Page 36

Teddy

Sometimes living with Mori made me feel as if I had two mates instead of one. Neither Othoni or I wanted to hook up with Mori or vice versa but when you live with someone your lives start entwining like any family does. We cooked meals together, hung out in our free time, made plans for the future together, and sometimes when he had nightmares of being kidnapped by shadowy men, he crawled into bed with us and we protected him from his own subconscious.

We watched him like a hawk all the time, waiting for him to fall over because some unknown entity kidnaped him out of his body. That meant I watched both of the omegas like they were mine because I hated to take my eyes off Othoni. He was gorgeous, of course, but my dragon couldn’t stand the thought of Othoni doing any manual labor once we knew for sure he was pregnant. Even with the doctor assuring me that Othoni needed exercise watching him struggle with anything due to his growing belly felt like treason. He was exercising! He was growing a whole baby! I’d like to see Jacob Leem do that.

“Eww! No thank you!”

my dragon said, having a good laugh at the thought. “He’d be such a bitchy pregnant man. His poor mate would never get any rest.”

I laughed too despite the worry nagging at me. Technically, Mori would be delivering our baby. I’d be there and would as needed. We’d call the doctor if we needed to. Othoni had no family history of trouble in labor and delivery but the past still hung over our heads. Both Mori’s carrier and grand carrier had trouble delivering at least one of their babies. Xenos had a c-section and Mori’s grand carrier passed away in childbirth.

I shook my head to rid myself of the thought. Mum said we’d have a baby, and we’d name her Zinnia. I had to believe that she would’ve mentioned something as vital as my mate being in danger. Sometimes carriers had trouble. It happened less and less often with all the new medical advances of recent years, but the past always whispered threatening to return and beat the shit out of all of us again. That was the worry I shared with Mori. It was like one big circle of worry. Mori and I worried about Othoni and the baby and Othoni and I worried about Mori keeling over because they abducted him out of his body.

“We worry about you too,”

Othoni said one afternoon, picking up on my thoughts. “We worry that we’re both worrying you too much. I don’t know if you’ve realized this but we out number you.”

I laughed and he rested his head on my shoulder.

“I’m not the one pregnant nor the one probably destined to be kidnapped, mate,”

I shrugged. “I’m okay. It’s hard to dwell on things and be sad when there’s so much living left to do.”

“Ah, so you’re using our problems to hide your own,”

Othoni teased me.

“I don’t have many problems. Not ones that can be solved anyway. Besides, you won’t be pregnant forever and when our little girl is born is when our real problems will begin. Then we’ll have to worry for the rest of our lives.”

“That’s a long fucking time, mate,”

Othoni smirked.

“It better be,” I nodded.

He traced the outline of my lotus tattoo and wondered if Astral knew anyone who could fix it up for me. Neither of us knew much about tattooing dragons except you needed specialized tools to do it. If you tried using the same tattoo gun as you would on a furry shifter, you’d just break your needle. Not all inks worked on them either.

“Eventually,”

I shrugged.

I wasn’t thrilled about Dern fucking up my tattoo but the flaws definitely told a story. Maybe I’d keep that story for a while. The bullet holes reminded me of what was really important. Baby Raylin, Astral, and Marsin were family. I’d get shot for them all over again if they needed me to.

“Mate, you know he’s gone, right? There’s no more scary old wolves to shoot you. Barry doesn’t believe in guns.”

We both laughed as Mori padded into the living room and flopped down in the recliner. He smelled bored, annoyed, and hungry. He was the hungriest furry shifter I’d ever met.

“Bears eat more than Mori,”

Othoni shrugged.

“Ni eats more than me and that was before he was pregnant,”

Mori shrugged back at him.

“That’s not something I’m embarrassed about. Storing and using magic takes calories and now I’m eating for two. Speaking of, what are we doing for dinner?”

Othoni asked.

“Going out?”

I suggested too comfy to consider getting up and going into the kitchen to cook. I never wanted to leave my mate’s side again and Dern’s couch was way more comfortable than its lumpy appearance led us to believe.

“But out is outside,”

Othoni crinkled up his nose.

“Ah, one of those days,”

I smiled softly.

“I don’t feel like socializing. People keep looking at me. Even when I use the pheromone blocker spray, they look at me because I’m pregnant. They know. It’s annoying. Don’t look at my baby. She’s my baby. Then they’re looking at you and at Mori and then they’re staring at Baby Raylin and I’m positive I’ll have to eat one of them and then I won’t be hungry anymore.”

“All this at one month in? Sheesh. I’m glad he’s your mate and not mine. If my wolf thought everyone was staring at our pup, he might actually ‘atsilv ko’ them,”

Mori sighed. “If you want, I can pick the food up as takeout. I’d offer to make a pot roast but if we were gonna do that we should’ve started hours ago.”

“Pizza?”

I offered.

“Yeah,”

Othoni nodded. “Pizza will do. I gotta shift for a while or I’m going to start licking myself in this form.”

He gave into his jaguar and was a million pounds lighter as soon as he had four paws. At least, that’s what his jaguar sighed over our mating link as he set to work licking his toe beans while Mori and I discussed what to get on the pizza. When that was taken care of I grabbed his brush. He surrendered to the soft bristles of the brush, scratching and soothing away his cat’s irritation. In this form, his pregnancy was twice as evident which meant I gave him twice as many belly rubs.

“It’s hard to imagine our baby is still so small with how poofy your belly is,”

I said, choosing my words carefully. He purred as I stroked his fur with my fingers. Mori watched, his expression unreadable. Was he wondering about our baby? His true-mate? Or his parents back home about to have him another younger sibling? I didn’t ask. We invaded his privacy often enough to keep him from hitting the floor all alone. He deserved to keep some thoughts to himself at least.