I’m seated at a spot on the patio at one of the local brunch places. It’s meant for families, a play area with soft turf and a smaller area for babies outside next to the patio. I got here for our reservation early after walking here. Selene had things that she wanted to talk about and I often find it easier to move during those conversations in my head. Might as well do something productive.
Julie, the owner, comes over to the table. “Hey, Meredith!”
“Hi, Julie. How are you? How are the pups? And Joe?” I ask her. Julie has become a good friend and Gael, Hakeem, and I had helped her with the capital to get this place off the ground. Because of that, we are the only people that actually get a reservation here. She says that if you really want something, you either arrive on time to get a seat or its worth the wait.
“Joe is perfect. The girls are giving me gray hair trying to figure out their major at the college. And the twins have just gotten their wolves, so things are a bit crazy in the house.” Even as she describes her life as something chaotic, a smile beams from her face. This she-wolf thrives on chaos. “Are Fati and JoJo meeting you today?”
“Monthly girls brunch,” I confirm.
“And those adorable little pups?” she asks with a giddy smile. Even though only one of the triplets is an actual werewolf, offspring from a wolf are referred to as pups. It’s a cultural thing.
“They better be here,” I joke. “I need my fix.” JoJo and her mates have been so busy lately that I haven’t seen my grandsons for nearly a week. It’s entirely too long for this Grammy to go without them.
“Of course I brought them,” JoJo says, coming from the side of the patio. “If I didn’t, my mother would string me up from the flagpole by my toes.”
I turn to see JoJo and Alexander. Alexander is pushing the wagon stroller combination that they use to cart the pups around. It’s huge, but honestly one of the best pieces of baby paraphernalia that I’ve ever seen. It carts around all three pups but can also double as a pack and play so that the pups have space to move and even sleep if they need to. JoJo is carrying their huge diaper bag.
I jump up from the table, giddy to see my babies. They are completely identical, except for their powers, which have already started to develop. I mean, they are all the sons of a god, a godling, and an angel. Though they definitely have an affinity for one of their fathers’ powers, they all have great power.
It makes things interesting for my daughter and her mates. Never a dull moment when the triplets are awake.
I run over to the stroller and grab Calix, who’s Nephilim wings are out as he starts to fly out of the stroller. “What are you doing, my little angel?”
He grins up at me, his normal gummy smile marred by the appearance of a tooth poking out of his bottom gum.
“What’s this?” I coo to him. “Did you get your first tooth?” His the last of the three pups to have his first tooth come in. Demetrios, the demi-god of the group, has two teeth and Brison, our werewolf pup, has nearly an entire mouthful of teeth after his first shift two weeks ago.
Yeah, sounds adorable to have a literal pup running around, except we didn’t know that was something that could happen. That was an interesting nap wake up.
Calix coos back at me, smiling broadly and drooling a bit. Brison gives a bark to grab my attention and Demetrios gives out a squawk of indignation that he wasn’t picked up first.
I laugh at them. “Let me sit down and I will hold all of you.”
Alexander navigates the stroller to the table, bending to kiss all three pups on top of the head and then engaging JoJo in a long enough kiss that Julie and I have all three pups out of the stroller and are playing with them before he leaves.
He knows the deal. This is a ladies only time. The only Y chromosomes allowed are still in diapers.
Just then, Fati runs up. “How am I always the last one here?”
JoJo, still a little dazed from Alexander’s goodbye, scoffs. “We always wonder that too. Been staying up too late with Caleb?”
Fati lifts her chin in mock snobbery. “I refuse to answer such questions.”
I snort. “That’s a yes,” I tell Brison and Calix, who are sitting in my lap.
JoJo dissolves and giggles while Fati stares at me like I’ve turned against her.
Julie decides to take that as her cue to leave and get our food ready. She passes Demetrios to Fati. She immediately tosses him into the air, catching him as he laughs and coos at her.
“Well, sit down,” I tell my girls. “I need to catch up on what’s going on with my pups.”
The girls sit down and a waiter brings over three large glasses with mimosas. We don’t play with champagne flutes during brunch. I don’t need to keep getting refills, give me the extra large slushy cup from 711. I’ll call it the lushy cup.
I take my first sip and then set my sights on JoJo. “Alright. What’s going on with Jacob?”
He’s been going through the process of changing back from being a Throne, a process which started about two months ago. It’s been grueling and really painful for him.
JoJo’s happy smile turns down, becoming serious and sad. “He just went through another siphoning, so he’s in stasis at the Archeon River. Hermes is there with him.”
I wince. The siphoning of the Throne powers is excruciatingly painful for Jacob and brings him near to death every time. The hardest part of taking away the angelic powers is that Jacob’s DNA was literally changed. It’s a lot easier to add to DNA than to take away from it, especially if they want to keep Jacob the same as he was before.
That explains why Alexander gave JoJo such a thorough goodbye.
I shuffle Calix and Brison in my arms and reach over to squeeze her arm. Fati wraps her arm around her sister, laying her head on JoJo’s shoulder. Demetrios reaches over and taps his mother’s cheek.
Well, he doesn’t have great motor control, so it’s more like a slap than a tap, but he’s trying to be sweet.
JoJo grabs his hand and blows a raspberry on it, causing the little boy to squeal with laughter and that sad look to turns immediately to a grin. She grabs him up from her sister, leaving Fati to grab Calix from me.
I can tell that JoJo is done talking about it. Especially when she turns to us and says, “Soooo, I might be pregnant again.”
“WHAT!” JoJo screams and I struggle to keep a straight face. Not my matebond, not my body.
But the pups are just 6 months old! If she was pregnant now, the triplets wouldn’t even be a year by the time they are born. Can you imagine having SIX kids under a year?!?!
“It’s not like I’m trying to have another set of triplets right now. That dud batch of birth control that went out? I had it and we were in Olympus during the last full moon, so I didn’t even get the emergency back-up pill. So it’s entirely possible,” she says shrugging.
“Well, shit…” Fati says.
“So, you’ll know in the next few days,” I say.
JoJo shrugs. “Yup.”
“Fucking glad I don’t have to worry about that,” Fati says.
I’m about to respond, but our food arrives right at that moment. I wait until everything is on the table and our waiter walks away.
“Speaking of that,” I say and JoJo shoots me a look. She knows what I’m going to say and she really doesn’t want me to. It likely isn’t going to go over well, but I promised Gael and Hakeem that I’d brooch the topic with our oldest child. “What are you and Caleb going to do about your matebonds?”
Fati shoots me a not so nice look. “What do you mean, Mom?”
Not a big fan of the way that she said my name but moving on. “Are the two of you still looking for your mates or are you two going to take each other as chosen mates?”
“We haven’t really talked about, Mother,” she says for me.
“Look, I’m not trying to push you. You dads and I just want you to be happy. By your ages, I had already had the two of you. Your fathers and I were happily mated for years and we just want you to be as happy as we are,” I say before taking a huge bite of my French Toast so that I don’t say anymore to put my foot in my mouth.
Fati doesn’t say anything for a moment before looking at me. “I want to find my mate. But I’ve been looking and I can’t haven’t found him, her, or them. I would take Caleb as my chosen mate in a second. But I don’t want to take away his chance at finding his mate.”
“But you haven’t talked about it with him?” I ask.
“I’m afraid to,” she admits.
“Maybe that’s a conversation you might need to have. And soon,” JoJo says and the forlorn that comes over Fati’s face makes me wish I hadn’t brought it up in the first place.
I sit in my office facing away from my desk, looking out through the open double doors that lead out into our yard. Though it’s a yard in the loosest sense of the word. Most humans, hell most werewolves, love to have an open clearing behind their house. A place to set up a patio or a pool. A place for pups to play or cookouts to take place. But that’s not what our yard is. We have a very large front yard that showcases the front of our house with a large porch across the front. But the back of the house is surrounded by trees. The only clear area is a path that goes through the trees, leading to a circular clear space about 50 feet in. The path is about two people across and I have a clear view from the desk in my office. It’s where Citra used to commune with Hecate on the Astral Plane, similar to how Bella has a large flat rock that she sits on by the river behind their house. I used to watch her out there, my wolf unable to stop
My lungs feel like they’re exploding, longing for air. I know that if I just open my mouth, let the water in, that it will be over. But it turns out that the more human I become, the more difficult it is to intentionally drown myself. Through the mindlink, I hear Hermes say, Stop fighting it, polemistí mou (my warrior). Let the Lethe in and then we can let you up. It all sounds so simple, especially to a god. Just breathe in the healing waters of the Lethe, the famed river in the Underworld where all ills are cured. Where Hercules gained his near invulnerability. Where traumatized souls came to forget after their deaths. According to Michael, the archangel who had been my guide as an angel, their god was able to give his “holy power” to those that he deemed worthy. But he was unable to take it away. That was the “world’s work,” for all were made in their god’s image and all were full of his glory. He was unable to take that away from them.
“He wants us to go to Apollo,” I tell our other two mates as we ready Jacob for a bath. Lethe is freezing and he’s always shivering and all goose bumpy by the time that he gets back home. This time his lips are slightly blue and his skin is pale. I’m worried.We all are.“Why? What can Apollo do that the Lethe can’t?” Alexander asks me.“Michael thinks that because Apollo is used to dealing with humans, he might have better success than what we’ve been doing?” I say, hurriedly taking my clothes off as Alexander and Josefina take off Jacob’s clothes. His baths work better when we’re all in there with him and right now I don’t trust him to stay above water by himself right now.His wolf, though awake and responsive, doesn’t seem to be healing him as well this time. Michael thinks that it’s because his wolf is losing his angelic powers faster than Jacob is. It’s his wolf’s way of protecting Jacob’s human form.I realize that I keep saying ‘Michael thinks’ about five more times than
I know that Jake and Hermes are going at it, Jake pretty much nonsensical with how needy he is. But right now, I can’t look beyond JoJo and the way that her eyes are devouring every inch of me. Fuck, this she-wolf knows exactly what each and every one of us likes and she deploys her skills with alacrity. I watch as she adds a bit of a wiggle to her hips, causing her heavy breasts to sway. They somehow got bigger and fuller after having the triplets. Actually, they seem even fuller over the past few days. That thought makes something in his brain hitch. Like there’s something important about that piece of information. But then JoJo cups both of her tits in her hands, one finger on each had reaching up to swipe over her nipples, and that though completely dissipates as he watches her. Were she a bit taller, I’d be able to smell her arousal, but the water in the tub is too high for that. She reaches me and pushes my thighs apart and she settles
“Thor, Erik will be awake soon,” I complain, but not very forcefully.Thor has his nose in my neck, his tongue playing alone her matemark. Our little godling is napping, but Thor, who had been visiting his father, just got home. And he is hungry.Just not for food.“He’s fine. He’s a godling. He can care for himself. Magic his own food. Care for his own entertainment. And isn’t Tethys just next door?” Thor’s voice sends shivers through my body, causing my core to clench and prepare for his entry. This is exactly what Thor does to me. Every single time.And the fact that he has had my Auntie Tethys come to act as a nanny for our son, Erik, and that he’s been hinting at Erik needing a brother or sister, tells me exactly what has been on his mind lately. The man is able as subtle as the damn hammer he carries around. I feel my body start to melt against his, my resolve to try and push his advances until later in the evening start to crumble and fall. There is truly
“Are you sure that you’ll be ok, babe?” I ask Freya. She looks at me from her seat on the couch. She has a heating pad on her back and her feet in magickally heated water filled with Epsom salts. She’s also drinking some tea with turmeric and ginger to help with the swelling that seems to be growing out of control with all of the rain lately. With both of us being at least half witch and half werewolf, we weren’t sure whether she would take after our witch side or our werewolf side. With how fast her stomach is rounding and her being only a few weeks along, it seems like the werewolf side is going to be taking over. Honestly, I’m happy about that. I want to meet our child. And I’m dying to know whether they are a boy or a girl. Waving me off, she picks up the remote for the television. “No, love. Go to your meeting. I’m just going to watch some trash TV. Maybe take a nap. I somehow have the afternoon off and I’m taking damn go
After I was finally able to calm down from the post-treatment sex and we had all nearly been asleep in our huge bed, all tangled in each other, Alex had sat up and cried out, “You’re pregnant!” He explained about noticing that JoJo’s breasts were fuller and us noticing how much more sensitive she was during sex. Alex had put it together and insisted that JoJo take a pregnancy test. JoJo tried to say that we didn’t have any in stock and Hermes produced one out of thin air. Seeing a demi-god, a god, an angel, and a werewolf stand over a stick for three minutes and waiting to see if a line shows up must have been an amazing sight to see. Even more so when that line showed up and we’d realized that in four months we’ll have another set of triplets with us. At first, there was nothing but surprised silence. And then huge smiles and more sex. Celebratory sex this time. Hermes got to pick the boys’ names, picking “good Greek names.” This t
Stepping into the house, I smile at my father’s assistant, Corey. “Hey Corey! How’s Larissa?” Corey’s mate is due any day with their fourth pup in four years. Those poor parents! They’ll never have a full night’s sleep again. Well, at least not for the next 16 yeas until the pups enroll in Arcadia University. “Ready to be finished,” Corey laughs. He looks exhausted, but extremely happy. Their other three pups seemed to have gotten their mother’s antsiness and hadn’t been sleeping well. He had been up with them and his mate. Ba had told him to go home and sleep while the pups were at daycare, but Corey insisted that they needed to work. Continuing, Corey asks, “You looking for Hakeem, Gael, or Meredith?” I smile. Even though Corey only works for one of the my parents, he always seems to know exactly where the other two are. “I’m looking for Ba. I was hoping that he had some time free for lunch.” Though I know that