34. Stella

34

STELLA

I sip my coffee and take in the rare sight before me that I would have missed if I hadn’t forgotten my phone. Though a lot of good it does me since I’d forgotten to charge it.

Stoneheart and Ben are still asleep, the gargoyle’s arm wrapping around the demon. The positioning of the sheet low over their hips cultivates a warmth in my core that should be extinguished by now.

This is the second day of waking up with them. Though yesterday they both woke before I did.

I’m too energized to stay asleep. I’ve already been out to eat breakfast and been teased by Fiona about missing the self-defense lessons I’m supposed to be attending every morning. Though she was sure to add that I’ve obviously been wrestling in the meantime.

Even Silas had cracked a smile at that one.

The fact that everyone in the penthouse seems to be aware that Stoneheart is trying to knock me up did not cause her comment to make me blush any less.

It makes the truth more awkward.

I’m pretty sure my fertility window is over. Stoneheart was just as touchy-feely last night, but it wasn’t nearly as driven as it has been. I’m doubly grateful that after Ben seduced the both of us with his music yesterday morning, we accomplished leaving the bed, and I got a head start on making the charms against the fae magic. If I can keep the same pace of work, I may be able to make two of them a day.

Because when I take a moment to breathe and evaluate my magic and my body, I don’t sense pregnancy.

Maybe it’s too soon to tell, but for a witch, it should be obvious the moment conception happens. Our magic is a part of us from our bodies to our souls.

If Stoneheart’s seed didn’t take, and I’m no longer ovulating, the charms are the next course of action.

I don’t let myself ponder the disappointment. I’m so in my head that I miss Stoneheart’s eyes opening.

“You’re looking way too smug this morning,” Stoneheart says.

“I have two hot men in my bed. I think I deserve to feel smug.” I smile and finish my coffee.

Ben hums and stretches, waking up. The fact that neither of them spring away from the other is a sign. The distance Stoneheart has been keeping from the two of us is diminishing.

Maybe when he wakes up more that will change, but it’s comforting when his hand flexes on Ben’s shoulder before pulling away.

With all the sex and teasing of the last couple of days, there’s a clarity that I refuse to ignore.

We belong together. The three of us.

I don’t know how we can get Ben to stay or if Stoneheart will ever open his heart, but this feels right.

Stoneheart crooks a finger at me, and I hesitate. I just did my hair, but the delicious sight of the two of them rumpled pulls me forward. He takes my coffee mug and places it on the side table before snatching me by the waist and pulling me into the bed.

I shriek, landing with two hard bodies on either side of me, but they only laugh. Ben’s hands start pulling off my dress.

“I’ve already gotten ready for the day,” I complain.

“So ready,” Ben says, nipping my ear and making me giggle.

Stoneheart puts his mouth over my mating mark, and I sigh in pleasure at the short circuit that spot has to overriding my good intentions. But we have things to do, and I spread my hands against the gargoyle’s chest to push him away and somehow get out of this bed full of hands.

“Don’t you want to reward your demon for his commendable service?” he asks. “Don’t you want for him to finally fill you?”

His words have me stopping long enough for Ben to get my dress off.

“He can come inside me?” I ask as a roundabout way of asking about how fertile my scent is. I don’t want to have the discussion yet that our plan A doesn’t seem have borne fruit.

The question gets Ben’s attention, and he pulls me to straddle him, his hands sliding up my thighs. His cock throbs against my panties to which my pussy immediately responds, making them stick to me with the flush of desire slickening my folds.

I moan as Stoneheart pulls the gusset of my panties aside for Ben’s erection to slide against me.

“Gods,” Ben says. “Please say yes. I’ve been dreaming of this.”

I rock my hips against him, imagining how it would be to be dripping with Ben and Stoneheart’s cum at the same time. My nipples are so hard against my bra that they ache.

We should at least finish getting me naked for a moment like this.

But I can’t wait.

I notch the head of him to me right as the bedroom door swings open, and the world ends.

“Stoneheart—fuck!” Silas’s curse hits me like a bucket of cold water.

I freeze. Ben’s wide eyes meet mine, but there’s a thread of determination there. He’s not leaving me to deal with the fall out of this.

Stoneheart’s wing spreads around us, preserving some modesty, but it’s clear what’s happening, and that it’s not just Stoneheart in bed with me.

“Apologies, my lady, I thought you had started work, but I didn’t know where you’d gone.” Silas sounds like he’s facing away from us. He pauses like he’s regretting all his life decisions. “We have an issue.”

I choke out a sound because this moment seems like it’s never going to end, and Ben runs a hand through my hair to comfort me.

“More of an issue than Kalos’s man being in your bed. Which I’m just so surprised about!” Silas’s voice is dry and slathered with sarcasm so thick it’s audible.

“Silas,” Stoneheart growls. My cheeks burn at apparently how obvious our arrangement has been.

Silas continues, “This can’t wait. It’s an official petition from the dragon for Stella’s presence.”

Stoneheart sits higher and his wing wraps around my back tighter, pressing Ben and I together. Danger rolls off him in waves. “Why?”

Silas takes a hesitant breath. “Stella, your mother has returned.”

“Everything will be fine,” Ben says, leaning against the doorjamb of the bathroom. While I fix the damage the two of them did to my hair. “An official petition through Kalos was the best way that she’d know to get to see that you’re safe and whole.”

“Why not just answer the phone?” I ask. Once I connected my phone to a charger, I’d seen the missed calls and texts. My heart hurts at how panicked they sound. I tried to call her back, but she’s not answering.

He shrugs. “Maybe she wants to talk in person? Or maybe she assumes anything you say will be influenced by Stoneheart. She doesn’t know him.”

He says it carefully, and I chew my lip. She doesn’t know if he’s any different from Lorenzo.

I take one more fortifying look into the mirror before turning. “Let’s get this over with.”

Ben holds out his hand, and I make sure to squeeze my eyes shut so I don’t arrive at Kalos’s nauseous. Stoneheart had agreed that it would be best for Ben to take me alone. We don’t want whatever my mother is going to say to get spread around, and Stoneheart trusts Ben to keep me safe.

The air whips around us before settling, and I open my eyes. We’re standing in front of the imposing door of Kalos’s office. I take a steadying breath, and the door swings open, the dragon in question stepping out.

“Oh good, you’re here.” Kalos’s relief is clear. His nostrils flare, and my cheeks heat. I don’t know if I’ll ever get used to the lack of privacy when it comes to paranormal beings with heightened senses, but I live in a territory of shifters, I can get over that he knows exactly what we’ve been doing. “And not too worse for wear. At least she can’t tell how thickly Stoneheart has plastered you with his scent.”

“Kalos,” Ben warns him but doesn’t continue.

The dragon raises a brow at the protective gesture. “That witch has turned my mate against me and demanded I summon another territory leader’s wife through official means. She’s a menace.”

Ben makes a sound. “Don’t make it sound like you’re helpless in the face of one witch.”

Kalos narrows his gaze. “A distraught mother. Do not underestimate that. She was going to kick up a fuss in Stoneheart’s territory, and I assume that would go poorly with what Moon has shared with me.”

Fuck.

“It would have,” I say. I need to see her right now. “Where is she?”

Kalos blows out a breath and turns to lead us away from his office. We move through the mansion that I’m relatively familiar with until we get to the outdoor patio where Katarina has a hand resting on Mom’s.

Mom looks up at me, and I stop.

“Hi,” I say. The greeting all at once too much and wholly inadequate.

I’ve always been happy that we look so similar and that I didn’t take after Lorenzo almost at all, but now that detail is a punch in the face. Her red-rimmed eyes and stark, tempered expression is like peering at my own grief.

It takes a moment of reminding myself that I’m safe and everything has worked out for the best to keep my heart from wavering. I nod to Katarina, who gets up and gives me a hug.

“We’ll leave the two of you to talk,” she says. Ben begins to argue, but Katarina yanks him with her. He lets her after I whisper that it’s okay and probably so he doesn’t upset the pregnant woman’s balance.

When we’re alone, the tension in the room swells. Her worry against my guilt.

“Hi?” Mom asks, and anger is now center stage.

I clear my throat and take Katarina’s seat across from her. “I didn’t want you to find out this way.”

“How would I have found out? I finally reach a place with reception only to receive an email congratulating me on your wedding .” Her voice is high, and she purses her lips for a moment as if to calm herself.

I frown, momentarily derailed from the emotion by the detail. “An email? From whom?”

The disbelief on her face would be comical any other time.

“It’s important,” I press.

She narrows her eyes as if to lecture me on what details are actually important, but the surge of her annoyance gives way to exasperation, and she waves her hand with a shrug. “One of the Council members. Mc-something or another. I don’t know him.”

Fuck. When Moon warned that a faction of the Council would try to sow dissention, I did not expect it to come from this direction.

“I thought it was a joke. My daughter would never get married without telling me, to a territory leader no less, and close the business she’d worked so hard on. Not while knowing the dangers of that.” Her cheeks flush with anger. “She’d never send me away for her to do that. That’s not how I raised you.”

I sink lower in my chair, but she’s not done.

“And then Carl told me he worked for Stoneheart—” she breaks off and a shattered expression flashes over her face before she reels it in. “I can’t believe I was so stupid.”

Why didn’t Carl warn Silas that she’d come home early?

“The marriage wasn’t a part of the plan. I sent you away to keep you safe,” I clarify.

“Because you meddled where you shouldn’t have. Kalos told me.”

Gee, thanks for throwing me under the bus. “I saved my friend and her mate.”

“He’s a dragon! He didn’t need your sacrifice.”

I shrug because she’s not going to see my side of things in this. I did something risky, and that goes against everything she taught me.

“I didn’t want this for you,” she says. “I wanted you to be able to live without fear?—”

“But I wasn’t,” I break in. “I’ve forever been in his shadow, waiting for the day that someone took notice of me. This way I was able to dictate my fate and get back at what he did to you!”

Mom holds up a pointed finger. “This isn’t about me. This is your own wounded pride. Your revenge was for you.

“It wasn’t just revenge. Kat?—”

“It didn’t have to be you!”

“Yes, it did.” My words snap without meaning too. “I was the only one it could be, and despite whatever you think of my revenge, I couldn’t sit aside and do nothing. Lorenzo had to be held accountable.”

She shakes her head and mutters. “You and your love of justice.”

It’s a break in the tension between us because it harkens back to arguments I’d made even as a child. But the moment doesn’t last.

Mom’s worry bleeds through. “You’ve shoved yourself back into danger. And for what? Have they convinced you they need an heir yet? Do you really think Frank is going to let the likes of you succeed him? He’ll kill you as soon as your guard is dropped.”

I’m a little too stunned by the heir comment to have an immediate rebuttal, but that doesn’t stop her.

“These people are vipers. You’ve never had to deal with politics.” Mom shakes her head and corrects herself. “Ariel isn’t mean spirited, but she’s not to be trusted. The territory will always come first.”

It’s eerie to have hidden so much from her, but for her to know more about this life than I did when I embarked on this marriage. She could have been a resource if I’d been open with her.

But would she have helped when she’d never support what I’ve done?

“What if the child you have isn’t a gargoyle?” she asks, and I silently choke. What does she know about Ben? There are tears in her eyes, but she ruthlessly wipes them away. “What if what happened to me happens to you? Will your husband be thrilled to raise a witch?”

I breathe and try not to show the relief on my face. I’m not ashamed of Ben being in our bed, but if even my mother knew, we’d have trouble.

“I trust Stoneheart,” I say. There’s no telling if an heir is even possible at this point. A fact that makes me itchy.

Her worry dries and anger flashes. “Trusting men has never gotten us very far.”

I shake my head, and even though each issue she raises pokes at my own insecurities, I don’t regret what I’ve done. Even if it has hurt her.

“I’m sorry, Mom.”

She continues as if I haven’t spoken because my apology doesn’t make a difference. “And the shifters! They only respond to hierarchy. Do you think they will accept your presence over Frank?”

Frank Leonid. Brother to a man who sold his own people to pay gambling debts. Ally to whatever fae lord is buying said people, and all-around shitty person.

She thinks that I can’t be a better leader than him?

Now I’m angry.

“How could you—” she starts, but I cut in. If she’s not willing to listen, this conversation isn’t going to do anything other than dig the divide between us deeper.

“This is my territory, and they are my people,” I say. “I get it. I hurt you by keeping you in the dark about this because I knew you’d never agree.”

Mom purses her lips and a little part of me dies to be losing the approval of my biggest champion.

I soldier on, “And this might be too much for you to take right now, but I can do this.”

I need to do this.

And no naysayers, not even my mother, are going to stop me.