23. Easton

Chapter twenty-three

Easton

F ortunately for me, I don't have to keep what I just saw bottled up until tonight. As soon as we walk inside, Emily excuses herself to take a quick shower and change. All three cats follow her, giving me a moment to hunt my brothers down.

Samuel is where I left him in my office, rummaging through even more paperwork. He raises an eyebrow at me but says nothing as I sit on the couch. I text Daniel, then drum my fingers on my knee, getting up to pour myself a drink only when Samuel finally gives me an annoyed look.

"Alright, what's going on now, Drama Queen?" Daniel quips as he comes to stand in the doorway. His unruly hair is sticking up on all sides, making it appear as if his head is touching the top of the door frame.

"I just saw Emily shift."

Samuel doesn't even look up. "Okay."

"You don't understand, she shifted . This entire time I thought she was human." I give them both a play-by-play of my mate shifting to protect the cats in her alleyway.

Daniel doesn't say anything, but his eyes go to Samuel.

Samuel takes off his glasses and starts to clean them. "I ran backgrounds on her myself. Even if she isn't human genetically, she believes she's human. Her family, her friends, medical records, dental records, school records going back as far as kindergarten–they all say the same thing. Human. Do you doubt my abilities?"

I pour myself another small amount of scotch in a glass and take a sip. "No, I–."

"What do you want me to say? Let's throw her in the basement and grill her about something you think you saw?"

"No, asshole. I just need to know what to do. She's a wolf ."

Daniel and Samuel look at me like I've lost my mind. "You would have smelled it on her if she was a wolf," Daniel says calmly. He picks up a ball off the end table and begins to toss it in the air.

"Then how do you explain her going into a partial shift in the alley not twenty minutes ago?"

"A true partial shift?" Daniel asks, skepticism in his voice.

"What do you mean?"

He stops throwing the ball and sits up from the couch. "You know, was it a true partial shift like how you and Samuel walk around all the time or was it just a few changes? Like when you're first going through puberty and you can only display claws or break out into a huge random growth of hair. Did she have everything? Strength, height, body hair, claws, ears, dark eyes–"

I open my mouth to answer only to close it again. He's right. I run a hand through my hair and take a deep breath.

"For what it's worth, I don't think this is something she's keeping from you. There's nothing in everything we dug up that would have led us to believe she comes from a wolf family." Samuel says as he turns back to his paperwork.

I play with the glass of scotch in my hand, swirling the liquid around and trying to work through it. "She told me the other day that Andreev has a little knot."

Samuel may be the mature one in our family, but he bursts into laughter. Daniel joins in.

"There's a reason I'm telling you this, assholes."

They ignore me and keep laughing, exchanging guesses on the exact size by holding up their thumb and forefinger until my patience has worn thin. "Could you fucking stop that for a minute? This is important."

Daniel rolls his eyes and turns to me. "You're no fun. You tell us he has a tiny knot and seriously don't expect us to speculate?"

"This is my fucking mate–our future Luna–I need you to take this more seriously."

"And I need you to trust your mate more than we do, because right now, it just sounds like she's human, with a little bit of werewolf DNA in her background. Maybe great great grandma liked to run around at night, slum it with some wolf down the block? Who the fuck knows? Who the fuck cares? How many times are we going to have to come in here and listen to you worry that every little thing she does is a secret betrayal she's about to spring on you? Every woman's not Kendra."

"I didn't say she was."

"Then quit dragging us into this shit. Get over her already. I'm tired of it. Trust Emily or get on some fucking suppressants and let her live her fucking life without your suspicious ass because I'm not about to be uncle to the twenty pups you're on the way to fathering and still listening to your constant doubts every time weird shit happens."

"You're supposed to be on my side." I can feel the anger of my wolf taking over. I may be the Alpha, but my brother doesn't back down. He meets my gaze and doesn't blink.

"This is me being on your fucking side, asshole. Stop self-sabotaging and fucking talk to her. Call me when you have an actual problem. I'll be at the warehouse until then."

Samuel storms out, leaving Daniel shaking his head. "What's his problem?"

Daniel just laughs. "You man, for one thing. You're not taking this whole Alpha thing seriously. You stick him with Al all the time. And now you've got this hot chick and you're fucking like rabbits. On top of all that, she's your mate and you're still not fucking happy."

"I didn't say I wasn't happy."

Daniel takes a deep breath and slowly releases it. "Replay the scene in the alley in your mind. What does it remind you of? When did things like that happen in your life?"

I sigh. "Puberty."

"Look, I'm not a doctor yet, but it seems obvious to me. It's exactly like Samuel said. Some great great grandparent was a wolf. Either pregnancy hormone changes or your pheromones have kicked something into gear that has been dormant her whole life. Whatever the reason, she had no control over any of it. Didn't even realize what was going on. It wasn't an act. It's not like she knew you were watching until you called her name."

The fight drains from my body.

"Just talk to her, man. You guys are stuck together for the rest of your life. It'll make everyone's life a lot easier."

***

My phone rings just as Daniel wanders back to his room.

The name on the screen takes me a moment to process.

"Darius?" In all the time he's worked for me, the man has never called me. Ever.

"There's a couple of Andreevs at the gate," he says calmly.

"A couple?"

"They say they're here to negotiate the release of their people."

"I'm on my way."

I text Micah as I make my way across the house to the arms room. Several nosey cats pick up immediately that something interesting is going on. They run just ahead of me, crossing in front of each other, as I hurry to get to the arms room and outside. I try to shove them back inside, but they insist on following me down the drive and up to the gatehouse. There, parked in front of the gate, is a shiny black Benz. Both of its doors are wide open and two men stand just in front of it .

"Is this how you treat guests, Degarmo?" the taller of the men calls as I approach. I guess there are going to be no pleasantries today.

The man's standing next to a kid. Who the fuck brings a kid to something like this , I wonder as Darius and I move a little closer to them. The kid looks fourteen, fifteen max. He's not even old enough to drive, let alone to ride shotgun on something like this. It's a dick move Holden Degarmo would have pulled.

I meet the gaze of the older man. "I don't have any guests at the moment. What do you want?"

A cat chooses that exact moment to slide against my leg. I'd forgotten all about them, but now they slink out between us, moving as a group between my people and the Andreevs. The motion catches the other man's eye, and he spits in disgust as he backs up half a step.

"You have something of ours."

Micah moves closer to me as Darius stands from the stool he usually sits on at the gate. Kevin appears from nowhere and moves toward the other cats. "We don't have anything of yours."

The man leans back on his heels. "Quit bullshitting, Degarmo. We know you've got Ivan and his old lady, too."

The cats move closer to the Andreevs. The kid starts to look nervous, but the older guy just stomps toward them. Perhaps he thinks this will scare them off, but he doesn't know these cats. A few make it past him and settle on the shiny Benz, their claws scraping the paint. "Well, don't just stand there, dumbass," he yells at the kid. Reluctantly, the kid moves closer to the car and reaches out to push the cats off.

I sigh and fold my arms across my chest. "I thought this was a negotiation."

He turns his attention away from the cats and back to me. "It is. You give us our people, we leave you the fuck alone."

I laugh. "You'll leave us alone?" I can't help myself. I break the distance between myself and this asshole. "Leave us alone? Who do you think you're talking to? This is my motherfucking town, asshole. You can't even get these cats to leave you alone."

He looks away and laughs. "If it's your motherfucking town, why are my nephews running their own flesh game through it?"

I should pull out a gun right there, but my body reacts first. My fist is in his face before rational thought forms in my mind. There is a crunch and a crack that seems to echo despite there being nothing for sound to bounce off of. He falls to the ground with a thud. Pain shoots through my hand, but I ignore it and pull out my gun. "I hope your fucking kid can drive," I tell the man as I put the gun to his shoulder and shoot, before pressing it to his other shoulder and shooting him again.

He cries out, as blood begins to gush from the wounds, but I ignore him and look up at the kid. He looks like he's about to piss himself, so I put away the gun. "Tell Old Man Andreev, this is the last time an Andreev leaves my property alive."

With a nod of my head, Darius and Micah move in, dragging the older man back to his car and waiting as the kid frantically drives off. We watch as the cloud of dirt and dust follows them down the road until they are an impossible dot to see. If the kid's any good, he might just get home before he bleeds out completely.

"Who the fuck does that?" I ask aloud.

Darius just shakes his head. Micah shrugs. Of course, the better question is why. They didn't really expect me to hand Ivan over–they came for something else. "Darius, have the men do a thorough sweep of the grounds. I want to make sure the Andreevs didn't leave any stragglers or use this as a distraction."

"Boss!" calls a voice from behind the gatehouse. I step out to see Jacob jogging our way in boxers and a t-shirt like he just rolled out of bed. "Boss!" he stops in front of us and braces his hands on his knees as he catches his breath. "Was that Andreev's people?"

"Yeah, what–"

"We need to get the cats…all the cats…" he manages to huff out.

"What the fuck are you talking about, Jacob?" Micah demands, looking annoyed.

Jacob catches his breath finally and turns to look at me. "This girl I hooked up with last night, she was telling me about this freaky family that comes to the club and tries to pick up girls to share."

We all stare back at him. Why the hell would he pick now of all times to run across the lawn half naked to share this stupid bit of information?

He waves his hand in annoyance at us. "It's the Andreevs. She says they call them the Rats of Garden City. Rats are polyamorous. Our guest hates cats. Could the Andreevs be rat shifters?"

I look down at my feet but, of course, the one time we need him, Kevin is nowhere to be seen. I pull out my phone and call Tracey.

"Tracey, we need all the cats outside right now."