“I am, but no more than I would have been afraid for her back in Ontario. I’d be afraid every day that she’d forget herself and shift in view of someone. Or that I would somehow lose control and expose us both.”
“Sentiments about shifters have changed a lot in the past few years,” she told him. “I know that in the US, poaching is outlawed and every year there are new protected areas popping up.”
“And that’s how humans want it,” he said in a patient tone. “A place for us and a place for them—but they don’t want to share their neighborhoods with us. And frankly, I don’t blame them. We’re ruled by our instincts, we don’t have the inhibitions that allow humans to cohabitate in an egalitarian society. Just look at what Sabine tried to do to you. In her mind, killing you was the ideal solution to reclaiming Erik’s favor. And if you hadn’t been his mate, no one would have faulted her for it, maybe not even Erik.”
Astrid pulled the pelt more tightly around herself. “What exactly was Sabine’s relationship with Erik?”
She had a right to know, given that Sabine had tried to murder her over it. The question had nothing to do with the vague feelings of resentment and jealousy that still curdled in the pit of her stomach.
“It’s as complicated as you’ve likely already deduced,” he said, uncrossing his legs. “Erik killed her father and most of her pack.”
Astrid’s brows shot up. That hadn’t been what she expected. “What, why?”
“It was back in the early days, when he was expanding his borders,” Sten said. “She and Sylvestre were the only ones to escape. They were only kids. They formed a small with another pair of shifters and ultimately sought vengeance on Amarok and Erik. But on their way across the territory, they ran into a bunch of trouble—storm, poachers, starvation. Erik found them holed up in a cave not too far from here, on the brink of death.”
She listened as Sten recounted the story, her mind conjuring images of a younger, but somehow harder and colder Erik, standing before shorter, lankier versions of Sabine, Sylvestre, and their friends. Erik stared at them and they stared back through sunken eyes.
“Sabine told Erik to kill them, and Erik said he didn’t take orders from her, though it didn’t matter, they’d be dead soon anyway. She tried to attack him, but Sylvestre stopped her. He wrapped his arms around her and held her until she stopped struggling, until she started to cry, and then Sylvestre fell to his knees and begged Erik to take them all into his pack.”
Astrid shook her head in disbelief. “How could he do that?”
“You’d have to ask him,” Sten said. “But my guess is that the journey had been a wakeup call. He accepted that he was weak and incapable of protecting the people he cared about. He recognized that Erik could do what he could not.”
She tried to imagine being in their position, but it was impossible. Erik had killed a group of men who’d been entertaining the idea of killing her, he hadn’t killed her family—that would have been unforgivable.
“Wait, so are you saying Sabine tried to kill me to get back at Erik for killing her father?” Astrid asked, remembering how Sabine had fondly reminisced about her sire while on the trip to the pool.
“Perhaps,” Sten said, with a measure of hesitation. “But I don’t think so. I believe Erik meant a great deal to her.”
How?
Her head had begun to throb and the question was far too multifaceted to contemplate. Sten had been right, it was complicated.
“Are you in love with him?”
The question made her tense, and for a split second she expected to look up and see Sabine’s feral green eyes. She could still hear Sabine’s venomous diatribe: ‘You are more important to him than I ever was. I’ve watched the two of you together. I’ve listened to the sounds he makes when he fucks you.’
When she glanced up, there were only Sten’s warm golden eyes, gleaming with an inquisitive spark.
“I barely know him, and all of the things I do know about him are awful. How could I love him?”
Astrid knew how easier it would have been to say no, rather than try to rationalize why she shouldn’t love him. The toxic feeling in her stomach turned into nausea as she considered the implication.
“It’s not love,” she said, her hands clenching her kneecaps. “I’ve been in love, I know what that feels like, and this is completely different. It’s totally physical, and—”
Sten kissed her.
It happened faster than she could perceive, one second he was sitting beside her, watching her, scrutinizing her, and in the next instant, his lips were on hers. They were hot and soft, but unmistakably male. There was no beard stubble to prick at her, irritating the area around her lips, only a smooth expanse of inviting flesh.
Her lips were parted, either from an aborted protest or a sharp intake of breath. His tongue probed along her bottom lip, but he made no attempt to slip past it. His teeth tugged at the plump lip, and her first coherent thought was that he was going to bite her, but he didn’t. It was gentle, teasing, almost friendly.
While his lips danced across hers, Sten brought his hand up to her head. He didn’t tug at her hair or jerk her around. With the backs of his fingers, he tenderly stroked her cheek. His long fingers glided downwards, until his hand was cradling the back of her neck, the pad of his thumb rubbing soothing circles at the base of her skull.
It wasn’t until he pulled back, his offending lips quirked in a mischievous smile, that she realized it had been a very good kiss. It was the kind of light, sensuous play of lips that she often craved from Erik, but the alpha’s brutal mouth always left her delicate lips swollen and bleeding.
Astrid could imagine a parallel universe, one that probably made a lot more sense than this one. There, she was Erik’s slave, forced to endure his harsh and relentless sexual appetite. And after weeks of the alpha’s cruel treatment, she would find herself here, nestled up beside his kind and beautiful brother, savoring a clandestine kiss—the kind of kiss that turned her knees to gelatin and set loose a flock of butterflies in her belly.
But this wasn’t that place. This was the universe where Sten’s achingly perfect kiss made bile rise in her throat, made tears of confusion prick at her eyes, and made her hand clench and unclench as she debated whether to slap him.
Sten gathered her fists up in one big hand and gave her a knowing look.
“I’ll admit, I didn’t do that entirely for your benefit,” he said evenly. “But try not to dwell on it. It didn’t mean anything.”
There was a long pause while Astrid struggled to find the words to express her maelstrom of emotions. But as angry as she was at Sten, the feeling could not hold a candle to the distress she felt over what she now knew.
I’m in love with him. I’m in love with Erik.
The thought looped over and over, like the repetitive chorus of a song she couldn’t get out of her head. She tried to compartmentalize it, to put it in a box, to write the words in sand and watch them get washed away by ocean waves. She couldn’t deal with them, not right now, but they refused to be sidelined.
Sten had returned to his former position on the couch, lounging in casual comfort, as though he hadn’t just flung her into an existential crisis.
“You’re his mate now,” he was saying. “He can’t treat you the way he did before. You have leverage over him.”
“What leverage?” she heard herself ask.
Some part of her had taken charge, a new part of her that had been formed in the wake of Sabine. A part that could act as her calm, collected façade, even while her inner-self was floundering in panic.
“He won’t hurt you. He’ll put you before everyone, whether he wants to or not.”
“Because I’m his mate?” she asked doubtfully.
Sten inclined his head. “I know it seems unlikely, but it’s like the thrall, he won’t be able to control it.”
CHAPTER THIRTY ONE
A new phenomenon in her life was Astrid’s awareness that she was dream
ing. It had begun during the repetitive onslaught of nightmares that had occurred after the attack on the campsite, nightmares that had now been usurped by Sabine, lording over her as Astrid drowned. Only in her nightmares, Ila never came to save her and Astrid never managed to free herself from the death grip of the icy water, because despite knowing that she was dreaming, she was powerless to change anything. In many ways, it made her nightmares all the more terrifying. Until daybreak, she was a hostage, and there was nothing that she could do about it.
Tonight, she didn’t immediately recognize that she was dreaming. She was sitting in Sten’s room, as she did almost every day, in a circle with her “friends.” Halley was braiding the long tuft of hair on the top of Noona’s head. Ila and the other women were staring at Astrid, their lips pressed thin and their faces screwed up as though they’d just bitten into lemons.
She knew she was dreaming when she looked down. Her belly was big and round, not impossibly large, but the cute, shoplifting-a-basketball look that only maternity store mannequins and sitcom mothers-to-be could pull off. Gingerly, she placed a hand right above her puckered belly button and stroked. Something inside of her moved, and she wasn’t sure if it was a baby, or her entire being simply settling into place as a profound sense of contentment washed over her. She looked up at the other women, unable to repress her ear-to-ear grin.
Ila blinked slowly and shook her head. “How many times do I have to tell you? You’re not pregnant, you’re just fat.”
Astrid’s head shot back down, and she saw that Ila was right. The basketball had deflated, and there was nothing except waves of loose cellulite. Astrid brought her hand to her mouth as a low whine escaped.
She heard Pocahontas whisper, “That’s what happens when you start to go through m-e-k-n-o-w-p-a-w-s.”
Halley said, “That’s not how you spell menopause.”
When Astrid looked up again, everything was dark. Faint orange light filtered in through the navy blue walls, and outside, the shadow of a wolf prowled. She was in her tent, the one she’d hauled on her back, through countless kilometers of open tundra.
It was almost a relief to be back at the campsite. At least this nightmare was familiar to her. In a few seconds, she would open her tent flap and step outside. She would see the dismembered corpses of the human men, and would stand, utterly vulnerable, as the wolves closed in on her. Sometimes, Erik would be with them, and he would rip her apart. Sometimes, he’d be watching from a distant hill, and she hoped it wasn’t one of those nights, because they were the worst of all. Those nights, she always felt a thrill of hope when she spotted him. But when she called out to him, he would only gaze back, no flicker of affection or recognition in his blue eyes. And that hurt worse than the teeth ripping apart her flesh.
But once again, the dream was different. Instead of stepping out of her tent and offering herself up to the wolves, she laid back down and zipped herself up in her sleeping bag. The wolf was still prowling outside, and she suddenly knew that it was Sabine, but that the beta bitch couldn’t hurt her, not while she was inside of her tent and her nice, cozy sleeping bag.
She closed her eyes, and had the pleasant thought that maybe if she fell asleep in her dream, she would wake up in real life. Maybe Erik would be back, and he would smell like crisp air, fresh snow, and sunlight. He would kiss her, not like Sten had, but in his own, hungry, frenzied way that spoke volumes. It said the words that she would never hear from him, but that she thought might be lurking somewhere within him: “I love you.”
Outside, a baby began to wail. Astrid bolted up, as though she’d touched a livewire. She crawled over to the flap, and then paused.
It’s just a dream. It’s not real. Lay down, and it will be over soon.
But she couldn’t lie down. She sat with her finger frozen on the zipper, her mind muddled with indecision. The baby’s wailing pitched higher and higher, until it became a terrible scream that made her feel like she was coming apart on a cellular level. Just when she thought she couldn’t take it anymore, the crying abruptly stopped.
Tears were rolling down her cheeks as she unzipped the flap one inch, and then two. She peeked out, her face burning with shame. There was nothing but an expanse of white snow. Then, Sabine came into focus. Astrid’s heart pounded as she waited for her to lunge, but the wolf sat down a few yards away and stared. The silver fur around her muzzle was saturated in blood.
Astrid spent the rest of the night in the tent, no longer certain that she was dreaming. Sabine sat outside, and Astrid knew why the wolf wasn’t attacking. It felt like her heart had been ripped out of her chest, she was sobbing so hard that she could barely breathe, and all she wanted was for Sabine to come in and tear out her neck so that she could either wake up or just be dead, because anything would be better than this.
When she finally did wake up, she wasn’t greeted with relief. The awful feeling still clung to her bones, and now it was accompanied by the worst nausea of her life. She was already throwing up as she pushed aside her covers and sat up. Her sweat-drenched clothes stung her skin as they hit the cold air.
Tears had clogged her eyes, and it wasn’t until she’d emptied the contents of her stomach that she realized she’d thrown up all over the front of Halley’s nightdress. If being covered in vomit bothered Halley, she didn’t show it. She had her small hands on Astrid’s shoulders, her knuckles white as she shook them back and forth with surprising strength.
Astrid was dimly aware of Halley crying her name. She pulled Halley’s hands back from her shoulders and patted them, trying to reassure the little girl.
“I’m okay,” Astrid said, but it was punctuated with another retch. She tried to collect herself, but instead devolved into a fit of dry heaving that left her feeling as though she’d been punched in the gut.
While she struggled to breathe, in a manner that was frighteningly reminiscent of her dream, Halley shifted, her dress tearing off as she dashed from the room. When her fit subsided, Astrid called out for her, but the small wolf was gone.
She lay back down in bed, not because she wanted to go back to sleep, but because she didn’t have the strength to sit up. Not even during the thrall had she felt so drained, and the only time she could remember being so sick was when she’d gotten food poisoning after comfort binging at a questionable buffet. She tried to think of what she’d eaten last, but even as she contemplated the tender slices of semi-cooked meat she’d eaten for dinner, an insidious little voice in the back of her mind was chanting “morning sickness.”
Astrid curled up into a ball and squeezed her eyes shut. She knew that even if she were pregnant, it wouldn’t already be affecting her like this. Doing a mental count in her head, she determined that it had only been nine days since Erik had left. She probably couldn’t have even gotten a blue line on a home pregnancy test, there was no way she was already having morning sickness.
“Get a grip,” she muttered to herself, but just the act of opening her mouth spawned another wave of heaving, this one not so dry. From some god-awful place in her body, yellow, foul-tasting bile shot up to decorate her pillow. The next wave hit her almost immediately, and she was too worn out to look around for something besides bedding to vomit in.
She had no idea how long it lasted, but when it was finally over, she wasn’t alone in the room. Halley had returned, bringing Ila and Snow White with her. They were all naked, and Astrid could tell from the fine mist that rolled off their flesh that they’d recently shifted.
“Is she going to die?” Ila asked Snow White, sounding more curious than anything else.
Halley started to whimper and Snow White patted her on the head.
“I’m fine,” Astrid grumbled, casting Ila a dour look. She caught a flash of disappointment on Ila’s china doll face.
“You’re not fine at all,” Snow White said as she thrust a cup at Astrid. Water sloshed noisily. “You’re dehydrated. It smells like you sweat a lot.”
“And she threw up,” Halley
offered, gnawing at her lip.
Ila grimaced. “That much is abundantly clear.”
Ignoring her, Astrid took the cup, downing its contents in three big gulps. She set it down beside her and then put her hand to her head.
“I also have a horrible headache.”
Astrid started a little as Snow White flung her arms around her, scooping her up in a big hug.
“Aw, it’ll be all right,” Snow White said, petting the back of Astrid’s head.
Astrid was tense for a moment, feeling rather uncomfortable, particularly when Snow White began slowly rocking her back and forth, and humming softly. Halley was quick to pile on, the little girl wrapped her arms around Astrid’s midsection and repeated, “It’ll be all right, Astrid” although she didn’t sound as confident as the older woman.
The weirdness of it all soon faded after that, mostly because Astrid still didn’t have the energy to hold herself up. She leaned into Snow White—no, Malina, that was her name—Malina’s embrace and let herself relax. Once she felt comfortable enough, she allowed herself to ask the question that had been on her mind since she’d woken up.
“Do I… Do I still smell pregnant?”
She had only just barely began to accept that she could be pregnant, and no matter how many times she told herself that things would be much better if she weren’t, Astrid was desperately hoping that the dream had not be prophetic.
It was Ila who answered first, her nose wrinkled. “Of course. You smell even worse today.”
“She doesn’t smell bad,” Halley said. “Well, accept for the sweat and the throw up.”
Astrid hid her smile behind Malina’s shoulders.
I’m pregnant.
The thought was accompanied by minimal excitement, and not because she wasn’t thrilled. The awareness had been bouncing around inside of her for a while, but she was finally allowing her mind to accept what her body had already known.
Enslaved by the Alpha (Shifters of Nunavut Book 2) Page 25
