Page 37 of Where the Current Takes Him (Mermate #1)

Beau

“L oriun’s freaking out.” Beau’s spine hit the counter and he leaned back against the granite, grateful for its support.

“He’s just like Vuos,” Jaime said, shaking his head. “He’ll calm down. Maybe not soon … But eventually. And he’ll be a lot less overbearing for the next one. If you’re planning to have another,” he added hastily.

Beau draped an arm over his belly. He hardly recognized his own body anymore. “When would you say Vuos started relaxing with your first kid?”

Jaime frowned slightly. “Hm… I think somewhere around Maevux’s first birthday.”

“God.” Beau let his head fall backward. “I have another year of him being like this?”

Jaime smiled. “He cares about you. I know we Omegas deserve to be the anxious ones—we’re the ones pushing a kid out our buash —but they feel so out of control.

Alphas like to be able to fix all the problems, but there’s not much they can do to fix pregnancy.

” Jaime jerked one shoulder in a half shrug.

“Being out of control while their mate is hurting drives them nuts.”

“What about after? What makes them nuts after the whole pregnancy thing is over?”

Jaime tapped the apex of Beau’s belly with one finger. “Dads of any species go crazy at first. The protective instinct knocks them right on their ass.”

Beau sighed. “I guess that’s kind of sweet.”

“Trust me. You’ll be a lot less annoyed when you see him cradling that tiny baby.” Jaime heaved a stack of bright orange and red plates into his arms.

“Need help?”

Jaime’s skeptical eye roved across Beau and his imbalanced frame. “You can carry the napkins.”

When the table was set, Vuos raised his voice. “Nuaiash, terrad’uix imin idaso!”

“Babies, come eat dinner?” Beau guessed.

Jaime whistled. “You’re getting the hang of it quick.”

Beau’s heart warmed at the praise, though it may have just been heartburn.

He’d been attending regular Loaish classes and was very pleased to discover that he could understand simple conversations while eavesdropping. Loriun had yet to master the art of gossip and rarely paid attention to what others were saying around him. Beau had vowed to one day break him.

“But isn’t there a word for kids?” Beau asked as Eret, the youngest, entered the room.

“Yes,” Vuos replied, reaching out to tousle his son’s curly black hair. “It is ainuo . But the older ones get irritated when I call them ‘nuaiash’ and it amuses me.”

Jaime shot his mate a look of exasperation. “Eret, did you finish your homework?” he asked his youngest.

“Almost,” Eret said. He was ten, and had just begun fifth grade at the local school. He looked the most human of the siblings, though little speckles of salt and pepper scales dotted his face and body. “I need Reio’s help with math.”

“Why not me?” Jaime teased.

Eret stared back at his jaei with wide, sea green eyes. “You suck at math, Dad.”

Jaime clapped a hand to his chest, an exaggerated expression of pain on his face. “ Suck at math? Me? Never.”

“Last time I let Dad help me with math, I failed my test.” Duion, the second oldest, took up a seat next to his little brother.

He looked like his reio , with coal black fins and a powerful build.

At seventeen, he was nearly fully grown, and had a light dusting of stubble along his jaw.

At his temples, charcoal gray scales glinted in the artificial light.

“You didn’t fail, ” Jaime argued. “It was a fifty five percent!”

“Dad, that is a failing grade.” Duion shook his head and reached for a taco.

Vuos craned his neck to peer around the corner. “Kere, yeirix!”

“Yai terradnei!” a voice snapped back.

Vuos winced. “If you have a girl, be prepared for her teens.”

The fifteen-year-old Omega swept into the room looking sulky.

“Hey, Kere,” Beau said, trying not to sound nervous. Which he was.

“Hey, Beau,” she mumbled, plopping into the chair next to him.

Though she wore a human sundress, her tail waved from beneath the hem.

Her scales were a beautiful shade of sage green and her fins a deep, titanium silver.

Her face could pass for any human girl, if they didn’t look too closely at the fins that curled around the edges of each ear.

Like her brothers, she sported curly black hair, cut into a pixie style.

She gave his enormous belly a sidelong glance. “You look like you’re going to pop.”

“Kere.” Jaime looked mortified.

“No, it’s fine, she’s right.” Beau laughed, rubbing a hand along the protrusion. “I feel like I’m going to pop.”

Duion was already three tacos deep, and the rest of the table hurried to follow suit.

At least the morning sickness is gone, Beau thought, wincing through a particularly violent kick.

Prior to his pregnancy, Beau hadn’t really considered the physical differences between himself and his Alpha.

Now that said Alpha’s child had taken up residence in his ribcage, Beau felt as though it had been an oversight.

“Jaime,” Beau asked casually. “Out of curiosity, how much did your kids weigh at birth?”

“Let’s see.” Jaime swirled a glass of red wine. “Maevux was nine pounds, four ounces.”

Beau stopped chewing.

“Duion was the biggest… eleven pounds, eight ounces.”

Horror bloomed in Beau’s gut.

“Then there was Kere at nine pounds even, and Eret was my smallest at eight pounds, seven ounces.”

Beau braced himself on the table, staring down at his midsection.

“And you… you had natural births for all of them?”

Kere wrinkled her nose. “Do we have to talk about childbirth at the dinner table?”

Jaime hushed her. “Yep, all four natural.”

“How are you… alive?” Beau didn’t mean for it to come out that way, but he also couldn’t fathom how a human, Omega or not, could push out an eleven pound baby without splitting in half.

Laughter erupted around the table.

“I know it doesn’t feel like it now,’ Jaime said, wiping his eyes, “But your body is made to do it. I won’t tell you it doesn’t hurt, because it hurts like hell, but you can do it.”

“You know, I actually don’t think I can.” Beau’s voice pitched up an octave or two.

“I believe… it may be slightly too late for that,” Loriun said.

Jaime shot the teal-scaled Mer a look of delight. “Loriun Kolhn, did you just make a joke?”

“Of all the times for you to discover your sense of humor, now is when you decide to do it?” Beau smacked his mate on the arm. “I’m having a crisis here!”

“Apologies, luae .” Loriun leaned over to kiss his cheek.

Eret made a noise of disgust. “No kissing at the dinner table.”

“Dude, don’t be a baby.” Duion nudged his brother. “How do you think Beau got pregnant?”

Eret looked confused, and Beau wondered whether anyone would notice if he simply crawled under the table. He’d forgotten how skilled teenagers were in the art of humiliation.

“Who would like dessert?” Vuos said loudly. He glared at his older son. The teen raised both hands in surrender, but an unrepentant grin remained plastered on his face.

“You’re gross Dui,” Kere muttered. “Nobody wants to think about that.”

Actually that’s exactly what I want to think about.

Despite his sheer size, there was one benefit to this stage of his pregnancy—Beau was horny all the time.

He’d stopped trying to count how many times he and Loriun had fucked in the last week.

Dr. Enas, embarrassingly, told him it was just an effect of the hormones, but it almost felt like a heat.

Except now, he wasn’t unbearably turned on. He just couldn’t get enough.

He eyed Loriun and, from the look on his mate’s face, he was thinking exactly the same thing.

It took all of Beau’s willpower to remain civilized for the remainder of their dinner. The moment the kids slunk off to their rooms, Beau faked a yawn.

“I’m beat, I think we better—”

“I do not beat you,” Loriun interrupted, outraged.

“ Tired ,” Beau said quickly. “I’m tired, so I think we better get going.”

“Mhmm.” Jaime was giving Beau a look that was far too knowing. “These final weeks are very… tiring.” He grinned lasciviously at his mate. “I remember those times very clearly.”

“Yep, so, uh, thank you for dinner,” Beau said, feeling his face go red. “It was great to see you and the kids and we’ll host next time, okay?”

“Only if you’re not too… tired.”

“Goodnight!” Beau tried and failed to leap to his feet, taking Loriun’s outstretched hand with resignation.

“Night, you two,” Jaime said, snickering. “Make sure you’ve read all those pamphlets before you go to bed. There’s one with ideal… sleeping positions for the third trimester.”

Vuos let out a low chuckle. “Very useful literature.”

Beau was almost certain the flush now reached all the way down his neck.

Loriun, completely oblivious, escorted his mate out the front door and to the muted gold sedan parked in the drive.

“Why are you pink?” he asked.

Beau groaned. “I really need you to start listening for subcontext.”

The Mer cocked his head. “I do not understand. Jaime was recommending a pamphlet on restful sleeping positions after you told him you were tired.”

Beau allowed Loriun to lower him into the passenger seat.

“He wasn’t actually talking about sleeping.

” Loriun closed the door with a snap and strode around the front, giving Beau an eyeful of his Alpha in that fitted, cream linen shirt.

His broad shoulders pushed the seams to their limit and the sides tapered in to highlight his narrow waist.

Beau’s cock stiffened, pressing against the underside of his belly.

God, all it takes is a nice shirt these days…

Loriun slid into the driver’s seat. “If he was not talking about sleeping, then what was he talking about?”

“He was talking about sex positions, Loriun.”

His mate paused. “Positions for your current condition?”

“Yes.”

“Ah.” Loriun reached around behind Beau’s chair and twisted, backing the car from the drive, and forcing Beau to physically fight back a whimper.

Loriun said nothing more until the car was on the main road through the neighborhood.

“Jaime’s knowledge is quite useful,” he said finally, lips curling into a smile. “I am sure we have that pamphlet at home.”