by Jessie Lane
Frustrated, Elena threw her hands up in the air. “How many times do we have to have this talk? Huh?! How many times do I have to tell you that it is NOT okay for you to be walking around, broadcasting people’s sex lives in public?”
Chloe used her hand to flip her hair over her shoulder, as if bored. “I don’t know why you’re so worked up over it Elena, really. If he’s going to give his secretary the business, he should expect people to comment on it.”
Losing her temper, Elena pointed a finger in her sister’s face. “No, he shouldn’t have to be subjected to your crazy ass-“
A masculine throat cleared, bringing their attention back to the lawyer. He was watching them with a pleased smile on his face. What was that about? “If you ladies could please hold off the finger pointing, name calling, and inevitably the hair pulling, nipple twisting and slap fight sure to ensue, perhaps we could move on here?”
Huh. How did he know that in ten minutes or so Chloe would be trying to pull her hair out by its roots while she in turn tried to twist Chloe’s nipples clean off while Delta watched us in amused resignation? That grin of his was still in place and Elena wondered for a moment what he saw when he looked at the three of them.
Three half-sisters. Two of them blessed with their mother’s Greek olive skin complexion, and Delta the odd ball out with her much paler skin tone. All three sisters with almost identical facial features, straight pert small noses, high cheekbones and lush lips. But there was where similarities ended. Delta’s hair color was a rich auburn complimented by her stunning moss green eyes.
Chloe stood out with her long curly golden brown hair, natural subtle honey blond highlights, and a length that reached to almost the middle of her back. Warm brown eyes that had been compared numerous times to chocolate. The body of a 1950’s pin up model. Every man’s sensual fantasy in the flesh. Almost the spitting image of their mother.
Sticking out like the sore thumb that she was, Elena’s own hair was stick straight, reached to the midway point between her shoulder blades and consisted of a deep shiny black color. Her eyes were often described as blue green or turquoise. People didn’t notice Elena for her non-existent busty chest, or the pin-up girl body she wished she had. No, if she garnered any attention at all, it was because of her eyes. Not that she was vain, because hell would freeze over before she ever acted like Chloe, but even she admitted to herself every now and then that she had killer eyes.
Since Mom hadn’t believed in long term monogamous relationships, all three sisters all had different fathers. None of them knew who they were. The only things they did know about them would be from the differences in their appearances from their mother and each other. The variety of their looks often threw people for a loop when they saw all three of them together. Enough features in common to make it obvious that they were related, but also enough differences to keep folks guessing as to how they were related.
Mr. Wroth sat back down behind his desk to shuffle a few papers around before looking back to the women. “Ladies, please have a seat.” The three black leather chairs were situated in front of his cherry desk. Taking a quick glance around the room, Elena noticed that it was decorated in calming tones of beige, blue with hints of silver accents in small details like the shelving on the walls. Common sense told her that Wroth had either let a woman decorate his office for him or hired a decorator. ‘Cause she had yet to meet a man who knew how to match colors, let alone decorate a room this comfortable. The scheme sent out a serene vibe that would more than likely be the total opposite of the heightened sense of panic, grief or anger that his clients probably felt.
Wroth’s voice brought her attention back to him. “Your mother’s will was somewhat odd, but very concise. It is to be read in two parts. We’re reading the first part today.” Picking up a packet of papers off the desk in front of him he intoned in the contents with a serious voice. Elena had a full attack of ADD two minutes into his legally worded spiel and couldn’t take it anymore.
Interrupting him, she said “Mr. Wroth, I know you’re supposed to do all this by the books, but could you please take some pity of my short attention span and spit it out already?”
The poor man looked somewhere between baffled and amused. “You want me to spit it out?”
“Yes! For the love of God get to the damn point already. Before I die of old age.” Elena huffed.
The lawyer laid the papers back on his desk and leaned back in his chair. And Elena was starting to wish she could slap that damn grin he was still wearing right off his face. “Your mother’s will basically states that she is leaving an inheritance of a substantial amount to be split between the three of you. As well as the information on who your biological father’s identities are in case any of you were so inclined to look into those familial relations. However, you will not receive the money nor the names until you spend a consecutive ninety days living and working with your extended family.”
Confused looks were traded between the three sisters. Leaning forward in her chair, Elena asked, “Extended family?”
Appearing now uncomfortable, Wroth cleared his throat again, “Yes. Extended family. Your mother has two sisters who live here in Wilmington. They’re already here waiting to meet you. Hold on one second please.” Mr. Wroth pressed a button on his phone.
“Clare, will you please escort Indigo and Thea in.”
That annoying, fake breathy voice answered, “Right away Mr. Wroth.”
A moment later as the soft click of the door knob turned and Mr. Wroth stood as two gorgeous women in their late forties strolled in. Elena had to stifle the gasp that threatened to escape. The resemblance between the two women and her late mother Aggie were uncanny.
Waving his hand towards the first woman Mr. Wroth spoke. “This is Indigo Demos, your mother’s younger sister by two years.” While the small wrinkles around her eyes and mouth indicated that she was at least slightly stressed, she gave a friendly - almost teasing - wave towards Elena and her sisters.
Indigo had shining brown hair that was contained in two braids that reached halfway down her back. That would have been okay if there hadn’t been a multitude of flowers woven in and out of those braids. She was dressed in loose, distressed dark blue jeans slung low on her slender hips, and being held up by what looked like a white braided hemp belt. Her aunt’s orange and white tie dye tank top was so bright it practically blinded you, and she was wearing Birkenstocks on her feet.
Apparently Elena was related to a frickin’ hippie.
Elena felt the familiar muscles under her eye start to twitch. She was only seconds away from complete loss of any good manners because it was taking every ounce of will power she owned not to start actively searching the woman for the peace sign tattoo Elena was sure the woman had somewhere on her willowy body.
If her aunt started singing Crosby, Stills, Nash and Young, Elena was so out of there.
Mr. Wroth’s voice broke into Elena’s inner musings about setting fire to that tie dye tank top the moment the woman took it off.
“And this is your mother’s older sister Thea. Thea and Indigo, these are Agatha’s daughters Chloe, Elena and Delta.”
Elena turned her attention to the other aunt. Thea Demos looked to be the polar opposite of her sister Indigo. She stood facing them with her legs braced, her arms crossed over her chest and a grey short sleeve t-shirt that reveled rather toned arms. If she decided to punch someone, Elena knew it would hurt like hell. And she totally respected that.
Delta leaned over and whispered by her ear. “It could be you in twenty years Elena. It’s like an older mirror image.”
Elena had to admit her sister was right. They both sported healthy tomboyish figures, and the same general aura of bad attitude. She’d been told many times in her Army career that the world simply could not handle two of her. It looked like those individuals who made that statement had been wrong. She’d also been told once that anyone harboring a personality even remotely like her own would eithe
r love her or hate her. So, either Elena and her new Aunt Thea were going to get along like gangbusters, or they were going to strangle each other in the very near future. Of course, all inner debates about how she would get along with her Aunt Thea ended when Elena caught the lawyer staring at her Aunt Thea’s ass.
She felt Chloe lean into her side again. “He’s doin’ her too.”
Could somebody just fuckin’ shoot her now?
CHAPTER-FIVE
November 2013 – Wilmington, North Carolina
Elena
“Three sisters walk into a wolf owned bar-“
“Again with the jokes Chloe?” Elena shot a dirty look at Delta who was giggling at Chloe’s antics. “Okay, it’s time for the rules.”
Chloe mocked. “Again with the rules?”
“Yessss.” Elena hissed back at her. “Because without rules my airheaded oldest sister tells vampires bad jokes, which nearly gets the life sucked out of us! If Aunt Thea hadn’t been there with her freakin’ piece of maple 2 x 4, you probably wouldn’t be here now! And because of that, the vampire refuses to be an informant for her anymore.” Elena turned her glare to Delta who was still giggling. “And without rules Delta walks around to any Other she meets and asks them inappropriate questions all in the name of ‘research’.”
Delta stopped giggling to sputter a defense. “I just wanted to know! It’s not like I can go check out a book at the library to learn more about them!”
“God, it’s a miracle nobody’s managed to kill you two yet.” Elena ran her hand through her hair in frustration. “No jokes. No questions. This one is important for me and you know that. Don’t fuck it up.”
“Are you ready to talk about it Elena?” Delta spoke the question softly with compassion. Which just pissed her off, because now she was going to have to tell her sisters about him. Originally, she had no intention of ever telling either of them of her humiliating experience with the very person they were about to confront. That had been shot to hell though after their aunts had given them the info for this case and asked them to start the investigation while being monitored. This was the first step towards proving that they had what it took to start working on their own for the family run private investigative business. Elena loved working with her Aunts, so she refused to let either of her sisters fuck this up for them.
Glancing at the door to the bar, half of Elena was been downright gleeful at the idea of walking in there and making Gage Ivanov's life a living hell in any way she possibly could. If that meant harassing him about his sister, so be it. The other half of Elena wanted to run as far away as fast as possible from the man who had absolutely shattered her into a million pieces. Almost two years later and she was still trying to metaphorically super glue herself back together.
Aunt Thea finally got out of the SUV and joined their huddle behind the vehicle. Taking a deep breath, she tried to get her shit together. It was time to get this over with. Running a hand through her hair, she forced herself to calm down so she wouldn’t snap at Delta. It wasn’t her fault that Elena had to go confront the douchebag from her past. “I’m good. Don’t worry about me. All I’m asking for is that you two not start shit while we’re in here. I want to go in, do what we got to do, and then get the fuck out of here. Okay?”
Chloe was unusually silent as she nodded her head and started walking after Aunt Thea towards the bar. Elena and Delta followed close behind them, through the front door and up to the long stretch of bar along the right wall. The four of them settled on bar stools and Chloe crooked her finger at the bartender who was watching them with interest.
Leaving Chloe to ask after Ivanov, she made a quick visual scan of their surroundings. There was a couple of guys towards the back playing pool. No way to tell if they were demon, vampire or shifter unless they did something supernaturally freaky. On the opposite side of the bar several men and women had pushed a bunch of the smaller tables together so that they could all sit at one long table together. Elena was guessing from watching them talk and lounge all over each other that they were probably shifters. It was something about the way they interacted with each other that gave them an impression of being a solidified group. Since she was sitting in a wolf shifter owned bar, Elena was guessing that they were probably part of a pack of wolves.
She heard Chloe murmuring to the bartender beside her, and a following sound of beer bottles thudding on the bar top, but Elena kept her eyes on the rest of the bar. She didn’t like the idea of anything sneaking up on her. And that’s where her attention would have stayed to if it hadn’t been for the sudden sound of a door slamming against the wall. She turned herself back around to face the bar when she saw him storming towards her.
Her breath caught in her throat as she took him in. His face was twisted in a mask of rage and he was so pissed off that he was literally stomping in her direction. After almost two years she’d hoped something horrible had happened to him. Something that would have disfigured him hideously so that he still didn’t have the ability to make her heartbeat skip. Luck wasn’t on her side since he was still as drop dead gorgeous as he had been the last time she had seen him. Damn but it seemed as if fate must really fucking hate her. She pushed her pain down and flipped that internal switch that turned her into an unfeeling bitch. Being numb on the inside was better than trying to sort through the barrage of emotions that were trying to overwhelm her.
Elena picked up her beer bottle and takes a few fortifying gulps. As Gage stopped in front of her she felt her sisters tense up on either side of her. Ever at the ready to jump in and fight her battles if they felt it was necessary.
He snarls at her. “What the fuck are you doing here, Sergeant Demos?”
Elena set her bottled beer back on the bar and decided not to let his anger at her appearance bother her. Pasting a smile on her face that she didn’t really feel, Elena leaned forward and rested her elbows on the bar. “I take it that you haven’t heard, Master Sergeant Ivanov. I’m out. As for the reason as to why I’m here in this bar, though, well that’s easy, I was looking for you.”
A man saunters up to the end of the bar, and Elena immediately knows who he is. Alec, Gage’s brother. The man who was on the other end of that phone listening to Gage tell him how Elena was just a piece of ass. How she would never be good enough for something more permanent with him. Alec looks just like the man who was once the love of her life, except he’s the light to Gage’s darkness. His hair is white and in a mohawk, his eyes are a weird arctic blue, his arms are covered in tattoos and there’s a smug panty dropping smile plastered to his face. While Gage is glowering at her, his brother Alec is eye-fucking Chloe. If she weren’t so concentrated on not showing the asshole in front of her how much he broke her heart, she’d laugh at the differences between the brothers.
Gage loudly snaps, “Why would you be looking for me, you little harpy?”
Elena refuses to let his animosity affect her. She widens her grin widens because she knows it’ll bother him. “I’m here to ask you about your sister, Ivanov. Seen Lulu lately?”
Gage leans across the bar to get in her face. “Why are you looking for Lulu?”
Reaching into her back pocket, Elena pulls out her new business card and pushes it across the top of the bar so that it’s right in front of Gage. “I got drafted into the family business recently, so I’m just here doing my job.”
Gage shoots her a disgruntled look, and then drops his gaze to the card. Wiping his face to display the best blank look Elena’s ever seen on him, she watches as he brings his attention from the card back to her and says, “That’s not possible. You can’t work for AI. That would mean you’re-“
Oh this is the good part. This is where she gets to rub it in his face that she’s so much more than that hot piece of ass he’d labeled her as in that phone call to his brother years before. And by that bead of sweat that just rolled down the side of his neck, Elena knows that Gage is already well on his way to putting together the truth. “That’s rig
ht, Ivanov. Amazon International would mean that I come from a line of Amazons, wouldn’t it?” she asks in a sickly patronizing voice as if she’s talking to an exceptionally small child.
Elena sees Gage’s fingertips turn white as he grips the bar top. The only other outward side besides that small drop of sweat that lets her know he isn’t as unaffected as he’s pretending to be. So she goes in for the kill because she’s more than ready to make her point, rattle him up, and then get the hell out of here. “And I’m here with my sisters to investigate your sister, Lulu, for the charge of murder.”
When Gage lets a fierce snarl out, she considers it a total win that she didn’t pee her pants in fear.
Gage
Was this a fucking joke? At the moment he’d give his left nut for someone to jump out from some hidden spot and yell at him that he’d been punked. So of course, it was just his luck that it didn’t happen. No, reality was sinking in fast.
The only woman he’d ever almost given in to the urge to take as a mate was sitting in front of him, pretending to be calm and collected as she informed him that she was descended from a long line of Amazons. This species of human was genetically superior to those around them. As a result, while they still lived an average human life span, everything else in them was wired for survival. They were literally born and bred with unique traits that made them the ultimate fighters. Every single one of them had been endowed with either a unique understanding for strategizing, an uncanny ability with fighting and the use of weapons, or extreme intelligence. It was Mother Nature’s way of taking the next step in human evolution.
Elena fell nicely in that middle category. Why in the hell hadn’t he seen it before? Granted, most women were already better shooters than your standard human male, but Elena’s skills with weapons had always been exemplary. Gage had gone and observed her at the range as often as he could because it was his proverbial catnip. Watching Elena as she went through the expert level drills, easily taking out targets with that big ass .45 of hers, was cause for an instant hard on. He’d fuck her for hours after that. How had he been so blind as to miss all of those signs?