Power of Three

  “I’ll get the lube.” Jim untangled himself from Mai and left the bed, returning a moment later with a towel, condom, and the tube of lube.

  Oh, boy.

  Lately, whenever they tag-teamed her like this, she ended up with a vision of some sort.

  At that point she was so freaking horny, she didn’t care. Having a vision would totally be worth satisfying her sexual frustration.

  Micah pulled her off his cock and on top of him, his hands dropping to her hips. Thrusting up, he buried his cock inside her, holding still and pulling her back down for a scorching kiss.

  “Wait for Jim, baby,” he said. “You wanted to play, so you’re going to get us both.”

  Mai let out a soft whimper of need. Her men knew exactly how to wind her up. Admittedly, she was already mostly wound by the time she woke them. But by tag-teaming her, with one of them in her pussy and one of them in her ass at the same time, it was a guaranteed way to send her into orbit.

  Mai felt the mattress dip behind her as Jim returned and quickly started working lube into her ass. Her clit throbbed as it rubbed against Micah’s body. Jim’s fingers slowly scissored inside her, loosening her and getting her ready to take his cock. It didn’t take long before she heard him rip open the condom pouch, roll it on, and then he pressed the engorged head of his cock against her rim.

  “Okay, babe,” Jim said. “Let’s see if we can’t wear you out.”

  She couldn’t rock back and forth against him, because Micah wrapped his arms around her and tightly held her in place, one hand fisting her hair, his lips slanted across hers.

  As she felt the wonderfully familiar sensation of Jim’s cock stretching and filling her, pressing Micah’s cock against her G-spot, she knew they wouldn’t have any trouble getting her to come like this. Sometimes, it felt like their mating was magick, and maybe it was. This was one of the many reasons, their perfection in bed, their bodies fitting together as if made for each other.

  Once she felt Jim’s thighs pressed against hers, he pulled her body up against his chest and reached around her to find her clit. “Let’s hear you moan, baby.”

  She did.

  * * * *

  At nearly two in the morning, in the dark of the balmy, late-April Florida night, Elain Pardie-Lyall slowly paced around her front yard.

  This was after she’d managed to roll herself off the edge of the bed without hitting the floor. Less than two weeks from her due date, she felt huge.

  Enormous.

  Titanic, except right now that particular word would hit too close to describing how she felt emotionally, and the word cut too hard and deeply into the truth of the matter.

  Pulling on one of her men’s T-shirts, which still hung past her hips even though her baby belly stretched it out tight around her midsection, she grabbed a bathrobe, felt her way into a pair of flip-flops, and shuffled out of the bedroom.

  None of her men had stirred, fortunately.

  Oooh, new skill.

  Her powers were growing at a scary rate. Even she’d admit that. She’d silently envisioned getting out of bed—albeit not very gracefully—without disturbing Ain, Brodey, or Cail.

  Sleep.

  Her three men had gotten little sleep over the last several nights due to a few difficult calvings.

  And now…Elain paced.

  Juju and Bea, their two Labs, looked up at her quizzically from where they each lay sprawled across a couch in the living room when Elain slowly walked from one end of the house to the other and back again. Mai and Micah and Jim were living with BettLynn in their own house, just on the other side of the yard. Elain’s mom and dad were still living with Elain’s little brother, Joss, in the main house until their house was finished.

  And then there was Brighton.

  Elain still didn’t know what her brother-in-law’s deal was. He was older than her triplet men by two years, and Elain’s initial feelings of compassion for the guy were quickly waning.

  Especially since it was obvious he hated her dad, Liam.

  But he was family. Unless or until he did something egregious to warrant Elain asking Ain, Brodey, and Cail to toss him out on his tail, she wasn’t going to be petty.

  I’m part of the fricking Triad. If I can’t have some tolerance for a whackjob brother-in-law who took one too many headers off a horse in his time, then I don’t deserve all these powers.

  Although, Lina had confided in Elain just yesterday, after seeing a dirty look Brighton had shot at Elain’s dad, that Lina thought Elain should start hinting to Brighton that he had outstayed his welcome. Maybe pay for him to get a nice room at a hotel in Arcadia. It wouldn’t be unreasonable, especially since Elain was so close to delivering her baby, to want some privacy.

  Not wanting to make noise that would disturb anyone, Elain walked into the kitchen, closed her eyes, and imagined herself out on the front porch, exactly where she wanted to stand.

  When she felt warmish, muggy air on her skin instead of an air-conditioner set to a comfortable sixty-eight, she knew it’d worked. Opening her eyes, she was, indeed, on the porch.

  “Fuckin’ A,” she softly muttered, smiling.

  She hadn’t yet confided in anyone but Callie that she could do the “poofy” thing, as they called it. She was hoping Mai, who didn’t have much confidence in herself or her powers yet, would figure out how to do it soon, and then Elain could pretend she’d finally figured it out, too. She wanted Mai to try to develop some confidence in her abilities and not feel more overwhelmed than she already did. Give her a Triad “first” in at least one way to help boost her self-esteem.

  Carefully waddling down the stairs, Elain trudged across the dew-covered grass, not caring that her feet were getting wet. Coot and Mina, her two horses, were grazing in the yard. At night, they sometimes closed the gate that led down the driveway and let them freely roam in the yard area instead of turning them loose into one of the pastures on the three-thousand-acre cattle ranch.

  Mina looked up and ambled over to her, nuzzling her.

  “Sorry, no snacks on me.” Coot joined in, and as Elain scratched their foreheads, she realized something. “Hold that thought.” There was a whole bag of fresh carrots in the veggie drawer in the spare fridge in the garage.

  Elain closed her eyes, held out her hands, and imagined a carrot appearing in each one. She no sooner felt that than the horses started nibbling on the carrots, apparently indifferent to her supernatural powers.

  “Good babies,” she whispered, feeding them the treats.

  After the events in Maine, killing Aliah—which Elain still wasn’t sure how they’d done that—Callie giving over her powers to save Mai’s life, and Gigi passing on her powers to occlude the fact that Elain’s adopted son had actually been born a full-blooded cockatrice, Elain knew she needed to follow her gut, her heart.

  Her instincts.

  Yes, she was guilty of overthinking. If she allowed herself to continue to be scared of what and who she was, it was no better than Lina sometimes letting her emotions get out of control and reacting instead of carefully responding.

  “You learn quickly,” Baba Yaga said from behind her.

  Elain didn’t even flinch. “’Bout time you got back.” Elain’s lupine nose picked up a hint of a cologne.

  A man’s cologne, very distinctive and familiar to Elain, which instantly conjured to mind a face she knew too well.

  Elain glanced over her shoulder at the former Immortal, who stood there in her matron form. “So how is Ryan Ausar?”

  Somehow, Elain managed to keep her face frozen and not grin from ear to ear as Baba Yaga frowned, brow furrowing. “How did you—”

  “I could say ‘Seer Says,’ but that’d be a lie. You smell like him. Not enough that you were fucking him, but you two had a drink or”—she sniffed again—“holy crap, how much Jack Daniel’s can you hold, anyway?”

  “More than you, I’m sure. Especially in your condition. Perk of the rank.” The matron aspect crossed he
r arms over her chest. “I’m back. That’s all I wanted to say.”

  “At this time of night?”

  She shrugged. “I was awake and saw you were awake. Motherhood looks good on you.”

  “Thanks. Oh, and no thanks to you, by the way, we kicked some fucking ass a few weeks ago. Saved Lacey’s life and got back another cockatrice spell book.”

  “So Ryan told me. He’s already brought me up to speed. I had sensed massive changes upon my return.” She stepped around Elain and stroked Mina’s neck. “Why did Gigi pass her powers to you?”

  Elain thought she might blush at that dead-on accusation, but even now she realized no, not so much. She wasn’t rattled at all. Maybe it was her baby hormones, maybe it was Gigi’s power flowing through her, she didn’t know.

  “Perhaps you should ask her yourself.”

  Baba Yaga’s eyes narrowed. “I asked you.”

  “Why? Can’t you ‘see’ it?”

  For a moment, Elain wasn’t sure what the woman would do. Then, finally, Baba Yaga let out a soft snort and smiled as she shook her head.

  “Well played. It will take me a while to relinquish my hold. I hope you understand that.”

  “Yeah, I do. And I hope you understand we’ll be bugging the crap out of you on a regular basis until we know that bomb vision Lina had isn’t going to happen.”

  “I would expect you to.” Baba Yaga gave Mina’s coat one last stroke. “Are you upset with me?”

  Elain didn’t need her to connect the dots. She stroked her baby belly. “No. Ain knows who she was in her last life. He’s okay with it and says Brodey and Cail will be, too.”

  “But you haven’t told them yet?”

  “Haven’t exactly had a good opening to broach that conversation yet, no. But they respected Mercedes, regardless of her true identity and parentage, because she volunteered to help and put herself at risk to save Jim. Because she saved Jim, and because that damn cockatrice in Yellowstone caught her scent, she’s dead. She might have been a wolfatrice with evil family, but it was her wolf side who ruled her life when she passed on. We don’t hold her bloodline against her because she fought and overcame it to try to do good.”

  Baba Yaga arched an eyebrow. “Self-serving good.”

  “Doesn’t matter how selfish it was, the end result was still good.” Elain tried not to think about her adopted baby boy, Connor, who was born a cockatrice, but occluded by Gigi to present as a wolf.

  Hopefully, Connor would prove Elain’s theory right in the future, that it was nurture over nature that made the cockatrice evil.

  “I’m glad. Not that she’s dead,” Baba Yaga quickly added. “Sorry. I’m glad that it’s not an issue for you that your baby was Mercedes. If it means anything, she had a good soul. She had paid her karmic debt through her later actions in life. She wasn’t a saint, but she did avoid deliberately doing harm to innocents. Especially to children. The timing was perfect. I couldn’t resist the chance for her to have, for once, a chance at a good life.”

  “You didn’t make me get pregnant, did you?”

  Baba Yaga chuckled. “That I did not do. That is beyond even my powers. But when I realized it was going to happen anyway, I stacked the deck, as it were. I reached into the Ether and gave her a chance.”

  “I wish life could have been different for her. She was trying so hard to make a good life for her baby.”

  “Someone had to die that day to maintain the balance. It was writ in the threads of the Universe’s tapestry. I had no control over that. If not her, then Marston. And had it been Marston, it would most likely have driven her deep into insanity of a dark kind and triggered her vengeance. Marston is imperfect, and his karma is still unclear. From what I know, he bears more light than darkness in him, and for that I cannot argue with the Elders.”

  Elain cocked her head as if she knew who the old bat was talking about, although she filed that nugget of info away for a future chat with Ryan Ausar. “My, that’s all very…reasonable of you. I honestly don’t expect that kind of moderation from you, based upon your past actions.”

  “Free will. It would have been preferable, had Mercedes and Marston been able to raise their child together, to heal together, but that was not how the tapestry was woven. The cockatrice would not be turned. They could have easily deviated from their course. Once again, they chose not to. Unfortunately, that is why they must be destroyed as a race, because they insist on dragging the world into darkness with them.”

  “Why did you leave Earth for a while?”

  “I had errands to run.”

  “Dry cleaning doesn’t take months to pick up.”

  The woman smiled. “Depends on where they are located and how well they press pleats.”

  Elain finally let out a chuckle of her own as she let the horses nuzzle her now-empty palms. “Okay, I get it. If it’s something I need to know, I’ll learn it or you’ll tell me.”

  “Exactly.” The matron hesitated. “I’m glad that you’ve accepted you’re the strongest of the Triad. I’m sorry you have to deal with this burden, and that it doesn’t make it any easier on you. If it’s any comfort, you are up to the task of dealing with this.”

  “Not like I have a choice.”

  “None of us had a choice. I was chosen, then Gigi, then Callie. Our only choice was when to abdicate our positions after the new Triad was in place.”

  “So, question. The old Triad. The one before you three. Callie said it was a while between you and Gigi getting called. That you had different powers and responsibilities. Why is that?”

  Baba Yaga’s gaze took on a faraway look. Elain was expecting a bunch of fortune cookie nonsense, but the Immortal shocked her.

  “Because I was very young, very naive, and had, unfortunately, caught the eye of someone very powerful. But even I will admit he was not a completely irrational or horrible person, despite the myths told about him. My ‘assignment’ basically was what he considered more than fair compensation to reward me for my experience, and what he thought might help me get over being pissed off at him for abandoning me the way he did once he met the woman who became his soul mate. A woman he went on to have legitimate children with. A way to assuage his guilt, as it were.”

  Elain winced. “And who might that person be?” She had no clue about Baba Yaga’s origins and past other than the little tidbits Elain had picked up from her through visions.

  “Oh, he’s had many names over the eons. You will perhaps know him as Hades, although your discretion with that little factoid would be greatly appreciated, especially around Ryan Ausar. It’s a rather touchy subject, and isn’t knowledge everyone possesses.”

  At that, Baba Yaga disappeared, leaving Elain standing there, mouth gaping.

  “Son of a fucking bitch!” she whispered.

  Baba Yaga had been Ryan’s father’s piece of ass way back when?

  “Holy fucking shitballs!”

  Well, that was that. No way in…heh, hell, Elain was getting back to sleep now.

  Not at all.

  And, apparently, neither were Micah, Jim, and Mai. Elain didn’t need anything other than her sensitive wolf hearing to know the triad was getting it on in their house.

  As cranky and huge as Elain now felt, she already knew, despite her men coaxing her into it the other night, that there was very little nookie in her immediate future, until after the burrito was born and she’d had a few weeks to heal and adjust. Dr. Alberto had already warned her that shifters usually healed up faster than humans did, and the average was about three to four weeks.

  Poor Brodey might not like that, but he’d have to suck it up.

  Elain closed her eyes and envisioned herself standing in BettLynn’s nursery.

  As soon as she smelled baby powder, Elain opened her eyes.

  BettLynn lay there, smiling up at her with beautiful emerald-green eyes that looked black in the dim light. She was almost a year and a half old now, slight of frame, and they were still trying to figure out how
her Down syndrome might fully impact her later in life.

  Everyone agreed she was beautiful and, except when she was crankily refusing to shift back from her four-legged state or pitching a tantrum because she was separated from Lina’s sons, George and Luke, a joyful little girl.

  Elain closed her eyes again and mentally turned off the baby monitor in the parents’ bedroom before she turned off the unit in there. Then she scooped up the baby, sighing as a wave of calming peace swept through her.

  It always did when she held BettLynn. How could it not? BettLynn was at peace. A soothing soul to start with, as everyone who’d known Bertholde in life had told her, and now she was reunited with the loves of her previous life in the form of Lina’s twin sons, nicknamed the Beasts.

  Who wouldn’t be happy?

  Elain took a deep breath and let it out as she sank into the glider rocker.

  Oh, little girl. If only you knew how much we all love you.

  Elain was always careful when handling BettLynn in terms of her Seer role. It was one thing to know who BettLynn had been in her former life. Unless something bad was going to happen and Elain needed to be aware of it to try to prevent it, she didn’t want to see…certain things.

  Hell, kids didn’t want to see their parents having sex. The converse was true, and she loved BettLynn and the Beasts as if they were her own children.

  Down the hall, Elain smiled as she heard grunts and squeals.

  Happy. It felt good to feel happy. They’d caught a brief, lucky break. There was still shit going to hit them in the near future, a vision of a nuclear bomb to prevent from becoming reality—

  Elain’s eyes dropped closed as she felt something.

  Not just something…somethings.

  Plural.

  It wasn’t a threat, but it was…odd.

  Maybe it was because of BettLynn’s soothing influence calming her, in addition to Elain’s new powers, courtesy of Gigi. But when Elain looked with her mind’s eye, she realized lucky Mai was enjoying being in the middle of a hunk sandwich, with Micah and Jim. And Micah was…