Pregnant With Four Alphas' Babies: A Reverse Harem Romance Chapter 71: Are You Kidding Me?

*Tristan*

“What? Why?” I ask. I had known that he was sadistic, but I don’t think I was prepared for just how far the royal ass was willing to go.

“Maybe Emily was just voicing her own desires,” Reece suggests, obviously also not wanting to believe that the king could be so evil.

“I believe her. King Gene has never liked Rose. Have you noticed how he never calls her by her name? He always refers to her as ‘that Breeder’ or ‘the Breeder.’ I wouldn’t put this past that man,” Mark says.

“Yeah, but calling her Breeder doesn’t mean he wants her dead. Emily is probably lying. He wants her to give birth to the children, right? Why would he then kill her now that she’s pregnant?” I wonder.

“Maybe because he knows we’re all showing more personal interest in her than initially intended. He wants us to be falling for his cousin,” Mark brainstorms.

“This is messed up, man. Do you think he wants to kill her before or after the children are born?” Reece asks.

“Probably after. Killing her before they’re born would derail his whole plan,” Eli reasons.

“His plan was to have one of us impregnate Rose. He didn’t count on her getting pregnant by all of us. Either way, his plan is destroyed, so he might want to kill her before the children are born,” I say. “If that was ever even his plan at all.” He doesn’t seem like he wants to give up the throne, in my opinion.

I walk over to the small table and take out four glasses before pouring some whiskey into each one. I’m certain we could all do with a golden alcoholic liquid pick-me-up.

“I am finding it hard to believe he’d really want her dead. Emily is a compulsive liar,” I interject. Denial is the only way I can escape this unending nightmare.

“What if it’s true? She was too drunk to have been lying, though,” Mark says.

I take a sip from one of the glasses and invite the others to grab a glass.

“So murdering is a family thing?” I ask.

“I was wondering the same thing. Rose’s life is in real danger. She’ll need more protection while we try to figure out what is going on, and what the king plans to do,” Eli agrees.

“Yes,” I state firmly. We’re all quiet for a few minutes as each of us sinks into our own thoughts. Rose has to be protected from King Gene and his cousin.

There’s a knock at the door, and Eli calls out for whoever is there to come in. I find myself wondering if it was Emily eavesdropping again. I shake my head as I know that if it is her, she wouldn’t be knocking to alert anyone to her rude tendencies… not that she would even understand what the word rude meant even if it hit her on the head like a boulder.

Beta Adam and his wife make their way into the room.

“Greetings, Alphas,” Beta Adam says, looking unsure of why he’s even in the room. He glances over at his wife, who smiles and bows slightly before smiling at her husband. It looks like she’s encouraging him to say something.

“Hello, Beta Adam. It’s nice of you to pay us a visit. You’ve never been in our common room, have you? You might know this place as Eli’s room, and I know it feels weird entering another man’s space. Don’t sweat it, though. Eli here is used to frequent gentlemen callers invading his space and drinking all his booze,” I say, attempting a joke to make him feel at ease.

“Honestly, I do mind. But they seem set on making this their personal rendezvous area. I think it’s probably because it’s cleaner than their own rooms,” Eli reasons and chuckles.

.

His attempt at making Beta Adam relax is definitely not as hilarious and effective as my own, but Beta Adam’s shoulders lower just a bit, and I know that it has worked.

“My husband has something important to tell the four of you,” Shelby, his wife, announces. She takes her husband’s hand and squeezes it. I feel my mouth go dry as I wonder what’s making him so nervous.

“King Gene asked me to get rid of Rose,” he spits out.

Mark places the glass he is holding down on the table. I’m glad he didn’t smash it this time around. “What do you mean by that?” he asks.

“After she has the children, he wants me to get rid of her.”

I frown as I try to digest this. We all knew she would have to go back to her home after the birth of the children, but the way he’s talking seems to imply a much sinister plot.

“Are you saying that he wants you to escort her back to her pack after she has the children?” Reece asks as his hand that is gripping the vodka glass trembles slightly. I can see his knuckles turning white from the tension. It appears today he’ll be the one to smash a glass in his hand.

I walk over and rescue the glass from his grasp. The poor glasses were continuously getting the short end of the stick, not to mention the precious booze that kept on being lost in this whole process.

“He wants her killed,” Beta Adam clarifies and glances down at his boots.

“We need your help. Rose’s life is in danger,” Shelby says and looks at the four of us with pleading, frightening eyes.

“I really thought Emily was lying. So it’s true? The king wants to kill Rose?” I utter. I really want to slide my hands around the king’s neck and make him wear them like shrinking jewelry.

“Do you think he’s the one who sent Emily to poison Rose’s food?” Mark asks.

“It could be the reason he didn’t punish Emily after the fact. He must have known if he accused her she would just point the finger back at him,” Reece points out.

“No, no. Emily acted on her own accord. The king wants Rose killed after she has the babies. Emily must have thought that wasn’t good enough and decided to get rid of her earlier. I doubt she is too keen about raising any offspring of her nemesis,” Adam explains

Mark snorts. “We also don’t want her raising our children.”

“What do we do?” Shelby asks, her eyes begging.

I know she hopes one of us can just wave a magic wand and make the king and his cousin disappear, but this will require strategy. I find myself wondering if we could find a sorcerer of some sort to actually make the two vanish. It would really save us from this horror.

“We’ll have to go talk to the king,” Mark exclaims.

“You do know you can’t tie up the king and spank him into revealing his ugly side, right?” I say. Mark glares at me and bares his teeth.

“You can’t go talk to him. If you do, he’ll know that I told you, and that will only put us all in danger. The conversation would end up doing more harm than good,” Beta Adam reminds us.

I nod as I see his point. “We have to play our cards close to the chest. Maybe we could just ask him what he intends to do since we all impregnated Rose.”

“How will that stop him from killing her?” Mark asks.

“It won’t stop him per se, but it will give us a reason to be talking about her. We could ask him that and then take the conversation from there,” I reason.

“The father of the first male child to be born will be declared the winner,” Beta Adam offers.

“What if all four children are girls?” Mark said.

Shelby crosses her arms and stares at her husband. I have been around enough women in my life to recognize an ‘I told you so’ stare.

“I guess we’ll cross that bridge when we come to it. For now, we have to make sure Rose is kept safe, even after she gives birth,” Eli says.

“We can still go by the playbook I just mentioned. For now, we’ll ask him how the winner will be determined. Then, after that, one of us can suggest that the ones who don’t win will escort Rose back to her home. We’ll say it will be to make sure she gets there safely and doesn’t get attacked by Alpha Kane or his troops,” I add.

“Yeah. This will put him in a corner. If he’s going to kill Rose, he won’t be able to do that if she has any of us as escorts. He’ll also look for an excuse if he’s still going ahead with this ‘killing her’ plan. Then, if he finds any excuse as to why we can’t escort her home, we’ll grill him about why. Either way, we’ll light a huge fire under his tiny ass and force him to talk,” Mark says.

“Bingo! Here’s to torturing people’s asses to get them to sing like a canary,” I say as I raise my glass.