Chapter Twenty
Brender
The holiday week slipped through our fingers like a school break. In previous years, I spent most of Yuletide week sleeping in or catching up with old friends from my previous career. This time around, I put in hours making a million tiny repairs to the nest and clearing out part of the nesting room to make space to build Saer’s boat. Stellan wasn’t thrilled about us beginning the project inside but at the end of the day it was the best way to keep all four of us (counting the egg in his belly) together once he was nest bound. Building a boat with a four-year-old who insisted on trying things his way before letting someone read him the instructions wasn’t an easy job. It sure in the hell wasn’t a fast job either. Still, it was more enjoyable than I would’ve ever guessed. Each time we set out to work on the boat he learned something new or reinforced something he learned before.
By the end of the holiday week, we managed to get a doctor to swing by with a sonic. It was a two-second test that gave us all the affirmation we needed. While the ‘pee test’ was entertaining it wasn’t nearly as accurate. Too many variables could interrupt the outcome. Saer insisted the doctor check me too while he was here. Fortunately for all of us, I wasn’t pregnant.
I emailed the school that I’d be taking my pregnant/nesting mate leave as soon as my new mate leave ran out. Someone else would teach the next semester of school while I stayed at home with Stellan and Saer. I’d miss teaching but didn’t want to miss a moment of Stellan’s pregnancy. Life on the Starscale worlds was safe for egg carriers. Our lives weren’t as dangerous as that of our ancestors. Regardless, my dragon was still on guard for the egg absorbing nutrients inside of my mate.
For New Year’s Eve we let Saer stay up late and went over to Oliver’s for a cookout. Saer was a bit crunchier than usual because instead of being at home building his boat, he wore ‘eleventy’ layers of clothes and his uncle wouldn’t even let him flip the cow burgers. To keep him entertained, I took him inside and dug out an origami book that our parents bought when Oliver was small. My brother never took to the artform, but my memory served blissfully correct, there was a ship in there. Together, Saer and I made up five boats and after dinner we all walked the couple miles to the icy beach.
Halfway there, Saer began to shiver, and I scooped him up. Stellan gave me a look that said he told me it was too cold for our baby to be out on the beach, but he stopped shivering as soon as he was next to someone else’s body heat. At the shore, he handed out the markers he hid in his many coat pockets, and we all wrote our wishes on them. Saer wrote his little sibling’s wish for them and didn’t tell any of us what it was. We sent our wishes out on the sea and they floated away with the tiny chunks of ice.
That night we stayed over at Oliver’s. The guest room slowly morphed into the room where Saer called his own when we visited. Stellan and I slept in my old bedroom.
“Most of your stuff is still here,” Stellan laughed, kicking off his shoes and looking around the room once Saer was all toasty and out cold.
“Where else would it be? It’s not like there’s a lot of extra room back at the house. We’ve already had to clear out your storage room to ensure the next kid has their own room. I guess it’s here until Oliver finds a mate or something. Besides, isn’t it nice to have a house on 2?”
“It is,” Stellan sighed. “Is it okay that all your stuff is still here, though? Do you miss it?”
“My books sometimes but when I go back to work I’ll be over here and can stop in to switch them out when I need to. I don’t go out with my old gladiator group as often as I used to. They’re meeting up tonight, but I told them I couldn’t come and before you say anything,” I said, giving him a pointed look, “I miss them, but I wouldn’t have traded our first New Year’s together for anything, and they understand. Most of them are single or have older kids. Eventually, you’ll meet them. Well, some of them. Some of them will never be allowed to open their mouths around our kids because they’ll cuss like sailors and that’s one part of the ocean that Saer doesn’t need to learn for a very long time.”
“It’s hot when you’re being all parental,” Stellan said.
He stretched out on the bed in just his light blue boxer shorts. I raked my eyes over him and licked my lips. His stomach was still a lean muscular plain despite the egg growing inside him.
“How out do you think he is?” I asked, looking toward the door. “Out enough?”
“Maybe,” Stellan smirked.
I cocked my head and listened over our family link. Saer was out cold, but he wasn’t dreaming yet. We could never be sure if we had enough time to finish if he wasn’t dreaming. I flopped down next to him on the bed, and he rolled onto his side.
“We should risk it,” he grinned, pressing his hard cock against my hip. “My morning sickness went away. I’m not too emotional. I get cold a little too easy since this all started but on the other side of the coin, I’m horny as fuck.”
And we did.
We ‘risked’ it right there in my old room with him straddled over me, riding my dick while I held my hand against his mouth to muffle the cries to spare not only Saer but also my brother. I thrust up into him, bucking my hips and reveling in how our pleasure mingled over our mating link. He braced his hands on my chest, and I wrapped my fingers around his dick. His pulse throbbed against my palm. We lost our thoughts to each other. We let go of the worries about to-do lists and when I might have to go back to work. We let go of if the nest was perfect or if I had enough of my stuff at home. It was just us – together and reveling in the warmth growing between our bodies until nothing could hold us back. He came first, covering my chest in the warm, sticky streams of his pleasure. My dick trembled inside him and he rode me harder. I struggled not to shred into the sheets or mattress when my dragon shifted my nails to his claws as pleasure shook us both to our cores. I came hard inside of him – desperate for more. We didn’t fall still into a tangle of arms, legs, and buzzed out brains until every last drop of the good stuff left us. We fell asleep like that – all tangled up together and falling more in love with each other every day.