by Shelby Lynn
Within five minutes, they were gone.
Within ten minutes—the police, responding to an anonymous 911 call arrived at the open gate at the front driveway.
It took them thirty minutes to get from the house to the Golden Gate Bridge. They were burning off the adrenaline and didn’t speak. Felix quietly handed Cody a bottle of water and some sandwiches. Cody was grateful they weren’t asking him questions. He wasn’t ready to speak about what had happened to him, maybe he never would be.
Cody was surprised when Oscar pulled the car onto the scenic overlook in Sausalito, instead of continuing up onto the bridge. When Oscar and Marcus got out of the car, he realized he also needed to stretch his legs a little more. After a week of being restrained for hours at a time, he had a need for movement.
Felix leaned against the car as he watched Cody walk around the parking lot. Oscar and Markus jogged down the pedestrian walkway on the bridge. It wasn’t until Felix noticed that Markus was holding a backpack that he realized what they were doing. While Cody was outside the house, he heard about the discs. And he’d heard Chaz pleading for his life as Oscar and Markus questioned him about any additional evidence and the house security.
After a few minutes of walking around, Cody went back to the van. “What are they up to? It seems unlikely they’d want to do the tourist thing at four in the morning, after the night we’ve had,” he said to Felix.
Felix looked at Cody closely, he knew what he was about to say would add another layer of misery, but also a bit of relief. “Chaz had discs of all of his sessions with you. They were clearly marked,” he rushed on to say as Cody’s posture stiffened. “It wasn’t necessary to visually review them. And Oscar interrogated Chaz, thoroughly, before we sent him to you for justice. Oscar and Markus are making sure the discs find their way to the bottom of the bay. I saw them add rocks to the backpack and Markus broke up the discs as he found them. The salt water will complete their destruction.”
Cody stood there, fine tremors shaking his body. Finally, he let out a breath and looked Felix in the eye. “Thank you. And I appreciate your word to keep silent about what you saw. I don’t want my brother to ever find out,” he said.
Felix wanted to reach out to the man, but he didn’t think Cody was ready to be touched. “All I saw was a beautiful wild cougar, ready to take the justice he deserved.”
The two of them looked at each other for another minute and then climbed back in the van. They could see Oscar and Markus returning.
“So, I’m starving, got any more food?” Cody asked, his mood lightening a little. He was beginning to realize that he was really free and these incredible men had his back. It was a wonderful feeling and his natural easy and friendly, outgoing, personality sparked a little inside him.
“Not here, but our sister, Marianna, spent most of the day cooking, so in another forty minutes or so, you can get some food. Then you can share the suite with your brother and his new mate, our brother, Arturo. There you can get some well-deserved rest. Tomorrow afternoon, we’re heading home for Christmas. I saw your bike, Oscar and I came up on ours, if you want you can ride south with us,” said Felix.
“Thanks, man, I’d like that a lot. I don’t think I could take a long drive in Brody’s truck and I’m sure he’d like some privacy with his new mate. But what about the M&M’s?” he asked.
“M&M’s?” asked Oscar as he took his seat behind the wheel. “What’d I miss?”
“We were discussing getting home in time for Christmas so Mama doesn’t come after us with her wooden spoon. Cody has his bike so he’d like to ride down with us,” Felix met Oscar’s eyes in the rear view mirror and passed him a message.
“That’d be great, but what’s this about candy? You want some chocolate, Cody?” Oscar asked.
“Who doesn’t? No, I meant Markus and Marianna,” he said and they laughed. “How will they get home? In this van?”
“The van is a rental, they’ll fly home,” said Oscar. “M&M’s, I’ll have to remember that one,” he said with a chuckle and Markus punched him in the arm.
True to his word, it took them another forty minutes to travel from the Bridge to the extended stay hotel where Arturo and Brody were. Cody didn’t really speak on the way; he just listened quietly while Felix, sitting next to him, finished telling him everything that had transpired that weekend.
Cody was really glad to hear that his brother was going to recover from the aconite poisoning. He really was looking forward to reconnecting with his twin.
Expecting to find Brody ill and still recovering, he was shocked and pleased to see he’d been busy mating.
“So this is what you get up to when I’m not around. They told me you were sick! If this is the kind of treatment you get, then let me know what you had. I may want to get that disease,” said Cody as he stood in the doorway to the bedroom.
It had been very difficult, but Cody didn’t want Brody to find out all that he’d been through. So using every ounce of energy he had, he put a smile on his face and tried to act as much like his old self as he could muster from within.
After giving Brody a hug and greeting his new brother-in-law, he used the excuse of the late hour to be shown to a bedroom he could use for as long as he needed to. The food, what was left, that Marianna had cooked earlier, and Felix pointed out the clothes she’d picked up for him at Target.
Brody wasn’t buying his excuse; his acting hadn’t been too good. Arturo recommended he take a shower and meet them in the living room in half an hour. Cody only hoped he could shore up his defenses; he’d die before letting Brody know what had been done to him. Thank the Gods, he was a Panthera, all his wounds had completely healed after his shift.
Finally after a couple of hours, he’d been able to get away. He was happy to accept an invitation to visit Arturo’s family. The more people around, the less likely Brody was to pick away at him. As wrapped up in his new mate as he was, it would give Cody time to get his head together—he hoped.
Excerpt from Enough Time
Stratum Series – Book Two
by Zach Collins
Prologue
“Uh….Ian could you come into the office for a minute,” Trent asked his best friend, as he stared at the large muscular man who was staring at him intensely.
“Sure, give us a minute guys,” Ian replied and nodded to the man he now called his husband.
Trent frowned when Ian’s mate had to pull the large man from the room they were standing in. When his best friend showed up, and called him after being gone weeks with only one prior phone call, he had been pissed. Not that he needed to check in with him, but he was his boss, and also his friend. It was bullshit that he was doing this right now.
Trent paced around his friend’s apartment, looking at the boxes and the things that were being packed. His best friend was leaving. It sucked, but he could live with it. What he couldn’t live with was the fact he and his friend had been fired from their jobs at the University, for stupid shit. Then his friend announcing it didn’t really matter because he was moving to another Stratum, whatever the hell that was, and Trent was on his own. Ian had started this shit, and he was going to be left alone to finish it. Being fired was the least of his worries. His reputation and his fucking life were turned upside down, just because he refused to admit his friend was a thief. Now it didn’t really matter, according to his friend. He didn’t need the job, he was moving.
Great, dandy, and where the fuck did that leave him? Being fired from his job, being accused of thievery and covering up a crime was like having his career implode right in from of him. In addition, Ian was spewing creepy weird shit, which pissed him off. He was going to have to go back to Ian’s father and ask for a job. It was pathetic.
Shit, he hadn’t been on his own since he met Ian. They were best friends. It was strange how it all came about. They met in college and were the only two gay men on the floor. They were not attracted to each other at all. They were like brothers. Trent final
ly had someone to talk to and not feel as if he was being judged. His family disowned him and his childhood friends shunned him. When he went to college, he had hoped to start a new life, which he did. Meeting Ian had been the best thing that ever happened to him. Ian’s family took him in and treated him as though he was a long lost family member.
When the Dean of the College came to him, told him Ian was suspected of stealing and being involved in some kind of smuggling ring, Trent had laughed. Then they showed him the proof. A tape showed Ian reaching for a stolen artifact that had surfaced. Trent assured the Board of Regents that Ian would never have stolen it. Instead, they had accused him of covering for his friend, so he told them to fuck off and walked out of the University. Never actually thinking they would fire him too. He left to try to prove his friend’s innocence, but when he had been unable to find him, his anger had grown.
Ian called him to say he was in Ireland, great, fine, if that’s where the hell he really was. However, it wasn’t. Trent knew his friend had lied to him, but he never thought he’d gone mad. In the past hour, Trent tried to get his friend away from the people who he came with. If he could talk some sense into him, maybe they stood a chance.
Trent thought Ian was being influenced by a cult. At least, that’s what these men appeared to be like. Blake, the leader, was very charismatic, and the rest of the men seemed to do everything he said. It was more than a little strange. Two of the men even bowed to Blake, what in the hell was that about? Then there was the large man who was looking at him with such intensity, he felt like a bug under a microscope. When he got close to anyone, the man had stepped forward as if in warning to the other men. He had no idea what was going on. Maybe they were going to try to brainwash him too. At this point, anything was possible.
He may need to send Ian to one of those deprograming groups. The movie he had seen was the one where they took the person, secluded him or her somewhere and deprogrammed them. It was ugly and could be actually painful. When a cult got their hooks into you, it could screw you up.
Hell, now he was out of a job, and although he had a lot of money saved up, there was no way he would be able to survive unless he found another one. How was he going to get help without money? Ian’s parents would not be able to be brought into this. That would be a political nightmare. Shit. He had been the Head of the Department, how did that slip through his fingers so quickly? The assholes never even wanted to listen to him. It was as if they had made their minds up before they even saw the video. Maybe their insurance would cover this if he could prove to the Regents that Ian was brainwashed. Crap, he was kidding himself.
Trent had to accept the fact they were probably happy that Ian and him were gone. They had been the only two gay men on the faculty. It was sad to think they would be happy to see them go if it were for that reason only. Trent really thought that Ian and he had finally found a home where they would not discriminated against. Maybe he was wrong, but it was feeling a little like a fucking set up.
His mind was going a mile a minute, trying to think of a way out of this mess. When they arrived to the study, Trent paused and made sure the door was locked behind him. Ian raised an eyebrow at him.
“Trent, let me tell you a little story,” Ian laughed, slapping him on the back.
“Dude, I really don’t need story time, I need to find a fucking job, and you need to get help. Man, this is beyond crazy,” Trent said warily.
“Maybe I can help you with that, well, at the least the job part. As for the other, we will talk about that too, but you have to keep an open mind,” Ian laughed, and waited for his friend to nod in agreement before he continued, “Okay, I told you part of the shit that went down a few weeks ago. Let me tell you the rest. When I was at the Museum that night, something happened, something strange and fucking unbelievable. The coin everyone is accusing me of stealing was not an artifact. It was a transport device, used by people in different Stratums.”
“Ian, did they drug you or something?” Trent asked his best friend worriedly and looked into his eyes. “Cause I swear if they did, I will kick their ass and make them sorry for ever fucking with us. I think we need to call someone, and get him or her over here right now. We can have you away from these guys in a few minutes.”
Trent pulled his cell phone from his pocket and began to search the Internet with it to find what he was looking for. How in the hell did you search for ‘deprogrammers’? He just typed in what he thought would pull up the information as Ian pulled the phone from his hands.
He laughed and slapped his best friend on the back of the head. They had been together for so long he forgot sometimes they were friends because he thought of Ian as family. His friend had the benefit of having a supportive family, while Trent didn’t. In fact, his family was a bunch of fucking lunatics and pricks. Trent had gone home with Ian on all breaks and holidays, just to avoid staying in the dorms by himself.
Trent had not told Ian the extent of his abuse as a child. It was easier to tell Ian that his family didn’t like gays and kicked him out when he came out to them. It was true, even if his father had always suspected. When Trent went to a gay pride parade, his father flipped. Trent knew he still bore the scars of that beating. Since that day, the beatings became more frequent. He could almost hear his father telling him as he whipped him that he was unnatural, a freak. Telling Trent all he had to do was accept that being gay was not an option, find a cute girl, fuck her, and then marry her. Then all would be right in the family.
His mother ignored it. When Trent had asked for her help, she smiled, told him to do what his father asked and it would be all right. Bullshit, he had tried, it was not all right, he chose a girl and tried to do what was asked of him, but it had been awkward. His brother told his father what the girl had said at school the next day. That had been the last straw. He refused to change what he was in order to please his parents. Therefore, he endured the beatings, but made sure his grades were exemplary, which paid off when he graduated and then received acceptance into a prestigious college. Fuck them, he borrowed and worked to be where he was today. Finding Ian and his parents had been a godsend. They gave him something he needed, support and acceptance.
Even though his friend’s parents loved Trent, there had been a time when they thought Ian and Trent were actually dating. Both of the men had laughed and set them straight. From their first meeting, it was as if they were long lost brothers. His parents accepted Trent and welcomed him into the fold of their family. He was surprised a little, since Ian’s father was in politics. It was bad enough Ian was gay, but to have his friend in the limelight also, had been unheard of.
Only the strongest men of character could withstand the backlash from having a gay son or daughter in the world of politics. Ian’s father and mother had supported Trent, just the same as they had done for their own children. For that, he was going to make sure Ian was taken care of.
Trent frowned at his friend and clenched his fists. Maybe if he knocked him out, he could make the call and escape through the window. The fire escape was right there. Trent was strong enough to make it down carrying his friend, which was one thing he knew for sure. His strength from working out would enable them to make a run for it.
“Bro, they didn’t drug me. I’m telling you the truth. Listen. There are seven different Stratums, ours, which they refer to as the Human Stratum, not too pressed for the imagination. Then there are the Wizards, Witches, and Warlocks Stratum, that is where Blake, my mate is from. He is the King of the Stratum, and I know it sounds crazy, but I will come back to this. I haven’t met Shifters yet, you know from the Shifter Stratum. Yes, I said Shifter, then there are the Elves, the Trolls, the Paladin, and the Fae,” Ian said slowly.
“Okay, I get it. Let’s call your parents and talk to them about this, I mean this is a big thing for you to be leaving for, what did you call it? Stratum. And mated to the King, well that is awesome,” Trent said easing toward the phone Ian set on the table. He had heard not to ma
ke sudden movements when talking to someone who had a psychotic breakdown, or was under mind control. His friend had, there was no other explanation. Trent looked into his friend’s eyes for any indication he had gone mad. There was none, only an amused gaze that was beginning to freak him out.
Shit, all this time he had been covering for his friend. Thinking he was just having fun with a new man. Really hoping his friend had found someone who he could spend the rest of his life. He trusted his friend’s call because Ian had never given him cause to think he was unstable. He knew this man and there was nothing he could not do. He was like Superman without the cape and he had told him that. Trent liked to think he was a lot like Ian.
He would make sure his friend had the best care. These men were obviously taking advantage of him. Well, that was fucking gonna stop. Trent was going to call Ian’s parents first, and then he would call the police to deal with these assholes. When Trent ran out of options, calling Ian’s parents was the only thing he could do.
“Trent, knock it off and listen. Blake is the King of the Trivet or Wizard Stratum, and he is a Wizard. I am trying to tell you this shit fast before Logan, Blake’s brother, has an aneurism. When I went to the Museum and grabbed ahold of the guy with the coin, we ended up in this other place. It looked a lot like New York but in a strange, freaky ass way. You will see, but listen first. The mate thing. I am Blake’s mate, which means I am the King’s Consort. I am heading up the Education Division there and I could really use your help. However, that will also be explained later. Mating, with Wizards is like crazy, they give you power, you also share their life span and everything. Some of the Stratums have been around long before this one. Humans are behind the power curve a little on some things.
“The man who was staring at you was Logan. He’s Blake’s brother, and the head of the Stratum’s security, a real big deal. I don’t know if he has a title, we can ask. Anyway, he’s your mate,” Ian said. “I need you to go to your apartment and pack some stuff. We really don’t have a lot of time for explanations. Nevertheless, there’s something going on. Someone has decided they are going to try to take over all the Stratums and it is a mess, once again something you have to hear about later, we just don’t have the time to fuck around here.”