanned muscle and manhood. He had the silvery-blond hair of his mother and a smoldering dark-blue gaze. The other male was slightly shorter, slender, with an androgynous beauty that caused women to gape in jealousy. His hazel eyes tended more to gold than green, staring up at her beneath thick, dark lashes. Paler than his alpha male, he was an adornment draped over steel. Fenris was sitting up against the head of the bed. His nose was buried in Rayne’s gold-blond crown, but the expectancy in his gaze was directed at her.

Rayne was doing his best to calm down the brute, his fingers working over the boulder of Fenris’s biceps muscle, but Freya’s very entrance into the room had put an end to that. Fenris, with nostrils flaring, backed away from Rayne as if Freya were some sort of misbehaving whelp in need of punishment. Rayne tried to smile but failed.

Freya snorted as she slammed the door behind her. She refused to be swayed. Fen could growl all he wanted. Rayne could throw the doe eyes until dawn. She would not fold. Just thinking of Benna’s suggestion caused her determination to blaze as she moved into the room. She walked over to the bed and stopped just at the foot. “Get your asses up, both of you. Move over.”

Rayne slipped from the bed immediately while Fenris only moved to the edge. She walked quickly to side that Rayne had freed up.

Rayne showed the worrying disposition of a hen, with one hand clapping lightly upon her back and the other reaching nervously to the swell of her belly. “Are you all right?”

Jerking away from the touch she knew was sure to turn into a caress, Freya scrutinized the concern of her beta. Rayne could play innocent all he liked, but the tip of his tongue, pressed at the corner of his lips, gave him away like a hound considering a pork chop.

“What’s wrong, babe?” Fenris asked, showing a more genuine if sterner level of concern.

Freya sat down on the bed, easily a king-plus and still not big enough. Refusing to turn her back to Fenris, Freya warned Rayne away with her eyes, denying any gestures of help as she pulled her boots off. “Nothing is wrong. I’m fine. I’m just sleepy. I’m fucking tired, and I want some rest.”

Rayne swiftly dived to the floor to retrieve each boot as it landed, always so attentive.

“If you were so tired, then you should have come to bed earlier.”

Freya had her hands on her pants and was pushing them down when Fenris made the comment. Pausing at midthigh, she suppressed the urge to curse the smug male, knowing that it would only provoke him.

She shed her pants and then shirt, both into Rayne’s eagerly waiting grasp, before finally addressing the brooding hulk. “Well, I’m here now.” She climbed over to the middle of the bed in her tank top and boy shorts. With a fluff of the pillows, she stretched out.

Fenris did the same, moving parallel to her. She stopped him before he could begin to scoot closer. She looked over her shoulder, ignoring his raised brow. “Um, no. All I want is just a good night’s sleep with no fuss out of either of you.”

“Fuss? What do you mean?” Fenris looked far too serious for Freya to think that he was joking.

“I just want to sleep. No cuddling, no poking, no licking. Just sleep. That goes for both of you,” she warned, hands blindly reaching for the spreads.

Rayne was immediately kneeling upon the bed, looming over her to make sure not just that she found the covers but that she was sufficiently covered.

Lying on her side, Freya slid an arm up from beneath the spread and used it to pin the thick covering around her frame. It wouldn’t do a lot to keep away determined hands, but it got the message across. Yawning, she closed her eyes and thought of the days when she could sleep in her preferred position rather than her child’s. “Sleep. Just sleep’s all I need.”

For a few minutes, Freya truly believed that that her males had gotten the message. As she enjoyed the comfort of their mattress, she allowed herself to sink within the darkness provided by her eyelids. She felt her child stir and prayed that the motion was no more than the simple act of him getting comfortable. Having had a late snack of salami after leaving Benna, Freya figured it would satiate them both at least long enough for her to spend quality time in wonderland.

Freya felt the bed move, sensed Fenris shift beneath the covers, and growled, knowing what would surely come next, what always did.

His hips moved flush against hers, and he muttered. “So grumpy. Is our little boy making you upset?”

No. Just that fat cock of yours, Freya lamented before moving her hip out of the reach of Fenris’s. Bun had actually been behaving, but then the smell of roasted pork hit her nostrils, and despite Freya’s exhaustion, her son stirred. She opened her eyes to catch Rayne walking away from the fireplace with a gift in his hands.

Rayne brought a ceramic covered tray to their bedside table. He lifted the dome lid to reveal a pile of flour-frosted buns, which Freya was certain contained minced pork and pepper-and-onion stuffing. Her favorites. Wondering why she hadn’t recognized the bait earlier, she gave a whimper. Her keen senses often faltered under the hedonistic musk that her mates gave off. Still she should have known. Mesmerized by the enticing treats, she felt the need for slumber receding, and although she really wanted to sleep, Freya couldn’t stop herself from sitting up. She frowned, eyeing her crafty beta. “Really?”

Rayne snatched up one of the buns and placed it in her hand, ever the helpful one. “I just thought you might enjoy one…or two.”

She brought the treat to her lips and took a bite. She savored the explosion of the greasy pork and spicy stuffing, contrasting with the buttery, floured dough. Freya shuddered with pleasure as she chewed. “I don’t need bedside fucking munchies,” she groaned before trying to take another taste.

Fenris reached out and grabbed her wrist gently, preventing her from getting her lips back to the treat. “Oh, no. You needed rest, right?”

“Yes. And you need to let go of my hand before I get upset.”

Fenris gave a wicked laugh, sidling up close to her, assaulting her thigh once more with the iron bar of his cock. “Are you going to maul me, my alpha female?” he asked, out of expectation and excitement rather than fear, she could tell.

As much as she wished that her threats held weight behind them, Freya knew the trap too well to play into Fenris’s game. Having a mate who was a Luna wolf, a berserker, was one thing; loving him was another. Her mouth could deny him for hours, but her heart always caved. Frustrated with herself, even as she felt her resolve softening, Freya turned to find Rayne upon the bed, framing her other side as he eased down upon the mattress with the platter in his lap.

His smile was sheepish as he held another bun just centimeters away from her lips. “That’s okay. You can have this one instead.”

Freya arched up and took a bite of Rayne’s while Fenris eased the other out of her grasp for himself.

She allowed Rayne to feed her the entirety of his offering, muttering curses with every chewing motion even as Fenris shifted beneath the covers. She felt Fenris’s palm upon her belly, sliding up and over the swell to end curled at her hip.

Freya didn’t fight what she knew was going happen. She was too tired, and pastries had only made her more lax. Fenris’s blond hair draped over her shoulder as he started placing kisses upon her flesh. He pulled her tighter to his corded steel frame while Rayne presented another savory treat for her to nibble upon. Between the three of them, six meat buns vanished.

Rayne moved the empty tray to the bedside stand. He had given Freya the last pie and slipped into bed beside her. Despite all his prior charity, Rayne too sidled in close. His intent showed itself as he moved beneath the covers, his fingertips playing at the hem of her tank top.

Freya groaned as she felt the gentle brush of Rayne’s fingers over her belly, creeping like thieves up to the swollen, sensitive mounds of her breasts. Placated by food and the easy warmth of two hard bodies, she found herself quickly overwhelmed. Between the stirring of the babe within her, the combined passions of her mates, and the exhaustion of the day, her resolve vanished faster than a vamp at sunrise. She was once again right where they wanted her to be.

As Rayne’s fingers found the rigid traitor of a nipple, rolling it between his fingers, Freya knew that she had lost. “You fucking asses,” she groaned as her body responded to masterful touches and nipping kisses.

Fenris breathed hotly into her ear as he ground his cock into her hip. “What, baby? Getting hot?”

“I just wanted to sleep.”

“So did I. Wanted to be put to bed hours ago actually, but no.”

Freya rejected the notion it was her fault, but then she wasn’t totally without fault when it came to both of them expecting to be sated before slumber. Bribery was what it was. Giving Fenris and Rayne a few hours of attention had been the only way for her to get any sort of peace, yet she was tired of having to fulfill that obligation all the time.

Catching Rayne just before he could duck his pale blond head beneath the covers, before he could get his lips onto her breast, she gripped her beta’s slender shoulders and tried once more to deny the arousal caused by just his breath against her skin. “No. No, Rayne. Both of you. I’d like to sleep, just sleep. No fucking dick at my ass happening to slip inside my pussy while I’m sleeping, no waking up to find myself nursing, and no fucking food put in my face like you’re trying to fatten me for a feast. You two must think that I’m playing.”