“The ones like your matriarch who create light bonds for mercenary reasons alone, will never agree to it, but it must be done, or this world is doomed. Can you see it?”

  Stacie snorted, “We’re to just believe you, one who consorts with a hybrid abomination?”

  Astra turned to Maria, “Show them the future we came from. Also show them how their leaders abandoned them and what you saw in their minds,” she turned back to Stacie, “We will provide proof of all I said here and all that I said at the hospital, and you will be released. If you ever return here to hunt my mate, we will end you. My patience and mercy are not without limits. I’d advise you to form your own coven of nine, and use our website to find another four, but I will not force you if you stubbornly fail to see the truth after this. Quite frankly, you deserve to be enslaved and your bodies ill-used if you’re that stupid.”

  Maria said, “I’ll also show them the satisfaction and joy in our deep bond, matriarch.”

  Astra smiled, “Good idea.”

  Stacie looked furious, probably at being told she deserved to be mind enslaved and raped if they continued on a course of willful denial of the truth and facts, but that faded as her eyes widened. All nine of them experiencing Maria’s memories of the old future, as well as their leader’s memories and how little they were actually valued, and how wonderful the deeper coven bond was.

  Now that I was human again, the plan made sense, as did showing a temperance of mercy. We needed to get some of the modern witches on board with the evolution that my coven from the future had already gone through, merely to survive. Their words to other covens, including the one that fled earlier, would hold more weight than our words ever could.

  The means were a bit heavy handed, which is why we were using the humans as foils and intermediaries for most of the plan and covens. It wasn’t the kind of approach we’d be comfortable using against a coven that hadn’t declared themselves our enemies and attacked with the intention of killing. But for those covens that attacked us, there was no reason not to do it this way and to forcefully show them the truth. Those covens would lose the right to be stubborn idiots and free from our interference as soon as they tried to kill us.

  They all looked to be in shock several minutes later, as Maria released their minds from the stream of memories. Two of them started to throw up, at whatever she’d showed them of Darrow Kincaid most likely.

  Astra said, “That is your future and fate, should you not heed our warning and act to protect yourselves. A greater coven bond will protect you from mind slavery, bring your coven closer together in trust, love, and mutual protection, and it will enable you to keep poisonous elements out of the coven. Why wouldn’t you want all of that, outside of being selfish? That tripe you said earlier, was probably a direct quote of your matriarch who would do anything to avoid the truth of herself being revealed. Who was using my mate as an excuse to dodge the truth of our message.”

  Stacie grimaced, “You’ve made your point. My sisters and I will consider all you’ve said, but not while under coercion, and I give you my parole that I will never return.”

  Astra waved dismissively, “You may go in peace, and may the goddess bless your path. I hope that one day you can look back on this day as a positive turning point in your lives.”

  The nine of them stood and left. They didn’t run, but nor did they dally, as they grabbed their cars and took off.

  I won’t go over it in detail, since the next eight witches in Hewitt’s coven pretty much followed the same path with a small variation in word choice. Argument, memory transfer, acceptance of the truth if not a decision, and release after gaining their parole. None of them were happy with my continued existence, even if they accepted the message now, but they agreed not to attack us again which was a win of sorts. But I didn’t fool myself into thinking they wouldn’t celebrate if another coven managed to take me out, nor did I believe that they didn’t hope that would happen.

  Chapter Six

  The hot water of the shower felt good, and I got the rest of the blood off my body. I hadn’t mentioned it during the battle, but getting out of the asphalt trap, the telekinetic pressure to shatter the street had all but crushed my leg bones and ground up the flesh. The healing power of a full coven running through me meant it’d healed before my paws hit the ground, but it had hurt like a bitch, and made me a bit bloody.

  Racism was a horrible thing, turning otherwise good people into idiots with rage and conviction through fear, lies, and instinct. I wished them well, but I can’t lie and say the whole thing didn’t affect me. It did. Yes, a hybrid was dangerous, but not nearly as dangerous as I was with a hundred and twenty some odd witches granting me power in a bond.

  Once that was over with, and those witches were ready to form a coven of their own, my days of taking out a coven single handed would be over. Less powerful healing and strength, and while still wickedly fast not fast enough for that. We’d have to go back to old tactics, where I was the support and not the offensive.

  The shower door opened, and Rue slipped in, naked.

  “Sexy,” I greeted and accused, as my eyes feasted, and she blushed as I pulled her into me.

  Rue was petite at five foot four, with a curvy and perfectly proportional body at that height with torpedo 34B cups, seventeen, thirty-four. She also had the sexiest and largest nipples I’d ever had the pleasure of playing with or seeing. There was something about her perfection of form that spoke deeply to my instincts, and she had flawlessly silky and dark tanned skin.

  Her complexion was just about perfect as well, her beauty of face absolutely stunning and in a class of its own, almost too symmetrical to look real. Almost. She had short curly black hair that barely tickled her shoulders, and expressive dark stormy gray eyes, and full lips.

  I normally didn’t find short hair on a woman attractive, but on Rue it just worked.

  She was head of security, the coven second, and a total badass. In public she even still sent a thrill of danger down my spine at times, and she was utterly ruthless in protecting our loving and empathetic matriarch.

  But behind closed doors in regard to our family, she was the most submissive of them all. Sweetly and accommodatingly so, yielding breathlessly and joyfully to my every touch, direction, and need. A similar drive to Astra’s submission, but totally different in execution. Where Astra was breathlessly aggressive in giving me her heart and body on her terms, my Rue was far more passive and obedient. Preferring me to take the initiative and eagerly fulfilling it.

  Point being, I’d been thinking lately I’d made an error of judgement with her. I hadn’t wanted to put pressure on my other mates, as far as children went, since both Carline and I were trying for one, and Sela was already knocked up. I’d been waiting for them to breach the subject with me, and Astra had and now we were trying. But such an approach wouldn’t work for my Rue, she wouldn’t bring it up, she wanted me to be in control of our family and bedroom life. To make all the decisions, so she could let go of all that responsibility and duty out in the real world.

  I pulled her silken warmth against mine, so supple and delicious against me, as she eagerly conformed her body to mine, and I claimed her lips with a languid kiss.

  She smiled when it broke, and looked up into my eyes, “Hi. I thought you might need help with your back?”

  I chuckled, squeezed her ass firmly, and kissed her softly, “I really could, gorgeous,” while I stepped forward and pinned her body between mine and tile, her petite five foot four form had me towering over her, as I kneaded her ass and bent down far enough to suckle one of her nipples.

  Her sweet breathy sigh of pleasure and the way her fingers ran through my hair and pulled my head into her breast, was a thrill.

  “I love when you suck my tits, and your hands on me.”

  I moaned in agreement, sending vibrations into her nipple as I swirled it, one of my hands continuing to tease her ass while the other slid up and around her body to tease her other breast. I rolled her nipple with my wet thumb and forefinger, while I nibbled and sucked her other nipple quite fiercely, drawing a gasp directly into my ear, her face buried in my neck and her fingernails teasing the back of my neck.

  She said softly, “You can’t resist me, can you, Glen.”

  “I really can’t,” I agreed, her breast partially muffling my response, “Too sexy for me.”

  She giggled breathlessly, then slid one hand down my body to take me in hand, while the other continued to tease the back of my neck she started to stroke me.

  “I love that about you, and it’s all for you.”

  It was probably a good thing she could feel my emotions. My love, admiration, affection, and adoration for all she was. Or she’d probably think it was all about her body and beauty, because she did overwhelm me, often, and I never bothered to hide it as my lust rose. Not that the beauty and bodies of my other mates didn’t drive me crazy too, but I’d started being shameless about her to convince her she was every bit their equal despite her less bountiful curves, and it was kind our thing.

  I lifted her by her ass as I rose high enough to claim her lips, and she wrapped her arms and legs around me for support and leverage as I pushed her into the wall. One of her hands snaked down to eagerly line us up, and I dropped her onto my cock, impaling her forcefully with the first few inches.

  She let out a sweet gasp, then said, “I needed this, needed you.”

  As I worked my way into her body with upward thrusts, I finally brought up my earlier thoughts.

  “Rue, I want to start our family. Take down the contraceptive spell, gorgeous.”

  She trembled, and her eyes widened, her pussy clenching wildly as her eyes filled with lust.

  “Yes, sir,” she said warmly, “Anything for you, my mate.”

  Fuck, that was heady. I’d just ordered her to give me a baby, basically, and it’d spiked her lust and arousal and made her affection overflow even as her body reacted potently. She awed me, her utter submission to me behind closed doors and her joy in me as she let it all go.

  I won’t lie, I almost came right there at that potent and submissive response. Fortunately, it was also the moment I buried myself and a natural pause in our coupling as her body grew accustomed to my invasion. Her slick heat enveloping me with her snug silken flesh, she felt so good wrapped around my cock and stretched so tautly, but I used the moment of relative stillness to regain my control.

  She giggled, “You liked that, didn’t you? I’ve been waiting for you to claim my womb, as you claim the rest of me.”

  “You’re fucking with me.”

  She laughed lightly, “Yes and no. Poking fun at myself too, at how shameless I am for you, how much I really wanted it, how much it just thrilled me to hear that demand. How much you want me to have your baby. How much I belong to you, in every way. Goddess, Glen, I love you so much it makes my mind spin, and my body sing. I never imagined obeying my mate like this, or that it would turn me on so much.”

  Then her eyes focused momentarily, and once mentally connected to it she spoke the final word of the contraceptive spell, which unraveled it leaving her womb unprotected.

  My cock twitched, hard, which made her sexy stormy eyes sparkle for me. Not just from her ending the spell as I’d ordered, but also from that hot as hell speech. I wasn’t entirely sure she was fertile in that moment, but she could be, which had my mind spinning in a fog of lust, and her lust was mor than a match for mine in that moment.

  She squeezed tightly around me, her eyes begging me for a baby, for my seed, even as she rolled her hips to signal she was ready to be ravished. She was so very light in my arms, her petite curvy frame, and with my shifter strength I barely even felt the effort as I started to thrust up into her, my hands firmly squeezing her ass cheeks and separating them slightly, as she bounced up and down the wall with pants of pleasure and feminine sounds of delight falling from her full lips.

  Her hot sex massaged my cock, gripping and pulling on the sensitive skin deliciously as she slid up the wall, only to blow my mind with intense silken friction as she fell impaling herself on my driving cock. Her eyes were lustful, needy, and begging for my sperm, for me to give her a baby, but they were also loving and accepting, full of awe in me and our relationship.

  She awed me, and I couldn’t look away from those intense eyes if my life depended on it, as I ravished her from below.

  She said in gasping begging breaths, “Don’t stop, never stop, fucking me, looking at me like you are, using my body for your pleasure while you worship me. I need it, like the air I breathe. Give us a baby, oh goddess, yes, don’t stop, don’t… don’t stop… cum with me, please.”

  “Sexy,” I growled, totally overwhelmed at her putting into words what we’d been living the last weeks. Shamelessly owning her submission and just how much she needed it, needed me, both my love and my wicked lust, my admiration and my possessiveness, both the deep and the shallow.

  I grunted deeply, as her eyes went wide and glazed over with pleasure as a keen escaped her lips, then pounded up a few more times and locked my legs, as the pleasure rose up from the depths and could not be denied. The thrill of all that she’d said and claimed, added to the idea of my seed filling her unprotected womb, threw me over hard. Though, her clenching and wildly writhing pussy certainly had a lot to do with it as well.

  Her eyes looked almost smug, smugly triumphant and joyous, as much as lost in pleasure, as I started to empty myself into her in powerful pulses. Her eyes holding mine captive, and it was completely overwhelming.

  It seemed to last forever, yet ended far too soon, and I claimed her sweet lips in a kiss as we came down, our racing hearts slowing as the kiss grew soft and teasing, and so very sensually loving.

  We washed each other then, with gentle loving attention to every square inch of each other’s bodies. The intimacy almost painful in its intensity.

  When we got out, I bent her over the sink, and took her from behind with a thumb in her ass. I loved the doggie style position, and over the bathroom sink removed the only downside, since our eyes were intensely locked through the mirror as I ravished her and took my pleasure only after drawing three orgasms from her sexy body.

  I couldn’t seem to get enough of her, or perhaps just her unprotected womb, because after all the kissing and cleaning up, I wound up taking her against the wall, right outside the bathroom in the master bedroom. It was only after we were both thoroughly sated with three rounds, that we actually made it to the bed, where I held her and snuggled her for a while.

  She awed me, because her scent and her smug eyes told me she thought she was getting the better half of the deal. Clearly, she was a goddess, and I was the lucky one.

  That was also all four of them now, all four of my mates were either trying to get or already pregnant. For all I knew they all were pregnant already, but even my sensitive nose wouldn’t pick it up for a couple of weeks. Although my wolf form might pick it up a few days before a pregnancy test would.

  But the coven and life outside our bubble called, we couldn’t adore each other forever, no matter how much I wanted to.

  Astra said, “Rue, Carline, and Glen, with me. The rest of you can stay out here.”

  It was later that evening, and we were having a barbeque of sorts in the backyard for an early dinner.

  “What’s going on?”

  Astra said, “The FBI is here, I think. Black SUV, two of them in a men’s and a women’s suit. Both armed with Glocks. They couldn’t see the house, were staring right through it, but I lifted that veil for them because I’m curious as to what they want. We’ll invite them in for coffee.”

  “Probably a good guess based on that description, we’ll find out soon enough.”

  Instead of going around, we headed into the house and toward the front door, and we made it about halfway there when the doorbell rang. Carline and I lingered behind them, as Rue and Astra took the lead and opened the door.

  Astra asked, “Can I help you?”

  The dark reddish brunette was in her thirties, statuesque and still attractive. She had a no nonsense look on her face. The man next to her was in his late twenties, brown hair and hazel eyes, with a medium build. He had a craggy face.

  She nodded, “I’m Agent Angela Dawson, and this is my partner Agent Christopher Murphy. We’d like to ask you some questions relating to the hospital incident, maam.”

  Astra tilted her head, “Incident. A curious word to describe hundreds of sick people being healed, including those on death’s door.”

  The woman didn’t quite grimace, but I could tell she regretted her aggressive word choice immediately.

  Astra waved, “Come on in. Do you want some coffee, or maybe a tea?”

  Agent Murphy replied, “Thanks anyway, Astra is it…” he trailed off.

  Astra nodded as she led us into the living room, “No last name, though I’m Simmons on my license that was a recent thing. As in the far past, the future I was born into didn’t use last names. I can make one up for you, if you’d like?”

  She waved at the loveseat in invitation, while she sat down in the curve of the sectional, and Rue sat to her right, I sat to her left, and Carline sat to Rue’s right. It wasn’t as huge as the one we had in the mansion, but it’d sit five comfortably, so handled the four of us just fine.

  The agents settled into the love seat, clearly comfortable enough with each other to sit closely without evidence of awkwardness, but they didn’t look relaxed, and leaned forward slightly instead of sitting back as we had. What I mean is they were comfortable as partners in the agency, I didn’t get the impression he was hitting that at all from the body language and their scents.

  Dawson said, “Did you just admit to defrauding the government?”

  She said, “Only my birth date. You see, I won’t be born for another two hundred and eighty years, but I am a U.S. citizen born on its soil, not all that far from here, in fact. I grew up in the Chicago area. I suppose you could arrest all witches for fraud, because we’re longer lived, and we don’t show our age. I suspect there’s more than one witch left puttering around who was around when the first continental congress was assembled. We tend to move every five to ten years.”