by M. L. Briers
“And do this on his own,” he cautioned her.
“And that could be a problem,” Cameron called from outside the closed back door.
“Now he comes for breakfast?” Mark asked in disbelief, and Tanya chuckled as she reached for the mug of coffee beside her plate.
“Thanks for the invite,” Cameron said, throwing open the back door and motioning to the threshold.
“No!” Mark growled.
“Come on in,” Tanya said and offered her mate a look of sympathy mixed with amusement. “It’s my house too.”
“Ugh!” Mark grumbled, rolling his eyes to where the vampire sat at the far end of the table. “When food is on offer you’re fast on your feet. How come you’re not that fast when it’s time to leave?”
“What’s the problem?” Tanya asked the vampire, ignoring her husband’s protests as she always did.
Mark grunted. “He’s at our house again. Not just that, our table.”
“Now I know where Max gets that pouty face from,” Cameron said, reaching for the plate of bacon just as Mark put it down.
“Eating our food,” Mark grumbled, and Tanya spluttered more chuckles into her cup.
“And it’s so tasty,” Cameron mocked him, waving bacon like a flag in front of his face.
“The problem?” Tanya asked, and the vampire snapped to it.
“His mate has a husband and child,” he announced and saw the smile drop from Tanya’s lips as her mouth opened in surprise.
“Ugh!” Mark grumbled. “Well, there goes my day!”
“Why?” Cameron asked.
“One son who might just kill someone, and one mate who might just rush to get involved in said son’s business,” he informed him. Then he reached out a finger under Tanya’s chin and pushed up. “Catching flies, honey, bacon tastes better.”
~
“So, pick one,” Kaylee said, stomping her booted feet on the ground to try to warm them a little more.
As any kid would, Jackson was taking his own sweet time in choosing the Christmas tree that he wanted for the cabin. She didn’t begrudge him that, but she wouldn’t mind some feeling back in her toes.
Christmas was the only reason why they weren’t on the road again and off to a different town, and then another, and then another. He’d said he wanted a real Christmas and she thought they just might have put enough distance between them and home to do it. At least, she hoped nobody would find them all the way across country.
With a deep frown of contemplation turning into raised eyebrows of his Eureka moment, he lifted a podgy finger and pointed to a ten-footer. “That one!” he said with glee.
“Think – shorter,” Kaylee advised him, eyeing the spectacular tree.
It was impressive, and the boy had a good eye, but it was also impractical, she’d need to buy the decorations, and that would take a lot of decorating, and then there was the height aspect to it. Even with magic it wouldn’t fit in the little cabin with its low ceilings.
“But you said anyone I wanted,” Jackson reasoned, giving her that Oliver Twist meets Puss in Boots face again.
Kaylee wasn’t falling for that this time. “Small cabin, big tree, you figure it out,” she offered back, determined to stand up to those pleading eyes of his. “You want an indoor tree or an outdoor tree?”
“Indoors,” he snapped answered back.
“Then that ain’t the tree that’s gonna fit, kiddo,” she chuckled.
Jackson pulled a face, shrugged his shoulders and kept on looking. Ugh! She thought maybe she should have just gotten the tree and cut it down to size, at least they’d have a tree and her feet could get back to being in the warmth of the car, or a store, she still had plenty to do around town.
“Hey, look,” Jackson said, pointing again. “It’s that guy.”
Kaylee’s heart skipped a few beats before she’d even followed where Jackson pointed at Max, who was coming towards them from out of what looked like a mini-wood. She’d known who she was going to find before she’d even laid eyes on him, it wasn’t like Jackson knew anyone else.
Aside from Jackson playing with the kids next door, and next door was about half a mile away when she’d gone into town to get supplies that never ended up getting because she’d met Max yesterday, the only other person he’d come into contact with was the shifter at their door.
“Pick a tree, we have a whole list of things to get done,” Kaylee told him, putting her hands on his shoulders; she spun him back to the mini-wood and gave him a little shove to be on his way.
When she gave Max a hard stare, he held his hands up to his chest in mock surrender and stopped just short of her with a tight smile. “I’m not stalking you,” he rushed out, hoping she wasn’t going to come out with all guns blazing at him.
“You’re not avoiding me either.”
“It’s a small town, and we own this place,” he said and spotted his sibling coming out from inside the store with a curious look on his face and glee in his eyes.
“Shocker, finding a bear in the woods,” she said quietly. “Why am I not surprised?”
Max shot a look over her shoulder at his brother and warned him off with a glare, but that had never stopped Lucas before, and it didn’t stop him now. “Well, now, how can we help you today?” Lucas asked, bringing her attention around to another man-mountain. The family resemblance was there, even if Max did favour his father more than the second shifter did.
Kaylee turned her stance so that she could see both men at all times. She wasn’t about to be caught on the hop, and she didn’t much like the fact that Jackson was with her.
Yes, he’d known from an early age that his mother and Aunt possessed magic, but she’d never had to use it for anything other than little things around him. She thought that decking two large shifters wasn’t how she wanted him to think magic was used, and then there was the whole shifter thing – he knew about them in theory, but in practice, not so much.
Plus, he was her Achilles Heel, she’d die to protect him, and kill if she had to.
Kaylee might have been an Aunt, but in all respects, she was like a first-time parent learning the ropes as she went along. This was not a good life lesson to teach an impressionable boy who would start to come into his magical powers soon enough.
“Well, der,” she muttered, deliberately rolling her eyes so she could take stock of where Jackson was. It wouldn’t do her any good to lose the boy and have to hunt him down if this all went pear-shaped and she needed to make a quick exit. “I’m standing here surrounded by Christmas trees, so I guess I need a pair of sunglasses and some sunscreen.”
Lucas leaned in just a little, and it was all his brother could do to hold onto the urge to warn him off with a hard growl. “You don’t need to tell anyone you’re a witch with that attitude,” he said with a mocking grin.
“And the way you smell, you don’t need to tell anyone you’re a shifter,” she offered back, waving a hand under her nose for effect.
Lucas pulled back, and that made Max feel a whole lot better, but when his brother frowned, dipped his head and scented his armpit, well, that just made Max chuckle at the sight of it.
Maybe he wouldn’t need to rip his brother’s head off just yet.
CHAPTER ELEVEN
~
“She got you there,” Max said, sticking out his chest with pride and appreciating that his mate had taken his brother down a peg or two. “And for the record, you do stink.”
Lucas offered his brother a sneer of contempt. “Well, that just proves which one of us actually works for a living around here.”
Kaylee snorted a chuckle, and when Max narrowed his eyes on her and frowned, she took a long step back. “And on that note I’m…”
“This one!” Jackson called, and for once, she was grateful for the child’s timely interruption.
“Going,” she said, hooking a thumb over her shoulder, but with the two men beaming smiles and snickering, she knew something wasn’t right.
“I don’t
think it’ll fit in your place, but if you want it…” Max said, folding his arms and chuckling.
Kaylee felt a sense of dread at having to tell Jackson he’d picked the wrong tree again, and she turned to find her nephew in front of a tree that had a branch span as large at their living room. “Boy, you have mansion tastes on a logger’s budget,” she said, rolling her eyes and bringing them down on the perfect tree.
It was three feet tall, stick thin, and would fit under her arm to carry to the car. “What’s wrong with that one?” she asked, and motioned to it.
Jackson looked and immediately turned his nose up. “That’s not a tree it’s a large branch,” he said, and those sniggering shifters behind her suddenly became really annoying.
“He’s not wrong,” Max said, leaning in a little too close for her liking, and she shot him a glare until he pulled back again.
Kaylee turned back to Jackson. “We could put it on the table…”
“Like a centrepiece?” Lucas asked, and she shot him a glare as well.
“How big is your table?” she muttered and then screwed her face up and shook her head. “I don’t want to know,” she said, turning back to Jackson. “The little side table with the…”
“Wonky leg?” he asked, and she had to admit, it did have a slight tilt to it. “I want one on the floor to put presents under.” He thought about that for a moment. “We are getting presents here, right?”
“Sure,” she said, and her heart went out to him. “That’s why we’re here, so Santa knows where to find us and…”
“Cool,” he said, and pointed to another tree.
Kaylee wasn’t sure she wanted to look, but when she snapped a look at where he was pointing, she had to admit, it was a pretty good tree. “Bingo!” she announced and he beamed her a great smile that made it all worthwhile. “Now, let’s get it on the roof of the car and…”
“We deliver,” Lucas rushed out, and heard the bones in his brother’s neck snap as he shot him a glare.
“Oh, no…” Kaylee shook her head so fast she almost went dizzy. “I can…”
“Can he bring it?” Jackson asked, pointing to Max.
Kaylee almost swallowed her tongue. “Delivery is for people who can’t get the tree to…”
“Nope, it’s free, and it’s for everyone,” Lucas lied. Although, in truth, they did deliver a lot of trees to folk who couldn’t take them. Hell, for his elderly customers, he even installed them in the house and had been known to string a few lights, not that he’d ever tell his family. “My little sister also decorated the church tree one year…”
“Yeah, that went well,” Max said, remembering it well. Kaylee shot him a curious look, and he rushed to explain. “My mother had to go rescue the tree, something about my sister having more lights strung on her than on the branches.”
Kaylee chuckled to herself, she could still remember the first year she’d had her own tree to decorate, and those lights could tie a person up in knots, especially after Christmas when you had to take them down again.
“Well, we can take the tree,” she rushed out when she realised he was waiting for her to respond.
“But it’s their job,” Jackson said, and she found that he’d moved to the side of the tree he’d picked and was grinning like a cherub. “And people’s jobs are important, right, Aunty Kaylee?”
“Aunty…?” Max’s tone was deep and thoughtful, and she thought it had an air of condemnation about it, but that could have just been her guilty ears playing tricks on her guilty mind.
Kaylee grimaced, closed her eyes, and told herself she was an evil person for leading him on, but she’d done it for the right reasons. When she turned to look at him, there was an accusation in his eyes that flicked on that guilt gene to full effect. “I never said I was his mother…”
“You said family,” Max tossed back.
“I never said which member,” Kaylee shot back, tilting her chin down and eyeballing him from under her eyelashes.
“Okay,” Lucas said, strolling towards Jackson. “Wanna see how we dress the tree to get it home?” he asked, and Jackson’s grin grew wider.
“Yeah!” he rushed out, and then quickly checked to see if Kaylee was going to say no.
“Go ahead,” she said and marvelled at the way that Lucas just picked up the big tree like it was a twig. He ruffled Jackson’s hair and nodded in the direction he wanted him to go, and as they set off together, Kaylee turned back to her mate.
“You made it sound like you were married,” Max said, folding his large arms over his broad chest and huffed out a breath. “Are you?”
“I… well, that’s not exactly…” She stopped when he cocked an eyebrow at her. “No,” she admitted.
“In that case…”
“Oh no,” she said, shaking her head too fast again. “I am not interested in becoming a mate to a…” She pressed her lips together as she looked him up and down. “Man.”
“You’re a lesbian?” he exclaimed, and she opened her mouth, screwed up her nose and just stared at him.
“A minute ago you thought I was married with a kid,” she said in disbelief.
“Lesbian’s get married and have kids.”
“Well, yeah, okay, you got me there,” she said, fidgeting in place. “But, just because I don’t want a man in my life doesn’t make me a lesbian…”
“There’s nothing wrong with being a lesbian,” he tossed back, unsure why he was arguing with her.
“I know!”
“Well, good!”
“I’ll keep it in mind and maybe give it a whirl!” she snapped.
Max opened his mouth, but he didn’t have an answer for that one. “Look…”
“No, you look,” she snapped back, cutting him off before he said anything else stupid. Then she didn’t know what to say, so she said nothing.
“I’m waiting,” Max offered.
“I’m thinking,” she snapped.
“Does it hurt?”
“Oh!” she snapped, and without thinking, she used her magic to zap him a zinger of a slap to his pride.
Max jumped in place, mainly because he hadn’t been expecting it, but it felt like a hundred bee stings. “You know, just for that, I’m delivering your Christmas tree…”
“You are not,” she snapped.
“Oh yeah…” he grumbled a low, but deep growl.
“Well, then I don’t want the damn tree, I’ll get one from somewhere else, and you can shove that one up your…”
“Look at the tree, Aunt Kaylee!” Jackson called as he and Lucas carried it back together. Lucas held the weight while Jackson had hold of the top. “It’s perfect!”
“Perfect,” Max echoed, and Kaylee offered him a dark glare, but the smirk on his lips didn’t go anywhere. “And nobody else does trees around here,” he muttered loud enough for her to hear.
“I still want to shove it up your chocolate whizz way and make you the Christmas fairy on top!” she bit out of the corner of her mouth so that Jackson couldn’t overhear her.
“Good to know you’re into that kind of thing,” he offered back and saw her lips quirk, but she turned back to Jackson before he could get a good look at what happened next.
“Great work. Let’s get it on the car,” she said, but Jackson shook his head.
“Lucas said that when they bring it over, they’ll bring us some of his mom’s Christmas cookies,” he said, brimming with excitement. “They are to die for,” he added and looked at Lucas for confirmation.
Kaylee shot a look back over her shoulder at Max, and the damn man was still smirking. That smirk annoyed her right down to her toes. “Well, let’s hope it doesn’t come to that,” she muttered loud enough for her mate to hear.
CHAPTER TWELVE
~
Kaylee pushed open the door to the store and Jackson shot by her like a racehorse. “Hey, slow down, we want to buy whole things, not broken ones,” she admonished him, and he immediately slowed his step as he moved through t
he aisle and weaved around the display baskets with their promise of Christmas cheer.
The bells and whistles of her inner witchy alarms had started to ring like a crazy Monk tugging at church bells and signalling impending doom, and her gaze shot to a woman up a ladder who was stalled in mid-flow as she reached up to the top shelf with a box of loose baubles.
“Wherever I go, I find another one,” Kaylee muttered to herself.
Tanya didn’t know if she was coming or going at the sight of Max’s mate, at least, she hoped it was his mate and there wasn’t another witch in town – that would really put Mark in a bad mood, and being a bad-mood bear wasn’t good for his health because she’d kill him if he ruined Christmas.
“You must be Kaylee,” Tanya said with a certain amount of glee. She’d finally got to meet her new daughter after it had been itching at her to find out what the witch was like.
“Kaylee!” Came the feminine shriek from the back, and Shauna shot out of the back room like it was on fire, colliding with the ladder her mother was standing on, and tipping the thing.
Tanya had no option but to let go of the box and grab the shelf to stop the ladder from falling, but she grimaced as she waited for the sound of the delicate glass baubles smashing against the wooden floor.
Luckily, Kaylee already had her magic at her fingertips, being in a town with shifters was a little unnerving, and on instinct, she raised her hand and swiped the air, sending the box onto the nearest shelf with only one glass bauble escaping the confines of the box.
In a heartbeat, Shauna reached out and snatched it from its downward journey, and all was right with the world again. Well, sort of.
Shauna looked up at her mother with an air of sheepishness when the mama-bear offered a little rumble of a growl, but it was Jackson who broke the tension. “Aunt Kaylee saved Christmas!” he announced.
“Aunt – Kaylee?” Tanya asked, frowning at the witch.
“Hello,” Shauna added. “Didn’t see that one coming.”