Page 19 of Raging Heat

“Let’s get some food into you, before you devour me and before we’re all way too obsessed to think about it.”He doesn’t lift the blanket and doesn’t try to move away, knowing that I’ll bite if he attempts it.At least, that’s what usually happens once my heat kicks in.

“Fucking hell.”Mathew’s voice is hoarse, little more than a moan.

A low keening sound escapes me.

I want them in here with me.

I need them in here with me.

All three of them.

All three of my mates.

8

Mathew

I stumble backas Vera’s pheromones hit me and Jorge catches me, keeping me on my feet, his grip careful but sure.

“You okay?”His voice is soft near my ear, his breath tickling the hairs in my neck, and I gasp, nearly overwhelmed by his pheromones.

“Yeah.”I breathe through my mouth, trying to keep a clear head.“I’m okay.”

I step forward, out of his arms, and stare down at the massive pink heart-shaped pillow covered in blankets and Caleb sitting next to it, one of his arms under the blankets.

We were so busy setting everything up in the nest that we hadn’t noticed that she moved the thing by herself.

How focused were we?How did we not notice it?

We really should have paid more attention to her needs!

“Where’s my shirt?”Jorge’s voice behind me is confused, and when I turn around, I see that the door to the bathroom is open and the laundry basket has been dumped all over the floor.

I laugh, glancing back to the covered pillow.“I suspect Vera stole it.Just like she stole our dirty shirts.”

Caleb nods, smiling.“She tends to do that.Sorry.It helps her through the early stages of her heat.”

He doesn’t look surprised that she did this, or worried that this means that we might not be taking good enough care of her.He looks… unusually calm.He was the one insisting that her nest needed to be finished as soon as possible, and it isn’t yet.

And now she’s gone into heat with an unfinished nest…

“It’s fine.I’m sure I’ve got an extra shirt here somewhere, or I can borrow one of Mathew’s.”Jorge walks over to my walk-in-dressing room and hunts around for one of the shirts he always leaves behind here.

Okay, maybe he doesn’t exactly leave them behind… More like, they miraculously go ‘missing’ when he’s getting ready to leave and he’ll need to wear something else.

And then I sleep with it until it has lost its scent.

It’s something we both know that I do but never talk about, because talking about it would mean talking about all the other things…

Which we don’t do, ever.

“How is she?”I kneel next to Caleb.

Vera’s scent is much stronger here, flowing from the gaps in the blanket around his arm.If it’s this strong here, I can’t imagine how heavy her pheromones are under there.

“Close, but I don’t think it’s hit her just yet.”He leans closer to me and sniffs my neck, humming, making me perfume and my skin flush.

Fuck, I’ve not perfumed like this in a long time and it takes me off guard.

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