“I’m afraid I don’t understand… She is also your mate?” Martin frowned, ticking numbers on his fingers. “But, what about her three mates?”
“Eeeeep, I’m not sure how to explain that… Rach?”
My best friend choked on her spit as I threw her under the bus. But it really wasn’t my place to tell other people about her condition, it was entirely up to her how and what she wanted to say.
Rachel shrugged and tugged part of her shirt up, exposing her birthmark. The one I traced hundreds, thousands of times without realising what it was. What it meant. Now that I stared at the odd shape that fitted perfectly inside of mine, I couldn’t believe how I hadn’t realised. Maybe I hadn’t wanted to believe it.
“There are no three mates for me, I just have the one and that happens to be the most stubborn and strong-willed dragon I’ve ever met.”
“So… It’s Hector?” Martin joked, slapping his friend on the back. Rachel laughed out loud and curled her arm around my waist.
“Oh, you guys have no idea what you’re getting into. This is going to be fun,” she laughed, looking a little less tense than before. They were seemingly taking it well, or at least, so in shock they couldn’t protest yet. Well, there wasn’t anything to protest. Rachel wasn’t optional, I already loved her. If I wanted all three of them, now that was something left to be decided. Although Heccie was adorable, even though he pretended to be a tough guy. And I couldn’t deny I enjoyed the flirting with Martin yesterday. That just left Todd who smelled deliciously like burned cedar wood and was actually surprisingly nice to cuddle, but of course, I wouldn’t tell him that.
“So… One, two, three, four…” I summed up, not sure why they seemed so calm and accepting about it. Fire dragons didn’t have four mates, or five, or two, or one. No, Every fire dragons always had three. Everyone. Except for me, apparently.
“I still don’t see why,” Todd muttered.
“Do the dragon gods ever make things obvious?” Hector asked.
“We don’t have gods,” Todd threw back.
“Exactly. They even made that difficult.”
I stifled a laugh, enjoying their banter and not wanting to remind them of my presence.
“But why is she different? She doesn’t look that special.”
“She’s pretty though,” Martin pointed out. “And a good Realms&Rebels player.”
“Neither of which are life time achievements,” Todd argued.
“Oi! I’m standing right here. Whether you like it or not, all four of you are mated to me. You know, big bonfire dance, lots of sex and eggs. That whole jazz.”
Todd’s cheeks flamed red. That wasn’t the reaction I’d expected from him. All I’d done was…ahhh. Okay then. Maybe he’d been waiting for his mate to come along. Like a lot of us did. Myself included.
“And competing in worldwide tournaments with us?” Hector prompted.
I twisted around so I could see Rachel and took in the bemused smile on her face. Oohhh. Her issue had been jealousy, not me gaming.
Sighing, I turned back to the guys. “Yes, and playing worldwide tournaments with you. But Rachel comes too.” I gave them each a stern look which was completely ruined by Hector fist pumping.
“Lola…I can’t come with you.”
“What? Why not?”
“I have a job, Lola. I can’t just pack up and leave.”
I frowned. Technically, I had to work too, but had the luxury of being able to program from anywhere. I really should thank my friend, Tate, for hooking me up with that one.
“What do you do?” Martin asked, sizing up my woman. If he was any other man, I’d be gouging his eyes out right now. But he was my mate, I knew he only had eyes for me and no other woman.
“Marketing,” Rachel murmured.
“But that’s not what you want to be doing,” Hector observed.
“No, it is…”
“But?” He raised his eyebrow.
I had to admit, I was impressed. I’d never managed to get Rachel this far into a career conversation. She normally avoided them at all costs. Now I felt like a bad friend. Who doesn’t push their bestie to spill the beans? What else had I missed out on by being so wrapped up in other things? Or by avoiding the mating bond I must have at least subconsciously known was there.
“But nothing.” She glanced away and I scowled.
Hector caught my eye and winked. Something inside me uncoiled, as if my dragon knew he’d take care of Rachel too. That was how fire dragons worked. While I was at the centre of all their affections, we were a family. None of them would ever look at Rachel the same way they looked at me. But neither would they look at each other like that. It sounded unfairly skewed in my favour, but I’d take that. It sounded fun in certain respects.
“So…” I prompted, hoping one of them would take the hint and help me determine what we were going to do next.
Not one of them moved a muscle. Great. I guessed this one was on me then.
“So… We’re all okay with the ‘situation’?” I asked, gesturing a circle between the five of us.
“I don’t see why not?” Martin shrugged.
“Depends… If Rachel is one of us, does that mean I can show her the mancave?” Hector grinned, his eyes twinkling in excitement.
My best friend pulled up her nose in a very Rachel-like fashion and I snickered. She was more of a girl than me, there was no way she’d join Hector’s mancave.
“Not a chance in hell,” Rachel snorted, leaving Hector with a disappointed grimace.
“I don’t have any problems with Rachel. You on the other hand…” Todd muttered, sulking in his corner. What was his deal?
I laughed out loud, hard and awkwardly. “Soooo… All good?”
“I guess you two will be staying in the guest room for a bit longer than expected than?” Martin offered. I didn’t know him very well, but I already knew he was the kind type. My mum would love him, he was the perfect son-in-law.
“I still can’t just leave my job,” Rachel interjected, her brows furrowed in worry.
“But you don’t actually like your boss,” I pointed out, hoping to sway her. Even if I hadn’t wanted to meet my mates, now that I found all of them, I didn’t actually want to leave.
“Yes, but I still need money. I can’t just uproot my life, Lola.” She fell down on a chair and softly banged her head down on the table. I jumped to her and quickly took her in my arms.
“Hey, hey. What’s wrong?”
My best friend sobbed softly in my arms and I threw a helpless look at the guys. Even if I hadn’t known them for long, seeking out their help seemed like the right thing to do.
“I’ll make a cup of tea,” Todd sighed, his gaze softening a little as he awkwardly patted Rachel’s shoulder. So he did have manners.
“Rach, talk to me?” I brushed a lock of hair back and gently kissed her cheek. Now that I knew she was my mate, it felt different. More intimate.
“I always thought that the moment you met your mates, I’d have to say goodbye to you. But then we kissed and there were sparks, and magic, and fireworks. All the things you’d expect from a mate. And for a moment, for a stupid moment, I thought I wouldn’t have to leave you. I thought I could stay with you, even after you met your Three,” she ranted, tears streaming silver rivers on her cheek. “And now it turns out, I can’t actually come and it has nothing to do with the matings. Isn’t that ironic?”
“Rach, I’m not staying here without you. I can’t,” I whispered, brushing her tears away.
“But you also can’t leave them. You know you can’t.”
I stared at the three men and while Rach was my best friend and they were just strangers, she was right. I felt the pull, the fire, the heat. Being away from any of them would be excruciatingly painful.
“You could work for me,” Hector interjected, breaking up our moment. I stared at him and a picture of Rachel as a bartender flashed in front of my eyes. In a tank top with a towel swung over her shoulder. Maybe she�
�d spill water over her shirt and the soaked fabric would cling to her body, all wet and…
Stop. We were discussing serious matters. I’d have all the time in the world after to fantasise about Rachel. And make some of that reality.
“I’m horrible at pouring drinks,” my best friend confessed and I had to back her up on that. There was a reason she was spilling water all over herself in my imagination.
“No, not to work in Dragon Soul. I could hire you as my campaign leader!”
“Campaign leader for…?”
Martin slapped his forehead. “Not this again.”
“What again?” I asked, tilting my head to the side.
Hector ran to what I assumed was his room and I caught Rachel’s eye.
“What’s going on?” I mouthed, earning myself a shrug from her.
With a lot of clanging and ruckus, Hector dragged a big banner inside of the living room. I didn’t have to know him well to recognise he had a proud grin on his face and excitement burning in his eyes. Mesmerised, I watched his biceps roll under his shirt as he folded the fabric open and presented us with a big red flame.
“What’s that?” I asked, studying the weird logo.
“HECTOR’S Power Juice! It’s my own brand of protein shakes and drinks,” he cheered, his voice so excited it cracked as if he was going through puberty.
“Put your HPJ stuff away, Hec…” Martin softy kicked the metal part of the banner and shook his head.
“Oh no, are we talking about his power juice again?” Todd asked as he emerged from the kitchen with a tray. Despite his grumpiness, apparently he hadn’t been able to resist making tea for all of us. How adorable.
“Guys, this is going to make us so much money! Everyone will love HPJ!” Hector protested, stroking his banner a little too intimately. I didn’t want to know how much time he spent looking and patting the thing.
“What do you think, Rachel? Want in?”
“Don’t answer, it’s a trap!” Todd whispered as he pushed a mug in her hands. She scratched her head and looked at all of them.
“I can’t actually commit to anything until l I’ve seen the product and heard about your business plans,” she said carefully, clearly not wanting to hurt his feelings.
“I’ll whip you up some Power Juice right now!”
“No, it’s too early for you to stink up the house!’ Todd argued, grabbing Hector’s arm in protest. So it wasn’t just me that Todd had no patience with.
“But I need to show Rachel! Her being able to stay is important to Lola, so it’s important to us. No?” Hector argued.
Todd grumbled under his breath, surely cursing me. But even if he didn’t seem to really like me, he nodded reluctantly. “Just clean up after, yes?”
“Yes, yes. Rachel, come with me! I’ll make you my famous smoothie.” Happily, he tugged my best friend into the kitchen and I could hear him chattering away to her. I hoped he could convince her. While this wasn’t the scenario I imagined that would happen if I figured out who my mates were, the outcome was threatening to be the same as my fears. That I’d have to leave Rach behind.
Nope. Wasn’t going to happen. No way.
A loud gag followed from the other room and I jumped up in concern. What was going on?
Martin shrugged and folded his arms behind his head. “I could’ve told her that would happen.”
An outraged Rachel stormed from the kitchen, smoke curling out of her nose. She spewed white fire at Hector running after her with a red concoction. The blonde clung to my arms and gurgled in my ear. “Save… Me.”
“You don’t like it?” Hector called, waving the drink in my face. A whiff of an unidentified smell brushed past my nose and I involuntarily licked my lips. That looked tasty.
“It’s ghastly!” Rachel cried, wiping her tongue with her shirt.
“But doesn’t it make you want to run?” He turned his head curiously, the muscles rippling under his shirt. How one looked both adorable and excruciatingly handsome was a mystery to me, but he pulled it off.
“Yes, it makes me want to run away from you!”
“Same thing.” Hector shrugged as if it really didn’t make a difference.
“It can’t be that bad?” I half asked, half denied. Rachel liked smoothies. She tried to feed them to me on a regular basis. Something about wanting to make sure my scales stayed nice and shiny. I didn’t need it in my opinion, but that didn’t stop her.
“Oh, it’s bad,” Todd said, a hint of amusement in his voice.
I eyed the glass Hector was holding, noting he hadn’t even taken it out of the smoothie making machine bit.
“May I?”
“Be my guest!” He bounced about with a grin on his face and a mischievous twinkle in his eye. Hector was definitely going to be the light hearted one of my mates. Though given how seriously he’d talked about his new business, he had the capability of thinking about things more deeply. I liked that. It was an attractive quality in a mate.
I took the drink from him and gulped down a couple of mouthfuls before grimacing.
“What the ashes is that?” I exclaimed as Todd snickered and Martin tried to smother a smile.
“Not the most violent reaction you’ve ever had,” Martin teased Hector.
“It’s banana, mango, spinach, ginger and my secret power recipe, including a dash of sulphur,” he listed.
“Sulphur?! You just let me drink sulphur?” I spluttered. Who even did that?
“You wanted to try it,” Hector protested.
“You could have warned me.” I glared at Todd who seemed to be the most against the juice in the first place.
“And missed out on the look on your face? No way.” He chortled slightly after he finished speaking and I narrowed my eyes at him.
Todd looked like the soft spoken and decent sort, not this…this…I didn’t even have a word for what he was being.
“Not very nice,” I muttered.
“My teasing, or Hector’s juice?” Todd responded dryly, only causing me to glare more.
“I think the juice is lovely,” I lied.
“I can work with it,” Rachel butted in. “A few ingredients are going to have to change, but I think we can make it into something viable.”
I stayed quiet. She wasn’t talking to me anyway, and even if I couldn’t see a future in Hector’s juices, if it meant I got to keep Rachel with me then I was all for it.
“All right then, hand your notice in at work, move in here and then we’ll get everything rolling.” Hector clapped his hands together, a gleeful look over taking his face. He looked like a youngling on bonfire night, full of excitement while waiting for the fire to start and the presents to come out.
“It’s not as easy as that,” Rachel protested.
“Isn’t it?” Martin asked. I’d been wondering when he’d pop back up. He’d been very quiet during the whole exchange. “In case the two of you hadn’t noticed, we own a bar. Plus, we’ve designed an exclusive level of Realms&Rebels, we’re not short of money.”
“But I’m not your mate,” Rachel pointed out.
Martin shrugged. “But you are Lola’s. Which makes us family. And the one thing we do is look after family. What is ours is yours, Rachel. Just as much as it’s Lola’s.”
“Except our dicks,” Hector chimed in. “They’re just Lola’s.”
Rachel choked slightly, her face turning bright red. “I wasn’t interested in them anyway,” she murmured, throwing me an uneasy look.
Smugness filled me. Four of them. One of me. This was going to be fun.
“Speaking of family…we need to figure out what we’re going to do at the ceremony,” Martin pointed out.
Oh eeesh. The ceremony.
“I take it you’re twenty-five?” Todd asked.
“Not quite. In a month or so,” I replied. I’d been ignoring my upcoming birthday and what it would mean for me. Coming of age didn’t seem so bad now though.
“Just in time for this year’
s ceremony then,” Martin replied.
“Yes.” It happened at the same time each year, which just happened to coincide with my birth month. I’d always found that a little funny.
“Why are we talking about this now?” Hector whined, drawing out the last word so it lasted far longer than it should have done.
“Because it needs to be talked about,” Martin said. “You don’t seem to put much stock in it yourself, but Mama would disown me if she discovered I was mated and didn’t go.”
I sighed. “We can go.”
If I was honest with myself, I was actually a little intrigued as to what it would entail. I’d always avoided them with Rachel, but a small part of me wanted to know what happened at them.
“Excellent. Do we just own that we have a fifth member of our family?” Martin asked.
“I guess so? I mean, there’s no way of preparing anyone for it, right?” I could just imagine the conversation with my parents now. They were fairly liberal, but even they might be surprised by me bringing home Rachel. I was sure they’d always been a little surprised I stayed friends with her after the revelation.
“There’s no past precedent for it as far as I know,” Todd said.
“Are you some kind of lawyer using such fancy words?” I demanded.
“No, but my dad is, gave me a basic understanding,” he threw back.
“Alright then, we show up, we do our thing and we run out before a scandal hits,” Hector suggested. “Sounds good to me.”
I turned to Rach, worried about how she’d take this. She’d never got an invitation to a ceremony before and I hoped this wouldn’t freak her out too much.
“You okay?” I whispered.
She nodded. “As much as I can be,” she replied.
I reached out and took her hand, giving it a reassuring squeeze. I’d done that countless times over our friendship, but none had meant as much as this one.
10
“I hate moving,” I grumbled, dropping the cardboard box on the floor. I didn’t care what was in it, I had enough of dragging stuff back and forth. Why did we have so much stuff and why did Rachel have to bring it all?
“Just a couple more boxes… until we get to the last row… of more boxes…” Martin muttered, his own voice sounding just as exhausted as mine.
Realms and Rebels: A Paranormal and Fantasy Reverse Harem Collection Page 29
