Chapter 65
Gonzalo POV
Helios gave a relieved smile and shook her hand. "That's the other thing we wanted to talk to you and Adrien about," he said, giving the floor to Nat.
"You and Adrien are both mated to our pack members. That makes you part of the pack. The only thing we need to know is when you'd like to be officially inducted into the pack. No pressure. You both need to decide with your mates. Just give us a heads up. We'll be arranging permanent lodgings for Elias and Adrien and you'll be moving up to the Beta floor when you're ready, so we need to plan for modifications to make it more vampire friendly." Nat explained. "Yes Luna," Kassie responded.
"Call me Nat. As the future Beta Female, you and I will get to know each other very well," Nat smiled at Kassie, who looked surprised and simply nodded.
"There's still about an hour to sunset, so let me go put the partition back in place and you guys can head up to your rooms." I ran out the conference room and set up the partition. I would have to think of something more permanent now that Kassie will be staying here permanently. That thought brought a grin to my face and had Dario purring at the thought of her being here forever.
And Adrien. He is kin - Dario said. I was a little confused at his words, but he was right, even before I knew Kassie was my mate, he felt like kin. I didn't know why or how, but he was family.
"See ya love birds," Adrien ran off to his room with Elias on his heels. I could see just how wrapped around his finger Elias was already. I was happy for them. Elias had always been a good warrior. He was quiet and reserved, which I think made him the perfect balance to Adrien's eternally happy personality. We walked into her room and remembering seeing her without her shirt earlier had my body pumping blood south. I stood at the door, unsure of what to do. We had a lot to talk about but not a lot of time before we had to head back downstairs. I wasn't sure if we should start it now.
"Want to come in?" Kassie asked, patting the seat next to her on the couch. I walked over and sat next to her.
How did you manage to get her to like you the first time when you never talk? - Dario mocked me.
f**k off man, I wasn't as rusty back then as I am now. - I grumbled.
"We don't really have time to start the conversation we need to have. Want to just watch some TV for a bit?" She suggested. I nodded thankfully and grabbed her free hand in mine as she flipped through the channels. She settled on a crime documentary. We sat in comfortable silence, but after a while my nerves started getting the best of me. I felt like I should be talking to her or something. I was getting more and more nervous that I was f*****g things up. "Are you OK?" She asked me.
"I'm sorry Kassie. I am...rusty. I haven't been with anyone in 200 years. I feel like we should be talking but we have no time for that right now." I laughed nervously, "I don't know what to say. Wanna make out?" I said playfully.
"Yes." Her soft whisper surprised me. She was looking at me with such a serious expression, a small blush on her face. I looked down at her lips and I felt my c**k harden as she licked them. Dario gave me a little push, and I found myself two inches from her. I put my hand on the nape of her neck. I wanted to drink this look on her face. I closed the distance and pressed my lips to hers. She sighed as I slowly started to move my lips against hers and melted against me. I wanted to take this slow. If I didn't, I'd end up throwing her against the bed and taking her. But f**k did she have other plans. She deepened the kiss with a moan. I pulled her closer and requested entrance to her mouth. She moaned again and parted her lips, allowing me to explore her mouth. I felt the pull of a mind link but ignored it. I could feel my c**k getting harder with every moan and I pulled her onto my lap as I pushed one hand into her hair and the other massaged her waist. I gripped her closer and sucked on her bottom lip. I wanted more. Like riding a bike - Dario purred.
Dude, not the time. Like at all. - I growled as I tried to stay in the moment.
I'm just trying to be encouraging. You don't have to be rude about it - he complained.
I blocked him lightly, trying to get back into the moment when Adrien burst in. "Whoops. Helios called for us. I guess I can see why he mind linked Elias instead of Gonzalo," He smirked at us. I put my forehead against her shoulder and sighed. I guess we were out of time.
Kassie got off my lap. "I guess I need to start locking the door."
"Just put a sock on the doorknob next time." Adrien laughed at us as he left the room.
"I need to get a tumbler. One second," she said. I nodded, unable to get up just yet without certain things showing and making things awkward. She poured a bag of blood into her tumbler and looked at me, a smart-a's smirk appearing on her face. "I've seen your erection plenty of times before Gonzalo, you don't need to hide it. I kind of caused it."This is property © of NôvelDrama.Org.
I barked a laugh while Dario rolled around the back of my mind laughing at me. I stood up and pulled her to me. She put her arms around my neck and I grabbed her hips and pressed her against my hardened shaft. "I guess you did," I whispered against her lips. "When did you get so bold? You used to be so shy about it no matter how many times you'd see it."
She buried her face in my neck and I had to stop myself from shivering as she kissed my neck. I froze when I heard her pain-filled voice. "When I thought I'd never get to hear your beautiful heart beat again. When I thought I would never get to touch you, or smell you." I wrapped my arms around her and held her close.
"Let's go, they are wai - Is she OK?" Adrien's voice came from the doorway again. I nodded and Kassie pulled back.
"I'm fine. Let's go." She said, totally ignoring the look of concern on Adrien's face.
We went down to the party. As usual, Crescent Moon joined us. The entire crowd cheered when Helios and Nat announced her pregnancy, but none cheered louder than our own pack members. Being such a young and small pack, our Luna having a child was a great sign of hope and promise for the future. We were almost at 50 pack members, with another 20 guests from the council. We only have about 8 or 9 mated couples. Well, more like a dozen now, after we added Adrien and Kassie. Only one other couple was expecting. I was looking forward to having little children playing around the packhouse. I had gotten used to them when we stayed at Crescent Moon. I looked over at Kassie, wondering what she thought about pups.
I want about 5 or 6 to start - Dario volunteered his opinion while wagging his tail.
Baby steps Dario - I scolded him. He was getting ahead of himself.
Oh, I'm thinking of all the steps we have to take to get babies alright - He yipped.
You're a f*****g horndog. We have a lot to resolve before we should have a baby. How are we going to get her away from Queen Karissa? We need to figure out what's happening with her seizures and we need to finish all these raids. - I reminded him...and myself, because I sure as f**k was imagining her belly swollen with our pup.
I didn't say we had to do it now. Besides, Helios didn't wait. We can make it work. We have a family that will support us no matter what - He countered - But yes, we should at least figure out what's happening with her seizures. We don't want her to be at risk during a pregnancy. I sighed in relief. At least I wouldn't have to keep fighting with him over the issue.
Three hours later, we were sitting in the company jet on the way to Atlanta. I was on my tablet, trying to organize the teams. Something I would usually have done before now, but hadn't been able to focus on anything the last few days.
"You don't want Isidro with Leo. Their sparring has been more fighting than learning. Leo was making fun of him for the beating I gave him. Put him with Olivia, Jonah and Nicholas. They get along OK." Kassie said from where her head was resting on my shoulder. I thought she'd fallen asleep.
"Hmm," I grunted and started rearranging the groups. I showed it to her after and she nodded.
"Have you found any information about what happened to you?" I asked her once I was finished with everything I had left untouched for the past couple of days.
"No. There's a few mentions of trying to find a way to make werewolves live as long as vampires and trying to make shifters by experimenting on humans, but none of them seem to be anywhere close."
"We knew they were experimenting on humans, but the video footage we have showed none of them ever survived. From everything we know, no one ever experimented on vampires. We don't actually know of anyone else being experimented on outside of you. Just beaten and medical tests performed."
"Wait, you have video?" She asked.
"Yes, only from the first lab we raided. When we first became aware that they were kidnapping shifters, it was because some friends of Nat's were kidnapped. It's how we crossed paths with her. We couldn't get into the lab and we discovered they were tracking him and he allowed himself to get kidnapped so we could rescue them. We have those videos in a separate place. Nat doesn't like people watching them. Helios was tortured a fair bit." I whispered, to make sure Nat couldn't hear me.
"He didn't get experimented on though?" She asked.
I shook my head, "They thought he was a normal human. The plan, as far as we could tell, was to t*****e him for Nat's location and then kill him."
"That's how you got involved in all of this?" I nodded in answer to her question.
"Can I ask a question?" She nodded in return.
"Why didn't you tell Karissa about what you went through when you got kidnapped?" I asked.
She sighed, "I had planned to. Before I even knew about the seizures, but when I got back to the Estate, they had given away my room already. I had only been gone 6 weeks and they gave away the room that had been mine for almost 130 years. I figured there was no point. She didn't care. I haven't had a personal conversation with my sister since the day she got me out of prison. I used my earnings to try to get answers from specialists in Italy, and I even took a few night courses about a decade ago to try to understand, but I still have no answers."
"Would you be opposed to some specialists taking a look at you when we get back?"
She hesitated, "Dr. Castle is already looking. I am still trying to recover from the financial drain of the last set of specialists. I don't think it's a good idea until we know what they did to me, so we have a better idea of who I need to see."
"These are specialists the council lent us," I said.
She looked thoughtful for a moment and then nodded. "OK. If you think it would help."
We arrived in Atlanta and headed to the lab the rest of the way on bus.
'Luna. I am going to need your help. I mind linked Nat.
'What's wrong?' Her concerned voice replied.
'Nothing. I looked up some things. I have some ideas for modifications to the packhouse.
'For Kassie?' she asked
'And Adrien. Yes, I added.
'We want to make some too. What did you have in mind?'
'I found a company that makes window tints to help people that have xeroderma pigmentosum. It's an extreme sun allergy. The windows are designed to block out UV rays. It should work for Adrien and Kassie. If we could get the windows treated on the first floor and the Beta floor, we could set Adrien up on my floor and that way, they could move about the packhouse during the day without fear. We can set some screen doors on the main entrance doors that can also be treated so we can still keep the doors open,' I explained.
'You want Adrien on your floor?' She asked in surprise.
'I don't mind having him there. It's a big floor. I told her.
'Send me an email with the company you found and I'll take a look,' She instructed.
'Thank you, Nat.
'I'm just happy to see you happy Gonzalo. If she's your family, she's mine!' She said with determination.
I looked down at her hand in mine and smiled at the thought. She is my family now.
The bus turned out of the city and Kassie sat back down. "How long?"
"About 20 minutes." I said. She nodded and sat crossed-legged on the seat. She put on some earphones, closed her eyes and took a deep breath.
I was going to ask something when I felt a hand on my arm. Adrien shook his head at me and then sent me a text and pointed at me to look at it.
Adrien: This is her process. Because of the seizures. You won't get much out of her again until the fighting is over.
I nodded at him and went back to my tablet. I had an idea for our date, and if she was busy, I had some time to look around for what I needed.
We pulled around off to the side to wait for the scouts we sent ahead. Everyone had their assignments. I began clearing the way to the computers with a new set of people. I liked to rotate their assignments so that no one got comfortable. Comfortable got you killed. Kassie had gone off with Theo and Helios to clear the rest of the building. We secured the main office areas and left two to help Evergreen and went to find Theo. I found them down the left side of the building. He and Helios were just standing at the entrance of a room, arms crossed.
"What's going on?" I asked.
"We were discussing your mate. I think she has some explaining to do," Helios said seriously.
I frowned, "What do you mean?"
"She's been lying, Gonzalo," Theo said, his tone serious, his face unreadable.