There’s movement behind me but I can’t be bothered to find out what. I hear the scrape of a chair being dragged across the floor and then hands are in my hair. Found Earl. Hi Earl.
Trevor turns on theTV but I can’t focus on the show. Every nerve-ending in my freaking body is alert. Earl brushes out my hair and the rhythmic strokes lull me deeper into the mushy feelings that threaten to take over everything.
This. This moment in time. It’s like a fairytale. I feel like a Queen and if I were a cat, I would purr with satisfaction.
Everything is perfect.
Everything except the incredible, undeniable, ridiculously distracting case of blue ovaries I seem to have acquired.
I’m not the kind of woman that gets a houseful of men doting and obsessing over her. This amount of attention is overwhelming.
Add in the attraction factor and these men are driving me absolutely crazy. I have needs. Pressing, intense needs. Needs that are screaming at me to be met. Soon.
But they don’t make a move. Maybe they’re waiting for me? I wish I were braver. Somehow, the idea of actually having them all is way less intimidating than verbally telling them I want them all. The more I think about it, the more agitated I get.
Is this how being a mate would work? I’d just be...shared? Between all of them? Is it an orgy all the time? Do I get one on one time with all of them? Are any of them involved with each other?
My mind is full of questions and each one leads me down a deeper and more interesting path as I consider my options. I’m teetering on the edge of something here. Probably insanity.
Right as I get up the courage to blurt it out, soft footsteps approach.
Chuck is standing in the doorway with a bashful look on his face and a pill bottle in his hand.
“I’m so sorry you got hurt, Ronnie. Here’s some pain meds, in case you need them.”
Much to my own horror, I burst into tears.
Even Chuck is taking care of me. That goofy kid doesn’t want in my pants or have any ulterior motives whatsoever, he just wants me to be ok.
I don’t cry pretty. I am not one of those women who have tears that glisten gently on their cheeks.
No. I’m the chick who turns bright red, gets snotty, and then the hiccups take over.
Never have I ever been taken care of like this, and I literally do not know what to do. So, naturally, I cry.
Babbling and sobbing, I take the pill he offers and swallow it down. The guys are frozen in place. They clearly don’t know what to do with me. I don’t even know what to do with me.
Bryan and Earl both growl at Chuck simultaneously and he edges out of the way with a stricken look on his face.
“Ronnie, tell us what’s wrong? Please? Are you in pain?” Trevor pats my non-injured leg gently and looks at me with wide eyes.
I struggle to sit up and finally manage it, leaping to my feet and immediately regretting it. My leg feels stiff and I want to go back to laying on them.
“Why are you being so nice to me? Is it because of the necklace? Is that it?” I’ve actually lost my mind. Scientific proof that blue ovaries are not good for your health.
“No,” Bryan has his hands out and is moving very slowly, like he’s trying to calm down a runaway emu... or something.
“Honey, we enjoy spending time with you and we want to protect you and make sure you’re safe. I’m sorry if we went too far,” he looks at his brothers and they are all nodding at me with varying degrees of apology. Except Earl. He doesn’t look apologetic at all. Earl looks intense.
But that’s the thing, isn’t it? They didn’t go too far. They looked, they appreciated, but they didn’t touch. They’d had me vulnerable, literally quaking with need, but didn’t press their advantage.
Maybe it’s the lack of touching that’s killing me.
I open my mouth to say it, to just put it out in the world. But nothing comes out. I can’t say it out loud. My face flushes scarlet and I hobble out of the room as fast as I can and down the hallway so that I can slam the bedroom door behind me as hard as possible. I am throbbing with needs too deep to express.
Maybe I should start calling them the Sea Lion Cockblock Club. I’ll even make them business cards.
CHAPTER FIFTEEN: RONNIE
I DON’T KNOW WHAT I expected, maybe for the whole pod to burst into my room and force me to talk about what I was feeling...but instead, they give me the space I need and I’m grateful for a little bit of peace. But it doesn’t change the fact that the sexual tension in the house is reaching unbearable levels, and the constant nudity around the house doesn’t help. With Fate determined to give me men that I am insanely attracted to while the universe cockblocks me, I’m becoming increasingly antsy.
I had to get used to the fact that nudity was a very normal thing in shifter communities. I’ve never had a huge issue with it, myself. Live and let live. All the body positivity. Show off what your mama gave you! All of that.
Which is fine.
Unless you’re living in a house with four men that you are impossibly attracted to but can’t, for some unknown reason, act on those impulses.
That’s when it becomes a problem.
A big, delicious, completely fuckable problem. Times four. Fuck my life. Please. Someone fuck my life. I’ll beg if I have to. I don’t care.
This morning, I’d gotten hit by two dicks in a row.
