Power of Three

  Oh.

  Mai had apparently forgotten to take her pill that morning. And she was in her fertile time of the month. This oopsie was going to happen regardless.

  Maybe that was why Baba Yaga had timed her visit so perfectly. Elain wouldn’t put it past her.

  Surrounding the three, with Jim busily pumping away in her friend’s ass and Micah on his back stuffing Mai’s pussy from underneath her, Elain spotted the swirling vortex of souls.

  Waiting.

  Ready.

  The Ether.

  Just as some lucky sperm of Micah’s would get its chance, some lucky soul would also get an opportunity to jump into the baby they were about to create, and get a chance at life.

  That’s when she spotted the familiar energy. Now freed of its tether of the madness that had been his cursed life from before his first breath, the soul that had formerly inhabited a man many would call a monster was now simply awaiting a chance to be reborn like any other soul.

  Instinct. Everyone, from her own men to Baba Bitchy, had told Elain, Lina, and Mai to follow their instincts.

  Elain let her mind drift into the bedroom even as she physically remained seated in the rocking chair with BettLynn nestled in her arms. Her mental fingers plucked that one particular soul from the Ether. And as Mai cried out in pleasure at Micah ordering her to come for him, Elain sensed he, too, was close.

  Why not? If Elain had ended his life, why not give him a new one? A better one?

  A do-over.

  Just like Mercedes was getting.

  One that wouldn’t be fucked up from the start. One where he could even his universal Karmic scale for the better with the nurture part of the equation already settled toward the good.

  Not to mention the private giggle Elain would get knowing that old Rodolfo would have freaked had he’d known he’d be reborn as a wolfote to the very woman he’d tried to have killed.

  Elain shooed the other souls out and closed the doorway to the Ether. She didn’t even know how she knew how to do it.

  She.

  Just.

  Did.

  Must be from Gigi. Then again, Baba Yaga never did things “just because.”

  It didn’t matter. Elain knew this was the right thing to do.

  And then, when she sensed the time was right, Elain envisioned flicking the soul’s energy into Mai, watching as the fertilized egg that had already started its journey to being a baby absorbed the energy.

  Elain opened her eyes and smiled down at BettLynn. “You’re going to have fun being a big sister,” she softly whispered, knowing the three couldn’t hear her. They were too busy recovering.

  Elain also knew from previous practice that not even Micah could sense her there. The same “bubble” she’d pictured around herself to get out of bed without waking her men also kept her disguised from Micah’s sensitive inner wolf radar.

  But she didn’t want to risk being discovered there and have to explain why.

  Mai had wanted another baby. Several more, actually. She’d wanted at least one by Micah and one by Jim, and then however nature distributed them from that point. No, maybe not right now, but with Lina and Elain’s mom living on the property literally within shouting distance, between Elain and the two of them, they’d all babysit for Mai so she could continue her college studies.

  Better they have their children now, Elain suspected, although she didn’t know exactly why.

  Instinct.

  As shifters, they all had longer lifespans. They certainly didn’t need to worry about their biological clocks just yet.

  Elain didn’t have any better answer than she sensed they needed to have them now. The first round of them, at least. Later, perhaps, another round, another generation. That’s what she felt in her gut, maybe more from there even than from her “Seer Says” powers that she still didn’t understand or know the full scope of.

  Elain stood and kissed BettLynn’s forehead before walking back to the crib. Elain gently laid her in the crib and let out a soft sigh of sadness as the feeling of peace disappeared.

  Oops.

  Maybe she shouldn’t have done what she’d just done to Mai, but…too late now. Mai would have gotten pregnant, regardless. That much was clear to Elain.

  At least Elain had control of which soul got the chance. There’d been a couple of dark spots here and there that had also been looking for a home.

  Good to know. She’d have to add that to the list of conversational topics to discuss with Baba Yaga or Ryan Ausar at a future time. She’d thought all souls pretty much started out as “good.” Or at least neutral.

  But if they could start out dark, she wanted to know that.

  Not that she wanted to make a habit of spying on her loved ones doing the dirty in bed, but if she could prevent any “dark energy” souls from gaining a foothold in her loved ones, all the better.

  Elain turned the baby monitors back on and then poofed out into the yard where the horses had started to doze on their feet. She should return to the house, even though she knew she wouldn’t get any more sleep that night. There would likely be a nap in her future that afternoon.

  A Seer’s work is never done.

  She didn’t get any farther than halfway across the yard when she heard the man’s voice, a British accent, softly speak from behind her.

  “So what mischief have you been up to tonight, my dear?”

  Elain stopped. “Not drinking with Baba Yaga, that’s for sure.” She turned.

  There he stood, smirking.

  And she knew he knew exactly what she’d been up to.

  “Got a problem?” she asked.

  Ryan Ausar slowly shook his head, his knowing smile annoying her. Then again, that could have been pregnancy hormones annoying her.

  Even coffee annoyed Elain some mornings now, something she never thought possible.

  She walked over to him, grabbed his arm—

  And poofed them both into the nearby equipment barn, where they could talk without worry of any of the shifters overhearing them, or Micah sensing his presence.

  It satisfied her greatly to register his shock at her display of her newfound powers. “Um…”

  She grinned. “Surprise!”

  * * * *

  Mai lay sprawled across Micah’s chest as she tried to recover. Already, she felt sleep trying to take over, but she didn’t want to forget about the vision she’d had while in the midst of her strongest orgasm with her men, and was trying to remember as much about it as she could to commit it to memory.

  Another of the nuclear bomb visions.

  A vision that left her filled with fear and dread when she realized that only she, Elain, and Lina stood between preventing an apocalypse and that vision coming true.

  I hate this.

  She’d been over the moon happy to meet and mate with Micah and Jim and realize she’d be able to raise her baby safe and loved.

  She’d never expected to become a Seer.

  She dang sure never asked for the responsibility. She barely felt like a competent mother sometimes. How was she supposed to help save the whole freaking world?

  Taking a deep breath, she focused on the mingled scents of Micah and Jim, who were already falling asleep. Being with them always soothed her soul, not just her libido.

  I’ll have to talk with Lina and Elain tomorrow about my vision.

  Still, inside her, she felt a slightly unsettled sensation. Residual tension from the vision? She didn’t know.

  Closing her eyes, she chased after sleep.

  Chapter Three

  It took Ryan a moment to regain his composure once he realized what Elain had done. One eyebrow arched skyward. “How did you do that? I thought you couldn’t transport yourself, much less other people.”

  Elain was pleased to note that Ryan Ausar, head of The Firm—aka the Devil, except that wasn’t even accurate, because he was one of the Universe’s good guys—stood there looking nearly speechless.

  She grinn
ed. “I dunno. I just felt it. That’s what you and everyone keeps telling me, to feel instead of think. Apparently I’m kind of juiced-up now, so to speak.”

  “I guess it’s working for you,” he finally said.

  “Fuckin’ A, it is. About damn time something went my way in this crazy mess.”

  He offered her another smile. “You and I need to schedule some time to speak in depth. Alone. I don’t mean in a barn in the middle of the night, either. I mean a day or so away where we can have an uninterrupted confab, as they say. I’ll even cook for you again. I don’t get to do enough of that. Cook for others, I mean.”

  She patted her huge baby belly with her free hand. “That won’t be possible for a while.”

  “I don’t mind if you bring the baby along.”

  “What about Lina and Mai?”

  “What about them?”

  “They’re part of the Triad.”

  “My dear, we’ve discussed this. They are not a fraction as strong as you are. Not even close. You are the head of the Triad, like it or not. That invitation was for you alone, and includes the burrito, as you call her.”

  Elain thought back to that afternoon in the cave in Maine, to Gigi saying Baba Yaga wouldn’t know about them occluding Connor’s true identity because Baba Yaga had been off-Earth at the time. “There might be things I don’t want…others knowing, when we talk.”

  His expression grew serious. He reached inside his collar with one hand and waved his other hand around while he muttered something in a voice too low even for her sensitive ears to hear. Elain’s hair stood on end for a moment, as if an electrical field had slipped into place around them.

  “When I throw up a barrier,” he explained, “it keeps everyone out to the extent that I wish them kept out. They might be able to sense we’re there, and talking, but they will not be able to ‘hear’ us. Like right now.”

  “Okay.” They walked over and sat on a couple of hay bales. “So what’s up?” she asked. “Why are you here tonight? This morning, I mean.”

  “My dear, when I sense someone playing around in the Ether, I always check it out. Especially when it’s someone so new at it as yourself.”

  She cocked her head at him, the vision of innocence. “Is that what I was doing?”

  He rolled his eyes, something that amused the hell out of her. “Elain, you damn well know what you were doing. Don’t play coy with me. It doesn’t become you.”

  “Hey, look. I’m new to all of this. I keep telling you people we need a 101 handbook or something, but nooo. No one gives us anything but fortune-cookie advice.”

  He took one of those breaths, like Ain sometimes did when Elain could tell he was trying to rein himself in and not be aggravated. “Let’s talk about what you just did.”

  “Do I get a demerit?”

  “It doesn’t work like that, and—”

  “She was going to get pregnant anyway. What’s the harm in stacking the deck?”

  Another of those breaths. “You are walking a very thin line in this regard.”

  “I didn’t mess with their free will. I didn’t make her forget to take her pill, or make her jump her guys’ bones, or make them make love to her. They did that all on their own. It was literally a crapshoot which energy signature—”

  “Soul.”

  “Okay, fine. Which soul made it there first. I keep hearing the phrase ‘free will’ tossed around. Let me reframe the question—where was Rodolfo Abernathy’s free will in the beginning? His mother was taken from him despite the fact that she was a good person and it wasn’t her fault she was part cockatrice. She was mostly wolf. That Seer is the one who told Rodolfo’s father to kill the mother. Then Rodolfo’s father killed Rodolfo’s One, his true mate, and it fractured Rodolfo’s soul. Helped drive him insane. Then that cockatrice bitch threw a spell on him and—”

  “All right, counselor.” Ryan smiled and held his hands up in defeat. “The court accepts your argument and finds you not guilty.”

  A thought occurred to her. “You know I took him out, don’t you? Rodolfo, I mean.”

  He slowly nodded. “I do. Again, that’s something else that pings my attention, as it were. That kind of energy signature. Not just because it was you. There are a few others who are not of your…ilk, who are able to do things like that.”

  She frowned. “What? Who? What ilk?”

  “None of your concern, and of no danger to you or yours. Nothing I need to burden you with at this time. Perhaps at a later date we can start expanding your knowledge, as it were, about those particular characters.”

  She had enough to deal with right then. If she didn’t need to know it now, she was fine with that. “Oh. Okay.”

  “Please understand that I need you to be very mindful of what you do in regards to things like this. Rehoming souls from the Ether. Do not make it a regular habit, as it were. I know it’s rather tempting, but that will only be overlooked by others for so long before they feel the need to step in if you take things…too far.”

  She felt her face heat. “I won’t. It just sort of…happened.”

  “Even more reason for caution. You cannot act impetuously when it comes to souls.”

  “Is that something you can do?”

  He took a deep breath and let it out again, clasping his hands in his lap. “Within the purview of my duties, there are times, yes, when such actions have been…required out of necessity. It is not something I make a regular habit of.

  “Like the Triad, my role is more to keep free will from being usurped, to prevent things from taking over in this realm which have no business being here. The times I’ve been required to do that have simply been a means to an end of keeping that goal in mind. Rest assured that souls always come home. They always find their way to the ones they love and who love them, where they belong. It is rarely necessary for direct intervention.”

  “Can you read my mind?”

  “Not if you do not wish me to. It’s not exactly a power I have, anyway. I can sense certain things in certain people, yes. I can influence things. I can, in some instances, compel the truth from someone. But I am not a Seer.”

  Her gaze narrowed. “You’re lying.”

  An aggravated snort escaped him. “What do you wish me to say, Elain? I am not a Seer, and I don’t even know what the full extent of your powers will be. My abilities are different than yours, even if I can, in some cases, achieve a similar result.”

  “I want a no-bullshit relationship with you is what I freaking want, Ryan. I completely get now why Lina spends most of her time wanting to blow up Baba Yaga after talking to her. If we’re supposed to be on the same side of right and wrong—”

  “It’s not that simple. We’ve discussed this. Dark and light and right and wrong are not mutually exclusive ideals. It’s all shades of grey. It’s all about balance.”

  “Fine. Same management company for teams of different sports. What-the-hell-ever. You know what I mean, so please quit parsing my phrasing.”

  “I just want to make sure we’re perfectly clear.”

  “Don’t freaking lie to me.”

  He studied her for a moment. “I suspect even if I tried you’d call me out, wouldn’t you?”

  “Uh, yah, and probably even more embarrassing to you if I do it in front of others.” She waggled a finger at him. “Which I will. Don’t test me.”

  Another long moment of silence. “There are things I cannot tell you, sometimes.”

  “Great. Just say that. I get it. ‘Seer Says.’ Well, not Seer. It’d be… ‘whatever the hell you are Says.’”

  He grinned. “Not exactly correct. We tend to say ‘home’ instead of ‘hell’ simply because it amuses us.”

  “Is that the royal us?”

  “No, the literal us. The archdemons in particular.”

  “So who gave you dudes the bad press anyway?”

  His expression lost all humor. “Believe you me, if I knew that with any degree of certainty, I would have taken c
are of it a long time ago.”

  * * * *

  They chatted for a while before he finally stood. “You probably should return to your home,” he said. “The others in your household will be awake soon enough, and you don’t want to have to explain smelling like me to your men.”

  She shrugged. “Seer Says.”

  He offered a hand to her to help her up off the hay bale.

  She took it, grunting a little as she got her feet under her and stood. Elain had her arm hooked around Ryan’s, but then a flash of insight hit. She grabbed his hand again with her free hand and clamped down tight, staring into his green eyes as they widened. Shock or fright, she didn’t know, but she also knew he wouldn’t hurt her or stop her.

  Not that he actually could stop her at that point, short of physically prying her hand off his.

  “A baby…” She stared into his eyes, the world around them blinking out and she was standing in a bedroom. Her instincts told her it was Ryan’s condo in Atlanta, even though she didn’t know how she knew that, since she’d never seen the inside of his bedroom.

  Ryan lay in the bed, looking like he’d…well, been to home and back. Severely wounded, but his injuries were healing before her eyes. He was unconscious and being tended to by—

  A woman…

  A naked woman.

  Elain instinctively knew Ryan could see what she was seeing, another reason she didn’t want to let go of him yet, for fear of breaking the connection and losing the vision. Some of it had a bluish tinge, meaning future events. Some of it looked normal, meaning past events.

  “A baby,” she said again. “There’s a baby in your future. I mean in your very near future. A couple of years, at the most. Or less.”

  “What?”

  “A boy…” She cocked her head, both seeing Ryan before her and seeing the bedroom scene, two images laid over each other, like TV channels gone fuzzy and comingled together. “I don’t understand. She is…and she isn’t.”

  “What are you talking about?” Fear tinged his voice.

  And hope.

  “She is…and she isn’t. She was and will be again. And—” A rapid-fire series of images and sensations flowed through Elain, accompanied by the sharp, painful sensation of a steel blade pressed against her throat, not once but twice, as two different people. The first ancient, and—