by Aiden Bates
Pete frowned. Was loving a cop always like this? Or would it get better once Sierzant was behind bars?
He stayed behind Ozzy, and a little behind the door, until Ozzy answered. He didn't think that there was any cause for alarm, but he wanted to make Ozzy comfortable. When the door opened, though, he rethought his plan of coming out and greeting his guest.
"Can I help you?" Ozzy kept his gun hidden behind the door.
"Who are you?" Angus didn't have the good grace to be afraid, or even concerned. He just scoffed and tried to push his way in. "Who are you, and why are you in my brother's house? Pete? Pete!"
Ozzy blocked his way. "You're not going anywhere until you tell me who you are and what the hell you're doing here."
Pete stepped in. He didn't want Ozzy to shoot his brother, whatever they'd said to one another as children. "Ozzy, it's okay. This is my brother, Angus. Angus, this is my alpha, Ozzy."
Ozzy put his gun away while Angus looked Ozzy up and down like a piece of meat. "Well. Hot cop stuck around, I see. That's sweet, I guess. Anyway, go put on something more suitable, would you? You're late for your baby shower."
"My what?" Pete wrinkled his nose. "There's no baby shower."
Angus rolled his eyes and gave an affected sigh. "Don't be ridiculous, Pete. Of course there's a baby shower, and it's today. Come on, you don't want to keep Mother waiting."
Ozzy turned to Pete. "Who throws a baby shower and doesn't consult the person having the baby?"
Angus scoffed and stuffed his hands into his pockets. "It isn't like he had anything better to do with his time anyway. Go and get dressed, Pete. Now!"
"Hold up." Ozzy frowned. "He's not going anywhere without me. Not someplace I don't know." He glanced at Pete.
Pete met his eyes, and Pete read his mate's real intent there. Ozzy wasn't that kind of possessive, controlling alpha. Not by a long shot. He was, however, defensive of his omega. More than that, he could see that Pete's family might not be the friendliest right now. He wanted to give Pete his options, whether it was to stay at home or to go into hostile territory with backup.
A wave of adoration swept over Pete. What kind of man put himself out there like that, volunteering to suffer through a baby shower with a bunch of people who definitely didn't care for him?
"Let's go get changed," he said after a moment. "It's not how I planned to spend my Sunday, but if people want to give Marissa things, I suppose that I should be there to accept them. What about you?"
"With everything going on, I'm not comfortable having you at an insecure site full of strangers when it takes you five minutes to get up off the couch." The corners of Ozzy's mouth twitched as Angus' jaw dropped in outrage.
"Our house is perfectly secure! It's gated, for crying out loud!"
"It's also going to be full of people, any one of whom may be compromised. There's a lot going on right now, stuff that you don't necessarily know about, Anus—"
"Angus," Angus corrected, flushing red. Pete tried not to laugh.
"Angus." Ozzy kept a straight face. "But I'm not just his alpha, I'm a cop, and I'm going to keep him safe while he can't do it for himself. Good talk." He patted Angus on the shoulder, closed the door behind him, and followed Pete up the stairs.
"Don't go messing with my stuff," Pete called as they climbed, an echo back to their childhood.
"Bite me," Angus retorted, from somewhere closer to the kitchen.
Once they were upstairs, Ozzy closed the door behind them and turned to face Pete. "You get this isn't normal, right? Normal people don't decide to throw a baby shower and forget to invite the parent." He rummaged through the closet until he found one of his suits from work. More and more of his things had migrated over to Pete's house over the past few weeks, but that just made sense. He was over here more often than not.
Pete grabbed for a suit of his own. He'd gotten a couple for pregnancy, just in case he needed them. "Welcome to Clan Nolan. They honestly think I spend my days sitting around eating bon bons." He started to change. "You don't have to come if you don't want to. I know you weren't necessarily impressed with my mom the last time you met; I don't think it's going to get much better in a house full of her clones."
"Then I'm absolutely coming." He huffed out a laugh. "She thinks you're slumming it, doesn't she?"
"Well, you're not the old-money CEO she wanted me mated to, so kind of." Pete shrugged. "But you're the one I want, so I guess she'll have to get over it." He gave his alpha a quick peck on the cheek. "I'm sorry if you'll be uncomfortable there; I can't do anything about them."
"I know. And trust me. I've been through worse."
"But not for me." Pete looked away. "I mean, not for me specifically. But we'll get through it."
Ozzy grabbed for his hand. "Did you really decide to name the baby Marissa?"
Pete blushed. "Well, Osmundia sounds dumb."
Ozzy's eyes widened. "But Marissa sounds like Morris." He nodded, and then he blushed a deep red. "That's the sweetest thing anyone's ever done for me." He wrapped Pete up in his arms. "I don't suppose we can tell your brother to go screw off and maybe stay up here all day?"
Pete laughed. The temptation was certainly there, and the desire strong. How could he really say no when it was all he'd wanted all morning? "We should go," he sighed, hand lingering on Ozzy's chest. "Otherwise my mom will come here, and she won't be nearly as easy to get rid of."
Ozzy shuddered. "Not the moment when I really wanted to see her face." He chuckled and moved away, and they both got dressed.
Angus tried to force them to ride in the car he'd secured from their mother, but Ozzy was adamant. No one was driving Pete around but him, or Pete himself. Once they were ensconced in Ozzy's Jeep, he openly admitted that he'd done that just so they could make a hasty retreat if they needed to. "Every day I love you a little bit more," Pete told him.
They headed to Weston, a twenty-two minute drive that was actually very pretty if Pete didn't let himself think about where they were going. Trees were just starting to show their buds, and the forsythias had started to turn yellow. The world was coming to life again after a long winter, and it felt good. Maybe the shower wouldn't be so bad. Maybe there wouldn't be so much judgment, or blame. Maybe it would just be a nice, small get-together.
"Did you even register for anything?" Ozzy asked him as they crossed the town line into Weston.
"No." Pete leaned his head on the glass.
"I see."
"I wasn't thinking about a shower." Pete winced. "It just never occurred to me." He thumped his head against the headrest. "I'm going to get fifty-seven silver spoons and not a single diaper pail, aren't I?"
Ozzy grabbed his hand. "Sweetheart, you already have two diaper pails."
"I know." Pete waved a hand irritably. "It's the principle of the thing."
They pulled up into the circular drive in front of Pete's mother's house, followed closely by the car carrying Angus. "I feel like I'm in a fire lane," Ozzy grumbled, and tugged on his collar. "Is this really the house where you grew up?"
Oh. Crap. "Uh, yes?"
"Like, the whole thing?" Ozzy's eyes dragged across the front of the house.
"Well, yeah." Pete blushed. "I don't live there now, though."
"No. No you don't." Ozzy shook his head, as if to clear it, and then gave Pete a peck on the cheek. Angus made gagging sounds that Pete could hear through the window. "I guess we'd better go inside before your brother makes himself throw up for real." He got out of the Jeep, circled around it, and then helped Pete out of the car. Angus led the way into the house and into the Blue Parlor.
To his credit, Ozzy showed no awe at the furnishings, nor at the size of the house. He nodded at the occasional staff member who looked at him or greeted Pete and stayed by Pete's side. When they got into the Blue Parlor, he offered Pete his arm and met Cynthia's eyes squarely.
Pete's mother rose from her chair near a marble-topped side table. She wore a pale blue pantsuit with a hat set at
a jaunty angle. "Peter," she said, striding forward to give him a cool hug and air kisses. "Glad you could make it to your own shower."
Pete just smiled and shook his head. "If I'd known in advance, I might have been a little better prepared. I might have even had a registry."
"Hah!" She turned to look at the two women with whom she'd been conversing. "A registry. As if we've ever used such a thing. Please. You remember Laura Sienkiewicz, of course, and Agnes Legrand."
Pete smiled at them. "Of course. How could I forget? Ozzy, these are dear friends of my mothers. She knows them from her work with the horse sanctuary up the road. Laura, Agnes, this is my alpha, Ozzy."
Cynthia wrinkled her nose, just a little. Pete probably wouldn't have noticed if he hadn't been looking.
"Charmed." Ozzy shook hands and shot Pete a look of confusion.
People started to trickle in, and hired catering staff circulated with hors d'oeuvres and mocktails for all. Everything, from the drinks down to the last crumb of food, was pink. For a moment, Pete almost regretted having told his mother that he was having a girl.
Then Ozzy touched his arm, and he got over it. The food, while pink, was exquisite. He enjoyed his strawberry smoothie so much he had another one. His mother had enough good sense not to have tried to force party games onto everyone, but then again that wasn't really Cynthia's style anyway.
None of the guests were people that Pete was all that close with. He knew some of them. Most of them were unknown, friends of his mother’s through one organization or another. The shower was less a celebration of Marissa's impending arrival than an excuse for Cynthia to throw a themed party for all of her friends, and the knowledge stung just a little bit.
Pete tried not to take it personally. After all, Cynthia was Cynthia, and he wasn't about to change her at this late date. At least he and Ozzy got some free fancy food out of it, and he got a picture of the adorable cake with the mouse topper to show Marissa when she was old enough to be interested in that sort of thing.
Some of the guests were people that he knew, of course. His aunts on both sides put in an appearance, although Pete wished they'd stayed home and polished their hair or whatever they did. One of them, Pete's father's Aunt Isabella, made a point of approaching Ozzy. "So. Cynthia tells me that you're supposed to be Peter's new alpha, hm?"
"That's the plan." Ozzy gave her a polite little smile, and Pete knew that this encounter was only going to go downhill.
"Hm. And you're a policeman."
"Yep. Detective, to be precise about it. Also a retired captain in the United States Army. And you are?" Ozzy kept that polite smile on his face.
"My ancestors were on the Mayflower." Isabella drew herself up to her full height, all four foot ten of her. "Which means that his ancestors were on the Mayflower. He could have had the son of a President!"
"Oh, Isabella." Cynthia sailed over before Isabella could cause a scene. "Are you on about that again? Dear me, that's so fourteen years ago. His father would never have allowed that; the age difference was too great. I may not be thrilled about the whole pregnancy outside of a claim aspect of things, but I'm quite content that he didn't wind up with that dried up old pervert anyway." She waved a hand. "Things happen for a reason, dear."
Isabella narrowed her eyes at Cynthia. She couldn't attack Cynthia on pedigree; Pete knew that his mother could claim descent from Queen Victoria. "Be that as it may," the older woman drawled, "I find it difficult to believe that you, of all people, would ever accept a policeman into the family."
"My dear, if he takes care of my son and my granddaughter I don't care if he's a detective, a garbage man, or a stripper." Cynthia sipped at her drink. "I certainly wanted him to choose from a family that we knew when he was younger, but he decided to go his own way. Tearing our hair out because he didn't elope with a man old enough to be his father seems a little counterproductive, doesn't it?"
"Hmph!" Isabella went storming off, and Pete picked his jaw up off the floor.
"Thanks, Mom," he said, staring after his aunt.
She grimaced. "The old bat had it coming. She's trying to fix Angus up with a woman who's my age."
Pete winced. "Well, if it's love…"
"She's a lesbian, Peter. Isabella's a busybody." Her eyes snapped over to Ozzy, whose eyes had gone a little wild. "Look, it's not going to get any better than that for a lot of people. Some people can't let go of their prejudices, I'm afraid."
Ozzy straightened up. "I don't care about that. I care about Pete, and about Marissa."
The vaguest of smiles crossed Cynthia's features, and she patted Pete's arm. "There now." And she walked back to the gathering.
...
Ozzy wasn't entirely sure how to feel about the events of Pete's baby shower. He knew that Cynthia didn't like or care for him, and had known it since they'd met. To have her spring to his defense like that seemed just a little bit like flipping a switch. He couldn't help but suspect that it had less to do with himself, or with Pete, and a lot more to do with scoring points against the old bat who thought they were still living in the 1920s.
He'd known that Pete came from money, too. At least he'd known it intellectually, although it was hard to reconcile that vague, theoretical knowledge with the reality of a guy who worked hard, lived frugally, and dressed in cheap and sensible clothes most of the time. What could Ozzy possibly offer Pete?
Pete was more than happy to reassure him of his place in Pete's life. "You offer me you. You protect me. You make me smile, and you make me feel more complete than anyone ever has before. If I wanted that kind of life, or even that kind of house, I'd have it. I chose to live here, like this, long before I met you, my love. Believe me, I'm not about to start pushing you to bring me home a Benz."
They had a good laugh together over some of the gifts that Pete's mother's friends had given Pete and Marissa. Some of them were very thoughtful, like the diaper bag that looked like a laptop bag and wasn't covered in flowers or other "mommy" crap. Others were the more typical clothing sets, some more practical than others. In the privacy of Pete's house, they could share a chuckle about how people who bought dry-clean clothes for babies had probably never had to do laundry, or manage their own baby, in their lives.
Some of the gifts were generous, if not particularly of interest to an infant. Some guests had given the baby various financial products, like shares in exchange traded funds or long-term bonds. The sums involved weren't inconsiderable—Isabella the Old Bat had put ten grand into bonds for Marissa—and Ozzy figured that she would appreciate them someday. Of course, that day was far away, but whatever.
The spoons, though, those were bizarre. "Is the silver even safe for her?" he asked Pete, as they looked down at the array of silver spoons that had been given to Pete's baby girl. "I mean, what exactly is she supposed to do with them? Has the metal been mixed with something dangerous, like lead? I don't know."
Pete grinned at him. "We'll just put these aside. I guess if we find that Sudbury is being menaced by werewolves we'll know exactly how to handle it, right?"
The jewelry, too, struck Ozzy as distinctly odd. A baby didn't need a string of pearls, damn it. He supposed that it was a very nice, high-quality string of pearls, insofar as he knew about such things, but a baby would just chew on it and probably wreck it. Those had both men shaking their heads, but they just agreed to put the jewelry into a safe deposit box once it had been put onto the insurance and moved on.
All that laughter would have to carry Ozzy well into the new week at work. He arrived on Monday morning to find himself summonsed to a meeting with Lt. Devlin. When he got to the meeting he found himself at a table not only with his own supervisor, but with Ed Amos from Internal Affairs and with a tall, thin, fairly butch-looking woman in a dark red pantsuit.
"Detective Morris." Lt. Devlin showed him to a seat near his right hand. "Have a donut. You remember Lt. Amos, of course. I want you to meet Lt. Eliza Ryley, from Worcester PD's Internal Affairs department."
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Ozzy shook Lt. Ryley's hand before sitting down and helping himself to a donut. "Worcester Internal Affairs. I see."
"When you noticed the pattern about questionable finances with some former state troopers, I did a little digging." Amos squirmed. "And some of those former troopers wound up transferring over to Worcester PD before they retired. I gave Lt. Ryley a call, and we had a little chat."
"Then I did some digging." Ryley made a face. "It's not good."
Ozzy paused with the donut halfway to his mouth. "To be honest, it was Nenci who pointed out the money. I just noticed that everyone who was associated with the deceased was no longer on the force."
"Well, it's your case. You're still the one who noticed something was wrong." Devlin grinned. "The thing is, because you noticed that, because you picked up on the pattern, the case has blossomed beyond a cold case murder of one man and moved into a large scale investigation of corruption of two law enforcement agencies. I don't have to tell you what that means."