by Kate Pearce
“Thank you, blunt knight of mine.”
“Anytime, sweetheart.”
Fiona straightened up and scanned the room once again, this time with clearer eyes. She gasped and clutched her chest. “You ain’t got a consort. The queen’s not mated? Where’s your mate? You’re supposed to have a mate.” She crawled over to Tess and grabbed her ankles. “If you don’t have a mate, they’ll get to you and squeeze you dry for all the information. Everything, they’ll take everything.”
Fuck. Harvey pushed his hands onto his armrests, preparing to stand, but Tess gave him a mental push back. Wait, she seemed to be saying.
“It’s sweet of you to worry about me, Fiona,” Tess said, “but I’m worried about you, and Annie and Ricky, too, of course. Tell me what happened at the park so we can get you home and taken care of.”
Fiona’s red-rimmed eyes went comically wide. “Take care of us?” she whispered. “Is that mobster talk for taking us out back and shooting us?”
The corners of Tess’s mouth twitched, but somehow, she managed to tamp down the laugh. Fiona would have been a hoot to be around if she wasn’t so ill. She shouldn’t have been on her own. Afótama took care of each other. Rarely was a person so unredeemable that the web tossed them out.
“No,” Tess said. “It means we’d find you someplace to live and a job to do. We’d make sure Annie and Ricky were enrolled in school. We’d make sure they wouldn’t have anything to be scared of, and that you wouldn’t have to run anymore. You’ve been running a long time, haven’t you? I know what that’s like.” Tess’s eyes shone with unspilled tears that everyone in the room except Fiona seemed affected by.
Nadia had turned away to face the blank wall behind her. Ollie was stone faced, but his hands twitched at his sides in a manner Harvey knew all too well. He wanted to touch Tess—hold her—but couldn’t risk it.
She rarely cried as a kid, and when he’d asked her why, she’d said because she’d given up hope that things would get better. She had less disappointment that way. Now when she cried, the rending of his heart felt so much more complete and the pain lingered longer. He hated that there were things he couldn’t fix for her, and nothing would ever be easy.
Sometimes, he even hated himself for bringing her home. She’d been struggling on her own, but more so now.
Fiona nodded. “I’d sure like someplace to go. I bet the kids would, too. They’re only half-breeds, though. You still want them?”
Tess put her hands over her eyes and let out a long sigh. “They’re yours, so of course I do. Please, Fiona.” Her voice was thick and pleading. Tired. “Please tell me what happened at the park.”
“There was a man there that day, and I must have said something he thought was interesting. Some throwaway thing about telepathy. I think I might have said something about my mother talking inside my head.” Fiona’s forehead furrowed and her voice was slow and steady. It was if it’d settled in that this thing was important and she’d found a moment of clarity to relay it. “He asked me a lot of questions I thought were silly at the time. It was like the same thing over and over again asked in different ways. And he asked what it was like where I lived and what kind of religion we believed in. He asked…who was in charge.”
Tess drew in a deep breath and peeled her hands away from her eyes. “And you told him those things?”
“I was bad. I should have known better.”
“You were little.”
“Yes. I was real little. Maybe four.”
“Fuck.” That whispered expletive came from Nadia, who still had her back turned. She put her phone to her ear. “Stand by. I need you to do me a favor,” she said into it.
“You think it was your fault that we—that some of the Afótama children—were abducted?” Harvey asked. Even if she’d inadvertently tipped someone off, how could she have known it was a person that wasn’t safe for her to talk to? She’d come out of Norseton where everyone knew everyone. There were no outsiders. Her mother hadn’t thought to prepare her for the possibility that someone would find her unusual and probe her about things that she didn’t know were meant to be secrets.
“They started disappearing one at a time about six months after that. I didn’t think about it until I was around fourteen, and then it hit me it was my fault. I ran away so nobody would find out.”
“Your mother must think you’re one of the missing ones.”
Fiona nodded, and that frantic look returned to her eyes.
“It’s okay, I forgive you. We’ll all forgive you,” Tess whispered, and she fell to her knees and pulled Fiona in for a hug.
Fiona’s thin body shook in Tess’s grasp, and her face contorted with her soundless cry before she started sobbing.
Tess rocked her. Shushed her. “You’re forgivable, Fiona. You were a little girl and you didn’t know any better. It’s okay to go home to your mom. I’ll make everything okay for you.”
Of course she would, because that was Tess. It didn’t matter that she was in such heartbreaking turmoil herself, because there was someone who needed fixing. Tess had always been the kind of person who’d put her own grief aside and take care of the person who could be helped. That was one reason she got in so much trouble as a kid.
“Where are the kids, hon?” Nadia asked.
Fiona dragged her dirty sleeve beneath her running nose and sniffled. “I parked in the McDonald’s lot and told them if I didn’t come back to call my social worker and say to come get them.”
Nadia murmured something into her phone, and then inclined her head toward the door. “Come on. Let’s go get them. We’ll put you up in one of our rooms tonight, and you can fly back to Norseton with us in the morning.”
“Will you let my mom know I’m coming?”
Nadia nodded. “Yeah, if she were my mom, she’d want to know. Come on.” She grabbed Fiona’s hand and pulled her to her feet.
Ollie got out of the way of the door, and the two women walked through it. He closed the door behind them, and Harvey hurried around the table and dropped to his knees at Tess’s side.
“Come here.” He pulled her in close and held her the same way she’d held Fiona, but he brushed her hair back from her face and kissed her temples, whispering against them, “I’m so proud of you.”
“It’s not her fault,” she said. “She was just a little kid who talked too much, and some asshole took advantage of that to hurt us. Why?”
Ollie knelt down next to her and wrapped his hand around one of her shaking ones.
Harvey could have pulled her away so he could prove once and for all that he was perfectly capable of being her sole provider of comfort, but she’d just had her world rocked in a way he couldn’t even begin to understand. She was queen, so she knew so much that was off-limits to him and she felt things so keenly. Maybe she felt everyone’s pain from back then—when each of those children was taken, one by one.
Her grandmother had heard the distress in the web when it’d happened, but now Tess was processing the archives and putting a why to the who and when.
“People are afraid of what they don’t understand,” Ollie said. “That’s why Ótama and all the people on that boat left Iceland, and why our ancestors kept heading west. Fear is an irrational thing, baby.” He stroked the side of her face, barely skimming Harvey’s fingertips in the process.
Harvey closed his eyes and tried to keep his thoughts pure and calm.
She needed comfort and strength, not jealousy.
If she could give her all to someone else even when she was in so much pain, he would do the same.
He loved her so much that he at least had to try.
13
Although Tess had planned on broaching the ménage topic with the men, she’d wanted it to be on her own time…and certainly, not yet. Unfortunately, circumstances had corralled the three of them into a single hotel room.
They’d booked three rooms for the trip. Tess and Nadia were meant to share one, and each of the men would sha
re with the security team members who’d traveled with them. With Fiona and her kids in one of the rooms, that left two rooms to divide between six people—four of whom were male.
Nadia had thrown up her hands, and said, “Look, you supervise your guys. I’ll bunk in Fiona’s room on the pullout sofa. Security can keep the room they were assigned.”
That had been all well and good until they actually entered the room and found there was only one bed. It was all the hotel had left, and it wouldn’t have been such a big deal if it was just Tess and Nadia. Nadia slept in Tess’s bed on occasion because Nadia, like most Afótama, was a toucher. Touching made her calmer, which everyone in her company appreciated greatly, so Tess obliged her.
But, never in her life had Tess had to share a single bed with two men whose feet would likely dangle off the end.
“Are you fucking kidding me?” Ollie said as they crossed the threshold. “That’s a full.”
Tess laughed and rubbed her tired eyes. “No, I think it’s a queen, which is still way too small if either of you plan on sleeping on it.”
Harvey sighed. “Should we flip a coin? Loser gets the floor.”
She stretched her arms over her head and yawned. “Maybe both of you should take the floor. That would be the fair thing.”
Ollie grunted and pulled open the closed door. He plucked the two spare pillows off the shelf along with the blankets, and tossed one of each to Harvey. “I’ve slept on worse. At least the floor is carpeted. Compared to the cot assigned to me at basic training, it’d be downright plush.”
She hadn’t really planned on making them sleep on the floor, but if it cut down on the discord, she’d go along with it. She was tired, and after having Fiona’s kids paw her for the better part of an hour during dinner, she needed a bit of space to decompress. She was getting used to being touched and wanting to touch, but on some days, it was draining.
After a quick shower, she pulled on her nightshirt and dove under the covers. Shirtless Harvey leaned against the right nightstand as he toyed with his phone. How he found time to work out, she didn’t know, but he had to be getting some exercise in. His chest was all hard planes and delightful angles. His shoulders were broad, and waist tapered to form perfect little dips for her to clamp her thighs against…or for her to rest her hands while she aided his thrusts in and out of her mouth.
Her gaze lingered on the downy, dark blond trail between his navel and waistband.
“You look like you want dessert,” he said.
More like the whole buffet, but a sandwich would do. She could be the middle.
He put down his phone and chuckled as he reached for the lamp switch. That was one of her men in an improved mood. Mission half accomplished. She rolled to the left edge of the bed and looked down at the other man.
Ollie reclined with two pillows beneath his head, one of which he must have nabbed from the bed, and chuckled at the television he’d turned down low.
She reached down and swatted his ear. “I think that’s my pillow.”
“Three isn’t enough for you?”
“If we’re going to be fair, the equitable thing would be everyone having two,” Harvey said from his little enclave.
Tess clucked her tongue. “You’re preaching communism to a pseudo-monarch? How dare you? If I were any less benevolent, I’d have six pillows, and you two would be shit out of luck.”
“My apologies for offending you, oh queenly one.”
“That’s more like it, peon.”
“Happy to be your peon, but really, about that second pillow…”
She groaned and tossed it down at him, being fairly sure it hit him square in the face when it landed given his oomph! of displeasure.
“All better?”
“Cold down here. I’m right under the vent. Got an extra blanket?”
“Sorry. Maybe you can go across the hall and ask Rambo and G.I. Joe if they’ve got any.”
“So they can call me a punk to my face? No, thanks.”
“Why would they do that?” Tess asked. “I have it on good authority that the queen can hire her own staff. They should all be minding their P’s and Q’s if they want to keep their jobs.”
“Until you pick a consort, most unattached Afótama men will probably be more concerned with getting into your pants than with their job security.”
Tess pushed herself upright and slapped the lamp switch. Harvey pulled one of the pillows over his face and groaned.
“No one’s trying to get into my pants,” she said.
“Sure they are,” Ollie mumbled.
“You know something I don’t know? If so, please spill the deets. I’ve been pretty sheltered the past few weeks, and the only men I’ve had regular interaction with have been my brother, my uncle, Chef, and those two security bozos.”
“The security bozos are problem enough,” Ollie said. “They may seem to be on high alert when you’re around, but I’ve gotten close enough to them today that I can state without a doubt that if either of them had two minutes alone with you, they’d make a play.”
“I’ve never been left alone with anyone outside the family, except for you two.”
“Exactly,” Harvey said.
“You’re responsible for that?” She reached down and grabbed the corner of the pillow covering his face.
He sighed when she yanked.
“Yes.”
“Are you trying to put a leash on me?”
“No, I’m protecting my interests.”
Ollie whistled low. “Bad choice of words, bro.”
Tess settled onto her forearms and glared down at Harvey.
He didn’t look away. In fact, he raised one eyebrow and turned his hands over in a So? gesture.
“Seriously?”
“I’m not going to apologize, if that’s what you’re waiting for. We’ve been half-bound since we were kids. Obviously, I’m motivated to win the rest of you. Not like I can move on.”
“What?” That was news to Tess.
“It’s the same with the folks in our group,” Ollie said. “Just with the men, though. I don’t know why that is. It used to be everyone.”
Tess rolled to the other side of the bed yet again. “You mean, once you attach yourself to someone, you can’t…break up?”
“You can’t entirely, no. You can try to hook up, but that new person will just be a warm body. You won’t want anyone else. It’s not a temporary thing.”
“So, you can’t get turned on by another woman if you’re fully bound?”
“Depends.”
“On what?”
“On whether or not the woman you’re with is the one you were supposed to have been with in the first place. Sometimes we settle for good enough, and then we can’t extricate ourselves when the perfect one comes along. Your body is always going to respond to perfect, whether you’ve already got a mate or not.”
Tess flopped back onto her pillows. “This is some seriously hardcore shit. You guys make having a perfect mate sound like commitment on steroids. I never even thought I’d get married.”
“And yet here you are,” Harvey said, voice sharp. “Hot commodity. They all think you’re picky and that the right one just hasn’t crossed your path yet. They’re going to get more aggressive. They’re going to spring forth from the woodwork making grand gestures, claiming themselves to be your ordained match, Tess. Those are the magic words, right?”
“Are you throwing shade at me, motherfucker? Really?” Ollie asked.
“If the shoe fits…”
She settled farther beneath the blankets and pulled a pillow over her face. “For fuck’s sake.” She needed to get her head out of the real world. They weren’t going resolve this like reasonable people, because they were Vikings. Being passive wasn’t in their constitutions, so they were going to butt heads. If they didn’t, then neither was aggressive enough to be her consort.
She’d let them have their pissing contest, but the two men still needed to find common gr
ound. They didn’t need to like each other, but they needed to tolerate each other at the very least or there’d be bloodshed every time Tess wanted to make love with them.
With Ollie on the floor, Tess was on her own to silence the voices in her head.
There was buzz on the web because Fiona was going home. People were concerned about the queen, wondering how she really felt about the discovery. Tess had tried keeping her thoughts neutral on the subject, but was finding it difficult because there was so much emotion involved—and not just hers, but everyone affected by the abductions. Her grandmother had done the psychic equivalent of hanging a curtain between Tess and the rest of the Afótama. Basically, she was using her superior psychic control as a shield to protect Tess for the time being. It was a temporary thing and would fall off as soon as Nan went to bed. The clock said that would be any minute.
If Tess wanted rest tonight, she’d have to entreat her potential consort for help. She nudged her pillow away and rolled onto her belly. The room was dark, but her fingers found what her eyes couldn’t. She traced along Ollie’s chiseled jaw, and let her anxiety escape on an exhale as the voices quieted.
Ollie grasped her hand and laced his fingers through hers.
“You’re going to get numb sleeping in that position,” he projected.
“Halfway there already. I can’t feel my breast.”
“I could remedy that.”
“Kind of you. Do you always go around fixing things, or am I a special case?”
“I repair motorcycles for a living, so yes, I do go around fixing things all the time.” He chuckled. “Jeff has this piece of shit motorcycle he should have sold for scrap twenty years ago.”
“Maybe he’s attached to it.”
“Baby, he treats that bike almost as good as I treat my kids.”
Tess dropped his hand and turned on the lamp. “What did you say?”
“Who are you talking to?” Harvey asked.
Ollie sighed and propped himself up on his elbows. “I said—”
“No, I heard you,” she said. “I just wanted to make sure I heard you.” Did he say kids?
