That night, I slept curled in Caleb's strong grip and woke up feeling incredible. Completely in contrast to the weak, sick feeling of the night before, when I woke up in the cool light of the morning, my face pressed into Caleb's sculpted chest, it was as though I'd just spent a week in a meditation retreat or something.

“Good morning, sleepyhead.” His sexy, sleep thickened voice rolled over me, and I raised my head to look at him.

“Hi.” I grinned. Oh fuck, this is awkward.

“Why are you looking at me like that?” he mumbled, rubbing his eyes with the back of his hand then closing his arms around me in a hug.

“Um… is this weird?” I asked, chewing my lip nervously.

“Is what weird?” He frowned, blinking sleepily with his dark, almost black eyelashes framing clear emerald eyes that I just couldn't seem to get enough of looking at.

“This… us… you know…” I trailed off awkwardly, and a small grin played at his sexy mouth.

“No?” he blinked at me, all innocent, like he didn't know what I was getting at.

Asshole.

I growled in my throat, narrowing my eyes at him. “You know exactly what I mean, Caleb King. Is this weird?”

Grinning broadly now, he leaned forward and kissed me lightly. “You mean the fact that we had seriously hot sex last night, three times, when you're also sleeping with Cole and River?”

Blushing, I nodded and bit my lip again, but he pressed another kiss to my lips, slower this time and totally unhurried. My stomach fluttered in response, and my hand seemed to have a life of its own as it slid up to the back of his neck to pull him closer. My lips parted and he deepened the kiss, caressing my tongue with his, and I smothered the girly whimper that wanted to come out.

“Does it need to be weird?” he finally asked, pulling back from my lips with flushed cheeks. “It doesn't bother me to share you with my team. I know how you feel for them doesn't impact how you feel for me… so long as you don't let them take you away from me…”

“I couldn't even if I tried,” I muttered, sinking back into the pillow and smoothing my hand over the rough stubble of his cheek. “I don't know what's going on with me lately, but even if someone held a gun to my head and told me to choose, I couldn't do it. Maybe there's something magic related here?” It was a possibility I had been pondering on for a while, ever since learning my abilities really were magic, and not the product of a genetic experiment like I had always assumed. It just seemed so unlikely, so serendipitous that these gorgeous, dominant alpha males would all be so into me and all be okay to share.

Caleb shrugged. “If it is, I'm not complaining. Neither are the guys, as far as I know.”

“I suppose so long as you're all okay with it…” I murmured and gasped as he pulled me on top of him, his morning wood hot and hard beneath me.

“We are more than okay with it, Kitty Kat. Our team had a ridiculously close bond even before you, so this doesn't surprise me. What did surprise me though…” he trailed off as he smoothed his hands up my body to locate my breasts.

“Mmm?” I murmured, distracted as hell at the feeling of his hands on my skin. “What surprised you, Cal?”

“…was hearing that you made out with my brother.” His words killed the mood as easily as any bucket of ice water might, and I sat up sharply.

“He really didn't tell you?” I frowned down at Caleb from my position straddling him.

He shook his head and arched an eyebrow in question.

“Huh, maybe you should ask him about that then. But in my defense, I thought he was you.”

A wicked grin slid across Caleb's face. “Really? So, my dickhead twin robbed me of our first makeout session then?”

“I think we more than made up for it last night.” I smirked at him, running my hands up his amazingly sculpted chest.

“Hmm, are you sure? Maybe we should make out a little more, just in case…” His very tempting suggestion was interrupted by someone knocking on the bedroom door.

“Must be Wes,” I whispered. Wesley was the only one who would knock so politely.

The quick wink and naughty smile on Caleb's face were the only warnings I got before he called out, “Come in!”

With absolutely no time to grab a sheet or anything, the door opened wide, and Wesley gasped. Sitting as I was, totally naked and straddling Caleb's waist, there wasn't any mistaking what we had been up to.

For a very long moment, Wesley stood in the doorway staring at us, his eyes wide behind his square-framed glasses until Caleb snorted out a laugh.

“Something you needed, Wes?” he asked, casually raising his arms over his head and making it look like it was me who had pounced on him.

“Uh, yeah,” Wesley said, darting a quick look at Caleb then returning his stare to me. For the first time, he wasn't dodging his gaze away in embarrassment. Instead, his face had clouded with lust, and the flush to his cheeks seemed far more in the realm of sexual frustration rather than awkwardness. “Cole and his brother are getting into it again. I thought maybe Kit might need to intervene and work out what the hell is going on with them.”

Rolling my eyes, I groaned in annoyance. In our fuzzy morning-after haze, I had almost forgotten the drama waiting for me between Cole and Vali.

“Okay, let me find some clothes, and I'll be out in a minute.” I clambered off Caleb, trying my very best to remain dignified in all my naked glory as I perched on the edge of the bed and looked around for some clothes. Surprisingly, having Wesley still watching me didn't make me feel in the least bit awkward. Quite the opposite.

“Cal, didn't you say you found me clothes last night?” I frowned, seeing none lying around the room. My own dirty, soot covered clothes were probably still in a heap on the bathroom floor.

“Yup, they probably got dropped somewhere in the bathroom, last night.” He winked at me, and I had an intense flashback of the night before with him bending me over the sink and pounding into me from behind.

Feeling my face heating up, I cleared my throat awkwardly and wrapped a sheet around my body before standing up and heading into the bathroom. Despite how happy I was to be sitting in bed naked, it was a whole other thing, in the light of day, to just wander around in my birthday suit.

When I came back out into the bedroom, fully dressed in the yoga pants and stretchy black top Caleb had found for me, the room was empty. I'd needed to recycle my bra from the day before but had decided to ditch the panties, so I made a mental note to pick up some more at the first opportunity I got.

As I headed back down the corridor to the living room, I could hear the raised voices of Cole and Vali, and I took a deep breath. This is going to be interesting.

“Good morning!” I halfway yelled as I entered the room, just to try and stop the arguing for a moment. It worked too, with everyone turning to look at me as though I had just grown three heads. Evidently I was the last one up because all six guys were already sitting around the living room cradling mugs of coffee.

“What?” I asked when they continued staring.

“Vixen, you look…” Cole started, then trailed off with a confused frown.

“Really great,” Vali finished for him, and I raised my eyebrows at them both.

“I think what they are trying to say,” River interpreted, “is that last night you looked a bit rough, like you were coming down with the flu or something, and today you look incredible. You're practically glowing.”

I shrugged. “I feel pretty great. Must have just slept well.” Austin snorted a laugh, and Caleb smacked him in the arm.

“Here.” Wesley handed me a mug of coffee, and his fingers lingered against mine as I took it from him.

“Thanks, Wes,” I murmured, and he gave me a tiny wink.

I think I like this confident Wesley. He's seriously sexy right now.

Pushing aside my dirty thoughts and my confusion over why I was suddenly such a nymphomaniac, I turned back to Cole and Vali.

“Okay, let’s get this settled. We need to get to Alaska today and then work out who the hell tried to blow us up, as well as what the hell is going on with this magic situation. So, who is speaking first?” I sat in the vacant spot on the couch, between the twins, and looked at Cole and Vali expectantly.

When neither of them spoke, River made an angry noise in this throat, drawing everyone's attention.

“Kitten asked a question of you two. Answer her, or I will.” His tone demanded compliance, and it made my stomach flutter.

Vali folded his arms stubbornly, leaning against a wall, and Cole's gaze darted between River and me.

“Fine,” he ground out, his fists clenching by his sides. “River would probably get the details wrong anyway.” It wasn't altogether shocking to find River knew this story, whatever it was, seeing as they had been friends since they were twelve.

Keeping my mouth shut, I waited to hear what he had to say, but my attention flickered to Vali whose neck muscles were bunched tight, the only indication of how tense he was. If not for that small sign, he would look like he didn't have a care in the world.

“Dragomir,” Cole began, and I saw Vali's eye twitch at the name he so clearly hated, “and I share a father.” He paused there as though that was the whole story, and I frowned.

“No shit, Cole. Please elaborate on why you look like you want to rip his head off with your bare hands.” I rolled my eyes at him and took a sip of my coffee. Delicious coffee.

Cole sighed, dropping his head into his hands, but Vali watched him like a hawk. “We share a father, but not a mother. Dragomir's mother disappeared not long after he was born, and our father remarried almost immediately to my mother. Our family was, you probably saw, in charge of a pretty influential crime syndicate. Father was raising Dragomir, his first born, to take over the family business while I was to be his enforcer.” There was a bitter, disgusted twist to Cole's words that made my heart clench. Standing, I went to sit on the arm of his chair, grabbing one of his huge, scarred hands in mine. He glanced up at me, then threaded our fingers together, holding tight while he spoke.

“It was our father’s opinion that in order to effectively give pain, one must first understand pain. Anyway, one day he got pretty carried away with the whole thing. I had made some smart remark to him about how he was already losing the respect of his men to Vali, a goddamn fourteen-year-old, and he flew off the handle at me.” From the corner of my eye, I saw Vali shift slightly at Cole's use of his nickname, but I doubted Cole even noticed he had done it.

“Next thing I knew, he had pulled out this knife and started cutting me. He'd never done that before, but he had this crazy look in his eye.” Suddenly all his scars, covered by beautiful tattoos, made sense. They were from his father. “My mother happened to be home that day, and she tried to stop him but ended up getting caught in between. He stabbed her, then tried to finish me off.”

His mouth was tight, and his hand was clenching so hard around mine that it felt like he was going to break something. Not that I was letting go for anything.

“Your father is a fucking sadist, Cole,” I murmured, placing my other hand on the back of his neck and rubbing small circles with my thumb, intended to comfort him. “I met him briefly and wanted to rip his head off myself, and that was before I knew this.” Cole grunted, but his jaw was still clenched tight and his gaze was on our hands, joined together in his lap.

“So, what does this have to do with Vali?” I asked tentatively. “You clearly hold a lot of hate for him, but it sounds like your father was the asshole in this?”

“I let it happen.” Vali's velvet voice startled me as he answered for his brother. “I stood by and did nothing while my little brother was beaten and tortured for years and then again did nothing while our mother was murdered in front of my eyes.” The bitterness to his tone suggested he hated himself just as much as Cole did for not doing anything to stop it.

“Vali, you were only a kid…” My voice soft, I had no idea what to say to help these brothers who were holding so much animosity for one another.

“I was old enough to take over the family when our father had a mental breakdown after he saw he'd killed our mother.” His chin was tilted up slightly, and I could see it wouldn't be an easy sell to talk him out of his guilt.

“My mother,” Cole growled, and I ran a soothing hand over his neck.

“Okay, well that explains this tension between you two, and I doubt it's something we can work through in the time we have,” I said carefully, trying not to escalate the already thick danger in the air. “Vali, why don't you tell us why you're here? Do your people know you're here?”

He shook his head, his arms still folded across his chest as he leaned against the wall. “I am not willing to discuss my reasons with anyone but you.”

“Well then, you won't be discussing them at all,” Cole snapped, tugging me down off my perch and into his lap. He wrapped his arms around me, and I could sense him glaring at his brother over my head. “If you think for a second we will leave you alone with her, you're wrong.”

“I guess I will be hanging around until I can convince you otherwise then,” Vali replied with a stubborn set to his jaw. “Because I am not leaving until I can speak with Kit alone.”

Rubbing my eyes, I sighed. “Cole, I think it's best I just let Vali say what he came here for. Sooner or later his merry band of criminals will notice him missing and cause more drama for us, which is just so incredibly not what we need right now.”

As absurd as it sounded, I genuinely thought Cole would be reasonable and agree, so I was surprised when his grip on me tightened and a threatening, almost animalistic growl rumbled through his chest.

“No,” he snarled, leaving no room for argument. River caught my shocked gaze and gave me a tiny frown. Even he seemed concerned by Cole's reaction.

“I think it's time we headed off,” River said, frowning between Cole and Vali then holding out his hand to me. “Kit, come to the kitchen with me, and we can get you more coffee before we need to leave.” Leaning forward, I took his hand, but still Cole didn't release his hold on me.

“Cole, mate. Let the kitten go so she can re-caffeinate. You know how she gets if she doesn't have enough coffee.” River's voice was low and calm, like he was speaking to a wild animal, but the words seemed to sink in. Cole immediately relaxed his grip on me and pressed a quick kiss on my shoulder before allowing me to stand and follow River to the kitchen.

Before leaving the room, I looked back and found him frowning like he was confused.

Once inside the kitchen, River turned and cupped my face gently in his palm.

“Are you okay?” He asked in a soft voice, the one he only ever used when we were alone.

“I'm fine, but what the hell was that? The way Cole just reacted was…” I trailed off, at a loss for words. It was weird. Downright weird.

“I have no idea,” he muttered, “but I think until he and Dragomir sort their issues out, it would be best for you to give them both a bit of a wide berth. Or at least try not to be caught alone with either of them. The shit that they both went through as kids, it tends to leave some pretty heavy mental scars. But you know that better than me.” His golden eyes seemed to fill with sadness. I wanted to reassure him, but my words were cut short by the kitchen door opening behind me.

“Guys, we’d better head out if we want to be gone before the Director arrives,” Wesley advised as he approached us. “Will you tell us later why you don't want him to know where we are going?”

“Later,” I agreed, jerking a quick nod. “So what's the plan?”