Then again, me and Ellis were the targets. So if they got to us, the whole issue was solved.
I put water on for tea. What I really wanted was a vat of wine. Or a nice cheap box of it that I could just stick a crazy straw in and go to town. I laughed softly, there was no way I could do that, but I could fantasize if I wanted to.
“When you get here I am drinking wine until I fall down,” I told my belly.
I found my favorite tea. Some herb, lemon concoction with a happy cat on the box. Why a cat was drinking tea, I didn’t know. Though I lived in a town full of shifters, so there you have it. Maybe the cat was actually a nice old lady who wanted a cup of herbal tea with her cookies.
“You are losing your mind, Ruby Sue,” I said to myself.
It used to be Tyler who called me that. Now I used it on myself. My, how things change.
I heard soft noises like people talking. Iris and Tyler again? Just thinking about it made my cheeks burn with things I had seen that I shouldn’t have. Samuel and Bertie? No, this sounded like Madeline. I walked softly down the hall and peeked through the cracked door.
Jeesh. Again.
For a house under attack by murderous men, we sure did fuck a lot. But then again what did warriors do before battle. Eat, drink, be merry, fuck. It was life affirming to feed yourself—body , mind and soul.
Madeline, pretty petite Madeline, was astride Peabody. He looked big in clothes, but without he looked like a small body of land. His broad, hard chest was bare and she had her small hands pressed to it to keep her balance. Her hips moved in some rhythm only she could hear, her breasts falling free, her hair tangled around them. As I watched, Peabody craned his neck and sucked her nipples, one rosy tip and then the other. She tossed her head back, moaning as her hips moved faster and his big hands found the flare of her ass.
I watched Peabody press a thumb to her at the junction where their bodies met. Knowing he’d found her clit by the sound she made, I felt a sympathetic shiver and contraction at the thought of being touched there.
I bit my tongue to keep from breathing hard or being heard.
My heart pounded, my face tingled and I briefly thought of going in to wake Ellis, to beg him to take me.
When Peabody’s hands found her breasts, squeezing and stroking and Madeline began to move side to side, her flat belly—that I envied so in that moment—flexing with the motion, I let out a shuddering breath. And then so did she as she came with a low sound and a shiver. Peabody muttered something, his big body contracting with his own release.
I heard the word lass and then I stepped back into the shadows because my water was surely boiling. Or maybe evaporated at this point.
I poured it over my tea bag, waiting for my body to calm down. Pregnancy hormones were just insane. I was constantly horny, weepy, turned on, irate, frazzled. What would motherhood be like?
I shut my eyes, touching my tea cup for warmth. A vivid flash overtook me and I grabbed the edge of the table. Madeline stacking nails and shards of glass and knives on the steps of a ladder. Slowly and methodically setting these tiny bits of dangerous materials on the metal steps as she worked her way up to the top.
Something fell in the living room space and I opened my eyes, the image evaporating. What the fuck? More whispering. More talking. I tip-toed into the open space in case Madeline and Peabody had moved their affections to a new room. But all I saw was Madeline pacing around talking on a small phone.
I bumped the table with my belly—still not used to that thing—and knocked a small picture frame to the floor
She turned to me, startled, but then smiled. “I’ll call you later, V,” she said.
“I’m sorry,” I whispered. “I heard someone. Couldn’t sleep,” I said, rubbing my belly. “Terrified I’ll wake up the size of my house across the street.”
Speaking of my house across the street that had contained just me and Ellis and what I was sure was our swiftly drying out Christmas tree, God how I missed it.
“I was just calling my best friend from home. She called yesterday to say Merry Christmas but, you know…”
“Killer wolves, dead guys, that kind of stuff?” I snorted.
She smiled wider and my body responded the way it would to a shark. All my wires were crossed, clearly. I was overtired, over-pregnant and over stimulated. I smiled back and pushed the odd vision of her stacking sharp things out of my head.
“Yep, that. But I didn’t want to bother you, Ruby. I’m sorry, you need your rest.”
I laughed. “Like I said, there wasn’t much rest.”
“Did you…” She tossed her head toward the door where Peabody must be sleeping. I felt my cheeks flush but I lied.
“No. I heard…noises. But, just me and my tea,” I said, pointing toward the table. “You want some?”
“I’m good. I think I’m going to go curl up next to a big bear of a guy and sleep.”
“Good luck with that,” I said. “I might put in a movie.”
“You need company?” she asked.
Somehow the offer made me feel claustrophobic. “No thanks. I’m good. You go snuggle up to that man. It’s cold as hell and I have to admit, shifters give good heat.”
She waved to me as she hurried out. I watched her go and when she was gone, I let out a breath that I’d been holding.
Now what the fuck was wrong with me? I was losing my waistline and my mind.
Chapter 23
There was a giant underground worm trying to eat a town. Thank goodness for campy horror flicks. I fell asleep watching the town try to avoid any and all vibrations while also trying to go out of town for help. I dreamt that I kept falling down on my back and Madeline kept putting me upright. I’d fall and she’d set me right. I’d tip and she’d push me up again. I woke to a chorus of hushed voices and rubbed my eyes.
I sat up and looked at the blue screen on the TV where the DVD had popped out.
“Good morning, sunshine,” Iris said. She smiled at me and handed me coffee and a croissant.
I stared at both dumbly.
“Don’t worry, it’s decaf.”
“Doc said a bit of caffeine won’t hurt, but thanks.” I dropped my napkin and bent to get it—only there was something in my way. My gut. I started to groan, loudly.
“Oh, Ruby,” Iris said, her bright eyes darting to the kitchen where my husband was. Surely he could come and deal with the manic, hormonal werewolf baby incubator.
That made me laugh. So there I was, bent over my own lap, groaning, snorting and wishing that this was over just so I would know. What I was. What I would be. If my child would be okay and safe and some kind of warrior.
“I’ve got it, Iris.”
Ellis’s caramel tones hit my ears and I felt better. I sniffled, still hanging over like a broken puppet.
“Little Bird?”
“I’m fat,” I whispered.
His laughter was low and soft and despite my agony, it made me smile. “You are pregnant.”
“Hugely, enormously, accelerating-ly pregnant.”
“And gorgeous.”
“And fat.”
“And stunning.”
“And I should moo.”
“And I want to take you into our bedroom before I go about all the bullshit and craziness of being the Alpha of a town being stalked.”
I looked up at him, the croissant and coffee forgotten. “You do not.”
He cocked an eyebrow at me and my entire body seemed to ripple with want and need. When he looked at me that way—period—I became lustful. When he looked at me that way when I was stuffed to the gills with pregnancy hormones, I became almost crazed with urgency.
“Don’t I?”
I stood. “I don’t care if you’re lying. I’ll be in there in five minutes.”
“Five minutes?” He touched my face and I loved him so much in that moment my chest ached with it.
“I have a person on my bladder. I need to pee.”
“Ah,” he said.<
br />
“And I have puppy breath,” I added.
He shook his head, biting his tongue, no doubt.
“And no,” I said, grabbing his hand and kissing his knuckles. “That is not a werewolf joke.”
“No doubt.”
I rushed to get him alone before he left for the day, surrendering me to being babysat by various other shifters and vamps and humans, oh my! He was sitting on our bed looking far away.
“What?”
“I just realized we have no baby stuff.”
I gnawed my bottom lip, refusing to cry. This crying thing had to end. Truly. I swallowed hard and felt better for it. And Ellis, damn him, started to laugh.
“Ruby, Ruby, that can be fixed. It was just a thought.” He pulled me to the bed and hugged me.
“We will have a naked, hungry, cribless baby,” I sniffed, damn it. I let him kiss me. I opened my mouth willingly to his tongue but my fear raged on. Even as he gently touched me through my nightgown. Three cheers for giant white Little House on the Prairie nightgowns, by the way.
“We won’t.”
“Werewolf social services will come and take our neglected child,” I moaned softly.
“Hush.” He pulled my nightgown up and I raised my arms to let him. We watched my belly get revealed together—for I had been too chicken to look in the bathroom alone.
“Wow,” I said.
“Wow,” he echoed. He took my hand and put it on my belly, covering it with his. We sat that way for a moment, Ellis dropping soft kisses on my cheek, my neck, my shoulder. My breasts were huge and sore and heavily veined, my nipples darker than I remembered them.
He bent his head and took one sensitive nub into his mouth, drawing fiercely on the tip until I felt the ache and tug of it in my pussy. “Don’t do that,” I whispered.
“You don’t like it?” he asked conversationally, moving on to the other nipple.
“I do like it. It almost feels too good,” I said.
“No such thing.”
His fingers found me wet and willing, he drove them in deeply and when he pressed my clitoris with his thumb and curved his fingers against the most swollen tender places inside of me, I came. It surprised us both.
“I take it that feels good, wife,” he said.
“It does.”
There would be no on my back or even on my front. I was awkward and big and for a brief moment I thought I might faint with the fear that the baby was going to come any moment. There was no way the pregnancy had become that accelerated. Right?
“What are you going to do with me?” I snickered as we tried to get it right.
Ellis grinned and shucked his jeans. He pulled off his navy blue hoodie and laid me on my side. “We’ll improvise.” Spooning me from behind, he angled me forward just a touch, lifted my top leg and pressed the head of his warm silken cock to my pussy.
I moved a bit to let him enter. I was so damn wet he slid in effortlessly, his huge hot hand gripping my thigh to hold me open. We had never fucked this way before and it was new and amazing and sexy as hell to feel his warm breath on my neck and watch is fingers flex on my thigh.
“You feel so good, Little Bird. I won't last long. The smell of you, so ripe and sweet, has me out of my mind.”
“You have me pretty out of my own mind right now,” I whispered, moving back to take him in with every thrust of his hips. “But it’s a short trip.”
I almost heard him smile, which was impossible but true. He worked a hand under me, snaking it around my waist to hold my belly, the other hand firmly holding my thigh up. He pulled it a bit higher to spread me wider and I gasped, my orgasm taking my breath and my words.
“I can feel every flicker of your cunt, Ruby. I can feel each little contraction as you come.”
I came again. Dirty talk did me in.
“And again,” he laughed.
I moved forward just a bit, contracting my body into a tight comma so that he could move more forcefully into me. His hand found my hips and my leg dropped, tightening my pussy on his cock. His breath wafted over the back of my neck, feathered into my hair, faster now that he was close.
“I love you, Ellis,” I said, suddenly overwhelmed with emotion and tight throated with feelings. Embarrassing but there it was. “And I am scared to death,” I admitted as he started to move faster. “But…”
A warm pulse of pleasure worked through my insides and I wondered vaguely if I might come again.
“But?” He had paused, rotating his hips but not driving into me.
“But I trust you to take care of me. To keep me safe.” I blurted it out, trying to remember if I’d ever said anything like that to anyone before.
“Oh, Christ, Ruby” he said, his grip tightening.
And then he was moving again and the brief respite had done odd things to me and everything was tight and swollen and ready again. I came when he came, his fingers sinking into my skin and his teeth raking my shoulder before he buried his face in my hair.
“Four?” he asked, brushing my hair out of my eyes. We remained spooned. He was still in me, though growing soft. I always felt a small sense of loss when he slipped free of me.
“Four. I guess hormones make me a slut.”
“Your heart is still beating fast, “he said. “You’re still scared.”
“I am.”
“I know what will help you calm down,” he said as his body started to undulate and flicker.
And that’s how I drifted off for a tiny cat nap, pressed naked to a pristine white wolf. I stroked Ellis’s fur like a security blanket, felt the heat bake off of him, listened to his rapid peaceful breath and nuzzled him. I only got to sleep for about 15 minutes. But it was the calmest 15 minutes I’d had all week.
Then the knock came.
* * * *
“We have a problem.”
Tyler’s jaw was set and he was twirling one lock of dark brown hair around his finger over and over. The way he did when he was anxious or pissed.
I’d thrown my nightgown back on and one of Ellis’s checkered shirts over it. “What’s the problem?”
My stomach dropped and then rolled. I felt ill. My mind was a swirl of red and black and white noise exploded in my ears. I sat down hard on the edge of the bed and Ellis put a calm hand on the crown of my head. “Shh,” he said.
“There’s been a murder by the town line. One of yours. But whoever called it in said that there were a lot of them and that—and this can’t be right—there was at least one vampire with them.”
Ellis frowned. “I know why you’re here. Why would any other vampire be here?”
Tyler shrugged. He came in and shut the door behind him with a nearly inaudible snick.
“I have no idea. But something has my funny bone singing grand opera. Something is stinky in this scenario.”
Hearing Tyler say that made the fear in me worse. I gripped big chunks of the bedspread with my hands and squeezed.
“Everyone come together or do we split up?” Ellis asked, already thinking tactically.
I could see he’d made up his mind what needed to be done, this was a courtesy to Tyler. A man to man kind of deal.
“I say we all go, strength in numbers.”
My belly bunched and I gasped, holding it in my hands like a separate part of myself.
Ellis rushed toward me. “Ruby?”
“It’s fine, it’s fine. I don’t think it’s real. I think it’s stress. What did Doc call them?”
“Braxton Hicks contractions,” Tyler said without thinking.
“What?”
“Hey, I dated an OBGYN once,” he said, shrugging.
“Dated is a funny word for what you did to that OBGYN,” I laughed and then rubbed my belly.
Tyler winked. “What about Ruby Sue? She can’t be running all around in the snow in a pack of killers with a baby on board.”
Ellis studied me. I could see that he didn’t want to leave me at all. Let alone pregnant.
Anothe
r knock.
“Grand Central Station!” I called, trying to sound light and amused.
The door opened and Samuel said, “What’s the verdict?”
“We think we all should go, since everyone here is in the know. Some of you would recognize the man who was here, Tyler might know the vampire that’s been reported and the whole lot of us think the whole thing stinks.” Ellis frowned.
They were all talking it over, but the air in the room was urgency. I could feel it as palpably as the false labor contractions in my belly. Thank God Doc had given us a pseudo crash course in all things baby and delivery, because it was flying fast at an insane rate.
I took his hand, squeezed it. “What do you think, Little Bird?” he asked.
“I think you should all go, kick their asses and take no prisoners.”
“What about you?”
Our bedroom doorway was crowded with people, but the way he looked at me, we were the only two alive in that moment.
“I can stay with her,” Madeline said.
We all stared and I caught an odd look on Samuel’s face and then it was gone.
“That’s fine. See that, I won’t be alone.” I smiled at Ellis. It was meant to be reassuring, but was more like a death rictus. Or so it felt. “She is mean with a shotgun, FYI.”
Madeline laughed and then I shooed them all away. I caught Samuel lingering and waved him in. Ellis had gone to put on his boots and find his coat. Not that the man needed one, he was like a furnace.
“What’s up?”
“I just have this feeling is all. It’s all around you—swirling–but I can’t pin it down,” he said.
“What kind of feeling?”
“Something’s off. But I’m not privy.” His kind face was somber.
“Why not?” I tugged the shirt around me, smoothing the white nightgown over my legs. I should get dressed soon. I was getting cold. Then again, what was the point and what would I wear? Before I knew it, I’d be dressing entirely in Ellis’s clothes!
“Because you are sensitive now, Ruby. And you’re getting the information. Which means it’s done and done. No need for me to know. But I do know that I feel an oddity around you.”
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