Chapter 16

SIXTEEN

Liam turned off Talahalusi's main road and onto a paved drive blocked by iron gates, each adorned with a giant raven, their wings spread wide, and in the middle where the gates met, the letters MC molded in ornate script.

"Not hiding, are you?" Paris said.

"It was called Crow Mountain before our mother's people settled it." Liam reached out the window and pressed his thumb to a keypad. "No matter the language, that's what it means." The gates swung open, and Liam drove through. "In the light of day, you'll understand why."

In the light of the car's high beams, Paris counted row after row of vines as the road snaked higher. Around one bend, a pair of long barn-like facilities appeared on either side of the road, stretching as far as Paris could see in the dark. Around the next one, a massive mansion—correction, castle—stood majestically on a clearing.

But they weren't done climbing yet. Liam circled behind the castle and veered off the paved road onto a gravel one, and up, up, up they went, all the way to where the vegetation and trees thinned out and a smaller version of the mansion below set atop the bluff. "This is the reaper's perch," Liam said as he parked in front of the stone steps that led to the front door.

Paris climbed out of the car and wandered to the edge of the bluff. Nothing but darkness below and starlight above. He rotated back to Liam and gestured at the relatively miniature castle. "If Mac lives in this monster, who lives in the bigger one down the hill?" The Cirillos were rich by YB standards, but the kind of wealth that built these structures, that cultivated this land was generational, far eclipsing Paris's father's ill-gotten gains. Hell, the real estate value alone dwarfed their compound of penthouse condos.

Liam chuckled. "Me and the rest of the family."

"Are you sure they're not all here?" Every light in Mac's place was on, several other cars were parked in the circular drive, and music played from somewhere inside.

"This is also the team's main base of operations." Starting for the front door, his foot had barely hit the bottom step when the door swung open and two children came screaming through, yelling "Daddy!" at the top of their lungs.

"Daddy?" Paris squawked.

"Not that kind," Liam said with a wink over his shoulder before he kneeled with his arms open for... his kids? "Hello, my tiny terrors."

They barreled into him, all giggles, and Liam laughed along with them, that full-bellied one Paris had heard before. Now he understood where Liam's wealth of happiness came from—these two children with the same sharp Kelley nose and black eyes, with skin that was several shades darker, and with brown hair that was coarse and curly. Close in age, if Paris had to guess, around five or six, and the both of them chatty, talking over each other as they told their father what all they'd been up to. Paris caught Icarus's name several times, the mention of crocheting, and then as fast as they'd appeared, the siblings raced back inside.

Standing, Liam wiped the gravel off his knees, and without the cute distracting chatterboxes, Paris's confusion retook center stage. "I had no idea you were a dad. Do you single parent, or do you have a partner?"

"That would be me," came a new voice from the doorway, and Paris swung his gaze her direction. Tall, curvy, with dark skin, black eyes, and brown hair, and ripped biceps that gave away the fact she could probably kick both his and Liam's asses.

That knowledge, unfortunately, did not reach Paris's mouth before he said to Liam, "But you flirt with?—"

"Everyone," Liam's partner said, her smile belying her beleaguered groan. She sashayed down the steps, hands in the pockets of her patterned dress. "Thankfully, I married him first."

"Because you've known since we were toddlers that I was yours." He held out an arm, and the woman slid under it, nestled against his side. "Paris, my wife, Rena. Rena, this is Paris."

"And those rug rats are our kids," Rena said. "Cherry and Abernathy."

Paris raised a brow, the contrast between the names stark.

"We let them choose," Liam said. "And after some back-and-forth, that's where we've landed."

"For now," Rena said, and by her tone, Paris fully expected the kids to have different names by tomorrow. Their prerogative.

"I'm sorry I've kept Liam away from you all lately," Paris said as he followed the happy couple inside.

"My parents are winemakers," Rena explained. "They came here to run the blending operation when I was a baby. I grew up with this one." She elbowed Liam's side. "I knew what I was signing up for."

Liam hugged her close and plastered a sloppy, wet kiss on her cheek that they all laughed over. "The kids should be asleep," he said as he drew back.

"You tell that to Icarus when he gets back. He bet them a cupcake each they couldn't out-stitch him. Pretty sure he let them win."

"That sounds like Icarus," Paris said, the vampire one of the more mischievous beings he'd ever met. But he was also inherently good-natured; of course he'd let the kids beat him.

"You know him?" Rena asked.

"Quite well," he replied, heat hitting his cheeks. Impossible for it not to given the very mischievous things, usually involving lace and blindfolds, he and Icarus had gotten up to since the courtesan had arrived in town nine months ago.

"Uh-oh," Rena said, brow lifted. "Are we going to have to referee a match between him and Adam?" she asked Liam.

Paris opened his mouth to reply, but Liam beat him to it. "No, honey, he's bonded to Mac."

Her assessing gaze shot back to him, even as she directed her question at Liam. "That's still possible? After?—"

"Apparently."

Paris shook his head, losing the thread back around the word bond . "I'm sorry, what?—"

Before he could finish his question, Cherry and Abernathy came racing back toward them, each waving what looked like pot holders at Liam. "Dad! Look it!"

"Amazing!" Liam oohed and aahed like a good parent should, until Rena eventually nipped the too late party in the bud. "We need to get them home and to bed."

The kids booed, but Liam gamely lifted one on each hip, advising, "Your mom is the smartest person on Earth. We have to do what she says. She's always right."

"I thought that was Mary," Abernathy said.

"Smartest," Liam said. "Mary's the most powerful."

Mary? Who was that? Paris was lost again.

"Can you show him to Mac's quarters?" Liam said to Rena, then said to Paris, "I'll be back to unpack once I get them to sleep."

Paris shook his head and held out his hand. "Give me the keys and I'll take care of it." He counted it a win that Liam didn't hesitate.

"Are Monte and Chaz here?" Liam asked Rena as he kissed her cheek once more.

"Down by the lake preparing for containment. Two of the coyotes are on guard."

"Good," Liam said with a nod, then readjusted the kids on his hips and shot Paris a smile. "Make yourself at home."

Once Liam carried the children out the front door, Rena closed it behind him, then waved Paris deeper into the house. "There's a lake here?" he asked, and they made conversation while he stared agape at the vaulted ceilings, at the artwork from prominent Indigenous artists, at the recently repaired sections of the walls and floor, the paints and stains not an exact match, not as aged as sections around them. Those repaired places increased in frequency as they made their way to the back of the house, then into a suite of rooms at one end, a bedroom, sitting room, and office, the latter nothing like the cabin but exactly like it. Laptops open, files scattered across an oversize desk, a notepad with the chicken scratch Paris recognized.

"You can hang out here." Rena pointed at another door on the other side of the office. "There's a guest bedroom over there." He didn't mention that he and Mac had been sharing a bed for days. Rena's ringing phone saved him from the lie. "I need to take this."

"Sure thing," Paris said. While she took her call in the hallway, he circled behind the desk, figuring he could distract himself from what might be happening with Jason and Kai, with the only family he had left, by continuing his and Mac's work. Grabbing the stack of files he recognized as the detective's cold cases, he sank into the chair and pulled them closer, flipping through to see if any jogged a memory or rattled loose another soul. Nothing in the first few.

He shuttled the third case file to the no luck stack, then turned back to start on the fourth, only to be stopped cold by the black-and-white photo that had been wedged between the folders. Two men, their clothes from a time Paris had only read about in history books, the environs behind them unrecognizable, but he'd recognize the taller of the two men anywhere. Long, rangy body, dark hair and eyes, a sharp nose and that soft smile Paris couldn't get out of his head. Only in the photo it was directed at the man standing in his arms. Shorter, broader, laughing with his head thrown back, his light hair caught in the breeze. What had Mac said to make him do that? Who was he to Mac? When he'd finished laughing, had Mac drawn him back upright and kissed him? It was a simple picture, and yet one of the most romantic Paris had ever seen.

A gasp from the doorway crashed through Paris's spiraling thoughts, and for a panicked second, he thought it would be Mac standing there, but it was Rena, her eyes wide as she clutched her phone to her chest. "I've only seen that picture out of the safe once since Mac moved in here."

"It was between these file folders," he said, gesturing at the two stacks he'd made before staring again at the photo. "Who is he?"

"The reason Mac will push you away. Don't let him."

"What did Liam mean that Mac and I are bonded?"

"You need to talk to Mac about that."

He set the photo aside and splayed a hand over his chest. "It's why I can feel him here, isn't it?" Her eyes widened impossibly further, mouth rounding into an O . She must not have believed Liam when he'd said it, but she believed now. "I grabbed hold of him that night I almost died. I didn't know what else to do, but if he's already bonded to someone, if he didn't want to be bonded to me?—"

"Have you felt him tug back?" Rena asked.

He held her gaze and nodded.

"Trust that," she said. "And trust yourself."