Edwina and the Seven Snowed-in Scientists (17 page)

“She doesn’t want to be our mate. Did she tell you that?” Brian

could feel his anger rising. He’d done nothing to hurt her. He’d

actually gone out of his way to not hurt the woman, so his brother’s accusations really hit a nerve.

“Gary told me,” Evan said as he turned around. All the anger

drained away from Brian as he took in the state of his brother’s face.

One eye was completely closed over, his jaw had a lumpy looking

bruise, and he moved gingerly like he’d hurt a rib or two. “Simon,”

Evan said by way of explanation.

Brian glanced at the hallway that led to the bedrooms. He knew

where Edwina was and who she was with, but Evan shook his head

and laughed quietly. “Technically, I started it, so don’t go blaming him.”

“Why haven’t you shifted?” Shifting to yeti form and back again

would heal most injuries, and it seemed rather strange that Evan

hadn’t done it yet.

“To remind me not to be a fucking dickhead. She’s here for eight

short months. It might be the only time that we all love the same

woman, and I don’t want my disappointment that we have no future

with her fucking up our time together.”

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“So you’re happy to make love to her, even knowing she’ll never

love you back.”

“Yes,” Evan replied in a tired sounding voice. “She’s our mate. I

love her enough to love her now and let her go when she wants to

leave.”

It sounded so simple. She was here, now, and they should make

the most of it.

But somehow it didn’t stop his heart from aching for things that

would never be.

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Chapter Nine

Edwina lay in Simon’s arms, feeling guilty for leaving Evan to

make dinner. It didn’t matter that the man had offered, or that he’d

suggested she go find Simon, she still felt bad for lumping him with

her one and only chore. Unable to lie still a moment longer, she

managed to wiggle out of Simon’s hold and slip her clothes back on

without waking him.

She wandered toward the kitchen and then hesitated when she

heard Brian’s voice. But it was Evan’s reply that had her heart

thumping hard, and her eyes filling with tears.

She really was their mate.

Somehow, she knew that to be true. But she couldn’t give them

what they most desired. She should’ve insisted that they get her back to Mawson base—despite the fact someone had tried to kill her—

before the weather had made travel dangerous, but she’d been weak

and scared and more than willing to lie to herself. Had she really

believed she was just having fun? She’d never been so attracted to

anyone in all her life, yet she’d tried to convince herself it was simple lust. It was lust, yes, but it was also a whole lot more.

“Edwina,” Brian said as he turned in her direction. “Come here,

sweetheart.”

She walked hesitantly into the kitchen but nearly buckled at the

knees when she saw Evan’s face. It didn’t make any sense that Evan

would be so banged up and Simon didn’t have a scratch, and she

found herself wondering if Evan and Brian had gotten into it before

she’d come into the kitchen.

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“What happened?” she demanded as a curious sort of protective

instinct rolled through her. It didn’t escape her notice that she was practically defending one of her mates from another, but it didn’t

seem to still the anger in her heart.

“Only what you saw with Simon,” Evan said as he stepped toward

her.

“So why isn’t he all banged up like you are?”

“He changed forms. It heals our injuries.” She crossed her arms

and tapped her foot, waiting for him to explain why he hadn’t done

the same. “I…um…” He must’ve realized just how pissed off she

really was because he took a step back, stripped off his clothes,

changed forms twice and dragged his clothes back on. She touched

his face, relieved to see no damage left behind.

She wanted to fall into Evan’s arms and beg him to make love to

her, but she also needed to deal with Brian’s problem. She turned on

her heel and gave him an assessing look.

“Are you going to reject me for the next eight months just because

I can’t promise you a future?” He shrugged, clearly uncomfortable

with her tackling this problem head-on. “Are you going to spend the

next eight months punishing us both because I can’t be the woman

you want me to be?”

He swallowed hard, but his stubborn expression faltered. “I’m not

punishing you.” He sounded bewildered as if he hadn’t really looked

at this side of the argument.

“What would you call it then?” she asked in what she hoped was a

reasonable tone.

He seemed lost for words, even looking to Evan for help before

shaking his head in resignation. “I don’t know,” he said, sounding like a man at the end of his rope. “I just know that I don’t want to love a woman who won’t love me back.”

The “L” word. It seemed strange to be using it after such short

acquaintance but it described exactly what was in her heart. And

suddenly she regretted ever starting this conversation.

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“Do you need help with dinner?” she asked Evan as she tried to

pretend Brian hadn’t spoken. Evan looked at her, a frown marring his

beautiful face as she tried to step around Brian. But Brian caught her arm and turned her to face him.

“So that’s it? You’ll never love me? You’ll fuck me if I want, but

you’ll never have any feelings for me or my brothers?” His anger

seemed to grow with every word, and the grip on her upper arm

tightened to the point of pain. Evan grabbed Brian’s wrist, squeezing until Brian let go of Edwina. She stepped back, rubbing the muscle,

trying to hide how much more his words had hurt than the grip he’d

had on her arm.

Evan and Brian glared at each other silently, neither willing to

back down. Evan had already defended her once today, and she

couldn’t let him get hurt again simply because she was a coward.

“Stop,” she said as she stepped between the brothers. Brian glared

at her, and she almost took a step back at the anger he projected, but then she saw the watery brightness of his eyes and realized he was

hurting also. She stepped into his embrace, held him tight. After a

moment his arms wrapped around her, and he hugged her back. “I’m

sorry,” she whispered. “I do love you, all of you, but I can’t stay, and I won’t make promises I can’t keep.”

He pushed her from his embrace, held her at arm’s length, his

eyes searching her face. She closed them, ashamed at admitting her

feelings when she knew it would just hurt them more when she left.

“Why can’t you stay?”

She shook her head, tears blurring her vision as he demanded an

answer to the one question she didn’t want to face. “Please, please don’t ask me that.” She swiped angrily at her eyes, frustrated that she couldn’t pull her emotions back under control. She should never have

started this conversation. “Please just accept that we have right now and let that be enough.”

“I want more,” Brian said evenly.

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She shook her head, the words burning like acid on her tongue. “I

can’t give you more. I can’t give you what you want.” She felt Evan’s arms wrap around her from behind and gratefully leaned against him,

her knees too wobbly to hold her up.

Brian touched her face with his warm hand. “Why?” he asked as

he smoothed the tears from her face. “If you love us, why can’t you

stay?”

She swallowed hard, her gaze darting around the room, her

breathing labored, the need to run tensing her muscles and fogging

her brain. She wanted to tell them, but it would hurt them and turn

them away from her. More than anything she wanted this time

together. Eight months to live the life she should’ve had. And when it was over, she would go back to the miserable existence fate had dealt her.

“Please, just tell us, Edwina.” That was Jake’s voice, and she

realized with a start that the rest of the brothers had come into the kitchen. They all stood there, waiting for an explanation, wanting to know how she could love them and not want to be their mate.

Her heart breaking, she realized that she couldn’t keep her secret

any longer. They deserved to know, and when they turned away from

her, she’d somehow manage to live through the next eight months

without their warmth, or their love, or their affection.

She closed her eyes as she said the words, too cowardly to see the

disappointment on their faces. “Because I can’t give you children.”

She’d thought she’d accepted that fact long ago, but the pain it

brought now was excruciating. “I had an illness…y–years ago. I c–

can’t have children.” She gasped, trying to suck in air as she felt

Evan’s hold on her loosen. Then she sobbed, unable to protect herself from their rejection, not even able to find the anger she’d hidden

behind for so long. She felt raw and exposed in ways she’d never

considered possible.

Blindly, she tried to step away, to escape the kitchen, but she was

engulfed in a tight embrace, and it took a moment to realize Evan was
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still holding her, whispering reassurances in her ear. “It doesn’t

matter,” he whispered confidently. “We all love you. We all want

you, with or without children.”

“How can you say that?” She probably should’ve expected it.

They were honorable men, she wouldn’t have fallen for them

otherwise, but it meant they’d sacrifice their chance for children just so they wouldn’t hurt her. Yet eventually they would understand what

that sacrifice cost them, and they’d grow to resent her.

“Because you’re our mate,” Simon said, sounding just as

confident as Jake had.

“So what?” she asked, finally tapping into the anger that had been

her shield for so long. “You’ll find another mate, and she’ll be able to give you everything you need.”

“No, baby,” Gary said as he stepped forward. “You’re the one we

want.”

She shook her head. She knew it wouldn’t work. She’d traveled

this road before.

“Please, just love me now, and when the time comes, let me go.”

Evan lifted her effortlessly into his arms, cradling her against his

chest as he took her from the kitchen and into the bedroom. She

protested when he laid her down on one of the beds and stretched out

beside her, but he pulled her tighter against him. Brian slid onto the other side, wrapped his arm around her middle and held her close.

Sobs racked her body, grief more acute than she’d ever known

drenching her in agony for a long time. Eventually she managed to

stop crying, and finally exhaustion pulled her into a fitful sleep.

* * * *

“What do we do now?” Calvin asked the rest of them. He knew

that with their yeti hearing Brian and Evan would be able to hear him from the bedroom, so he basically addressed them all.

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“I don’t know,” Kieran said, showing a vulnerability they’d rarely

seen. Kieran was always in control, always thinking, planning,

making the tough decisions, but today, he leaned heavily against the

wall, his hope somehow lost. “It changes things.”

“How the fuck does it change things?” Simon clenched his fists,

obviously angry at Kieran as well as the situation now. “We love her.

It doesn’t matter if children aren’t in our future.”

“No, it
does
matter,” Kieran said in a resigned sounding voice,

“because it matters to Edwina.”

Calvin couldn’t argue with that. He knew that he and his brothers

would love Edwina with all their hearts. If children weren’t in their future, they would deal with that, but it was obvious by Edwina’s

heart-rending confession that her infertility tore her in two. She would always feel inadequate, and being mated to seven of them would just

magnify what she saw as failure.

“We don’t know any details,” Jake said cautiously, “and it’s

clearly a very painful topic for Edwina.” They all nodded in

agreement. “But we still need to find out who tried to kill her, so we have an excuse to stay close when it’s time for her to leave

Antarctica.”

Calvin smiled grimly as he realized where this was going. “And if

we can somehow get her to Uncle John, maybe he can help.”

Jake shrugged. “I’m not saying it will work—we have very little

idea what the problem is—but maybe there is something yeti medical

science understands that human medicine doesn’t. At the very least

it’s worth a try.”

All of them in the kitchen nodded in agreement. He heard quiet

noises of assent come from Evan and Brian in the bedroom.

“So what do we do in the meanwhile?” Simon asked.

“We give her what she wants,” Gary said confidently. “She wants

eight months of living and loving all of us. Forget everything else, and just give her the love that she deserves free and clear of worries for the future.”

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Calvin glanced around the room and agreed with the rest of his