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“I’m positive, mate. Come get warm by the fire while we wait.” Nacho and I had come up days before and set up a rock firepit and placed some logs around it so that we would have a place to sit and enjoy the show.
Riggs had brought up champagne and, once the fireworks were over, we intended to bring in the new year in exactly the way we’d hoped. The three of us—in the tent—not sleeping.
“Is that my phone?” She ran over to her backpack. We were glad she liked the outdoors and wanted to spend time here since it was our animals’ favorite place to be—ours, too. “Hello?” As soon as the word was out of her mouth, her smile was erased. The lines in her forehead deepened, and her fist balled up at her side.
“Who is it?” I asked, stepping closer. Whoever was pissing on our holiday, unless they were dying or sick, would regret calling her.
Marney took the phone from her ear and pressed a button, changing the conversation to speaker so we could hear. Nacho moved to stand next to me; both of us crossed our arms over our chest.
Some woman named Genia was talking and her attitude was shit.
“The family paid for most of your wedding. We lost all of our money on the downpayments. We’re in a mess, and it’s your fault. We need half of the money back. After all, it was half your wedding.”
Marney cocked her hip out. “It wasn’t any of my fault that Claude decided he didn’t want to get married. I showed up in the white dress and intended on going through with it. Why don’t you call him and ask him for the money?”
“Claude did nothing wrong. Besides…if you were more of a woman, maybe you could’ve changed his mind.”
Gods above, whoever this was clearly had no brains and even less manners.
“May I?” I asked Marney in a whisper.
“Genia, is it?” I asked.
“Who is this?” Her whiny voice pierced my ears.
“This is Riggs, her mate. Here with her other mate, Nacho. Our female owes you nothing, and you won’t see a single dime. If you’d like to continue harassing her, we won’t hesitate to file a protection order and harassment charges, since this call is being recorded. Claude has made his choice, whether you like it or not. Now, leave our mate alone. Are we clear?”
The woman hung up.
“Well, that was easy.” Marney explained who the woman was, and I regretted not giving her stronger words.
“People have balls the size of Texas, sometimes, but without the claws to back them up.”
That night, we shared hot cocoa, French vanilla this time. My girl loved new flavors of hot drinks. Tea. Coffee. All of them. And I loved experimenting for her. I hadn’t hit a flavor she didn’t love yet.
The fireworks burst forth on the stroke of midnight marking one year ended and another year began. We would never have another year like the previous—lonely and waiting for the one to complete us. She was here as the new year rang in, and no way in hell we were letting her get away.
Chapter Twenty-One
Marney
My mates were the best at celebrating holidays. I’d always loved to plan for them, but usually the people in my life thought I was overdoing it. Not Riggs and Nacho though. They loved my quirk and did everything to help our celebrations be bigger and better each time. We’d gotten through Christmas and New Year’s, Valentines Day and St. Patrick’s Day, and the spring equinox.
Every day with these men was a revelation. I had realized somewhere along the way that they really did derive pleasure from making me happy. I didn’t mean to be sexist but based on past experience, I had begun to think that men who wanted to be with me were not the best kind of people. They expected women to get their happiness through pleasing them, and if we didn’t, there was something wrong with us. Claude had been better than most, but even he had not been the most giving of souls.
These two? I had to keep telling them they had done enough, that I wanted to give back. If I wanted to make breakfast, I had to get up before the sun rose, or they’d be in the kitchen “assisting,” which really meant taking over and making me sit down and relax and keep them company.
They were hard to give to, but I spent a lot of time trying to do just that. When you live with a successful author and someone who works in many other areas of the book world, you find yourself, or at least I found myself carving out a niche in there for myself. A lot of that niche involved watching for places I could be helpful, like beta reading and doing some reaching out for support. There were so many independent bookstores around, all of whom were hungering for visits from a “big” author, and when I approached them, they about did backflips in appreciation and always ordered a whole lot of copies—which my mate’s appearance made fly out the door.
I also did housework and was working my way through every book on the shelves. By my calculations, I’d be done with them sometime next year and have to either start buying more or use my Kindle a whole lot. Not exactly a big problem compared to the situation I could have found myself in if Claude hadn’t finally decided to speak up for himself. At the last minute, but that counted.
If I hadn’t been upset, I wouldn’t have ended up in the bar that night where the bartender loaded the app into my phone and encouraged me to tap it. And then how could I have ever met these men who had become my world? When I brought that up, both guys assured me that Fate knew her business and fated mates would meet. But I wasn’t so sure. Just grateful that we had met.
It was early evening, and the sun was just now sinking low in the springtime sky. We’d had snow on the ground for a long time, and I was more than ready for the thaw that had just begun. Outside the windows, the drip drip drip of melting snow from the roof was constant, and Riggs had told me that I wouldn’t believe how soon it would be green out there. He actually had some sadness in his tone when he said it, but that’s what polar bears were all about.
This morning, we’d gone for a run in the woods, something we’d done often over the winter months. Their bears were so big that if we wanted to go farther than my human legs could carry me, one of them would let me ride them. I’d never imagined having a partner who I could climb on and go running over the mountains. Who would? But it was so incredibly magical, it made me almost want to weep.
“Marney, you’re working too hard.” Nacho came up behind me and kissed the back of my neck. “Come watch a movie with us.”
