Page 66 of Omega's Triplets

Harley shook his head. “I’ll die before I let that happen.”

Was that meant to be reassuring? If so, he’d missed the mark. Maddy felt suddenly seasick. What if she escaped this mess, her children safe and sound, but all their fathers were killed? How would she move forward without her alphas?

***

THEY SPENT MOST OFthe day in the trees, waiting to see what would happen. Maddy’s muscles were cramped and sore by the time Harley indicated that they could get down. She climbed down carefully, slowly, each step feeling like a risk, worried that she would miss her footing and plummet to the earth.

Then, strong hands were on her waist, lifting her easily, setting her on the ground and turning her. It was Jamie, his arms a circle around her, his face white. He slid his hand around to rest on her belly, and she took his other hand and held it. This must have been hell for him, she realized. Being away from her and the babies all day. He must have been losing his mind.

Harley seemed to pick up on his brother’s anxiety. “We’ll camp here for the night,” he said. “They won’t come back and look for us here, I don’t think. They checked this area already. I’m sure they think we’ve moved on. Piper, why don’t you and I take the first watch?”

Piper stepped forward. She was pale, Maddy saw, but her mouth was set in a grim line. She nodded and shifted gracefully into the form of a lithe young wolf.

Reese sat down right where he was, at the base of a tall sycamore, and let his head curl in toward his chest. He was asleep in moments.

Jamie led Maddy off a little way, behind a bit of shrubbery, and pulled her down to the ground. She laid beside him and touched his face, feeling the reality of him, reveling in the fact that he was present and that they were together and—for the moment, at least—safe.

She was surprised, as he answered her touch with his own, to realize that the arousal that had been a constant undercurrent in her life since she’d become pregnant hadn’t been stifled or dampened by the intensity of their flight from their home. Laying with Jamie now, she found she wanted him just as much as she ever had. More, maybe. It was as though the panic and desperation had combined with her lust and stoked the flames of passion. Suddenly, she couldn’t resist him.

She rolled onto her back and smiled as a knowing gleam came into his eye. They didn’t remove their clothes, not completely—Maddy knew they might have to run at a moment’s notice—but they put things off, pulled things aside, made room for each other in the way of desperate teenagers who knew they might have only a few moments of privacy.

As hasty as they’d been in preparing, he entered her slowly, and she watched as his eyes drifted closed in satisfaction. She hummed softly as he filled her, reaching up to pull his face down to hers so she could kiss him. They laid like that, their movements slight, breathing against each other’s mouths, reveling in the feel and the taste of each other.

“Am I hurting you?” he whispered, tracing a hand over her body, feeling the new curves and swellings there.

She shook her head. “You’re perfect. Don’t stop.”

He sat back on his knees and pulled her hips into his lap. The angle was new and strange, erotic and exciting, and Maddy closed her eyes and reached her arms up to press into the tree behind her, to push herself more firmly toward him. He rocked gently, thrusting into her with slow and steady force, until Maddy thought the pressure building within her would drive her wild.

“Faster,” she whispered. “More, Jamie, please...”

Something in her voice must have set him off, because a low growl ripped through him. He scooped his arms under her back and lifted her to him, bringing her breasts within reach of his mouth, never separating from her. He suckled at her as she ground into his hips. He continued to thrust upward, his embrace tightening as she tightened around him, until it seemed they would both go mad.

Pleasure crashed over Maddy. She gasped, burying her face in his shoulder, and felt the sharp sting of pain that let her know he’d marked her.Good, she thought, riding him through her orgasm.Claim me. Let everyone know I’m yours. If those Death Fangs ever see me again, let them know I’m used, that they’ll never get a good price for me now. Mark me where everyone can see it.

They laid on their sides when they were finished and fell asleep like that, wrapped up in each other, clothes half off and lying in the dirt, without a care for what was going on around them, without a thought given to the fact that they were still on the run and that the enemy might be lurking nearby.

Later, Maddy would realize that this had been careless in the extreme, that they had allowed the afterglow of their lovemaking to blind them to the precautions that should have been taken. Later, she would realize that she’d done everything wrong.

But, in the moment, all she could think about was the sweet pleasure of Jamie’s embrace and the ecstatic release he had brought her.

Maddy’s pregnancy had caused her to have all sorts of crazy dreams so far, but that night she slept dreamlessly for the first time in months. Maybe it was because of her exhaustion, which had finally taken hold of her after the stresses of the day. Maybe it was because the lovemaking had been so intense and so good. Maybe it was the wonderful feeling of being held in the arms of one of her lovers and knowing another was stalking the perimeter of their little section of the woods, making sure they were safe and secure. Whatever the reason, when she fell into sleep, it was peaceful and silent.

For a time.

When Maddy awoke, it was harsh and cold as a slap in the face, a knife in the back.

She woke to the sound of a scream.

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