Interspecies Public Relations Officer [Milson Valley 4] (Siren Publishing Ménage Amour ManLove)

by Jo Penn

  “Yes, Emile. No, Emile. See ya!” Marco hung up his phone. “Three bags full, Emile.”

  Luka laughed. One of Marco’s elder cousins was an arrogant, uptight feline shifter and never to be messed with. You said “yes sir!” sharply and jumped to it. Drax was more relaxed than Emile and that was saying a hell of a lot.

  “Oh, he’s hot.” Luka checked out a big guy across the bar.

  Marco shrugged. “He’s okay. Prefer mine smaller. But then, I’m not a bottom.”

  “Bite me.” Luka retorted. “And I’m both.”

  “Me, I’ll take it any way I can get it.” Bray grinned. “And gentlemen, I’ve got myself a date.” Bray strolled off to a sexy little human woman eying him up like candy.

  Both Marco and Luka groaned. Lucky Brayson.

  Luka frowned. “What are you groaning about? You’re gay.”

  “Hey, I can appreciate and imagine. And so are you and you’re staring. Damn, will they never leave me alone?” Marco snatched his phone off the table and rolled his eyes. “Yes, Dominic?”

  The conversation went downhill fairly quickly. Marco was ordered back to the compound immediately, as he’d left without protection and that pissed the Sanchez pride off. They were all about protecting their princes and lords, which Marco was one of. Marco was safe here though. The wolf pack always looked out for him. Often he got tumbled by a few, or really, he tumbled them for a good fuck, but the Sanchez’s were strict and Marco was theirs.

  “Now be a good little wolfie and keep it in your pants.” Marco stood and waved a finger under Luka’s nose.

  “Like that’s going to happen. I’m not good and I can never keep my dick in my pants.”

  Marco laughed like he gave a shit and left the bar. And little ole Luka to fend for himself from any advances.

  Luka rarely rejected any advances. Usually his protectors did that for him, but as he was now considered all grown up he had free rein to do whatever he wished. So he ended up in a hotel room with a well-endowed shifter. Just when things were getting good, the hotel door burst open, flung back against the wall and splinting. Three large felines strolled in.

  “Hey, comin’ to join us?” Luka grinned from the bed where he was mostly out of his clothes. One of the shifters he was with was pulling off his boxers.

  Marco winced. “Sorry to do this to you, buddy, but I’m saving you from yourself…and very bad repercussions.”

  Luka had no time to react before Marco’s older brother, Lord Baron Sanchez, an Enforcer for the Sanchez pride, tore him away from the shifter he was getting frisky with while the other big feline with them, a bodyguard, subdued the two shifters Luka had intended to have a bit of fun with.

  “What the hell?” Luka exclaimed.

  Marco snapped paranormal cuffs on Luka’s wrist. “You’re really drunk, buddy. Let’s get you out of here and get you more drunk.”

  Luka began to pant, eyes flicking back to the two creatures the Sanchez bodyguard was warning to stay still or they would be dealing with the Sanchez pride.

  “But he’s a wolf!” one of the men growled.

  “Belongs to the Sanchez pride also. Let’s go.”

  Through the blur of alcohol and being dressed by his friend, Luka whined and panted, overheating. He needed, was burning up with the needs, body flushed and twisting and turning, skin feeling like it was on fire. Marco dealt with that by injecting a syringe into Luka’s ass once they were in the back of a big SUV.

  “You’re gonna fill me in on why we’re doing this, Marco,” Baron snapped from the front seat. “Luka needs to get off. Though usually Drax and the pack keep a better eye on him. I’ll be speaking to them about this tomorrow.”

  Everyone knew Luka was protected, even from himself. He had guards which was just shit annoying.

  “Yeah, yeah.” Marco patted Luka’s head that now rested on his lap. “Just give us a few days, it’ll be clear after that. Drop us at his place.”

  Dropped off at Luka’s condo, Marco remained while the bodyguard hung around outside. Marco explained, as he mixed mojitos, that it wasn’t a good idea to cheat on a mate, regardless of whether the mate knew of Luka yet or not. Luka growled and stomped around, drunk, and tried to bat Marco away when his friend put the medallion back on.

  After that he didn’t remember much except there were a lot of mojitos.

  * * * *

  Luka woke the next morning with a killer hangover, his eyes like sandpaper, and barely any idea what had happened the night before. After Marco left, some friends came in, they did shots, talking about the snowboarding holiday Luka had just been on. He remembered being picked up in the bar by two shifters then Marco and Baron spoiling his fun.

  By the time he stumbled into the conference room at city hall, he was bleary eyed behind dark glasses, stunk of a dozen or more creatures and alcohol, and he wished he could just go home and sleep the day away.

  He lowered the sunglasses a little when Prince Dominic, one of Marco’s cousins, and Baron strode in with a few of their pride, Uri, Mason Armstrong, and Laurie.

  Laurie took one look at Luka and paled. “Where’s the medallion?”

  “I dunno.” Luka had turfed that as soon as he was out of his condo this morning.

  “Dammit, Luka, you were supposed to wear it all the time. You reek of a dozen creatures! The fae will be here in a minute. Why do I bother? I try to help you out and I’m the one going to be screwed!”

  “Sheesh, calm down, it’s not like I went and…okay, I did go and do that, but then Marco stuck his big head in. Doesn’t matter now anyway. No one will ever know.”

  “You smell like sex.” Drax sat down on Luka’s other side. “Couldn’t you have had a shower at least?”

  “Sure.” Luka shrugged.

  Lounging back in the chair, he got clipped on the back of the head by his alpha. He winced and inclined his head. Next his father shot him lethal looks so Luka hunched in his seat.

  “You’re going to be useless to us, Luka,” his father said, annoyed. “So much for your public relations skills.”

  “Does that mean I can go?”

  Urian gave a sharp nod. “Get out of here. And by the way, I got a call from a lion shifter this morning wanting your number for him and his friend. I get another one and you’re back to either living with your parents or at the pack. I have decided it best we go back to keeping guards on you and screening everyone.”

  Luka blinked. Shit. “Err, right, sorry, Alpha…it was just a bit of fun.”

  Which had been spoilt anyway.

  “The problem is that every creature who sees you wants to keep you. This happens too many times and then the soldiers have to get involved. That’s a waste of pack time and energy, Luka. No more.”

  Dominic and Baron were smirking, Baron clapping.

  “We’ve had to deal with our shifters every time Luka sets foot in the compound. We’d be happy to keep him locked up if you want. Save us having to rein in Marco and Luka’s friends from my pride.” Baron grinned.

  “Hey, I’m not doing anything wrong. I can’t help it if these creatures get hung up on me. It’s just fucking. We all do that.”

  “Except, Luka, you shouldn’t be fucking anyone,” Laurie said quietly, nervously.

  Luka glared at his friend. “Is this gang up on Luka day? ’Cause if it is, I’m not interested.”

  “No, but I think Urian is right. You’re one of those wolves who ends up being a fable in some nightmare. Been going on since you hit puberty. Most of the time Marco just bats creatures away but now you’re sort of out of control.”

  Luka gaped at his friend, then stared around the table. They were serious! This was shit! They all slept around. They were creatures, and that’s what creatures did. It was natural! And yeah, he seemed to have a few creatures go a bit psycho intense over him, or thirty or so, that didn’t mean anything.

  He’d just gained his freedom from years of being considered a pup, trained, monitored, and forever being surrounded by
guards and now they were going to take his freedom away? Nope, didn’t sound good.

  “Fine, I’m out of here.”

  “Luka, I will speak to you later, son.”

  Luka pressed his glasses up to his nose and stumbled out the door, swearing. Getting bumped in the shoulder, Luka growled at the creature responsible as now half his coffee was on his shirt.

  “Oh, sorry! I’ll pay for dry cleaning. Got to go, sorry again!”

  Sliding his sunglasses down his nose, he blinked to get the blur out of his eyes, watching a really cute, sexy wizard run through the office hall, cinnamon colored hair flowing in shiny curls behind him, bumping and apologizing as he went. Next thing Luka knew he was following the wizard, just had to. Instincts perhaps telling him there was something not quite right going on, and he’d spotted a vamp slinking back into the shadows when he glanced in that direction.

  Dashing out the side door, he saw the wizard leap down the stairs of city hall and get only a few steps before two vampires grabbed the guy. The wizard tried to get free but he wasn’t much of a fighter. Besides, vamps were real strong buggers. A car roared to a stop beside them and before Luka could do more than yell out, they had the wizard in the back of the car.

  “Shit!” Luka grabbed his phone and took off after the car. He punched a pre-programmed number as he ran.

  “I don’t have time for you right now—”

  “Drax, I just saw a wizard tossed into the back of a car by two vampires, a third was driving.”

  “Where are you?”

  “Side entrance, Kruger Street. I’m going to shift and follow them. That wizard did not want to be grabbed.”

  Luka quickly striped off and shifted, dumping his clothes by the side of the road and racing after the speeding car.

  * * * *

  Tudor was so not having a good day.

  Then again, his life was plagued with not such good days. He’d been out for a stroll around the picturesque side of the city known as the Village when he’d nearly been grabbed by a vampire hell bent on taking him away, probably to some dark dank dungeon. As he wasn’t keen on that idea he had run to what he felt may be the safest place in the city, but the vampires were quick and he wasn’t use to asking for help, nor did he want anyone to get hurt.

  Should have stayed in the coven. That would have been safer.

  The vampire in the back of the car with him backhanded him hard across the face. He saw stars, tasted blood, and his head spun.

  Ouch! Now he couldn’t hear a damn thing as his hearing aid was flung from his ear. The vampire picked it up, smiling and crushed it with his vampire strength and wiped his hands together. Little bits of plastic and wires fell on the floor.

  The vampire bared his fangs just before sinking them into Tudor’s throat.

  Ouch, again.

  The vampire suddenly stopped and looked to the front of the car, saying something that Tudor couldn’t hear. The two vampires argued as he felt blood trickling down his neck. Maybe he’d just bleed to death, that’d be an easier way to go, rather than be torn apart by vampire talons. Those things were nasty and razor sharp.

  With a small sigh he closed his eyes briefly only to blink them open as the entire car shook and skidded across the road. The vampire half on him was thrown forward and straight through the front window.

  That was why you should always wear safety belts.

  Tudor wouldn’t forget that from now on and quickly scrambled around but was thrown back across the seat and banged his head on the side door. Ugh, ouch again! Why was he always the one getting bruised up? He stayed out of the way, kept his head down, didn’t step a foot out of line, yet his life was full of these kind of incidents. Snatched, grabbed, backhanded, bruised, and bossed around. Then of course there was the being traded from his old coven to the Armstrong one, which surprisingly was a lot better than where he was from originally. They treated him nicely at the new coven, and they had rescued him from the vamps that just kept trying to snatch him because of what was in his head.

  It wasn’t like he was a genius or anything, nor was he very strong magically, sort of a weak wizard but not so bad he was utterly useless. He did have some skills. Mostly the vamps wanted him because he and three others from different covens had overheard and seen something they shouldn’t have that implicated one of the Senators in nefarious dealings with Renegades. One friend had died, the other two were safe, hopefully. Tudor had been traded. It was a barbaric technique and Lady Delia Armstrong, the coven leader, stated clearly she did not believe in trading in these modern times but used whatever means were possible to remove Tudor from his old coven because she heard from her grandson Prince-mate Xavier Dalton that he was being mistreated and it wasn’t safe there.

  At the time of the incident where he overheard the senator, Tudor told all the important people what he saw, and the little he’d heard, his hearing wasn’t great even with the hearing aid, and now he was kept safe until the tribunal before the Council next week where he was to testify. It wasn’t that he wished he’d never heard and seen anything, he couldn’t do that, he wasn’t that selfish as there were lives at stake, innocent and good ones…and his life wasn’t worth much compared to that or anything else.

  He was just saddened by the fact he was causing so much trouble for nice Lady Delia and the new coven. And he probably wouldn’t make it to the tribunal to testify and help stop the corrupt senator and Renegades. He just hoped his other friends, a witch and a wizard, were safe and got to the tribunal.

  The car skidded out of control and Tudor got whacked against the arm rest, everything going black.

  * * * *

  Raising a hand, Caspar Morgan, fae Prince, stilled the out of control car mid flip in the air and carefully lowered it to the ground.

  With a flick of his other hand, the doors of the car were torn off and flung away. With super speed he raced to the car, quickly checked the driver who was quaking in his seat, then leaned in and checked the pulse of the wizard sprawled half on and half off the back seat, blood trickling from a cut on his forehead and fang marks in his throat.

  Cute, rumpled, with a helluva sexy body.

  Caspar had been entering the Milson City Hall for a meeting when he spotted this wizard run past him, brushing by and almost tumbling up the stairs in his haste. For a moment, Caspar was too stunned to move. His second-in-command had watched also, then frowned at Cas for a while. It wasn’t until a vampire slunk out of the shadows and slithered along the building and around the corner that Cas snapped out of it. He hurried into the building where he completely ignored the security and wolves there to greet and direct him to the meeting with the local Alpha, mayor, and some of the Sanchez pride.

  Instead, he followed the little cinnamon haired creature who actually smelled like cinnamon. It was enticing, and soul shaking.

  Mate.

  Mate, mate, mate, mate.

  He’d waited nearly two thousand years for a mate and then one dashed past in a panic.

  And if that didn’t beat all, his other mate had run from him yesterday, too!

  To make it even stranger, both mates just ran into each other right in front of him. Neither even noticed or scented him. The cinnamon haired one bumped into the wolf and knocked coffee over the creature’s top, apologized and kept running. The wolf stood there frowning then seemed to snap out of it and rushed after the wizard.

  And, of course, Cas bought up the rear, neither even noticing him, not even the wolf who should have scented him directly behind. Wizards were vastly different as they didn’t scent their mates, but wolves did, and his had yesterday and rushed away. Cas had followed at a distance. Once he knew where the wolf went, he left with the knowledge he could easily catch up to his mate.

  Now he realized his mates had been in the same place yesterday, all of them at the same spot. Had his wolf known? Had the wizard? He would discover.

  His attention snapped to the wizard being tossed into the back of a car and it tearing off.
As he neared, the smell of his wolf hit him hard. Alcohol. Anger. Old lust and the scent of more than one creature all over him.

  Infuriated, Cas had nearly grabbed the wolf, but then the creature just tossed his belongings aside and shifted, tearing after the car with the wizard inside, drawing Cas back to the immediate danger to his other mate.

  Now, Cas saw his mate was breathing but unconscious. He used fae healing to close the wounds on the wizard’s forehead and throat, checked for internal injuries and broken bones, found a broken wrist, healed this and the bruise and split lip on his mate’s astonishingly cute face.

  What a tremendous gift the fates had given him. Well worth the wait. A wizard, a magical creature, would understand the magic of the fae. They would enjoy this together. Plus, the beauty of the creature, the soft nature Cas could feel, was a delightful bundle.

  The wolf though was an entirely different matter.

  Cas lifted the wizard into his arms and gently carried him away from the car.

  He pointed at the wolf who was wide eyed, still in wolf form, looking torn between bolting and maybe protective of the injured wizard. Who knew? What shifter ever ran away from a mate once scented? None of it made sense.

  “Net him.” He ordered Visij, his second and best friend.

  The wolf howled and turned to run. Visij was fast, magicking a net and tossing it over the small light colored wolf who struggled and howled.

  Cars were coming fast down the road, pulling to a halt in front of them. A big wolf jumped out and glanced at the wolf in the net before stopping in front of Cas and inclining his head. Not submissively, not this creature’s style, just respecting Cas’s title and status.

  “I’ll deal with the vamps. I assure you, my brother would have been trying to assist. If he got in the way, it’s just his over enthusiasm for everything. If you can remove the net.” It wasn’t a request.

  Cas smirked. “Enforcer Drax, perhaps you could have your Alpha meet me at the house that the Sanchez pride so graciously provided for my visit to scout locations for my guild?”