Page 21 of The Alphas' Beach Baby Mama (Triple L Ranch Shifters 3)

Chapter Thirteen

Andrade

She was halfway to the bottom of the bed when I realized she meant it. She was leaving, and Zion was doing nothing to stop her. He was just watching in bemusement. But I wasn’t having it. Reaching out, I caught her arm and dragged her back up between us. The fog was still heavy outside the window, but daylight was brightening behind it and we would probably have a sunny day eventually.

One where I could splash in the waves with my mates.

Plural.

Unless our new mate left, because she had a lot of weird ideas about what it meant to be mated to someone. I couldn’t imagine settling that way, and that he treated her the way he did before she left? Rage stirred within me, and my wolf wanted to hunt him down and shred him. How dare he insult our mate that way?

I sat up against the headboard and tucked her under my arm. My wolf had wanted me to mate her, to mark her, almost since she walked in the door, and I knew Zion’s had as well, but we couldn’t move forward until we untangled any confusions in her mind and made sure she was ready.

“We can’t send you back to Triple L,” I said. “Not to someone who will be a bad mate to you.”

“No. I’m not going back. Crain will not accept that I’m ending our betrothal. He showed me how determined he was. Isn’t it funny, up until that day, I’d have told anyone we were good friends who cared about one another and nothing more. But apparently, he had stronger feelings, and maybe was insecure even when I agreed to mate him. Like if he let me out of his sight, I’d end up with someone else.” She wiped her face with the back of her hand and sniffed. “I guess he was right.”

Zion moved to sit on her other side and picked up her hand, toying with her fingers. “And maybe he did have some kind of a feeling about it, or maybe he just recognized that you didn’t share his love. Friends can be happy together. I’ve seen it. But not when there are fateds waiting for you. If you are one of the lucky wolves who has a fated mate? They will cross your path. You will have the chance to be with them. And that’s what happened.”

“When the fog goes away, I’ll just leave and…I might need to borrow a few dollars from you if you don’t mind? I promise to send it back when I’m settled and working somewhere. You just have to give me your address and—”

I used two fingers to tip her face up toward me. “Diana, everything we have is yours. But why do you want to leave us? Don’t you want to stay and accept the gift the Fates have given us?”

“I can’t cause trouble between you and Triple L. It wouldn’t be right.” The tears fell freely down her cheeks, puddling on her collarbones. “And it’s better to be alone than with the wrong person. I know that now. If I—if I asked to be with you both, just one time, would you do that for me? So that when I am all alone, I have that memory?”

My heart split in half, my wolf howling mournfully inside me. The idea of our mate all alone in the world clinging to one memory of being together was unendurable.

Zion turned her to face him. “First, we want nothing more than to make love to you. A hundred times, a thousand, and we would never hold you with us against your will, but you don’t need to go away. Sawyer and Tadeo are strong alphas who would not permit personal matters to affect pack relations. Especially when one has found her fated mates. When they met Analise, they had such joy about them. I met them at a gathering, the three of them, and at the time, I wondered what it would be like to have two mates. Could it possibly be as satisfying as the one who filled my heart?” He pressed his lips to hers then to mine and sat back. “And yet, from the moment you arrived, I have learned that there is always room in a heart for what the Fates give us.”

“I don’t…what are you saying?” Her eyes were spilling over again.

“I am refusing your request for a single and memorable time together.”

“All-all right.” Her lower lip trembled. “I understand. I’ll leave, and thank you for helping me last night.”

She was not getting it. “Alpha, please be clearer. Our mate thinks you are rejecting her. I think she’s too upset to understand.”

“How can she think that when I am explaining that we want her to be with us forever?”

Diana—such a beautiful name—sat up straight and looked from one of us to another. “But what about the packs?”

“I’ve got this.” He kissed the top of her head. “The packs will be fine but if you want us to mate you, then we will also claim you, and we will be accepting the gift of the Fates. In full.”

“You would mark me?”

“Yes,” Zion said.

“And take me to live with you? You don’t mind adding me to your mating?”

He tore off his pants and lifted her to straddle his lap. “Diana, you are a beautiful woman who makes both my heart and my wolf sing. Why don’t you see your value? You were willing to accept a male unworthy of you instead of waiting for us.”

“But not everyone has a fated mate.”

“No, but you do,” I told her. “You have two.”

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