“I’m nearly done, have some coffee.” She pushed away from him reluctantly. “This kitchen is a dream, I love it. Maybe I can do something like baking muffins and cakes and selling them. I always wanted to do that, but—” She stopped suddenly and felt the pain of how disappointed her parents would be if she didn’t follow their dream.
“As long as we get to test all the products,” Dane said, as he headed for the coffeepot.
He poured a coffee then came over to Melanie and kissed the back of her neck, over his mark. “Good morning, little one, you’ve been busy I see.”
“Good morning, Dane.” Melanie could only get the words out in a small voice. She couldn’t believe she would abandon her parents’ dream so quickly. What had come over her?
Cooper and Finn filed into the kitchen and made straight for Melanie. She had turned her back on them and was trying to pull herself together.
“Good morning,” they both said as they leaned down and kissed their marks on the sides of her neck.
“Good morning. Please get a drink and sit down. I am ready to dish up.” She had found her voice again and was determined to not ruin their first breakfast together.
Melanie watched them all fix their coffee, four blacks no sugar, which was easy for her to remember. She placed the platters on the table—scrambled eggs, bacon, pancakes, sausages, and blueberry muffins. She so hoped that they liked it.
All was quiet as they ate, just nods of approval and smiles at her. They ate like they had never eaten before.
“You guys eat so much, how come you aren’t fat?” Melanie blurted out, true to form on her lack of verbal filtering.
They all laughed. Cooper swept her onto his lap as she walked by with the coffeepot.
“It’s the shifter genes, angel. We need massive energy reserves to shift, then we run for miles once shifted, so we burn up any excess we may have consumed. Plus all the sex we had yesterday has left us seriously depleted.”
Melanie blushed, but enjoyed their light banter about all the sex. She was hoping they didn’t think she was a sex maniac.
“I will feed you if it means more sex. I can’t seem to get enough of you all.” She smiled up at him happily.
“The mating bond is driving us at the moment, but if our parents are anything to go by, it won’t wane in the next eighty years at least,” Finn said as he kissed her head and got up to clear the table.
“Really, your mom and dad still, well, they are still very active… sexually?” Melanie was just too curious to be polite and not ask.
Cooper answered her question as he nibbled on her ear. “Our dads and mom spend a lot of time reinforcing their mating bond.”
“Your dads?” Melanie asked. “Your mom has more than one mate, too?” This was great news. She would have someone to talk to who lived a ménage lifestyle.
“We have three dads, all brothers. It is common for Alphas of our race to share a mate. We would like to have them meet you. Is tonight too soon for you?” Finn asked with such a hopeful look on his face that Melanie would not have been able to turn him down.
“Of course, I would love to meet them, but I don’t really think one of your T-shirts is going to be appropriate attire.”
“To the business of the day it is.” Finn picked her up and kissed her soundly, making her tingle all the way to her toes. He sat her gently on the table.
“Cooper is about to go on patrol, Hunter has to go to work, and I have pride business in town. I will pick up the food for tonight’s meal and bring you in some clothes to last until we can get yours here. Dane will be here with you and he will guard you as well as show you around the house and property. Don’t go too far, Dane, not until we are sure it is safe.”
“Done,” stated Dane, coming and sitting next to Melanie and enfolding her in a one-armed embrace.
They said their good-byes and Melanie was feeling very lost as she got up and began to stack the dishwasher. She gave herself a mental shake. She was used to being alone. The thought of being here without three of her mates should not be making her sad.
Chapter 17
Dane didn’t miss the look of sadness on Melanie’s face as his brothers left for the day. He knew they must have felt awful for putting that look there, but they really had to get things done. Fucking Melanie could not be their full-time jobs, as much as he knew they all wanted it to be. So he decided to keep her busy all day. The mating heat was making it hard for her, but he would help her, starting now.
He slid quietly up behind her at the sink and wrapped her in his arms. “Ahh, you feel so good here in my arms, in our home. I never imagined it would feel like this. If I’d known, I would have been out scouring the county looking for you, my little one.”
“Thank you, Dane. I never knew either that I could feel like this. I was resigned to being alone until I died, or becoming a ‘crazy cat lady’ at best.” She melted back against him, feeling so right.
“I just watched Cooper walk onto the porch, naked, I might add, and poof, he leapt off as a huge mountain lion and was gone in a blur. Does it hurt?”
“No, it just feels like letting the other part of you free. It’s a release, and it feels wonderful to run as a cat. We call it shifting, too, by the way, not ‘poofing.’” He kissed her head.
“Sorry, but it was magical to me. I’m glad it doesn’t hurt you. I have a lot to learn don’t I?”
“Yes, and a very long time to learn it. Don’t fret, my darling, we will all be here to help you.” She stiffened in his arms and turned to face him.
“That sounded nice, Dane, can I call you ‘darling,’ too?”
“You can call me anything but pretty.” He laughed and kissed her soundly. “Now, we have some of my mother’s clothes here. They will be a little big, but you can’t explore the property in that T-shirt. Let’s get you dressed and we can go riding.”
“Horse riding? You have horses? I haven’t ridden in years, but I love it,” Melanie gushed.
Dane led her to a laundry room off the kitchen and they found some of his mother’s clothes that would do. He had thought his mother was small, but they still needed to fold up legs of trousers and sleeves of shirts and coats many times so Melanie could function in them. The boots were hopeless. She just walked out of them. So several pairs of thick socks were used, and he would have to carry her everywhere—not a bad thing at all.
“What size shoe are you, little one? No way will Finn guess your shoe size correctly.”
“I’m a four and a half, it’s embarrassing. I have to get them in the kids department. But I get to have cute sneakers.” She looked sad again. He would fix that.
“Pink cowboy boots it is. You will look sexy.” He was so pleased to see her face light up again. He called Finn and relayed her size and the idea of the pink boots.
He lifted Melanie up to stand on the table and presented his back to her. “Come on, hop up. Let’s show you around your new home and then we can go for that ride.”
* * * *
Dane was being very sweet and she would not let him see how sad she was to see his brothers leave for the day. She didn’t want him to feel he wasn’t enough. She was being ridiculous anyway. She was used to being totally alone. Having one person with her was a bonus. So Melanie decided to suck it up. It wasn’t hard. Dane was really a great guy, and easy on the eyes, too.
It had been a revelation to see Cooper shift, even though she knew they all did it. This really was a strange new world she had entered. She was loving it, and them, but she wouldn’t say it out loud. They would run a mile.
The house was huge, with the big open kitchen and living area that she had seen last night. The laundry room, and a storeroom were downstairs, too. The house had a wide wraparound deck, giving 360-degree views of the property. The area close to the house was neatly trimmed grass, leading to an inground pool that was covered for the winter, but would be amazing in the summer, being Olympic-sized. There were fenced paddocks with a few horses to be seen in the
snowy fields, and a huge barn.
“Am I getting heavy yet, Dane?” Melanie asked. Dane had shown her around the yard and was on the way to the huge barn.
“I can barely feel you, little one,” scoffed Dane.
Dane took her into the huge neat barn and sat her on a railing of an empty stall. She watched fascinated as he saddled two horses in competent and rapid movements.
“You have done that a time or two in the last sixty years then?” Melanie teased, the smell of hay and horses making her feel so happy and relaxed after all the stress. “This is so nice. Thank you, Dane.”
Dane walked the horses over and, with a swift hard kiss to Melanie’s lips, proceeded to swing her into the saddle of a small palomino. He adjusted the reins and stirrups then mounted his own large roan.
“We aren’t going far, so you will have a chance to get your horse-riding mojo back.” Dane gave her a devastating smile and nudged his horse on.
They rode around the property close to the house and after an hour Melanie’s butt was starting to go numb and she was fidgeting in the saddle.
“You are going to slide off that horse if you don’t sit still, little one.” Dane rode up next to her and lifted her off her horse effortlessly and placed her onto his hard thighs.
“I think that I need to break my ass in with short rides.” Melanie laughed. “It is so beautiful, thanks again for taking me riding.”
“It was worth it to see you this happy, my darling. We can go out each day and build up the time slowly. We have better ways to give you a sore ass than from horse riding.” With that, Dane cupped her breasts and squeezed firmly.
Melanie moaned and leaned back into his hard chest. She couldn’t believe how quickly these men, her men, could get her aroused. A word and a touch and she was creaming her panties. Their mom’s panties actually. Eww. That was like a cold shower to her libido. She couldn’t wait to go shopping for some sexy lingerie. Now that she had a reason to dress sexily she couldn’t wait to give it a try.
“You all say that, but I am just too good a girl to need a spanking,” Melanie teased. Dane kept one hand on the reins of his horse and with the other he pushed down the top of her jeans and into her panties. He rubbed around her clitoris in rhythm with the horses gentle rocking.
“You are so hot and wet for me, little one. Come for me,” Dane spoke in her ear and sucked on her neck, over his mark.
Melanie screamed her release, collapsing even further against his broad chest.
“You just proved you are a good girl, Melanie. You follow commands so nicely.” He rested his chin on the top of her head.
Melanie felt so relaxed after her orgasm, with the warmth of Dane surrounding her and the motion of the horse, she soon felt herself drifting off to sleep.
Chapter 18
Dane was in a very happy state of mind as he approached the barn. His woman was warm and sexually satiated in his arms. In fact, he couldn’t even remember feeling this happy and at peace ever before. Then he caught a scent that shattered it all.
His cat scratched under his skin to get out and hunt the threat to their mate. A snarl rumbled deep in his chest, waking Melanie from her doze in his arms.
“What is it, Dane? I’m so sorry for falling asleep,” Melanie said, sleepy and confused.
“It’s not you, little one. I just caught a scent of that asshole, Curtis. He’s been in the yard. I’m heading out to the pasture we just left until Hunter can come and see if that bastard is still here.” Dane hugged her tight to his chest. He let Melanie’s horse loose to find its own way to the barn, and he ran the horse back to the far pasture. As he rode he pulled his cell phone from his jacket pocket and called Hunter.
“I don’t know how, Hunter, but Curtis has slipped into our territory and was at the house.”
“Fuck me, I’m leaving now and I’ll call in Finn. Are you and Melanie some place safe for now?” Hunter asked frantically. Dane could understand the panic. If it had been him in town, he would be going nuts not knowing if Melanie was safe.
“We’re in the top pasture now, no trace of his scent here. I was at the barn when I first caught it. I didn’t stick around to see if he was still there, or where he had been. I couldn’t protect our mate and fight as well.” Dane tried to reassure Hunter that they were safe.
“I’m on the way.” Hunter hung up.
“Are we going to be okay now, Dane?” Melanie asked in a small voice.
Dane was about to reassure her when the sound of a snarl ripped through the air. They were both knocked from the horse by a huge mountain lion.
Dane tried to soften Melanie’s fall but lost her in the speed of the attack. He shifted and turned to see Curtis dragging Melanie into the trees. Fuck, that lunatic is fast. He raced toward the pair. He leapt onto Curtis’s back, trying to slow him down.
Curtis let go of Melanie and turned with fury to fight Dane.
Dane was slashing at Curtis’s flank when Curtis flung himself back against Dane, smashing Dane into an old pine tree.
Dane shook his head to clear it, seeing blood on the snowy ground. He scented some of it was from Curtis and with a roar, he scented Melanie’s blood.
He got shakily to his feet. Hunter was sprinting up the paddock in his lion form. Dane couldn’t understand where they had gone. His head was throbbing and his vision blurred. He must have been knocked out. He snarled his rage. How long had she been gone?
Hunter was at his side. “Are you all right, Dane? Where is she?” They spoke through their link. When shifted they were able to communicate with all pride mates. It had never come in as handy as it did now.
“I must have been knocked out, I don’t know how long. They’re both bleeding, let’s go.” Dane staggered on his legs. He was not going to let Curtis take his mate.
“Cooper and Finn are on the way, so are the dads. They were nearly here anyway, for our family get-together.” Hunter reassured him as they started after their mate, following her blood and scent trail.
* * * *
Finn couldn’t believe that Curtis had come back to pride land. What was he thinking? Finn couldn’t work it out. He was just putting the last of his parcels in the car when he had gotten Hunter’s call. Dane was alone with Melanie. Finn felt his cat trying to shift to get to her side. He pushed it down. He had to keep himself together, for Melanie’s sake.
He knew he would get there faster driving, plus he could coordinate other pride mates to join in the search for Curtis while he drove. Max Wilder, the local fire chief and older brother to Axel and Calder, was on the way. Axel and Calder had lost Curtis’s trail that morning, but were still too far away to help. Their fathers and mother were only about ten minutes away from the ranch. He could not contact Cooper as he had already been in his shifted form for his routine patrol when Hunter had called. Hopefully he would have crossed Curtis’s scent trail and be following it now.
None of this was making Finn any calmer as he drove as fast as he could home. He couldn’t understand why Curtis would have come back. He was just hoping that it had nothing to do with Melanie, but he suspected it did.
He pulled up in front of the house to find his dads waiting for him. Theo, Chris, and Paul were all big men, all over six foot four and still heavily muscled. Due to the shifter gene they looked to be in their midforties instead of men in their second century of life. Trina, his mother, was a tall woman at five foot ten, but slim, and looked dwarfed by her husbands. She was wringing her hands and rushed to Finn and embraced him.
“We have bad news, Finn. Curtis has managed to take Melanie from Dane,” Trina stated, with tears running down her cheeks.
“Hunter and Dane are in pursuit and Cooper and Max are coming in from the north,” Theo stated as he and his brothers began taking off their clothes.
Finn didn’t wait to strip. He shifted, and with a roar that shook snow from the trees, he raced up the paddock following Melanie and Dane’s scent. He knew that Curtis was in the area, but to find he had ac
tually taken his Melanie was putting Finn on the edge of insanity.
He was able to communicate with Dane now that he had shifted, and he got the rundown on what had occurred. He could feel Dane’s anguish at not keeping Melanie safe, but there was no time to reassure him. He called out commands to all of his pride and made sure that the net they were forming had no holes for Curtis to slip through.
His cat was glad to be free and racing to Melanie, but the man was in anguish at not knowing how or where she was. He held himself together with white-hot rage and determination. Curtis would pay for hurting his mate.
His fathers were close on his heels and he could feel he was drawing closer to his brothers. Then he felt a stirring in his mind, a new voice in the pride awareness. He didn’t stop running. He felt the warmth of that voice wrap around his cock. Melanie was calling him and his brothers, it was a faint call, but it was there. How she was doing this he didn’t know, but he was so relieved to hear her.
“Fuck me, I can hear Melanie,” came Cooper’s gasp.
“We heard her, too,” Hunter added.
“We can’t hear her, boys. It is just you four talking through the mating bond. It is rare, but it does happen to humans sometimes when the bond is exceptionally strong. You will have to tell us what she is saying,” Theo told Finn.
“Quiet,” Finn rasped. “She is getting stronger, but we have to listen to her.”
“We can hear you, sweetness. Can you hear me?” Finn tried to contact her.
“I’m so scared, Finn, where are you?” came Melanie’s weak reply.
“We’re all out looking for you, Melanie. Is Curtis with you?” Cooper screamed down their link.
“Cooper, I need you. I seem to be underground somewhere. It is earthy smelling and cold and dark. I can’t see very much, it is so dark. Curtis isn’t here right now, but I can hear him growling.” Melanie spoke quickly, but she was sounding stronger and louder to them.
Melanie [Eminence Shifters] (Siren Publishing Ménage Amour) Page 9
