It was similar to the plasti sleds we had used previously but curved upwards along its edges and had padding on which to sit. Sparrow selected a bright-red toboggan and got comfortable on it. Then, an attendant gave her a push. I giggled at her gleeful yells that echoed back to us from within the tunnel of ice. The chill in the air made my laughter visible. Soon, Tracy and Terre disappeared into the cylindrical ice tunnels.
Dario selected a longer blue toboggan and placed it down before me. “I thought you might be more comfortable if we were to ride down together.” Remembering my nervousness when sledding for the first time, I agreed. I sat between his long legs which provided me with a feeling of added security. Dario put his arms around me, pulling me back against his chest. “Ready,” he said to the attendant, who gave our toboggan a push.
White-blue ice began to blur past us, and we moved up onto the sides of the tunnel as we raced along its length. I clutched at Dario’s arms afraid we would spin upside down.
“Do you want me to steer us into the alcove up ahead?” Dario asked. He had been laughing the entire time.
“Yes! Let me catch my breath!”
The scratchy sound of ice under the toboggan took on a new quality as he pushed a peddle with his foot and steered us over into a small snow cave to the right.
“It’s so fast!” I closed my eyes and took a breath.
Dario shifted and leaned over, cradling the back of my head with his right hand as his hot mouth claimed mine. As he deepened the kiss, my troubled thoughts of earlier began to fade. I could feel him hardening at my back, rivalling the ice around us. A moan escaped me. Dario drew me onto his left thigh and moved his hand from my hair and underneath my jacket and shirt. His cold palm closed over my breast, and liquid heat pooled between my thighs. I was in the process of straddling him to relieve the hard ache he had created when the sound of an approaching toboggan stilled my hands on the fastenings of Dario’s pants. It was Cadet Cedrenus. I stared at him in annoyance.
“Forgive me, Princess. I believed myself far enough behind you to ensure your safety and allow for your privacy.”
With a sigh, I returned to my seat between Dario’s legs.
“I’ll be certain to tell Inquisitor Gordian how diligent you have been in guarding the Princess,” Dario said with a touch of frustrated anger lacing his words.
“Thank you, sir. I do have my orders.”
Dario put his arms around me and maneuvered us back into the tunnel.
“Cormac ordered him to get into your way with me. Didn’t he?” Dario couldn’t see my smile, but I could feel his sexual frustration pressing into my back.
“Oh, I’m certain of it,” Dario said.
The girls had cups of hot cocoa waiting for us when we reached the end of the tunnel. The ice cave café had benches and tables made of chiseled ice. After warming up with our drinks, we were hauled back up the mountain of snow in an open transport with fur hides to huddle under for warmth. Dario sat beside me and shared my large brown fur. Cadet Cedrenus didn’t let me out of his sight. After our third trip down the tunnels, I was shivering.
“I’m going back. Stay here and play as long as you like,” I said to the girls, but they were already screaming and laughing their way back down.
Dario gave me his arm. “Join me in the sauna.”
“Good idea,” I said. No amount of effort would make my teeth stop chattering.
Back inside of the lodge and on the spa floor, I disrobed in a dressing room, wrapped a towel around myself, and scurried into the sauna where Dario waited. Two cadets waited outside of the door, presumably guarding me from the thick steam. I took a seat and waited for the warmth to seep into my bones.
“It’s nice to see you enjoying yourself for a change,” Dario said in a relaxed deep voice.
“This has been fun. I only wish Violet had joined us.” I laughed to myself.
“What amuses you?”
“I was just remembering a snowball fight Violet had with Kaoti.”
“The two of them make a good match and bring out the best in each other.” Dario moved closer and took my hand in his. “You are a remarkable female. I was impressed with your performance during the training exercise.”
“Thank you.”
Dario began to lean closer for a kiss, and the door opened letting the heat escape. I suspected that Dario might physically and brutally attack the interloper. The steam cleared enough for me to see the light-brown hair and eyes of Cormac Gordian. He entered the sauna, closed the door, and sat to my left. Cormac wore only a towel around his hips into which a trail of hair disappeared. The word had spread among my Military Advisory Committee that I had a weakness for male chest hair. Therefore, males in the know were no longer having it removed.
“Cormac, what are you doing here?” Dario asked in a tone that belied his rage. “Shouldn’t you be evaluating the cadets?”
“With the exercise complete, I felt a duty to offer assistance to Inquisitor Rovek.”
“How is he?” I asked.
“He continues to improve. He asked that I personally thank you for the flowers and for stepping in to rescue his cadets along with himself.”
“I’m glad we could help. Maybe, now you can call off Cadet Cedrenus and his boys.”
“I have done so. I have brought my own men along to guard you. However, the Empress will arrive by morning,” Cormac responded. “Are you enjoying your stay?”
“Oh, yes! Thank you for treating us!” I laughed. “I don’t think I’ve ever had so much fun.”
The sauna door opened again admitting Sparrow, Tracy, and Terre. They were bubbly with chatter and livened up the room to a considerable extent. It sounded like they were already making plans for the next day.
“Inquisitor Gordian, please allow me to introduce Lady Terre Dacia. Terre has agreed to become one of my Imperial attendants.”
Cormac and Terre bowed their heads to each other. I caught Cormac eyeing Terre’s long dark legs appreciatively and grinned to myself. She was beautiful. Maybe, some of my suitors would pursue her instead. It amused me that males were terrified to cast such glances at Tracy or Sparrow. Their fear of my Omnes Videntes was too deep.
In my mind, I heard Jazon say, “Believe it.”
Laughing silently, I asked Jazon telepathically, “How long before you arrive?”
Zared responded. “In the morning, before your first cup of coffee.”
I did my best to share my joy and happiness with my husbands across the distance. To the ladies, even though I was sure they already knew, I said, “Don’t make any decisive plans for the morning. Our husbands will be arriving. Terre, have you spoken to your mother?”
“Yes, I have. She caught me alone soon after dinner and is no longer cross with me.” Terre gifted us with her tinkling laugh. “She is quite pleased and has begun packing some things for me.”
“We’ve been preparing for a trip to Thalassa. Will you need to do any shopping?” Tracy asked.
“I may need to purchase a few items,” Terre answered.
Sparrow groaned.
“Violet and I will take her. You don’t have to go,” Tracy said.
Cormac said, “You ladies will do me the honor of accompanying me to the Inquisitor Cadets Award ceremony before our departure to Thalassa, I hope.”
Tracy, Sparrow, and I shared looks of disappointment. “Of course,” I replied in an attempt to be gracious. “If you all will excuse me, I believe I will call it a night.”
The girls joined me. I wasn’t sure it was wise to leave Dario and Cormac alone together, but they could work it out between themselves. Cormac deserved whatever he got after all of the intervening he had done with the cadets.
“What was the cause for all of their tension if I may ask?” Terre questioned as we returned to our rooms.
“Both of them want Teagan,” Tracy answered.
“Will you accept either or both?” Terre asked.
I shrugged.
“It was ge
nerous of Inquisitor Gordian to cover the expenses of your stay,” Terre said.
“Yes, it was, but I could easily afford to pay the bill. He pleased me more by allowing our participation in the Inquisitor Cadet training exercise.”
Terre looked surprised. “But, isn’t that only for males?” Now, she seemed downright scandalized.
“Yes, and I don’t think it’s fair or right.”
“But, certainly you realize that our circumstances within the Empire differ from elsewhere. With females being a minority amongst the population, participating in hazardous occupations is detrimental to our survival as a species. Male births exceed female births by at least four to one.”
“I just think some exceptions should be made.”
“Teagan thinks, and I agree, that females should have the same freedom to decide how best to serve the Empire as males do,” Tracy said.
“I know I’m not cut out for it. I learned that years ago when the Galaxic Militia rejected me. However, there may be the odd little girl here and there who dreams of commanding a warship. Well, goodnight.” I escaped into the privacy of my room, took a bath, and went to bed.
Hours later, I had become one with the mattress, but something threatened to pull me from my contented dreams and warm cozy blankets. I grumbled at it and heard a deep chuckle. My face was planted in the pillow, so the sound came from somewhere near my left ear. I felt my warm blankets shift and then felt cold, hairy man legs and feet to either side of me. I woke up and turned toward Yukihyo. His lips claimed mine, and through our empathic bonds, the passionate desires of my Laconian husbands overwhelmed me. I ran my hands up Yukihyo’s thickly muscled arms to his shoulders.
He paused our kiss long enough to ask, “Of what has our Lady Wife fantasized?”
“I believe she yearned for our love, to feel our caresses against her skin, to feel our bodies and minds joined with hers,” Zared answered as he softly ran his fingertips from my left ankle up to my hip.
As he ran his hand back down my leg, he spiraled pleasure through me, spiking my pleasurable endorphin response with his touch. I gasped and then moaned as Yukihyo claimed my breast with his warm mouth. My nipple became a hard pebble that he flicked with his tongue. Taking advantage of my distracted state, Zared moved down my body, pushing the warm covers from the bed.
“Don’t worry, female. We will keep you warm.”
I felt Zared’s long hair tickling my thighs as he positioned himself between them. Then, he found me with his soft lips and warm, wet tongue. Yukihyo captured my mouth with his own muffling the inarticulate cries of pleasure as I made them. Yukihyo’s kisses prevented me from begging to be filled, but with Zared reading my mind and emotions, he knew what I wanted. He removed his tongue from within me and replaced it with something much harder and larger. Yukihyo’s lips left mine, and I panted for air only to end up using it to moan. Zared pushed himself into me and set a hard, fast rhythm. Yukihyo began placing soft kisses along my neck and chuckled as I screamed with the intensity of my release.
I melted into the mattress. Zared’s thrusts became more and more erratic. I could feel his balls slapping against me and chuckled. The sounds I made along with the satisfaction he felt through our bond were his undoing. Slamming into me, Zared filled me with himself. I could feel the hot spurt hitting deep within me, tickling me, and orgasmed again.
“I want my child growing within you,” he said with desperate longing.
His words humbled me. He knew, they both did, what the miscarriage had done to me. It had hurt all of us.
“Lady Wife, will you do that thing, the one with your mouth?” Yukihyo asked with a naughty grin. He laid back against the pillows with his erection standing tall.
Through the pale light seeping in through the curtains, I could just make out the pink and gold streaks filling his eyes. I waited until Zared laid to the side and moved to position myself over Yukihyo’s legs. Then, I licked him from his base to his tip. While his length jerked and bobbed, I licked the pearl of moisture at his tip. Yukihyo fisted his hands in my hair. I knew what he wanted and gave it to him.
“Oh, stars,” Zared said as he watched us.
The mattress shifted, and then I felt him behind me, running his hands up and down the backs of my thighs from where I kneeled on my hands and knees over Yukihyo. As I took him all of the way into my mouth, I felt Zared’s tip at my entrance. I was surprised that he had hardened again so quickly. I gasped around Yukihyo’s shaft at the feeling of steel pushing aside my delicate folds. Never before had he felt so deliciously hard to me. I pulsed around that hardness and shuddered with an intense orgasm brought about just by the feeling of him within me. Zared drove his hips forward, burying himself so deeply that his thighs squeezed against the backs of my own. I sucked hard on Yukihyo as I lifted up to his rim and swallowed.
Yukihyo’s hands tightened in my hair. His eyes were squeezed shut. “Yes, Teagan. Yes.”
Zared began driving himself into me. His thrusts set the pace for my mouth upon Yukihyo. I feared my own pleasure would cause me to leave Yukihyo unsatisfied. I had no sooner had the thought than Zared began spiraling pleasure through me. It passed through me and into Yukihyo. While I sucked hard on him, a loud, uninhibited yell burst from him along with his seed down my throat. Releasing him, I rested my head on his stomach. Zared held my hips and slammed into me with hard feral need. Another orgasm tore through me leaving me weak. He cried out with his second release, filling me yet again. I could hear him panting with exertion as he pulled himself from me.
Before I could collapse, Zared picked me up and laid me beside Yukihyo, my head on his chest where it was supposed to be. He covered us with the blankets and laid beside me. Yukihyo’s heart pounded under my ear.
“Are you alright?” Yukihyo asked.
I squeaked a response, trying not to black out from the pleasure.
“I was talking to Zared,” Yukihyo said.
They both chuckled in a manly fashion. I went back to sleep. Too soon, someone signaled at my door for entry. “No,” I mumbled.
Zared slid from the bed and completely naked walked to the door. Appreciatively, I gazed at the indents to either side of his butt as he walked. Then, I panicked. “Zared! It could be Tracy, Sparrow, or Terre!”
Heedless of my concerns, he opened the door wide. Dario stared at him in surprise. “I brought the Princess coffee,” Dario said.
“How thoughtful. I’m sure she could use it.” Zared took the coffee and closed the door in Dario’s face.
“That wasn’t nice,” I said as I held my hand out for the coffee.
“Neither was his plan in attempting to ignite your passion, but deny you fulfillment until you placed your palm on the marriage contract. Dario will need to be more creative.”
That information silenced me. I drank the coffee before joining my husbands in the shower.
In the restaurant, Drex, Eli, and Cormac each wore unreadable expressions at the table they shared which worried me. Tracy and Jazon sat at a private table for two. Each of them wore sappy expressions and had white sclera surrounding their eyes. Tracy looked tired. Zared chuckled at my thoughts. Sparrow and Xavier were nowhere to be found.
Zared whispered in my ear, “Sparrow had her own fantasies about Xavier in a gondola above the trees.”
I laughed and imagined one of the gondolas swaying dangerously above the tree line. Terre was seated at a table with her parents having a family breakfast before her departure. “Are my babies aboard our ship?”
“Yes,” Yukihyo said.
“Let’s just have breakfast on the Empress. I miss them.”
Yukihyo grinned and kissed my nose.
Out loud, Jazon said, “Don’t worry. We’ll bring Terre and her belongings with us when we return to the ship.”
I smiled at him, waved to everyone, and rode to the land port with Yukihyo and Zared.
Chapter Five
“Mommy!”
“Mommy!”
“Ma!”
I heard all at once from three little voices as I ran with open arms to my babies. We covered each other with kisses. “I love you. I love you. I love you,” I said to each of my children.
“Mommy fly ship,” Niklos stated.
“Yes, it was fun, but I missed you, and your brother and sister.”
“Mommy, show Neema which ship,” my daughter demanded.
I held Peter and followed Neema and Niklos over to the most heavily toy-littered area of flooring where I carefully sat. Neema collected all of their toy ships and transports, lining them out in front of me. I picked up a toy stealth ship. “This one.”
Niklos and Neema each selected a ship and held them up in the air while running around with them. I took Peter to my bedroom and nursed him. Then, everything felt right in my world. Returning to the sitting room with Peter in my arms, I walked to the dining table. Contentment filled me. I realized that I wanted nothing more than to be a good wife and excellent mother. It lessened the regret I felt for having failed the training exercise. I caught Zared, Walter, and Rozz exchanging looks just as I was lifting a big bite of my omelet to my mouth.
“What?”
Zared said, “You didn’t fail.”
“What?” I asked as my fancy artificial heart sped up.
“You, Sparrow, and Tracy succeeded in your mission. The question remains of which teams completed their objectives in the least amount of time.”
“What?” I parroted myself in a higher-pitch.
“What?” Neema mimicked me.
“Wa,” Peter said.
I laughed.
“Mommy finished!” Neema shouted.
“Yes, you never asked Dario to intercede. Eli is quite proud of you,” Zared said.
My cheeks heated with pleasure, and my nose started to tingle.
“Uh, oh,” Neema said. She pressed her palm to my forehead in exasperation, checking to see if I was sick. Her actions made me laugh instead of cry. I wasn’t a failure.
“Is that what you thought?” Zared asked in concern having read my mind.
I nodded and looked at Neema. Then, I smiled at Zared. Yukihyo captured Neema and put her in her chair while Chef caught Niklos. I marveled at how much more civilized my children were during meals after Momma’s influence. Peter fisted his tiny hands in my hair, and I inhaled his sweet baby smell. We had finished breakfast and moved on to the sitting area by the time Drex and Eli joined us. Drex had brought me a bouquet of wild mountain flowers.
The Inquisitors (The Space Merchants Book 6) Page 5