novelraw Chapter 95: Switching places
Chapter 95: Switching places
Liam’s POV
The air in the room was toxic. I could smell Leo’s scent all over her—lake water and heat—and it made my wolf want to rip his throat out. I looked at Scarlett, expecting her to pick me... of course she has to pick me... I’m her mate. She wants me... she’ll feel more comfortable in my arms than in my brothers’, who were nothing more than crushes.
"Scarlett, choose," I demanded, already confident she would pick me.
"What nonsense is this?" she rasped, her face flushed with a feverish glow. She looked at us with glazed, glassy eyes, her mind clearly still half-submerged in whatever nightmare had broken her. "Fine. You can all fucking stay."
"Scarlett—" Leon started, but she cut him off with a weak, trembling hand.
"But I’m not choosing," she whispered, a delirious edge to her voice. "Since you’re all so worried... you can switch places. Every fifteen minutes. One stays on the bed, the other two wait... I can’t... I can’t deal with the fighting."
I stiffened. Switching places? Like we were guards on a shift? I looked at Leo, who was still holding her, his face full of smug triumph that shifted into annoyance at her words.
"I’m staying first," Leo snapped, tightening his grip. "I’m already here."
"The hell you are," I growled, stepping toward the bed. "You’ve had your time. Leon and I just got here."
"Stop it!" Scarlett cried out, clutching her head. The fever was clearly taking hold; her skin was radiating a heat that was unnatural, even for a shifter. "Leo... fifteen minutes. Then Liam. Then Leon. If anyone growls, everyone leaves."
Leo let out a frustrated huff, but he stayed put, glaring at me over her shoulder. I checked the clock on the wall. 2:15 AM.
I sat on the floor at the foot of the bed, my back against the wood, while Leon took the rug by the window. It was the most humiliating moment of my life. Three Alphas. The future of the Pack. Sitting in the dark like dogs waiting for a bone.
The silence was agonizing. I watched the second hand of the clock tick by. I could hear Leo whispering something to her, his hand stroking her hair. Every time he touched her, my blood boiled.
Why does he look at her like she’s his soul? I wondered, my eyes narrowing. It wasn’t just a crush. Leo was acting like a male who had found his mate. But he couldn’t have. Because she was mine.
"Time’s up," I snapped the second the hand hit the mark. I stood up, my joints popping.
Leo looked like he wanted to fight me, but Scarlett let out a soft moan of pain in her sleep, and he froze. He reluctantly slid out from under the covers, his eyes dark with challenge.
"Don’t get comfortable, Liam," he hissed as he passed me.
I didn’t answer him. I climbed into the space he had just vacated. The sheets were hot—from her fever and from him. I pulled Scarlett into my arms, and the second her skin touched mine, my wolf let out a purr so loud I was afraid the others would hear it.
She turned to me, her small hands clutching my shirt. "Liam?" she murmured into my chest.
"I’m here, Scar," I whispered, my heart thudding. Of course she would react differently to me... I’m her mate!
I looked over at the floor. Leon was watching us, his jaw tight, his eyes tracking my every move. And Leo was pacing the balcony, his shadow flickering against the wall.
Something was wrong. The way they were both looking at her... it wasn’t just protective. It was possessive. It was the same way I felt.
Could it be? I thought, a chilling realization starting to take root in my mind as I felt Scarlett’s pulse thrumming against my own.
The thought flickered in my mind for a split second before I crushed it. No. It was impossible. The Moon Goddess wouldn’t make mistakes like that. She was mine. Mine only.
Leo and Leon were just confused. They had always been protective of her, and after the way Ethan treated her today, their hero complexes were probably just working overtime. They were feeling the echoes of my bond because we were triplets. Yeah, that had to be it. They were just picking up on my frequency.
Scarlett hummed softly against my chest, her arms tightening around my waist as she buried her face deeper into my shirt. A surge of triumph flared in my gut. See? She knew. She was choosing me, even in her sleep.
But my fifteen minutes felt like fifteen seconds.
Leon stood up from the rug, his movements silent and heavy. He didn’t say a word, but the air in the room grew dense. I looked up, ready to snap that I wasn’t moving, that she needed me more. She was my mate, for fuck’s sake. Why should I have to share her with anyone else?
I opened my mouth to argue, but the look Leon gave me stopped the words in my throat. Leon was the quiet one. He was slow to anger, never impulsive like Leo, and never as loud as me. But I knew that look. It was the calm before a hurricane. If I pushed him now, he wouldn’t just growl; he’d burn the whole room down, and Scarlett would be the one caught in the crossfire.
With a low, frustrated snarl, I carefully untangled myself from her. I felt her whimper at the loss of my heat, and it took everything in me not to crawl right back in.
I stepped away, moving toward the balcony where Leo was still pacing like a caged animal. I leaned against the doorframe, watching Leon slide into the bed with the same reverence I’d felt.
"What really happened, Leo?" I whispered, my voice low and full of worry. "Don’t give me the ’passing by’ bullshit. Why was she screaming like that?"
Leo stopped pacing, his sea-blue eyes dark with a haunted look I’d never seen on him. "She’s trapped, Liam. It wasn’t just a nightmare. It’s like she’s living through a war in her head. She mentioned blood... and bodies. She said she saw us dead."
My stomach did a slow, sickening roll. Shifters had vivid dreams, but this sounded like something else. Something darker. And Scarlett... Scarlett was once a seer...
"Her fever isn’t breaking," I muttered, looking back at the bed where Leon was now holding her, his large hand resting protectively on the back of her head. "We give it a few more minutes. If there’s no improvement, we’re calling the healers. I don’t care about the rumors anymore."
"That’s risky," Leon’s voice drifted over from the bed, steady and grave. He didn’t look up from her face. "If we force her out of a vision this deep with medicine or magic, we could break her mind. She has to come out of the dream herself. We just have to be the ones she finds when she wakes up."
I frowned, my worry increasing.
"She better wake up soon," I whispered, staring at her from the nightstand.
"She’s shivering," Leon suddenly spoke.
I whipped my head around. Leon wasn’t just holding her anymore; he had sat up slightly, his face etched with a worried, terrifying kind of focus. Scarlett’s body was vibrating against him, but it wasn’t just the shaking—a thick, cold sweat was breaking out across her forehead, even as the heat coming off her skin seemed to intensify.
"The fever is peaking," Leon muttered, his hand moving to her neck to check her pulse. "Her heart is racing too fast. If she stays trapped in that thick cardigan, her body temperature is going to skyrocket until her organs can’t take it."
Leo stopped his pacing instantly, hovering at the foot of the bed. "Then wake her up! Leon, do something!"
"I can’t wake her, I told you," Leon snapped, his patience finally fraying. He looked up at me, then at Leo, his eyes as hard as flint. "The clothes have to go. They’re soaked through and trapping the heat. We have to take them off and get her cooled down by our skin, or we’re going to lose her to this fever before the sun comes up."
My stomach dropped. I looked at Scarlett—pale, sweating, and broken in her sleep—and then at my brothers. The possessiveness that had been driving us all night hit a sudden, icy wall of reality. This wasn’t a game of ’switching places’ anymore.
"Leon’s right," I said, my voice thick. "We should undress."
Leo didn’t argue. He began to unzip his jeans.
I moved to the side of the bed, reaching for the hem of her oversized cardigan. My hands were shaking. I was her mate, and the thought of her in pain was enough to make my wolf howl, but the thought of my brothers standing here, watching her get undressed.. it was a bitter pill to swallow.
"On three," Leon whispered, his jaw set. "Carefully."