“Three days,” Kade said as he helped Gavin to sip the water through a type of plastic straw. Gavin stopped sucking. Three days? He knew enough about severe dehydration to know to take it easy. His body rebelled as the cool fluid hit his empty stomach. Oh, hell, apparently dehydration had similar effects on werewolves.
“What’s the last thing you remember?” Hensen asked, holding Gavin steady as he tried to adjust to a world slightly off-kilter.
“The hike, and then the cabin.” He remembered something about water. “Maggie insisting we rinse off in the cold stream before climbing into th—” The rest came back to him in a rush. Hensen must have sensed his distress because the arms around him pulled tighter. “Is–is Maggie okay?”
“Not quite,” Hensen said. “She wakes every few hours, but she’s mostly incoherent.”
“It didn’t work.”
“What didn’t work?” Kade asked with a worried glance at Hensen.
“My blood is the key. She needs my blood to recover.”
“Gav,” Hensen said, his voice filled with emotion. “We don’t know if that’s true or not. What we do know is that she nearly killed you.”
“Is she talking in circles? Saying the same things over and over?”
Kade seemed surprised and maybe even a little bit hopeful when he nodded his head. “But how could your blood be the key? You were human only a few days ago.”
Gavin glanced at the still non-purple hue of his skin. “I don’t think I ever was fully human.” He breathed out heavily, maybe a little freaked out himself by what he was about to say. Hell, if he was suffering PTSD and not really in the middle of nowhere with three werewolves hiding in the abandoned cabin built by bear-shifters nearly a hundred years ago, he was about to give whoever was really listening enough delusional information for them to shove him in a psychiatric ward for a good long time. “My grandpa…used to tell us stories about the forest guardians—it was their job to keep the balance.” He shook his head as his voice gave out. “Thought…just a story.”
“You think you’re one of these guardians?” Kade asked. He seemed to want to believe, but it was clear that the evidence wasn’t adding up for him. “But your scent was human.”
Gavin shrugged. “Don’t know…fits.” He gratefully sipped more water as Kade held the straw to his lips. “Worth trying.”
“Not if we lose you both,” Hensen said quietly, his fear for Gavin and Maggie very clear in his tone.
“Can’t…hear you,” Gavin said as he finally realized he no longer had a link to Hensen the way he had when he’d first become a werewolf.
“Whatever happened with Maggie severed my link with both of you.”
“Can fix…my blood.” He fought the lethargy that threatened to take this chance from him, but he struggled to get the words past his aching throat.
“We’ll try,” Hensen finally said, “but not until you’re feeling better. We don’t have the medical equipment to keep you alive if you slip into another coma.”
“Okay,” Gavin said, letting his eyes close as Kade offered him another sip of water. A part of him kept pointing out that his grandfather’s story was probably just a story, but the similarities between the story and Maggie’s condition were too many to ignore.
For the next several hours he let his mates fuss over him as he slowly recovered from three days without food or water. Thankfully, his new werewolf side made it much faster than what would likely have happened when he was human.
He wasn’t even certain he could help Maggie—he was going on stories his grandfather had told him as a child for heaven’s sake—but he had to try. He could sense Kade’s and Hensen’s concern for them both, but thankfully they didn’t try to stop him when he finally lay down on the pallet-type bed that she slept on.
“Okay, sugar,” he said lifting her into a sitting position so that he could hold her close and still press his forearm against her lips.
Kade looked horrified. “Her teeth,” he said worriedly. “They’re not…normal.”
“It’s okay,” Gavin said, giving his lover a reassuring look. “I remember. They’re part of her mutation. My blood will fix that.” Again he really had no idea if what he said was true, but it seemed important to trust what he’d learned from his grandfather. “Come on, Maggie. It’s time for you to feel better.”
Sleepily Maggie caressed his forearm with her tongue. It was a rather sensual and intimate moment, and for a brief second Gavin’s confidence faltered. But when she bit down and he felt her teeth puncture his skin, he suddenly knew this was exactly what he needed to do. He caressed her hair as she swallowed his blood, this time less frantically. After a little while she went back to licking his skin and he smiled when he realized she was using her werewolf skills to heal his wounds. He was fairly certain he didn’t need her help, but it was exactly the type of thing that Maggie would do.
She’d proven over and over that she would care for and protect her mates as fiercely as they would protect and care for her. Hensen and Kade both smiled with relief as Maggie curled into Gavin’s embrace and fell asleep once more.
Hensen held Maggie close as she slept peacefully. She wasn’t tossing and turning or mumbling incoherently the way she had for the past three days and nights. For the past few hours she’d seemed just to be sleeping. It was a tremendous relief to feel like things were getting better.
Having two of his mates unconscious from unknown causes had left him floundering. He was used to protecting the people around him, but he’d never before needed to fight something he couldn’t see. Despite his size and strength he’d felt helpless. It wasn’t a feeling he liked.
“You weren’t helpless,”
Kade said telepathically, apparently worried enough about his state of mind to still monitor him when he and Gavin were getting reacquainted.
“You kept them both alive, and you helped me through it, too.”
Hensen desperately missed his link to Gavin and Maggie, but in some ways he was glad that they couldn‘t hear his thoughts right now. Self-doubt wasn’t something he was used to dealing with.
“Thanks, baby,”
Hensen said telepathically to Kade.
“I don’t know how I would’ve gotten through it without you.”
“See, we support each other. That’s what a relationship is all about.”
He must have overheard a few thoughts that flitted through Hensen’s brain in reaction to that because Kade growled telepathically and added,
“Don’t for one moment think that you’re alone in this. We all have doubts about ourselves from time to time.”
He laughed softly.
“Most of us long before we get to your age.”
He felt pleasure swell through his mate as Gavin slid down his body and took his hard cock in his mouth.
“Thanks, baby,”
Hensen said.
“Make love to Gavin for me.”
“With pleasure,”
Kade whispered on a groan.
Hensen pulled Maggie closer and then rolled them both over so that he could watch their mates together. It wasn’t the frantic, enthusiastic fucking they’d indulged in back at Kade’s home. This time they made love to each other slowly, savoring every soft touch, every sweet moan, every loving sensation. Hensen felt his love for both of them grow in his heart, his need for the two men making his cock rock hard.
The beautiful woman in his arms wriggled back against him, the soft globes of her ass caressing him intimately. He tried to move away, not wanting her to wake and think he was groping her in her sleep, but she followed him, sighing as the changed angle brought his cock closer to her pussy lips.
She moaned as she rubbed against him, but suddenly stopped and rolled over to look directly into his eyes. “I can’t hear you,” she said worriedly.
“It’s okay,” Hensen said, caressing her face with his fingertips. “Gavin says it’s only temporary. We’ll share it again once we claim each other.”
She glanced over to where Gavin was easing his hard cock deep into Kade’s ass, and then turned her attention back to him. “I guess that means I didn’t hurt him.”
“No, baby girl. You’re both going to be fine.”
“Good. Make love to me, please.”
Hensen laughed softly, his cock aching, but his need to protect her overriding all else.
“You’ve been asleep for three days. You need to recover first.”
“No,” she said rolling into his arms and kissing his chest. “I need my mate to claim me.”
“But—”
She shook her head as she placed her hand over his lips. “I’m fine. I feel better than I have since the wolf attacked. Even before the thing with Gavin it was kind of like I had the flu—I felt all heavy and aching—but now even that’s gone. I’m not sure how it all worked, but I truly feel better than I have since becoming a werewolf.”
“Stop being so noble and claim the woman already.”
Hensen smiled at Kade’s bossy words, only then realizing that Kade intended to claim Gavin right then if the man agreed. He felt the rush of excitement run through both of them when Gavin nodded and offered his throat to Kade.
Hell, Hensen almost came himself as he felt Gavin pump his seed into Kade’s ass.
Unable to control his need for Maggie one more moment he rolled onto his back and dragged her over him. She giggled and then squirmed into a comfortable position, her legs open, her pussy nudging his cock, her warm, slippery fluids coating him as she rubbed up and down his length.
“Finally,” she said with a grin as he lifted up to take her mouth. He thrust his tongue inside, exploring every inch of her warm cavern as his hands roamed her body, learning her shape, loving her curves. He held her hips in place, refusing to let her take control as he slowly lifted his cock into her pussy. He moaned at the delicious feeling of finally being inside his mate.
She broke their kiss, gasping for air as she stared into his eyes. Carefully he released his grip on her, letting her move so that they made love to each other. When she tilted her head to the side, offering her throat, he couldn’t control his need to take charge once more. He rolled them over, thrusting into her more forcefully, pinning her to the makeshift mattress as he started to plow into her pussy hard and fast. He opened his teeth over her throat, her warm skin filling his mouth as he carefully bit into her soft flesh. She moaned, shaking in orgasm, her emotions and thoughts washing over him as he claimed her, their link settling into place once more.
He stilled for a moment as he carefully extracted his teeth and then he started fucking her hard and fast again, his need to fill this woman with his seed now a wild, out of control compulsion.
Maggie opened her mouth over his throat, licking over the flesh but not biting into him.
“Baby girl?”
he asked through their newly repaired link.
“I don’t want to hurt you.”
“Hey,” he said out loud, stopping all movement to stare into her eyes. “It’s over. Gavin’s blood repaired the damage. You won’t hurt me by claiming me.”
She seemed doubtful for a moment but then she smiled. Her teeth had lengthened, just as they did for any werewolf. There was no sign of the strange, pointed, shark-like teeth she’d used to bite Gavin. Hensen placed a hand behind her head and lifted her to his throat. This time she didn’t hesitate. This time she sank her teeth straight into his throat. This time she claimed him the way he’d just claimed her.
The orgasm that shot through him damn near curled his toes, but it was the loving way that she soothed him with her gentle touches that filled his heart with joy.
Kade had been right. He wasn’t alone in his self-doubts. They all had them, but it was how they coped that made the difference.
He held Maggie close, unwilling to pull out of her body just yet. He smiled as he sensed the mating link between Gavin and Kade also settle into place. They were finally starting their lives together as a true werewolf family, and in that brief moment anything seemed possible.
Sadly, he knew life was never that simple.
* * * *
Gavin hurried to wash up in the cold water of the creek as he felt Kade claim Maggie, his intense orgasm making Gavin groan with renewed arousal. Hell, he planned to claim their woman as soon as she got some rest, but it was Hensen who plagued his thoughts.
Waking earlier with Hensen’s arms wrapped around him had been both a little strange and amazingly comforting. In that moment he’d felt loved in a way that he’d never expected to feel. Thanks to his access to Kade’s memories, he had a very clear understanding of how both Kade and Hensen had felt while he and Maggie had been unconscious.
As a man used to being in charge of any situation, Gavin could certainly share the fears Hensen had felt, but all that did was bring him full circle. He’d accepted his connection to Kade easily because the type of relationship they were building was very similar to what he’d envisioned when he’d realized his bisexuality.
But Hensen still challenged everything he’d thought he knew about himself. The discovery of skills he hadn’t expected had only muddied his thinking even more.
Perhaps sharing Maggie and Kade should be the only connection between him and Hensen.
“You okay?” Hensen asked as he stepped onto the edge of the stream. “Kade was worried.”
They both smirked at that. Kade had a link to both of them now so he knew exactly where Gavin was and what he was thinking.