Loving Lachlyn (Ashland Pride Two) (12 page)

Chapter 13

When the sunlight woke them Sunday morning, Lachlyn followed Jericho and Alek out of the tent.  She picked up her dress and pulled it over her head.

“You don’t want to change into the clean clothes you brought?” he asked as he deflated the air mattress while Alek took apart the tent.

She tapped her fingers against her arm, and he could hear how sticky her skin still was.  “It’s amazing that we weren’t attacked by ants last night.”

He chuckled.  “I think ants are too smart to bite weres.  Even if they are covered in fruit juice.”

He wasn’t nearly as sticky as she was, but he decided to put back on his clothes from the day before, saving his clean clothes for later.

“Can I help?” Lachlyn asked.

“Just relax, love,” Alek said as he began to fold up the tent and put it back in its carrying case.

Jericho noticed she was shifting from foot to foot and he grinned.  “Something up, Sunshine?”

“I have to pee.  So get the lead out.”

“There’s a whole forest full of trees.” Alek pointed out.

She made a face.  “No way!”

Jericho and Alek teased her about being too prissy to pee in the woods.  She waved her hand dismissively.  “It’s so easy for you guys, just point and shoot.  But with me, it involves putting a part of myself I like a great deal very close to the ground.  No thanks.”

Even though he enjoyed her feisty side, he didn’t want her to be miserable the first day of their mating, so he and Alek hurried through their cleanup, loading their supplies into a wagon that he pulled back to the house.  Lachlyn raced into the house, and he heard her saying hello to whoever was in the house before her footsteps moved quickly up the stairs to their bedroom.

James, John, Aaron, and Grant were sitting at the kitchen table drinking coffee when they finished putting their supplies in the shed, except for the air mattress, which needed to be washed before it was put away.

“Congratulations, boys,” James said, standing and hugging Alek and squeezing Jericho’s shoulder.

“Thanks,” Jericho said, accepting a cup of coffee from Grant and joining them at the table with Alek.

“Do you feel any different?” John asked, pushing a plate with a wedge of coffee cake across the table.

Alek said, “Definitely.  I mean she was already our mate before we marked her, but now it’s permanently etched on her skin.”

Jericho liked that, too.  He couldn’t wait for Lachlyn to be able to mark him.  Her suggestion that she mark each of them privately made his blood heat.

Over the last week, he’d had no trouble sharing her with Alek.  His bear was content to be part of a tri-mating, and it didn’t bother him to have Alek’s scent on her skin.  He was lucky because he had been able to spend more time alone with her during the day than Alek had because of his job.  Speaking of jobs…well, he didn’t need a job for financial reasons because of the money he’d saved.  But he’d go nuts if he just sat around the house all day.  Even working out with Henry every day and doing odd jobs around the house hadn’t occupied him enough.

“Jericho?” Grant asked, pulling Jericho’s thoughts from job hunting back to the present.

“Sorry, what did you say?”

“Rhett could use some help on the farm.  Are you interested?  He pays well.  I work there with Ethan, Ray, and Wesley.”

“I was just thinking about what to do for work,” he mused.  “Yeah, that would be great.  I don’t know much about farming, though.”

Grant shook his head.  “I was telling him how you’ve been fixing stuff around here, and he’s really looking for someone to do more handyman-type stuff than farm stuff.  Plus, his mate, Lisa, has got a to-do list two miles long.”

“Man, I saw that list!  She wants a gazebo
and
a greenhouse!”  James laughed.

Alek said, “We’re going over there for dinner tonight, so you can get to know my brothers, their mate, and my nephews, plus Rhett and Lisa.  You can talk to him tonight.”

“Sounds good to me,” Jericho answered, finishing his coffee cake and cup of coffee.  Lachlyn had been upstairs for a while, so she was probably waiting for them.  He took a cup of coffee and a plate of coffee cake upstairs to her.  She was leaning against the bathroom counter and looking at her face.

“What’s wrong, sweetheart?”  He put the plate and cup on the counter.

“Nothing.  I just thought for a second that my eyes changed color, but they’re just blue.  I’m too tired to think straight.”

“Then into the shower and straight to bed with you,” he grinned, enjoying the way her eyes lit up at the suggestion.  While they stripped and got into the shower, he told her about their dinner plans and the suggestion he work at Rhett’s farm.

She said, “I should probably get a job, too.”

“You don’t need to work, baby.  Alek and I will take care of you.”

“But I want to work.  At least for now.  Maybe not when we have kids, but for now I’d like to do something.”

“Any thoughts?”

“Yeah, actually.  I saw in the community paper that the school library was looking for an assistant.  You know how much I love working in libraries.”

“I remember you crying when your mom wanted to leave the library,” he chuckled, and she elbowed him with a grin.

“I would have lived there if I could.”

He kissed her forehead and rinsed off his hair.  “You can do whatever you want, Sunshine.  All I need to know is that you’re happy and that will make me happy.”

“I’m happy right now,” she said as she took her turn under the spray, “but I’ll be happier when I’m in bed with my mates.”

“That can totally be arranged.”

Sunday night, they went to Alek’s Uncle Rhett’s home for dinner.  The large farmhouse was warm and inviting, and Rhett and his mate, Lisa, made him and Lachlyn feel right at home.  They were enjoying fresh apple cider from Rhett’s own orchards when Alek’s brothers came into the house with their mate and children.

Ethan and Eryx were identical twins.  Callie hugged Lachlyn and said with a big grin, “I’ve always wanted a sister!”  They had twin sons, Elliott and Evan, who looked like miniature versions of their fathers, and Cameron, who had the same auburn hair as his mother.

“Say hi to your Uncle Jericho and Aunt Lachlyn, boys,” Ethan urged, bringing the twins to stand in front of him.  Jericho knelt down so they weren’t craning their necks up to look at him.

“Hi,” he said, and the boys’ eyes widened.

One of them turned into Ethan’s side and hid his head and the other hugged his arms around Jericho’s neck and kissed his cheek noisily, then did the same to Lachlyn as she knelt down next to Jericho.

Ethan chuckled, “That’s Evan.  He’s more outgoing than Elliott.”

Rhett said, “I remember that you and Eryx were like that, polar opposite personalities.”

Callie said, “They’re still like that.”

Jericho stood and held Evan’s hand as they walked into the kitchen to have dinner.  Lachlyn sat between him and Alek on one side of the table, and his brothers and their family sat on the other, with Lisa and Rhett on the ends.  As the food was passed around, Rhett told him about the work that needed to be done.

He’d come to Ashland many years ago, wanting to get away from the females and make his own way without their threatening behavior.  He met and married Lisa, who was human, and they farmed the land together.  Ethan and Eryx were the first to come with Callie, and their family followed several months later, with the exception of Alek, who remained in King with John and Henry, until John’s daughter, Jilly, turned sixteen and left home.

Lachlyn said, “I don’t understand.  Jilly left when she was only sixteen?”

Eryx nodded.  “It’s the way of the females.  Once a female shifts during her sixteenth year, she leaves her dad’s house and lives with the females.”

“With her mother?” Lachlyn asked.

Rhett shrugged.  “Anything is possible.  We only know for sure that the females don’t care about the males.”

“They’re like a really horrible sorority.  I think it’s a lot of male-bashing type of stuff.  Jilly was frosty as hell when I met her, and the women were even worse.  One of the boys fell down and got hurt, and they didn’t even blink an eye,” Callie said.

The meal continued as they talked about the mountain lions and the strange behavior of their females.  Once more, Jericho wondered if the females were really done with the males like Alek and the others hoped, or if they were simply lying in wait and watching for an opportunity to strike again.

Rhett took Jericho outside after dinner and showed him around the main farm and talked to him about the jobs he needed done around the farm.  Jericho liked Rhett immediately and looked forward to working for him.

As he opened the screen into the house, Rhett said, “I’m so glad you’ve joined us here in Ashland, Jericho, and it’s not just because you can fix things.  Alek’s been lonely for a long time, and it does my heart good to see him finding a mate and sharing her with a strong male like yourself.  Welcome to the family.”

“Thanks, Rhett.  I never dreamed I’d be sharing Lachlyn with someone from another were group, but I can’t deny that it feels right, and Lachlyn is as happy as I’ve ever seen her.”

“Love will do that to a person,” Rhett said, following him inside the house.

How true.

* * * * *

On Monday, Jericho headed to the farm and met up with Rhett in the storage barn where he put him to work sanding down and painting the railing around the porch of the home.  As Jericho fit the sheet of sandpaper around one rung and smoothed it down, he smiled inwardly.  He was using his hands to build something, not tear it down.  He didn’t go to work today knowing that he’d have to wash blood off his hands at some point.  If he bled today, it would be because he did something stupid like smash his thumb with a hammer, not because he would be fighting.  Coming to Ashland was turning out to be one of the best decisions he’d ever made in his life.  Not only because Lachlyn was safe, but also because he’d found a purpose to his life that didn’t involve loan sharks, collections, or hurting others.

When the work day was over, his muscles ached, but his spirits had never been happier.  The porch railing was a gleaming white, and Lisa’s genuine happiness over what he’d accomplished filled him with a sense of pride he hadn’t experienced in a long time.  He imagined that his mother would be proud of the male he had become now, because
he
was proud of himself.

Tuesday morning, when he stood at the sink to shave, Lachlyn slipped in the bathroom while Alek still slept and kissed his shoulder.  “I have a request.”  She hopped up on the counter, shivering as she sat naked on the cool marble.

He rinsed the blade under the water and arched a brow.  “Is it to distract me so I’m late for my second day of work?”

She smiled sweetly.  “Not at all.  Alek is working his late shift tonight, and I wanted to know if you would be up for me marking you?”

He stopped sliding the razor through the shaving cream and looked at her. “I’d love that.”

She wiggled her brows and touched her fingertips to his neck at the place where his pulse now pounded in excitement at the thought of what was to come.  “I want my mark on your neck.  The sooner the better.”

“My neck is feeling a little bare,” he mused, winking at her and resuming shaving.

She slipped off the counter and kissed his shoulder.  She paused with her hand on the door.  “Jer?”

“Yeah, Sunshine?”  He met her eyes in the mirror.

“Do you think your dad is looking for us?”

She trembled slightly, so he put the razor down and turned, pulling her into his arms.  “I don’t see how he could find us.  We’ve been careful.  If he
is
looking, he’ll give up eventually.  And besides, with me out of the den, that leaves the succession for the throne up for grabs.  I don’t expect that all of the males will be willing to wait for my father to step down gracefully in his old age.”

She lifted her head from his chest and smiled.  “They’ll want to help him take a fast train to the afterlife?”

He chuckled, kissing her nose and leaving a smear of shaving cream behind.  Rubbing it off with his thumb, he said, “I wouldn’t be the least bit surprised.”

“I can’t wait until tonight, Jer.”

She slipped through the door and shut it softly.  He finished shaving, unable to hide the smile from his face.  Even the unwanted thoughts of his father couldn’t dampen his spirits today.  Lachlyn was going to mark him, and they would get to spend the entire evening together.  Alone.  He couldn’t wait.

He spent the day working on an old tractor.  Brio had shared a love of mechanical things with Jericho as a child, and although he was no true mechanic, he had a talent for fixing all sorts of things, from cars to equipment.  Attempting to wash the grease from his hands at the sink in the shed, he glanced at the clock and saw that it was time for him to head home.