Page 8 of Cathmoir’s Sons (Bad Boys of Bevington #5)

Chapter 8

Kittering

LAW

I f the last few weeks have been hell, then the past day has been heaven.

Every hour I spend with my mate, the better I understand her, the more I feel for her, the harder I fall for her. In all the years I’ve known about our fated mate, all of the dreams I’ve had about her, all the plans I’ve made for our life together, I never imagined I’d love her so much. I knew from Luca’s research she was someone whose spirit I’d admire. I knew I’d be drawn to her physically from watching fated mates like my parents who still have trouble keeping their hands off each other. But how could I have known she’d be so fierce? So determined?

I never imagined I’d kneel at anyone’s feet. I am Cait. But as Caileán climbs into Luca’s bed, already naked and wrapped around Luca’s human, I’m happy to kneel on the edge of the bed. When she stretches her legs out, I capture her ankle and draw her foot into my lap.

She lifts her head from the human’s shoulder and looks at me. “My love?”

I stroke my thumbs up her instep.

She shivers. She blinks at me with heavy eyelids.

“I’ve never known the kind of pleasure you gave me last night. Let me take care of you. I’ve missed doting on you.”

She curls forward and cups my face. “I’ll never say no to doting. But I owe you many nights of pleasure for the pain my unawakened self has caused you.”

I tip my head so I can kiss her fingertips. “I don’t remember a second of it.”

Luca, who has crept into the bed and curled on Caileán’s other side, scoffs. “We do.”

“Were you sitting in the snow until your toe pads froze?” I grumble.

“Maybe the frostbite damaged your memory,” my twin grumbles back at me. “It certainly seems to have impaired your strategic abilities.”

I bare my fangs at him. “What the fuck does that mean?”

“It means,” Rhodes says, pressing kisses up Caileán’s neck, “that it’s been days since the Holly King showed up at your door and we still don’t have a plan to get Kellan back.”

“Trophy houses.” Caileán’s voice is breathy. More because of the attention I’m giving her foot than the human’s kisses, I’m sure.

“I should take Kellan back to the Trophy House? I can do that.”

Caileán shakes her head. “Remember that night? It was your first date. That was meaningful to me—to share a first with you. We communicated openly. You revealed an important part of your life and your culture. Those are things I value. You involved me in one of your personal rituals. That made me feel loved. Important.” She curls her arm around Rhodes’ neck. “What I missed most about Rhodes when we separated wasn’t the physical affection. It was not having someone to share the small moments with. You all know my unawakened self well. You’ve spent time with me. You know how lonely I’ve been. Show me I’m an essential part of your lives. That’s what will win me back.”

“I can do that?—”

“And be prepared to wait.”

I snap my mouth shut. I’m not prepared to wait.

“Relay, not a dash,” Rhodes says, kissing his way up to her ear.

“Marathon, not a sprint,” I tell the useless human, who can’t even get his own cultural references right. “I understand that. But you also told me that nothing was certain and to remind you not to waste a minute.”

Caileán smiles cryptically. “Both of those things can be true, my love.”

I smile back a little grudgingly. They seem mutually exclusive to me. But I bow to my mate’s wisdom. She knows her own self the best. I immediately see the possibilities in wooing Kellan with points of connection. Beyond winning her forgiveness, I never want my mate to feel alone in the world. She has me now. Us now. She’s not alone. She should always feel surrounded and loved by her mates. As appealing as the idea of asking her for a kiss every day until she bends and gives in is, I see the wisdom of seeking a deeper path.

When Rhodes turns Caileán around so he can press kisses down her sweetly curved back, I put those thoughts aside. Whatever the future holds, my mate is here with me, now, filling the air with her soft sighs and the heady scent of her warming skin. I catch her other foot and draw her legs across mine, stroking my fingertips from ankle to calf and grinning at the goosebumps that feather her skin despite the room’s comfortable warmth.

As Rhodes and Luca flank Caileán and tip her back between them, I follow the path of my fingertips with kisses. Her skin’s softer and sleeker than the feathers of her cloak. I’ve sampled hundreds of tastes, but nothing’s better than the flavor of her skin: the perfect blend of salt and musk, rain-washed freshness, a warm breeze through forest pines, and the faintest copper. When I lick the sensitive spot behind her knee to feel her shiver, I discover a floral tang. Has she tucked a bit of perfume in this gentle curve to tantalize her mates? Hoping she has, I nibble until I draw a gasp out of her, which sneaks around the seal of Luca’s mouth.

While Rhodes and Luca cup her breasts and tease her nipples, I walk my fingers up the curve of her inner thigh. She shifts restlessly, pushing her legs against the heavy limbs framing hers. The skin of her inner thigh is so soft, so delicate. It begs for my teeth. As my fingers sneak into the apex of her thighs, I heed her skin’s call and sink my fangs in until hot, rich copper spills across my tongue.

More sweet gasps from above and a questing touch: the faintest prickle of claws creep across my scalp. I reach up and find her hand, squeeze her slender fingers, and draw her hand down to join mine in exploring her wetness.

As I move up, she moves down. She dabs a fingertip in the wound I’ve left on her thigh, smearing crimson over her pale skin. She slips the fingertip across my forehead, leaving behind a glyph that cools on my skin. Her fingers return to the wound.

I position myself across her thighs, letting them frame my chest. I run my hands under her, fill my hands with warm, yielding roundness, and lift until her body opens to me. She raises her bitten leg, pulling her knee up to her chest. Rhodes’ hand rises from her breast to stroke her knee. She nudges my shoulder with her toes and I turn my head to lick her ankle. She laughs softly against Luca’s lips before draping her leg over my shoulder.

I blow a warm breath over the gleaming skin spread before me. Magick rises in a swirl, pearlescent against her body, scattered with tiny drops of blood that gleam like rubies. I catch each drop on my tongue and lick it into her slit.

Energy surges, hotter than the August sun, biting with fangs sharper than my own. Above me, Rhodes and Luca grunt. Luca’s magic slips in and around Caileán’s, a cold breeze that does nothing to dry the sweat on my skin. Rhodes’ power rolls in behind Luca’s: a crash of heavy surf, drenching the air with the smell of brine. My Element rises in response to its opposite. Tiny blue flames dance across the skin of the queen spread between us.

Rhodes runs his hand across Caileán’s belly. He turns his hand over so the blue flame spirals across his skin. Small red blotches rise in the flame’s wake. Our Water and Fire will never coexist comfortably, but Rhodes seems unconcerned by the small burns. He shakes his hand to snuff the flame and his skin shades back to its usual hue. A small price to pay for touching the heart of Fire.

Rhodes shifts, wrapping his arm around Caileán’s middle. He pulls her tightly against him, trapping my hand between their bodies. I wait to see if he’ll push me away. He doesn’t. He shifts again: a rolling motion much like the tide of his power. Brine rises again to tease my nose, this time heavy with his body’s musk.

“Put me in her,” Rhodes says, his voice deeper than I’ve ever heard it.

I slide my hand free, reach under Caileán, find his shaft, and notch it against her opening. Perhaps I should be disgusted by his request. Perhaps I should feel indignant being ordered to handle my brother’s lover intimately. None of those emotions register. I only feel gratitude in this moment: to be here with my mate, to be included in the love she shares with her consorts, to be branded with what I can feel is her sigil on my forehead.

As Rhodes pushes slowly into her and I lower my mouth to lick at the delicate tissue that stretches around him, she reaches up and draws the same shape on Rhodes’ forehead.

As he moves in her, as her body arches against my mouth, she draws her sigil on Luca’s forehead and then her own.

As their breathing rises to fast, thick pants, as Caileán’s tang fills my mouth, the power crashes and roars around us. It pulls me in, rolls me over and over as though I’m being tumbled by waves, buoys me up until I’m weightless and floating on a rising draft of pleasure, and slowly incinerates me with bliss.

I rest my cheek against Caileán’s thigh and drink in the mingled scents of our bodies. The bedding beneath me is wet with my release. Luca’s is spattered across Caileán’s belly. She drags her fingers through it and raises them to Rhodes’ mouth in offering.

In a damp tangle of satiation, I drift, stroking my mate’s sweet skin.

Jostling wakes me sometime after the moon’s set and I no longer feel it’s faint pull in my heart. Luca’s sandwiched between Rhodes and Caileán, the three of them rocking together as one. Luca’s head’s thrown back on Rhodes’ shoulder, a rim of blood on his lips, gasping with pleasure.

I slide up behind Caileán and join their knot of limbs and skin. I lick up her spine, glorying in the salt of her exertions. Unsure of whether she’ll welcome me as Luca is welcoming Rhodes, I slot my cock into the warm valley between her buttocks and rock with them, providing a bedrock for Caileán to move against. She draws my hand over her to settle on her breast. My grip anchors her even further and their movements grow frenzied. Luca howls first, a long wail of abandon as he’s overcome by sensation. Rhodes follows in a series of grunts so deep they could be echoing up from the Mother’s own womb.

That leaves my mate unsatisfied. Once Luca slowly withdraws, stroking Caileán’s face reverently, I draw her hips back against mine and replace my brother in her body. She reaches back, her hand clasping at my nape, that sensitive and evocative place for cats. I slide my hand up her chest and tease her throat with my own fingers. As we find our rhythm, so familiar from the many nights she mounted me in her sleep, I squeeze gently. Never enough to stop her breath. Just enough to send her head spinning as her body slips away from her control and into mine. I change our pace thrust by thrust until she’s writhing wildly, impaling herself on me over and over. I sink my fangs into the soft curve between shoulder and neck, knowing the pain will heighten her pleasure.

She screams, as beautiful a sound as I’ve ever heard from my mate. I lick the wound I’ve made, nuzzling desperately, as my body boils over and I fill her. I hang in that moment, suspended by pleasure, utterly fulfilled. I wrap my arms around Caileán, and she tucks herself as tightly against me as its possible to be, my flesh clasping her flesh, my bones wound tight around her bones. Magic dances between us as much a part of me as a part of her.

We are one.

Caileán stretches and I wake out of a blissful doze. I’m curled around her back as she lies with her head cushioned on Luca’s shoulder. She yawns and rolls over to face me, her skin tacky against mine.

She looks exhausted. The brilliant blue glow of her eyes is dim. Deep shadows underscore the faint glow. I stroke her cheek.

“Didn’t you sleep?”

She folds her arm under her head. “I didn’t dare. If I awoke without my full memories, I’d think you kidnapped me or something worse.”

“I’d have stayed up with you if I’d known.”

She gives me a weary smile. “I know, my love. You need rest. You all do. You and Rhodrhi are still recovering. Luca’s lost sleep worrying. Besides, I wanted to savor these moments with the three of you. I don’t know how long it will be before I can be with you like this again.”

I catch her free hand, fold it in mine, and kiss her knuckles. “I’ll find a way to make it sooner than later.”

She draws our joined hands down to her soft belly. “You most of all must be both patient and persistent, my love. Your seed has taken root here. My unawakened self doesn’t know yet but will realize when my menses don’t come. Rage and hormones are a poisonous brew. Never, ever forget that no matter how angry or hurt I am, that I love you with everything that’s in me.”

My mind stutters when she says my seed’s taken root. I hear nothing beyond that.

“You’re kittering?” I whisper in wonder.

“I am. A harvest baby.”

She blurs in my sight; I blink rapidly to focus on her.

“A harvest baby,” I repeat, my mind doing wild loops. I didn’t think I could be happier than I was when I fell asleep. But now my chest is exploding with a wild emotion I have no name for.

“When Rhodes wakes, you can ask him whether it’s a boy or a girl.”

I shake my head. “I don’t care. Caileán, a kit! A kit already.”

She laughs softly, untangling our hands and pressing her fingertips to my mouth. It’s too late for that. My shout’s woken my twin and the human. They grumble sleepily.

“Who’s dying now?” Luca grumbles.

“No one’s dying. We’re living. All five of us,” I whoop.

“Five?” Rhodes murmurs sleepily. His hand slides over Luca, finds Caileán’s skin, and spreads across her belly. “Oh! Five.”

“Boy or girl?” Caileán asks.

“No,” I say quickly. “I want to be surprised. You can find out when I’m not around.”

“I’ll wait.” Caileán smiles slyly. “Or maybe I won’t, and I just won’t tell you.”

“Minx.”

“Cait,” she replies.

“Are we really having a baby?” I ask, still not quite able to believe it.

“We are.”

Despite how tired she is, Caileán beams at me.