“So basically what makes her different from you is that by the time you decided to bump off your husband, you had five sons to keep earning money for you to spend. Is that what you’re kind of alluding to?” Orion did not bother to sugarcoat his feelings on the topic.
“I didn’t bump him off,” Tisha said stiffly. “Your father was killed in a hunting accident.”
“You know that horrible genetic fact that you’re always bitching about, Mother?” Orion felt the anger rising deep inside him, and for a moment he was afraid that he might actually lose control and shift from man to wolf right here in the storage closet of his family home. “That thing where all of us can shift into wolves?”
“Don’t talk to me about that!” Tisha grabbed hold of Orion’s sleeve and yanked as though she intended to rip his arm off.
It had zero effect. It was rather like a mouse going after a lion. Orion yanked his arm away with such force that Tisha was nearly pulled right off her feet. “Don’t touch me. And I’ll talk to you about whatever I want because you need to realize that my father—Mackenzie King—could never have died from a hunting accident. Your son Devon was shot just a few days ago. Did you know that? The bullet worked its way out and the wound closed in less than two hours. Even a head shot, Mother. It wouldn’t have killed him. He could have lain out there and bled for a while, but he would have woken up because his body would have healed all on its own.”
Tisha opened her mouth and closed it. She seemed to be at a loss. Then she rallied and went with the same thing she had been telling everyone since this whole farce began months ago. “That’s what the coroner said!”
“That’s because the coroner didn’t know that Dad was a shifter, you grasping bitch!” Orion curled his lip and growled at her. “He didn’t know because it’s not common knowledge. So sure. It was easy for you to lie. And if you think that we don’t know, you’re out of your damn mind. You got me?”
Tisha’s face went ashen white. She stumbled backwards and hit the doorframe as she struggled to get out of the closet and away from Orion. “You’re wrong!”
“No. I’m not.” Orion had never been so sure about anything before in his life. “I’m not wrong and that’s why you’re running away from me right now and why you’re lying and trying to deflect back to the coroner. You’re full of shit, Mother, and at some point you’ve got to be afraid that we’re going to realize it and you’ll wind up living with Alaina Ariosa in her house because you will have no place left to go.”
Tisha Olivares-King spun about and ran out of the storage closet. He heard her leaving the downstairs, her feet pounding up the stairs as she headed for her suite of rooms on the second floor.
Orion picked up the gift he had just wrapped and stepped out of the closet. The house was disturbingly quiet. He had grown up here with four brothers and a father who was about as full of life as the boys had been. It got quieter as the boys grew up, but not much. Until a few months ago, four out of five of them had still been living at home. Now things were a bit different. It was just Orion and his mother.
The only light on in the kitchen was the one over the stove. Their housekeeper and cook—Lupita—had probably left it on just so they wouldn’t be stumbling around in the dark. Rain pattered against the windows of the living room and the dining room that led off the kitchen. The house’s open floorplan had always made it very convenient for his mother’s propensity for entertaining her friends.
Now it was silent. There were Christmas decorations everywhere. It was rather eerie. The white lights were scattered throughout the ground floor of the house. Along with the greenery, they were left over from the slew of holiday parties and dinners his mother had been throwing since about Thanksgiving.
Orion was still carrying the package. He walked into the living room and stared at the tree. With the eleven foot ceilings the tree was easily ten feet tall. The pre-lit monstrosity had been decorated by a company that his mother hired each year to make her house the toast of the holiday season. That meant the branches were heavy with ornaments and every single one matched its neighbor as though they had been laid out on a grid and then applied to the tree with absolute precision.
There were fake presents under the tree. Orion knew this because it had been his mother’s habit for years to place enormous, wrapped “gifts” under the tree. The bows were the size of Orion’s head and each elaborately styled box was totally empty inside. That had been going on for ages.
The longer that Orion stared at the empty boxes the angrier he started to feel inside. He could well remember being a young boy of perhaps five or six and coming out here with his younger brothers to peer at the packages. Each boy had thought that he was getting something absolutely amazing for Christmas, but they had learned all too quickly that the boxes were empty and that their mother wasn’t going to buy them squat for the holidays.
There was no Santa Claus in the house of Tisha Olivares-King. The boys had been fortunate. Their father had taken them out to the ranch where they had decorated their own tree and placed their own home-wrapped packages beneath it. The holiday had been warm and wonderful and totally Mother-free.
Orion gently set Jason’s package aside for a moment. He began to pick up the huge empty packages one by one. Even the thought of them gave him a juvenile jolt of rage. Sometimes Orion wanted to default to that. He wanted to show his mother that they all knew just how uncaring and selfish she really was.
With a fake present in one hand, Orion used the other to open the sliding glass door that led from the living room to the deck and the yard beyond. With his superior strength Orion lobbed that fake gift into the center of the yard. He heard the raindrops begin to soak the red and silver foil paper. He was glad. He wanted the present to melt into a gelatinous puddle of pasteboard and wet paper. That was what it deserved.
One by one the rest of the fake enormous presents joined the first. It did not take long to clear the room. It was almost the equivalent of an emotional purge for Orion, if he were willing to admit to anyone—even himself—that such a thing existed for him.
When every one of those horrible things was sitting in a huge pile out in the yard, Orion closed the slider with a bang. He locked it and turned back to the tree. It looked strangely hopeful. As though the edifice were actually waiting now for something worthwhile.
Orion reached for the single and now very lonely-looking package that he had just finished wrapping for Jason. He placed it squarely beneath the tree. Orion had expected it to look lonely, like a sad little reminder that Orion was essentially alone in this damn house. But it didn’t. Strangely enough, the package made everything appear expectant. This wasn’t going to be the only one. It was only the beginning. Soon enough there would be more and they would be waiting there for the family who was going to come together on Christmas just because they could.
Chapter Seven
December twenty-first. Only four days left until Christmas. Eleni stared at the email invitation on her computer screen and wondered if any of her coworkers would actually notice her absence at the annual staff Christmas party. It was tomorrow night. Not that Eleni had anything else to do exactly. She was just very tired of attending these office parties alone. She wasn’t the only single teacher at Addison Elementary, but she was starting to become wary of the constant advances of the school’s physical education teacher. Mateo Canjillon was an amazing guy. All you had to do was ask him. He was happy to talk about his many talents and accomplishments all night long. Even worse, some of Eleni’s teacher friends had started alluding to the fact that they thought Eleni should just go for it with Canjillon. As if the guy was some sort of catch.
Eleni sighed and got up from her computer. It was already nearly noon. She never slept in anymore. She had been awake since nearly dawn reading a book. After a lazy morning in bed she had made herself some eggs and toast. Now though, there was really nothing to do but clean her house. What a way to spend Christmas break.
The doorbell was
a startling surprise. It rang just as Eleni opened the cupboard near her tiny utility room to pull out the cleaning supplies. Perhaps it was just one of the neighborhood kids. Eleni could not think of who would send her a package or call at her door, but she was curious enough to go and find out.
By the time she had managed to unfasten the myriad locks on the front door and fling it open, the visitor had rung the bell a second time. Eleni found herself staring right into the familiar and very unexpected face of Orion King. If someone were trying to send her a Christmas present, they’d certainly picked the perfect thing. The man looked good enough to eat. He wore jeans that were snug enough to make her want to stare at his butt, thick-soled leather shoes that looked as though they could easily withstand all of this horrible rain. His leather jacket seemed almost custom fitted to his broad shoulders, and the only thing Eleni could think when she saw how his wonderful chest tapered to a narrow waist was that she wanted to push that jacket off over his shoulders just for the excuse to run her hands all over those wonderful pectoral muscles.
“Ahem.”
Right. She was supposed to be acknowledging him or something. Eleni cleared her throat. “I’m sorry, Orion. Would you like to come in?”
The expression in his dark eyes was odd. She’d never seen him look so uncomfortable before. The guy was usually totally at ease in his skin no matter what was happening around him. Then a cold chill slid down Eleni’s spine. Just as she stepped aside to welcome Orion King into her home, she had a horrible vision of her mother attacking him and trying to force him to marry her or some other such nonsense.
“Please tell me this has nothing to do with my mother,” Eleni said tightly.
Her chest felt constricted. She was very, very uncomfortable with this notion. Especially considering everything that Eleni had found out about her mother the previous night. God knew what lengths Alaina Ariosa might go to in order to secure someone’s paycheck for her own use.
“Not your mother,” Orion said quickly as Eleni closed her front door. He very gently laid his hand on her shoulder. The tenderness in the touch was surprising. It was almost as though she could feel the empathy he was offering her. “It’s actually more about my mother.”
“Oh.” Eleni was taken aback. She gnawed her lip, feeling nervous. “Can I offer you a drink or something?”
“No. I’m fine.” He motioned to the living room. “Can we sit for a moment?”
“Sure.”
She led the way through her tiny foyer into the modest living room. They both sat down on matching chairs that flanked her fireplace. The Christmas tree was behind them positioned right in front of the front windows. Thanks to the gloomy day outside Eleni had the lights on just to brighten the atmosphere in her home. Now it felt oddly intimate to be sitting here with Orion King.
“How can I help?” Eleni folded her hands tightly in her lap. She wasn’t sure what the protocol was here. Actually, she wasn’t sure about much right now. This was all so strange. “I’ll admit that I’m really surprised you would come here to ask for my help.”
“It’s roundabout.” He shoved his fingers through his dark hair, and Eleni noticed that it was mussed in a way that suggested he’d been doing that a lot lately. “I’m sure you know—because everyone seems to—that all of my brothers have moved out of the house. It’s just me.”
Eleni had heard that from several difference sources. It sounded awful. The idea of moving back into her mother’s house was horrible to contemplate, even if Alaina had been able to get the electricity back on. “Yes. I had heard that. I’m sorry that your brothers all moved out, but it was probably time.”
“Oh, I completely agree.” Orion knew that the prevailing opinion around Dallas was that he was very angry with his brothers for doing that. People could not have been more wrong about him. But that was just the way things went sometimes. “I’m glad they moved out. But that means Christmas will be very different this year. They’re all married. Edward and Diana are out of reach in Italy, but still. I’ve invited the others over for a family Christmas on Christmas Day.”
Eleni felt her eyebrows shoot up in surprise. That was a very un-Orion-like move. In fact, it was really quite sweet. She impulsively reached out and patted his knee. “That sounds really wonderful, Orion. I’m sure you guys will have a great time. I’m not really sure what you want me to help you with though.” His mother. That’s what he’d said. How odd. Eleni was not volunteering to babysit both mothers while they took potshots at each other for hours on end. How awful!
“I need your help shopping for gifts for my sisters-in-law.”
“Excuse me?” Eleni was pretty sure she’d misheard him. “Did you just say you need my help shopping?”
“Yes. It’s far too late to try and order something online.” He scratched the back of his neck. It was easy to see that he was really uncomfortable right now. “That’s actually why I was at the mall last night. You know? I was picking up a present for my brother Jason. It’s the only one I have so far.”
Wow. That was—well, Eleni didn’t actually know what that was. It was sweet and it made Orion seem strangely human after all these years. The two of them had been so on again off again as friends since they were children that it was currently very difficult to even begin to classify where their relationship was at right now.
“I’ll help you.”
“Really? That’s great!” He half rose from his chair. “We could start now if you want.”
“Hang on!” She held up both hands to stop the Orion train from leaving the station. “I want something in return.”
Oh boy, what was she thinking? Eleni was pretty sure that she was absolutely out of her mind right now. Orion appeared to agree with that. He seemed as though he were truly surprised that she would put conditions on it. Of course, he hadn’t heard them just yet.
“What is it?” Orion pressed. “I confess I’m surprised you would say that.”
“I need someone to go with me to my staff Christmas party tomorrow night.” The words came tumbling out before Eleni could allow herself to change her mind or rethink it. Then she realized how that might sound. “Wait. Just as friends. I should have added that. I know that your mother would absolutely kill you if she thought that we were dating. I believe she’s forbidden me from being anywhere near a King brother—romantically speaking, of course. She doesn’t mind inviting me and my mother to her parties as long as it’s to gloat.”
“Yeah. I’m really sorry about that. I know that party last week wasn’t fun. I appreciated you being a good sport.” He shifted in his seat. He looked uncomfortable. That was unusual for him. What was up with him? “And yes. I would be happy to go with you to your party. I completely understand how distasteful it is to show up to an office party like that without anyone to accompany you.”
“I’m just tired of people suggesting I should take up with the gym teacher.” Why was she telling him this? It was ridiculous! She needed to keep her mouth closed, but the words just kept coming. “He’s really not my type at all. I mean, I’m sure he’s a nice enough guy, but I get a little tired of hearing him talk about how awesome he is at everything. Why do guys do that? I mean, it’s like they’re determined to make every woman compliment them or something. I mean, you don’t do that! You never have. I don’t think I’ve ever seen you pandering for compliments or strutting around like some kind of peacock!”
He threw back his head and laughed. Eleni finally managed to stop talking long enough to let what she had just said finish sinking in. Dammit. She had basically just told him that she thought he was far more confident than other men and that she had been noticing him all these years. Of course, she had been noticing him. But it wasn’t necessary to tell him that. Was it?
“I would be happy to help you puncture the ego of gym teacher man,” Orion told her warmly.
Eleni pursed her lips and stared at him. “What’s up with you? You’re different. I know the last time I saw you at that holiday part
y”—she cleared her throat because that particular party had become absolutely infamous in Dallas social circles for an entirely different reason—“I sort of told you off for all of the drinking and stuff you’d been doing lately. You were really mad at me. You told me to back off. I believe you even called me a clingy girlfriend. So why are you being so friendly?”
It occurred to Eleni that the man had to have some kind ulterior motive. That’s how people behaved. At least normally. And yet she couldn’t really see one. He bobbed his head though, as if he knew exactly what she was talking about.
“My mother was watching us. Did you know that?”
Eleni sucked in a quick breath. “No.”
“She made certain that I knew about it later on. So while I don’t appreciate being told that I need to seek help for a nonexistent drinking problem”—he gave her a very pointed look—“I can now freely apologize for being so rude. I am sorry. I didn’t intend to hurt your feelings that night. Our mothers are…” He let the sentence drop as though he couldn’t really figure out what to say.
“Exactly the same?” Eleni offered. She had thought about this a lot, and she felt fairly confident making the statement that rested on the tip of her tongue. “If your mother didn’t have you and your brothers earning money and she’d had to marry off a bunch of daughters to try and get it, she would be in the same exact boat as my mother.”
“I absolutely agree with you.” He sounded almost depressed about that notion. “I also agree with what you said at the party the other night about my mother’s plans to force the sale of the company. I think that’s exactly what she’s intending to do. I believe my brothers know this too. We’re not oblivious. We’re just not sure exactly how to block her. She doesn’t play fair.”
Eleni felt bad for him. He had always worked hard. He’d tried his hardest from an early age to be the perfect son. Unfortunately, it wasn’t like that was easily accomplished in the King household. “My mother and your mother were very, very close right up until that big explosive fight during the other infamous dinner party.”
Billion Dollar Wolves: Boxset Bks 1-5 Page 100