CHAPTER THIRTY-EIGHT

GAGE

Once both women fall asleep, I motion to Mav and Sebastian to go downstairs, mouthing the words, "We need to talk." As gently as possible, all three of us get off the bed and witness the sweetest thing. Lucy shifts in her sleep and moves closer to Stella, wrapping her arm around her, it's not sexual in the least, but fuck it's sweet. I think jealousy in a relationship like this can destroy everything. Stella and Lucy loving each other as fiercely as they do, I don't honestly think we'll ever have that problem. Sure, there was a bit of a bump in the beginning, with Lucy being obsessed with Mav, but we've worked past that.

We all grab sweatpants and head downstairs. Mav, of course, grumbles, "Here we are, your highness, here at your beck and call."

Sometimes I want to punch this asshole in the dick. Instead, I stay focused on the task at hand. "Sit."

Sebastian takes a seat and Mav does too, but not without complaining under his breath. Naturally I take a seat beside my Pretty Boy where I always prefer to be.

Glancing at Mav and then Sebastian, I say, "It's time we make this permanent. They are having our babies and, legal or not, we need to marry them."

Mav nods in agreement. "Yeah, we can get someone out here tomorrow to perform the ceremony."

I flash him a look that says, ‘have you lost your mind?'

"No. They are women, and we have to do this right."

Mav arches an eyebrow before narrowing his gaze. "There is no right or wrong way."

Sebastian rubs his temples as I chuckle. "Yeah, there is, dickhead. They are women and they have expectations. They want flowers, and pretty dresses. All of it."

I pull out my phone and show them the pictures of the rings I found for them.

"We should get matching rings for both of them. And then all the same for the three of us."

Mav bursts into laughter. "Gage Carlisle getting all fucking romantic. I never thought I'd see the day."

Joining Sebastian in rubbing my temples, I glare at Mav. "Yeah yeah. Laugh it up, chuckles, but it's not about me. It's about what they want. Because let's be honest. None of us guys gives a fuck. But our women do. We'll take what we want, but also give them what they need."

Mav groans. "How long is this going to take?"

I shrug. "A few days maybe."

"Alright," he says, "I can wait a few days, but not much more."

I knew his argument would be about time. Mav has wanted this for a while, certainly before I did. Hell, I had planned on killing them. That was then. Things are different now. As I've proven, I will do anything to protect them. Do I regret taking them the way we did? I'd like to say I'm a good enough man to say yes to that, but I can't. If we hadn't resorted to drastic measures like kidnapping, I don't think we'd be here now and fuck, it's good. I can't possibly regret something that brought us together.

Sebastian glances at me. "So, we're talking about proposals and everything?"

I nod slowly, but don't speak until he asks the stupidest question I've ever heard.

"What if they say no?"

I chuckle as I wrap my arm around him. "There's only one acceptable answer, baby. But they won't."

The fact is, I would've never allowed them to leave before. But now? There's no fucking way they are leaving us and taking our children with them.

STELLA

A hand wraps around my throat. Squeezing. I try to breathe through my nose, but he closes off my air supply there too. I writhe, trying to get away, but there's no use. The pain. My head throbs as white spots dance in my vision. I'm going to die here.

Tears spring to my eyes as the white spots turn to black.

He chuckles viciously, but off somewhere in the distance I hear someone screaming, "Help! She won't wake up. Help!"

I gasp repeatedly while warm arms pull me in. Sebastian. I know it's him. The scent of cedar and orange surrounds me, and I come unglued.

Sobbing into his bare chest, he holds me tighter. "Let it out, baby. You're safe. I'll protect you."

That's the problem with nightmares, no one can save you from them. Once you're there, you're trapped. There's no way out until somehow you wake from them.

"We never should've left her," he says to someone angrily.

The bed dips with someone's weight, and I hear Gage. "Little mama, look at me."

I blink my eyes open, finding Gage beside us on the bed, staring at me with a concerned expression. "I'm sorry."

Gage wipes my tears on one cheek away with the pad of his thumb. "I'm sorry."

What is he apologizing for? Mav stands behind him with the same worried look, and I sit up because this isn't right. I shouldn't be making them all anxious. I'm fine. I didn't get seriously hurt. I'm still alive.

Wiping my tears away, I sigh loudly. "I'm sorry. It was just a nightmare. No big deal."

Gage's expression turns from concern to pure anger, although I don't think it's directed at me. "That's what you think, Stella? You think it doesn't matter? What you two went through, no big deal? Wrong, baby. It's a very big fucking deal."

Crossing his arms over his chest, he narrows his gaze directly at me. "You will not do any more of this book shit without us right there. You will never again be in danger like that."

Kneeling on the bed in front of me, with Sebastian's legs between us, he cups my face. "Never again, Stella. We almost lost you, and that is not something I can tolerate."

MAV

Both the other guys are worried about Stella, rightfully so, but they're missing an important piece here. As I stare at Lucy, she's huddled in the corner of the bed, arms wrapped around her legs, and she's not okay. She didn't get beaten by that asshole, nor did she nearly get raped, but she has also been traumatized. And if I know her at all, she's beside herself with worry about her best friend, while simultaneously berating herself for not saving her. Any of us could tell her there was nothing she could've done. That doesn't change how she feels. I know when we walked into the house, we heard Stella screaming. It was painful to hear. How long was Lucy listening to that very same thing?

I walk around to the other side of the bed and sit next to Lucy. "Are you okay?"

She nods, but I know she isn't being honest. I've paid close attention to her for so long now. I know her expressions, her body language, I fucking know her like the back of my hand.

Pulling her into my arms, I hold her against my chest and whisper in her ear, "You're such a beautiful liar."

She giggles against my chest. "You have a way of making an insult sound nice, Mav."

I shrug my shoulders. "It's a gift."

Again, I whisper to her, "Just because you weren't attacked physically like she was, doesn't mean you didn't go through it too. It's okay to feel whatever you feel."

Lucy doesn't respond, she just wraps her arms around me and holds me tight, and I know for once I said the right thing. Like she frequently tells me, I tend to be a bell-end most of the time, but I can be more than that. I am capable of being the soft place she can land, either of them.

I turn quickly to a bizarre sound. "What the fuck was that?"

Stella turns bright red and covers her mouth in shock. "My stomach."

Sebastian chuckles. "Mama is hungry."

I set Lucy on the bed beside me and stand up. "Alright. Let's get the babies fed."

SEBASTIAN

After ordering room service, we talk quietly, but we're so watchful of our ladies that I think we're starting to irritate them, but I think we're still waiting for them to have some huge reaction to what happened to them. I know they're safe now, and they got to see that fucker suffer, but there has to be shit they're holding in, doesn't there?

"Dammit, Sebastian, stop giving me the puppy dog eyes, I'm fine," Stella finally says, laughing quietly as she reaches over and squeezes my hand. She and Lucy are managing to actually eat without feeling sick, so at least we don't have to worry about that right now. Stella's also feeling better since she had some sleep, thank God.

"Yeah, Pretty Boy, our ladies are just fine now, right? It's not like you didn't know we were coming to rescue you or anything." Gage doesn't frame it as a question, but I think it is one, as he lifts his eyebrows at Lucy and Stella in turn.

"I was worried you'd think we left on purpose," Lucy says, not for the first time, because she's very sensitive to triggering Gage's abandonment issues.

"It's okay, baby. We saw your live feed, or heard it, and we knew you were taken from us. It doesn't matter now though, because you're safe, and you'll never be at risk like that again. In the future, we'll be all up in your business when you're at book stuff, and we'll be watching for any assholes who want to try anything."

"Situation normal, then," Lucy says with a giggle, grabbing a fry from my plate, since hers is empty already. I push the plate closer to her, and she grins as she stuffs a handful of them in her mouth. Say what you like about someone taking food from your plate, but feeding my women makes me fucking ecstatic. Especially now we're feeding our babies through them. Oh hell. I grab the plate again and pull it away from her.

"Are fries good for babies? I really need to read up on this shit, so I can make sure I'm not letting-"

"Wait, letting? Excuse you, Sebastian, but we'll eat what we feel is right for our babies!" Lucy snaps, having shifted so fast from cute and giggly, to savage and kinda scary.

"Hormones?" Mav asks with a laugh, practically petting her head like a fucking dog. Dude, I don't think that's the best move right now. If he loses a finger, he'll bitch for weeks about it.

"Pretty Boy didn't mean anything by it, baby. He just cares," Gage says in a calm tone, resting a hand on my thigh and squeezing gently. Okay, who's this and what did you do with my man?

"Gage is right. Wow… have I ever said those words before?" I ask with a grin, relieved when both girls giggle again, even though that hand tightens dangerously on my thigh. Joke's on you, baby, I'm into that shit.