Protective: Legatum - Book 1

by Sylvian, LuLu M

  *

  A sharp knock rapped on the door. Morgan stepped out of the bath room, shaving cream slathered over half of his face, and a thick fluffy white towel wrapped low around his hips. His visitor had to be his sister since his morning meal service tray sat on the table.

  “Good morning, Morgan,” Julia said sharply as she brushed past him into the room. A suit bag hung from one finger and a pair of shoes dangled in the other hand. She wore a black pant suit and had swept back her dark brown hair into a low ponytail. Several thick gold chains draped around her neck and hung in front below the pointed collar of her red blouse.

  He closed the door behind her. “You know you could have had a valet bring those up.”

  “Nice to see you too, brother.” She laid the suit bag across the bottom of his rumpled bed. Morgan returned to the bathroom. “I see your hair is growing back. Please tell me you are shaving that mange off your face.” she said with an I-told-you-so tone to her voice.

  Morgan growled a low rumble of disagreement in his chest. “It’s too early for you to be this bossy, Julia.” He leaned out from the bathroom to glare at her, “You still going to make me wait until we are in Aventine’s office to tell me what this is about?”

  “Hmm-mmm. And I’m not bossy. It’s called leadership skills and effective decision making. You don’t want to appear all scruffy when you meet Aventine since he will be wearing some custom tailored suit and not that off the rack special.” Julia picked up a piece of untouched toast and slathered jam across the top. “Honestly, Roman didn’t tell me much. Only that this is mutually beneficial and historically important.”

  “Roman? You’re on first name basis now?” He picked up the suit bag, removed slacks and a shirt and returned to the bathroom.

  “Shut up, Morgan. You’re in a foul mood.”

  Morgan emerged from the bathroom in dress slacks and a crisp, pale blue shirt. He reached back into the suit bag to retrieve a pair of socks and a red tie. He sat, put the socks and shoes on, then began knotting the tie. “Yes, I am. I had to ride up here late, in the rain, on my Harley, and I still don’t know why. You’re telling me what to do. I’m pretty sure I recently met the mother of my children, and I’m fairly certain I completely blew it like some thirteen-year-old dweeb who doesn’t know how to talk to girls.” He shrugged into the suit jacket. “Are you done eating my breakfast?”

  “It was only the toast. You never eat your toast, Morgan. Did you just call yourself a dweeb?”

  “A thirteen-year-old dweeb. There is a difference. This had better be worth my time. I really should be in Monterey trying to figure out how to make it up to Honey.”

  Morgan followed Julia out of his room and down to the lobby.

  “Her name is Honey?” Julia paused. “You’re serious? Mother of your children? The whole mate thing?”

  They were met by Julia’s driver outside the door.

  “Yes,” Morgan grumbled getting into the car. “The whole mate thing. You think you’re merely flirting, then BAM, you realize this is the one. Felt like a frying pan to the back of the skull. It really threw me off last night. I was less than impressive.”

  “I don’t want to hear about your sex life, brother.”

  “You’re not, and there isn’t going to be one if I blow this.” Morgan watched the city slide by through the car window.

  “Your mate? I always thought that was a bunch of hokum our parents fed us. You know, wait for your true love. You don’t need to date around, you’ll know, you’ll profoundly know.”

  “Julia, they were so right. I wish I could tell Mom how right she was. She’d really like Honey. You and Caro will. JoJo will adore her.” He was sure his sisters would be as impressed with Honey as he was.

  “Well, you can make things up with her after the meeting then bring her up for JoJo’s wedding.”

  Morgan shook his head, recalling the evening before. “If she’s still speaking to me.”

  “That bad?” Julia tilted her head to the side.

  “Worse.”

  *

  Roman Aventine stood behind his desk when Morgan and Julia entered his office He wore a gray pin-striped suit that skimmed his slender frame. As tall as Morgan, Aventine was of a much thinner build so he appeared to not be as large. He wore his pale blond hair short, clipped close on the sides. His blue eyes were enhanced by the royal blue tie he wore.

  He stepped out and offered Morgan his large hand. “Palatine.” Morgan shook it. Roman nodded to Julia “Julia.” Roman’s gaze noticeably lingered on her face, and his tongue lingered on her name.

  “That’s Ms. Palatine, Mr. Aventine,” she smirked as he took her hand and stepped in a little closer than professionally necessary.

  “Roman, please,” he corrected her.

  “Look at this,” Roman slid a stack of papers across his desk to Morgan.

  Morgan flipped through the stack, shaking his head. “I’m looking at what? This looks like genetic code. G-A, C-A, T-A.”

  “Exactly. It’s a DNA report from a genealogy lab.”

  “So?”

  “On the second page, the fifth group of gene data.” Roman picked up a second set of test papers, flipping to the area of data indicated. “See here.” He pointed between the two groups. “The report you hold belongs to one of my cousins. This report—” he tapped the second document, “—was included at random to be a control, basically. Do you see here? This gene pair on my cousin’s report isn’t recorded on the control report.”

  Roman walked across his office to close the door. He returned to his desk and tapped out commands on a keypad. A soft swishing sound could be heard as sound proofing baffles slid into place, the windows dimmed. “My cousin is full wolf. The control is full human. When this was first brought to my attention, she had already run tests on random family members, those who turn and those who don’t.”

  Roman added more reports to the pile on his desk and pointed to different pages.

  “Look, I don’t have all the scientific terms, but this is how it was explained to me.” He tapped a specific sequence. “This is a full genetic marker, indicating whether the subject is one of us—wolf. When a person has a full gene set, the person turns. When a person doesn’t have a full marker, they don’t turn. Now this one is interesting,” he opened another report and indicated the area where the gene showed on previous reports. There was no mutant gene pair present. “This is my second cousin or something. Neither of his parents was capable of turning. He can’t either. I’m betting that none of his children will have the gene since he doesn’t. We’re still waiting on their results. But get this, his brother has the gene, but the indicator is only for one of them, not for a full pair. He can’t turn but will be able to pass the gene along to his offspring who might be able to if they inherit a full pair.”

  “Do you know what this means?” Julia asked breathlessly.

  “We can be traced.” Morgan’s voice was calm.

  “It means we need to start buying into genetics labs and getting people into position in them. How did you come by this, Roman?”

  “One of the family works for a lab, ran her own DNA test. Came to me as soon as she figured out what was going on. Right now we are in a position to leverage this to our advantage. Our gene signature is going to start showing up as an anomaly as more and more people start using DNA for their genealogy hunts.”

  “We need to be part of the lab that all anomalies are sent to. How do we do that?” Morgan said.

  “Leave that up to me,” Julia jumped in. “We need to buy out a genetics company, become someone who is already leading in this area.” She bit her lip calculating. “Aventine, I know you aren’t in a position to take on something like that on your own.”

  Roman raised his eyebrows at her. Julia was on top of business knowledge for her company and her competition.

  “I’m going to confess neither are we,” she said. “Guys, you’re both going to have to agree to a joint venture or it’s not going
to happen. I doubt we will be able to do this amicably, so we have to provide a united front and stage a hostile takeover of a genetics company.” She began typing frantically on her tablet, her fingers flying to keep up with her brain. “Need to either stage a coup with the board of directors and supersede them or get them on board fast. Roman, your people are going to need to get moving on this as well if they already haven’t started.”

  “We’ve started. Aventine Industries is in process of buying out the lab facility in Emeryville where our scientist is. I actually want to head over there this morning, and she can explain the situation better and maybe show us how we can tap into their network of other labs. We already have the one geneticist in our ranks. What both families need to do is find out who else is a geneticist and get them into some of these jobs ASAP. And we need to start making sure all data showing anomalies with that gene signature comes to us.”

  “My understanding is with the simple genealogy tests, they don’t have enough information to find out what this mutation does. We are currently ahead of the game in that we have identified it as ours. As long as we trace that gene, and every instance of it that comes through, we can still control the knowledge about our kind.”

  Morgan glanced up from the report he stared at, “We no longer need to go on hearsay regarding other families. As long as people are voluntarily sending in for these tests, we can find who we have lost track of.”

  “Great. You two go visit that lab and start strategizing on how we become a clearinghouse for that piece of information. I have to go back to my office and get started on whats needed. I have to do some research, find who we can partner with, buyout or take over. Roman, who in your camp is going to be my contact regarding this venture?”

  Roman smirked. “Sorry, Julia looks like you are going to be stuck with me since I’m the one who takes care of mergers and acquisitions. We’re going to be spending a lot of time together.”

  Julia rolled her eyes. “Fine, I’m scheduling us for something early next week. I’ll see you two later.” She picked up her purse and headed out the door.

  Roman paused admiring the view as she left. He pressed a button on his desk phone. “Have the car pulled around. Let Jeeves know we are headed to SeaQuence Labs.”

  “Your driver’s name is Jeeves?”

  “Hell, I don’t know their names. I call them all Jeeves.” Roman collected the reports from his desk and stuffed them back into a folder.

  9

  The car was large, but not large enough as far as Morgan was concerned. Two tall men, both dominant in an enclosed space, was never a good idea, especially since Morgan wasn’t sure about Aventine’s commitment to playing nice.

  A few months previously, Julia had come to Morgan with a plan to strengthen the family. Her concept was that if the Palatines could play nice with the Aventines then they could stop wasting a lot of needless energy on grudge matches, even if those grudges went back thousands of years. Turns out she had been approached by Roman’s mother. Whoever originated the idea, it was a good one.

  Morgan began losing sleep and business when the Aventine family moved into the neighborhood and set up shop. The Palatines had held onto the northern California foundations market for years, decades even. Their diversified interests in construction, wine, and renewable energy had made them a very wealthy family. Julia’s business acumen made sure they stayed one.

  The Aventines, a very similar family, had been located and focused in New England for over a century. Their move to a San Francisco base of operations could be clearly interpreted as a hostile maneuver, especially since they were actively cutting into Morgan’s Seven Hills construction business.

  The move was driven by the alpha’s wife, who currently received medical treatments at Stanford Cancer Institute. Blackston Aventine was not ready to release control over the family or the business; however, he had been willing to negotiate a peace with the Palatines, since his focus was now on his wife and her health. He didn’t want the hassle of petty rival arguments between the two families which could be disastrous, both financially and physically.

  Roman Aventine was not his family’s alpha. His father was. Even if his father decreed a peace with the Palatines, it didn’t mean Roman would necessarily follow suit. But he had been active in the accord meetings, and he was the one to set up this morning’s meeting. He had been the one to share the information regarding the DNA find.

  Aventine had introduced the venture, that clearly indicated he was willing to play nice. If Morgan faced facts, he was uncomfortable because he sat in a car headed towards the East Bay and not back to Honey in Monterey.

  He combed his fingers through his hair. He was a grown-ass man, and he had messed up his date with Honey as if he had never been on one before. He shook his head. Honey was so beautiful he couldn’t think straight. Morgan sighed. Loudly.

  “You seem distracted a bit, Palatine. Not getting car sick, are you?” Aventine’s voice cut with sarcasm. Morgan had no plans on sharing his personal defeat with this man. He quickly brought the conversation back to business and concerns with the newly discovered genetic evidence. “No, just lots to think about. This DNA evidence—it means we have to be even more careful.”

  “It’s why I brought you in first. I thought if we can get some kind of containment on the information, then when we start to let other families know, we actually have solid information plus actionable solutions. Right now, if I start alerting other groups to the ability to identify wolf shifters by DNA, we’re going to have a lot of panic. Unnecessary panic,” the blond man explained with cool demeanor.

  “Have you begun analyzing the international implications?”

  “That’s exactly why I wanted to bring your sister in on this. Her business mind is ten steps ahead of the competition. I’m brilliant, but she’s better.”

  Morgan slid his gaze sidelong to glance at Roman Aventine. Not in so many words, but Roman had revealed a weakness for Julia. It could be purely appreciation of her professional skills, but Morgan didn’t think so. Not after what he witnessed back in Aventine’s office. He shook his head, jogging his thoughts back into position.

  “So our businesses partner up, make a game plan for the information. Then what? Sell it to the highest bidder? Keep some families in the dark?”

  “Not at all. This gets shared freely with all parties concerned. Otherwise, we end up on the front page of every newspaper in the country—and not just the National Inquisitor. Know what I mean?”

  Morgan nodded. This was good. Aventine showed concern for the greater good of their kind and not the greater good of his wallet.

  The car maneuvered into an office park and stopped in front of a long low building of white stucco and blue glass. The sign out front indicated they had arrived at SeaQuence.

  Roman took long confident strides as he approached the reception desk. The young woman behind the tall desk stammered over his name, clearly impressed by his clean-cut good looks, and continuously glanced at him through her lowered lashes.

  A woman in a white lab coat approached them. “Roman Aventine, nice to see you again.” They shook then Aventine introduced her to Morgan.

  “Doctor Stacey Barnes, this is Morgan Palatine.”

  She paused slightly in recognition. Morgan’s position in his family was well known among the Aventine family.

  “Mr. Palatine, a pleasure.” Dr. Barnes turned and headed back through the double doors she had previously emerged from. “If you gentlemen will follow me.”

  The two men followed her through several corridors of white walls. She led them into a large open area filled with laboratory benches. They passed a bank of equipment along one wall. Lights flashed and containers spun. On the far side of the room, she opened a glass door and held out her hand indicating they should enter.

  “Please sit.” She motioned towards two chairs facing a desk. The men each took a seat.

  “Stacey, could you please review the information with Mr. Palatine t
hat you shared with me the other day?” Aventine asked.

  She nodded then began pulling out stacks of paper similar to those Aventine had shown Morgan and Julia in his office.

  “We’re learning more and more about human DNA every year. Keep in mind twenty years ago we didn’t have half the DNA information we had ten years ago. So all this is new. To everyone. I’m sorry if I’m repeating anything you already know. At SeaQuence, we run genetic sequencing and identification. We are one of the labs that courts use in paternity testing cases, and we do DNA identification for crime labs. We also run some of the tests that those genealogy places now offer, the ones that help you identify your ethnic heritage.” She carefully looked from one man to the next. “That’s how I found the marker for wolf.”

  “Okay.” She spread several sheets of paper on her desk. Alphanumeric codes covered the page. Some of the codes were outlined in green, others yellow, others blue. One set of codes had a bright orange starburst clearly drawn around them with a highlighter. “I ran my DNA through the system. Might as well get a heads-up on any inclinations towards heart disease and the like. But this showed up unexpectedly.” She tapped the starburst of orange. “This page shows my ethnic breakdown. This is what it looks like before it’s evaluated and translated for the average Joe to understand. This group shows Nordic ancestry,” she circled a cluster of codes with her finger. “This group is the Mediterranean-Aegean ancestry. Nothing unexpected.” She circled the cluster of codes around the highlighted mark again. “At first I thought this was junk code—DNA with markers but no actual genes or DNA that codes for a gene or genes with no know function. All DNA has some, so it’s nothing actually unusual. I was reviewing some other reports, and I noticed their junk DNA looked different. The sequences in this region were unique to me. I wanted to find out if it was me individually or me as wolf.” She nodded looking back up at the men. “Make sense?”

  Morgan leaned in, focused on her information. Mostly a repeat of what Aventine had said, but hearing it a second time, the information started to take a more comprehensible shape.