The Island Of Alphas: A BBW Paranormal Romance (16 page)

In the same moment that I had this thought, I spied some fairly large rocks near the lake shore. They were just about the size of softballs. Just about the perfect size for throwing.

With adrenaline flooding my body, I didn't even think. I just dashed toward the lake as fast as I could on my shaky legs. Being careful not to touch the murky water, I snatched up a rock and hurled it at the approaching bear. But, like so many of my bullets had, it missed its target. I immediately grabbed another rock and launched it, and this one directly hit the bear's right eye. He paused, roaring, the eye that had been hit going dark.

"Yes."

Still being careful not to let my hand come in contact with the dark water, I stooped, picked up another rock, and hurled it hard, as if I was pitching a baseball. It hit the approaching bear directly in his left eye. He roared, if the feeble sound could even be called that, and dropped to the ground not ten feet away from me, his left eye going just as dark as the right.

Elated, I made a cry of joy. Though at the same moment, I felt something, something like a hand or a rope or a claw, I couldn't even tell, close around my right ankle. The thing tugged at me, and I went down on my stomach, crying out again, though this time in terror, not joy, realizing that I must have unknowingly stepped into the water when I'd stepped forward to pitch my last rock.

"Nate! Eric!"

Whatever thing had my ankle began tugging at it harder, beginning to drag me into the dark water. I clawed at the sandy, rocky shore, screaming, trying to kick at whatever thing had my ankle in a vice grip. "Eric! Nate! Please!"

I could see them on the ground, not very far away, both of them still unconscious.

"Please! Help me!"

I was now in the water up to my knees, and I could feel something else, in addition to what had my ankle, trying to drag me into the lake. It was something like a rush of water, a strong current, flowing toward the center of the lake.

"Help!"

Suddenly, I caught a glimpse of Eric stirring, lifting his silver-furred head from the ground. Screaming once more, I again kicked at the thing or things dragging me into the lake, still keeping sight of Eric, who was slowly rising to his feet.

"Eric! Help!"

After giving his head a quick shake, as if he were waking from a dream, he began charging toward me. Sobbing with relief, I dug my fingers into the sand in front of me, praying that I could hold on for just a few more seconds, and I did. Eric reached me, right away shifted into his human form, and grabbed my forearms, pulling with all his might.

Whatever had my ankle wasn't about to give up, though. It clutched my ankle tighter, yanking me, the force of its movements counteracted by the power of Eric pulling on my arms. Soon pain exploded in my shoulders and my right hip. I felt like I was literally being ripped apart, and I probably was.

Gritting my teeth against the pain, I looked up at Eric. "Don't let me go, please. Don't let me go."

He didn't, digging his heels in the sand and further tightening his grip on my forearms. "I won't. Never. Just hold on."

The current I felt pulling me toward the center of the lake suddenly became stronger, as did the hold of whatever thing had me by the ankle. But just then, Nate came tearing out from the jungle, snarling, leaped into the water, and began snapping his jaws in the water near my ankles. Almost instantly, I lurched forward and into Eric's arms. I was free.

Though, now something seemed to have a hold on Nate. However, being that he was a shifter, he had much more strength than I did, and a few kicks from him, combined with Eric giving one of his arms a hard tug, was enough to get him clear of the water.

And just in time. The last remaining bear was now up and lurching toward us, though with both of his eyes now darkened, the only red visible being rivulets of blood.

Scrambling away from the water, I turned my eyes away from the bear's grisly face, sure that Eric and Nate would have him dispatched within moments, and they did. He barely made a whimper as they ripped him to shreds, I was sure, howling and snarling.

Once their task was done, Eric and Nate both shifted back into their human forms, rushed over to me, and took me in their arms, cradling me between them.

Eric kissed the side of my face several times before speaking in a voice thick with emotion. "I promise you this, Liz. I'll never underestimate you again."

Suddenly a bit misty, I buried my face in his chest, sniffling.

Soon the three of us returned to Clearwater, anxious to see if everyone was safe, and if all the other Forms were dead now. To our great relief, everyone in the village was safe, and no one had been hurt, though only one of the Forms had been killed before the rest had escaped into the jungle.

After delivering this news to Eric, Matt heaved a sigh. "The others probably headed straight back to the lake, where they'll probably rest up for a while before coming back to trouble us once again."

Eric, who was now holding me like a baby after insisting that I not walk until I was checked over by Bev, began rocking me in his arms almost imperceptibly, his gaze on Matt. "Maybe. Maybe the Forms will come to trouble us again. But not today. And right now, I need to take care of Liz and make sure she's okay."

Soon I was thoroughly examined by Bev, who proclaimed that other than some serious bruises that were already forming, I was indeed going to be okay.

"You just need some rest to help you heal, and you'll be just fine."

To that end, she gave me something to make me sleep, which I gratefully took, and within minutes, I was out like a light. I slept for twelve hours solid.

Over the next several days, Eric and Nate were by my side constantly, though the three of us didn't engage in any intimacy, because of the enormous purple bruises covering my arms and my right ankle and calf. Also, probably from all the pulling I'd endured, my joints also felt incredibly stiff and achy.

However, by the fifth day of my recovery, I was finally starting to feel okay. Okay enough that I responded eagerly when Eric gave me a tentative kiss while we rested in bed together after having had a wonderful late afternoon nap.

I began running a hand across the chiseled planes of his chest, kissing him back passionately, but before long at all, I had a sudden thought and broke the kiss. "Wait. Maybe we should pause this until Nate comes back."

Along with several other pack members, he was doing a bit of surveillance around the lake that day, making sure that the remaining Gray Forms were staying put, where they belonged.

Eric frowned at me, drawing his dark brows together. "Remember, though...I agreed to share you with Nate for one night only. And that already happened."

Realizing he was right, I sighed. "I know, but...I care about you both. I don't want this to end now. I don't want what I feel for both you and Nate to end."

Eric frowned even harder. "But we're supposed to be making a baby together, remember? I want to have a child with you, and I thought you were open to that possibility, and the possibility of staying on the island forever."

"I am. I am, Eric, but I just can't let go of Nate just yet. He means too much to me. Just the same as you do."

"Well, you can't have a child with both of us."

"Yes, I realize that. The thought crossed my mind the night the three of us shared this bed together."

Though I wasn't using any form of birth control, I hadn't been very concerned about becoming pregnant the night the three of us had shared intimacy, because a day or two earlier, I'd done an ovulation test on myself at the clinic, and that test had revealed that I wasn't ovulating. I'd already passed that point in my cycle. As I was about to start another cycle, though, I knew things were about to get a bit more complicated.

Sure that I was frowning just as hard as he was, I reached out a hand and began stroking the side of Eric's handsome, strong-jawed face. "I know I can't have a child with both of you. I know that. But I care about you both so much. I just think I need a little time to figure things out."

I'd thought Eric might respond in anger. Or, he might get out of bed, uttering something about regretting ever agreeing to share me with Nate in the first place.

But instead, surprising me, he moved his head in a slight nod. "As you wish. But I'll agree to this under one condition."

"What is it?"

"If you want to continue sharing a bed with both Nate and me, that's fine. But I want you to agree that when you become pregnant, you'll accept the father of the baby as your mate for life. No being on the fence about anything, no contemplating about which man you care about or love the most. It'll just be a done deal. Whichever man is the father of your baby, that's who you'll agree to accept as your mate for life."

"But wouldn't that be an awfully long nine months until we could test to see who the father of the baby is?"

"No, not at all. Before they left the island, the scientists here developed a test that can determine paternity of a baby simply by drawing some of the mother's blood even a week or two into a pregnancy. I'm not entirely sure how it works, but all their notes, and the equipment they used for the test, are still in the lab. I'm sure you could make sense of things and do the test yourself."

Looking deeply into my eyes with a shaft of sunlight coming in through a window making his own eyes a lighter shade of gray than usual, Eric paused. "So, will you agree to this? If I agree to continue sharing you with Nate until you become pregnant, will you agree to accept the father of your baby as your mate for life?"

I thought for a long moment or two before responding. "Okay. Okay, yes. I'll agree to this. If and when I become pregnant, I agree to accept the father of my baby as my mate for life."

A grin slowly spread across Eric's face.

"Good. It's settled, then."I smiled back with butterflies fluttering in my stomach. "It's settled. We better call Nate back from the lake right away, though. I think the two of you have some serious work to do."

Eric chuckled, and I laughed along with him, praying that no matter how things turned out, I wouldn't regret my decision.

CHAPTER NINE

I gasped, sinking into my desk chair, when the second line of the pregnancy test stick began turning a crystal-clear, bright pink. My voice came out in a near-whisper.

"No. No way."

Staring at the stick, I blinked a few times, not believing my eyes. But the second line of the test didn't lighten or fade. It just got even darker, changing from bright pink to a deep magenta. Once again, my voice came out in a barely audible rush.

"Not possible."

I'd spoken the words while knowing that it
was
actually possible.

It had been about two weeks since Eric and I, and then very soon Eric and Nate and I together, first had sex. Beforehand, I'd given myself an ovulation test that had revealed that I
wasn't
ovulating. However, instant ovulation predictor tests were not perfect, and I'd known it at the time, but had just kind of ignored that little fact.

And now, I was late for my period. Now, a little test stick in my hand was telling me I was pregnant.

After all the action at Black Lake, when Eric had said that if I wanted to keep on sharing my bed with both him and Nate, I'd have to agree to accept the man who got me pregnant as my mate for life, I'd agreed readily, just wanting to continue on with our little threesome. Though in the days that followed, I regretted my agreement. I loved sharing a bed with both Eric and Nate, loved living out my fantasy nearly every single night, but I'd come to realize that when it came to whomever would be my mate for life, I didn't want to leave it up to chance.

And that was mainly because with each day that passed, despite the fact that I loved Nate's body, I could feel myself falling more and more for Eric on
both
a physical and an emotional level.

Though we'd never said it to each other, I realized that I probably loved him, and he probably loved me. Now I was pregnant, possibly with Nate's baby. Now my hope for a future with Eric might be ruined.

Knowing that I could get pregnant at any time, I'd been meaning to call the continued ménage a trois off. I planned to tell Eric that as much as I was enjoying a bed with him and Nate both, I was having serious thoughts that he was the man I wanted a future with. He was the man I wanted to be the father of my baby and if he felt the same, that he wanted a future with me, too, I was going to try to let Nate down easily.

That's what I'd meant to do, but every time I got up the nerve, I found I just couldn't. I kept telling myself just one more night with Eric and Nate both, then I'd call things off. Now it was too late. And it had probably already been too late even from the moment that I'd agreed to accept as my mate for life the man that got me pregnant. I realized that in order to turn the second line on the pregnancy test pink, I probably had to be close to two weeks along. I'd probably gotten pregnant either my first night with Eric, or the first night he, Nate, and I shared a bed. Meaning that, while there was a good chance my baby's father was Eric, there was also a good chance the father was Nate.

Just staring at the test, trying to accept the result as completely real, I slowly spun in my chair in my little office in the clinic. Rather than taking a more accurate blood test, I'd taken a stick pregnancy test into the bathroom down the hall, then rushed into my office to wait for the results, because I hadn't wanted Bev, Laura, or the lab technicians to know what I was up to. Now, I
really
didn't want them to know.

It would only be right to tell Eric and Nate first, of course. Although, I wasn't in a huge hurry to do that, knowing that once I did, they'd likely want me to test for paternity right away. It would be easy to do so, even at this early stage, with some of the testing equipment left behind by the island scientists in the lab.

Then, if Eric wasn't my baby's father, I'd have to say goodbye to him and begin my new life with Nate, something I didn't know if I'd ever be ready for.

Though, that wasn't to say that I'd be entirely displeased to spend the rest of my life with Nate as my mate; I wouldn't be. There were many things besides his looks, his body, and his performance in the bedroom that I liked, including his sense of humor, his fairly easygoing nature, and his kindness. I knew he'd make a good father and husband. But at the same time, I knew Eric would as well, and he was the man I most wanted. He was the man who made my heart beat the fastest.

Still slowly spinning in my desk chair, I imagined a baby with Eric's coal gray eyes and dark hair. I imagined what Eric might look like holding a baby in his strong arms. And not just holding any baby, but
our
baby. I silently cursed myself for not calling off the ménage a trois, and for even starting it in the first place, heavenly though it had been.

Before long, a knock on my office door startled me out of my thoughts so suddenly that I dropped the pregnancy test stick and it bounced off my knee and onto the floor beneath my desk.

A moment later, Laura opened the door and poked her head inside. "Don't mean to bother you, but did you forget about your afternoon appointments?"

I tried to force my brain to think. "My...my what?"

"Your afternoon appointments. There are two patients waiting already. Today's the day we need to do blood-work and examine all the women included in the fertility drug trial, remember?"

I was starting to, though my mind was still focused on the shocking results of my pregnancy test.

I moved my head up and down in a nod. "Yeah. Yes. Yes, I remember. The women who volunteered to take the fertility drugs. They need to have blood-work and exams today. I remember."

Laura stepped inside my office, peering at me intently and frowning. "Hey, are you okay? You look really...just, pale, I guess. And you seem a little spacey, no offense."

I definitely wasn't quite ready to tell Eric and Nate my news, though considering that Laura could already tell something was up after observing me for just a few seconds, I was sure it wouldn't be long before Eric and Nate would sense something, too. Until I was ready to reveal my pregnancy, I was going to have to develop a better poker face, that I knew.

Attempting to give Laura a genuine smile, I gave my head a quick shake. "I'm completely fine. Just a lot on my mind."

“Just pregnancy-related thoughts, or...."

For a split-second, I sat stunned, thinking that she
knew
, and I couldn't understand how, since I myself had just found out. But then I realized she almost certainly meant "pregnancy related thoughts" in regards to our patients. Of course.

I discreetly breathed a little sigh of relief before responding. "Yes. Pregnancy thoughts. And I don't want to keep our patients waiting any longer, so I'll just finish up what I was doing in here real quick, and I'll be out."

Laura nodded, already withdrawing from the office, and said okay. Once she'd shut the door behind her, I breathed another sigh of relief. I was glad that my explanation for my spaciness had seemed to satisfy her, though at the same time, it didn't feel great to be hiding something from her. We'd become very good friends during my time on the island, and I wasn't in the habit of hiding things from good friends.

However, I knew I could never tell Laura I was pregnant without telling Eric and Nate first, whenever that was going to be. I just needed a little time to gather my thoughts and let everything sink in, even though I knew that was just delaying the inevitable, the inevitable being running a paternity test on my own baby and getting the results, for better or worse.

After I'd picked up the pregnancy test and stuck it in a desk drawer, I grabbed a few clipboards and began heading out of my office, but just then, my phone went off, stopping me. I pulled it from one of the front pockets of my white lab jacket, saw that it was Eric calling, and answered right away, conscious of making my voice sound as normal as possible. It was Eric who actually sounded rattled, saying that he and Nate wouldn't be able to visit me that evening.

"I'm really sorry, Liz. I know this is the second night in a row."

"Well, what's going on? Is it the Gray Forms?"

Eric heaved a sigh, the sound seeming to be one of tiredness rather than exasperation.

"Surprisingly, no. The Forms have been pretty quiet ever since you took out Gabriel and his clones."

"What is it, then?"

"Well, nothing serious. Just some trouble from the wolves. The
other
wolves here on the island, that is. We've never really been too friendly with this other group up on the northern point of the island, or they with us, and you could say this general lack of friendliness between our two groups hasn't exactly been getting better lately."

"Well, why? What do they want?"

"Hard to tell exactly, but probably what they've always wanted, which is to take out all us wolves here in Clearwater and then take all our land, women, and resources for themselves. See, they have always had...well, just simply
less
than we have. This is mostly because of all their infighting and complete inability to get along with each other and work with each other to build a strong community.

“Their alpha, Dominic, isn't a very effective leader, and he allows all this fighting to go on, even encourages it sometimes, I think, because he figures that all his people constantly squabbling amongst themselves makes them easier to control, somehow.

“It also makes it easier for him to blame other people when things for their group don't go as planned, like when earlier this morning they tried, and failed, to raid our village. Dominic blamed his men for being disorganized in their attack, even though as alpha, he was the one who directed their actions."

A bit uneasy, I shifted my feet, clutching my clipboards to my chest. "Do you think they'll try to attack our village again?"

The prospect of raising a child in a village where frequent attacks were the norm, wasn't exactly a heartening one. The long moment of silence that ticked by before Eric answered wasn't exactly heartening, either.

He took a deep breath and spoke with tension evident in his voice. "Well...will they try to attack our village again? Unfortunately, I know the answer is likely
yes
to that. But the thing is, Liz, their attacks will never, ever be successful. They can attack us a thousand times, and they still won't be successful.

“We're too strong for them, both physically, and also in terms of our strength as a group. My men work together, always have, and always will. Dominic and his men are no match for us, and they know it. If they want to continue to cause trouble, the end result will probably be that they'll ultimately self-destruct in their desperation."

"What do you mean?"

"Well, each time they make an attempt to attack, we always take out at least one of their men, sometimes more, and injure several others. Because of this, their numbers and power are slowly dwindling, making them even more desperate to get what we have...our women and children, our well maintained homes, our food production resources, everything.

“I'm sure Dominic wouldn't mind getting a few of my men on his side, either. But, the smaller his pack gets because of their attempted attacks, the more desperate they become, which, in turn, makes them attempt to attack us again, making many careless mistakes while they do so, losing even more of their men. It's a cycle of desperation and foolishness that will eventually get every last one of them killed, I'm sure. And in the meantime, it's an annoyance to me and my men to not only have to keep a close watch on the Forms, but these other wolves as well."

"Well, can't you go on the offensive and take them out right now?"

"That's something I've considered many a time in the past, but unfortunately, it's not that simple. Dominic's village, which is called Wulfric Palms, isn't only home to him and his men, but their wives and children as well, and I know they could be hurt in an attack. Unlike Dominic, I actually care about not hurting innocent people.

“So, my men and I will continue the same way we have been when Dominic and his men get a mind to try to attack us every now and again. We'll just play defense, until over time, all of Dominic's men, and him, hopefully, are eventually killed. At that point, I suppose our village and maybe some of the other villages on the island will absorb the women and children of Wulfric Palms."