by Honor James
“Thank you,” Maya said with a grin and leaned in to kiss him again. “I love you, too, Quincy.” She then spoke into the comms. “And next time, boys, cut him some slack. Keep in mind that he’s having to deal with an overly hormonal pregnant woman right now, so back off unless you want me to ask Talon to give you boys more reminders of just how to treat a pregnant woman as well as the soft way to tread with her bond-mate.”
Listening for a moment, he shook his head. “They are still hysterically laughing. Don’t think they care this time around, darling.” Dropping a kiss to her lips, he waved her to the bathroom as Trey radioed that they were moving from the house. Easing back behind his computers, he watched his mate’s ass and grinned. He was one lucky bastard.
Moving at a crisp but carefully steady pace for the female, Trey and the others kept their eyes and all their other many senses wide open. It was calculated taking the walk, but he figured she’d been boxed up long enough for one day and would need a little air. “You doing all right, ma’am?” he asked her as he watched her clipping along in her ridiculously interesting shoes. Gods, if only the other guys knew just what having a bond-mate really did. Noticing things like high-end shoes, well-tailored outfits, haircuts—even trims were important apparently—a new doily, new throw pillows, the list was fucking endless.
Rimi was so very happy to be able to have a moment to walk in the night air. Closing her eyes, she breathed in the scents of the night, and then when she heard Mercury crying, unzipped the bag and pulled the little guy out. The others were still out cold, so she zipped the bag back up and stroked her kitten, holding him close as she did so and then dropping him into her shirt after ensuring that no one was watching her. She spoke softly. “It’s all good, sweetheart. No one will hurt you, darling,” she whispered. “We have all these big men here and no one will hurt you, darling, I promise.” She knew it was silly, talking to her kitten, but he needed it and honestly so did she.
When they came upon a field she frowned. “Where are we going anyway?” She wanted to know. It was weird. She hadn’t even asked once where they were going until just this moment.
“Helicopter,” Trey said, pointing to the large black shadow in the field. “Light it up, Harry,” he said and grinned at her look as the helicopter came to life and the blades started to spin. “Duck your head and walk right up to the side panel. We’ll get you and the kittens tucked in.”
She felt Mercury wiggling and winced when the little sharp claws dug into her breast. “Oh crap,” she muttered and pulled the kitten from her shirt. “All right, Merc, you are going back in the bag. I’m sure your siblings are awake anyway,” Rimi dropped him into the case, giving each kitten a bit of love first. “Do you have a large heavy blanket? Something that we can wrap the bag in so that most of the noise is muffled for them?” she shouted when the noise got louder and louder.
Tapping Harry on the shoulder, Tryggr sat down and buckled in as the machine slipped into quiet mode. “Better?” he asked her. The others all climbed in and got strapped in, the doors were shut, and in seconds they were off the ground.
“Yes, much thank you.” And it was much better. It was amazing how silent the helicopter was.
Plugging the camera into the laptop, Trey loaded the video into a file, compressed it, and dropped it onto their secure server. “File’s there, Skittles. Take a look through it and we’ll talk with Bulldog when we get back.” They would all need to debrief, brief though it would be, upon their return.
Leaning back, Rimi asked, “Will I be going to Aunty B’s house?” She didn’t want to take her issues to her aunt, so she would ixnay that one right away. “I should tell you though that you shouldn’t take me there. I love them both so much, but it would kill me if I brought this mess to them. So, I guess that leaves me asking, where are you taking me?”
“Back to our base of operations to debrief and update Talon,” Trey said to her. “Our boss,” he clarified with a grin. “Then you’ll be coming home with me to a nice secure location outside a quaint if slightly bizarre town. The locals are good eggs.” Especially since they’d gotten rid of the drug issues in those parts…mostly. “Katherine is waiting for you there and has likely already gotten your room ready for you.”
“Douglas?” she asked with wide eyes. “You are taking me to Kat? Good lord, I haven’t seen her in years, but I adored her when we were kids. I swear I drove her nuts most times. I would dog along at her heels.” She paused and got a serious look on her face. “And then her brother came into the picture.” She shuddered. “He was a serious, serious monster. I’m so glad that he’s in jail where he belongs.”
“That he was,” Trey agreed, shooting a warning look to the others when she glanced back down at the kittens. She was a civvy, in all ways, no knowledge of their world, and hopefully they could keep it that way. He still didn’t know how Katherine was going to explain having three husbands. The town was accepting, but he didn’t think this female would be as receptive. Hopefully they could keep that on the DL. “She’s looking forward to seeing you as well,” he told her as he put everything away and sat back to relax for the flight.
“Is it true?” she asked suddenly and looked up at the large man. “Does she have three husbands? Aunty B let it slip that she did, so I just would like to know. Does she?” She paused and added, “And are they good to her? She deserves only the best, and if she’s got three of them then I say good on her!” And she meant that. “I’m totally jealous. Well, is it true?”
Sharing a look with the others, Trey nodded slowly. “It’s true,” he said, watching her carefully. She seemed genuine in her feelings on it though, so he relaxed. “I’m the only one around right now. The twins are out on another mission so you won’t meet them until later.” Grinning at her shocked look he said, “She pointed, I went.” He chuckled in reference to his bond-mate telling him just what was expected. Damn female should have been in the military. She was good at giving orders and expecting them to be followed to the letter. Period.
That had Rimi grinning. “I knew I liked you for some reason,” she teased. “Is she okay, really?” She was suddenly serious. “What happened to her with her brother trying to use her to cover his debts.” She shook her head. “It’s just too much. I can’t get over the betrayal. Is she going to be okay? Don’t let her ‘I’m tougher than God’ front get you. She’s a big marshmallow under that tough exterior but won’t show it.”
“She’s doing just fine now. For a while it was a little shaky, but she’s gotten back into things and is running the entire show,” he said with a smile. “She’s had a lot of shocks unfortunately in the last while, so she definitely was trying to pretend she was granite for a time. But we cracked that tough exterior and got her to soften up and even convinced her to talk and vent. Seems to have helped her quite a bit. Plus the fact we have a heavy bag in our basement that she occasionally goes to beat on when things get too much.” Or one of them drove her near insanity.
“As long as you were there for her,” she murmured. “Thank you for that,” she reached out to squeeze his big hand. “Thank you for being so very good to her. And I know that you are because if you weren’t…” She felt her lips tugging upward in a grin, “Because if you weren’t good to her, she would have gelded you.”
Every male winced at the implication, and a couple even shifted to protect their jewels better. Trey on the other hand was fairly used to the comment now and just shrugged. “We’d have talked her out of it. We’re very persuasive.” He grinned at her. Winking, he chuckled and shot a look out the window. “We’re just approaching the base. You’d better sit back in the seat. We sometimes catch a weird crosswind that tosses us a bit. It’s rare, but better safe than sorry. I absolutely refuse to tell Kat how you ended up with a black eye.”
“I don’t bruise easily at all, so it would take one heck of a lot to put a mark on me,” Rimi replied honestly but still held on and leaned back. She looked to Tryg and smiled. “Thank you for taki
ng such good care of my babies, Tryggr.” She pronounced his name perfectly.
“You’re welcome,” he assured her. “They are cute at that age.” He shot a warning look at one of the others who was snickering. “Don’t make me toss you out of the copter, bud.”
“Behave,” Trey said quietly to them all. So close, so damn close. They’d nearly made it back to the pad without anyone getting maimed. Shaking his head as they settled down without a hiccup, he waited for Harry to shut down the rotors before he opened the side door and hopped out. Turning back, he took the bag and held out a hand. “Come along, let’s get you inside and we’ll get you a drink while we go through everything with the boss man.”
“I have a feeling that I would need a lot of really stiff drinks. If only I drank,” she admitted. “All right, what about a place for my babies to go to the bathroom? That really needs to be a serious priority.” Trying to find and clean up kitty poo totally sucked. The buggers got into everything and all kinds of places she couldn’t reach.
Helping her down, he pressed on her shoulder as he bent over and moved out from the range of the blades. “We’ll get them set up in the bathroom off the conference room with a box and some paper if all else fails. I’ll even have the cooks get them some warm milk and little munchies to work on. Don’t worry, it will all be organic. They are good at that kind of thing,” he assured her as he walked her toward the building housing the offices.
“That’s very sweet, thank you for that. You guys really aren’t your average, run-of-the-mill mercenaries or alphabet soup agencies, are you?”
“No, ma’am, we most definitely are not like those idiots,” he told her honestly. Guiding her to the conference room, he paused. “Ms. Charisma Coleman, my boss Talon. T, this is Rimi, as she prefers to be called.” He grinned at her look. “Big ears.” He winked and pulled out a chair for her. “Why don’t you take a seat, ma’am, and I will get the box for the wee ones and arrange for food for them and for you as well. Anything you can’t or won’t eat or are allergic to?” he asked her.
“Nope, nothing at all,” Rimi said and looked to the large man. “Talon, you have an interesting team. So are you going to talk to me and tell me why they all seem so very different?” She wasn’t a fool, and one thing she had noticed was how each and every man acted differently than any other team. Not that she had been a huge studier of special forces, but she had known one or two in her lifetime, sold them houses even, and these men didn’t act like that at all.
Waiting until Trey headed out to do his tasks, he moved and shut the door before sitting down next to her. Leaning an elbow on the table, Talon dropped his chin into his hand and watched her. “We’re not human,” he said honestly, watching her closely. “Except for a few on the base, we’re all either changers or Mage or Warlocks. Personally I’m King of the Dragons, Trey is a Wolf, Tryggr is a Jaguar. We have Lions and Tigers and Bears, oh my,” he said and waited to see what she’d say to that.
Chapter Five
She snorted at that and shook her head. “Yeah, I’m sure,” she said with a frown. “And what’s your next gag? You have a beautiful lakefront home to sell me in the Atacama Desert, too, don’t you? Is that what’s wrong with you guys? You are all jokers?”
Snorting sharply, Talon shot her a slow grin. “Not one person actually believes us until they are faced with the undeniable truth.” Pointing toward his face so she looked there, he let his eyes change and let the Dragon begin to take over, his facial structure shifting, the snout beginning to show and his teeth turning long, vicious, and sharp. Snorting out a breath of smoke just for kicks, he pushed the beast back and tipped his head. “Seeing is believing after all.” He just didn’t know if she was going to crap a load or slide out of the chair in a dead faint.
Rimi felt her vision wavering. She felt as if her very vision was about to fail her when she looked at this man before her, this…“Oh God,” she whispered. “You weren’t lying were, you?” she asked and gulped. “Oh Jesus H. Christ, what in the hell do I do now?”
“We can’t lie,” Talon told her. “We can hedge, we can insinuate and tell a tall tale of what-ifs, but we can never outright lie. It goes against who we are. Now?” He shrugged with a smile. “You are going to go home with Trey, who’s a Wolf, reunite with Katherine, and have a long, long sleep. We won’t hurt you, Charisma, no matter your choice, unless you threaten us or our loved ones. There is a whole new world out there lying right under and beside the one you know. We try to let humans do what you do and we do what we do. I’m all for letting bygones be bygones, darling. But if you have any questions, talk to Trey and Katherine. They will have pretty much any and every answer there is. And if not, they will call me or one of the others that is older and get them for you, all right?”
Trey walked in with the food and box of supplies for her and the kittens. “So they sent up some warmed whole milk for the little ones,” he commented, setting everything down, and caught how she was watching him. “Seriously, Talon, you have to stop being the one to terrify the humans,” he growled at his boss. “I haven’t had that opportunity forever, damn it.”
“Oh don’t worry, you scare the shit out of me without even growling,” she assured him, looking at Talon the entire time, however. “Oh lord,” she whispered. Dropping her face into her hands, she sat there with her shoulders hunched as she realized that her whole life was no longer what it had been. Tears freely flowed down her face. Nothing was ever going to be the same again. Swallowing hard, she whispered, “Why would they be after me? Who is after me? Why were you guys called in? I don’t understand.”
“Oh hey now,” Trey said, whipping out a tissue from the box of things he’d collected. “No crying, that is seriously unfair.” And took him out at his knees every damn time. “We don’t know why they were after you, sugar. Hell, we don’t even know if it has anything to do with us or you. We went in as a favor to your godmother because of her friendship with Kat and so forth through to us all. Besides, it’s fun to bring all the cool toys out and taunt the little towns with all the gadgets and doodads.”
“Oh lord love a duck.” She muttered one of Kat’s favorite curses. “Of course. Men and their toys. Be they magical, extra-special men or human men, one thing that they will always have in common is the fact that they will forever and always love to play with their toys.”
“Well, yeah,” they both said with huge grins of pure glee on their faces. “Come on, Ms. Coleman, give me the wee ones and I’ll get them settled out of the way. The others are coming for debrief, boss, just getting out of gear when I saw them a moment ago,” he told Talon. Digging out her meal, he set the tray before her. “I didn’t know what you might like, so I brought a bit of everything, plus a few desserts and a couple beverage choices.” Taking the bag with the kittens, Trey headed for the bathroom to get them and their milk and food set up.
“Oh and careful with Mercury, he bites first and cuddles to make up later, so make sure that you take care when letting him out of the bag,” she told him and looked down at the tray of food. She didn’t feel particularly hungry, sadly enough. She honestly felt seriously out of place here, but she had to ensure that she kept with it. “When will I see Kat? And my godmother? When can I see them?” And then just as fast she added, “Or is it too dangerous to go to them? What do I do now?” She had a hundred-million questions in her mind right now. “I have to take Snowball to the vet because of her feline diabetes. I can’t just not take her, because I can’t lose her.” Dammit, her whole life was in chaos now.
Reaching out, Talon gently touched her hand. “Take a deep breath and relax,” he advised softly to her. “You will be going home with Trey to stay on Kat’s property, which is heavily guarded and protected from all comers. You can call your godmother from there and arrange a visit however you see best. If you want, we can even go and collect her and fly her to you, just ask.” He smiled. “As for the kitty diabetes, there’s a vet in the town where Kat lives. I’d suggest hooking u
p with her and seeing just what you can do for the little one.”
Rimi nodded and took a deep breath. “Thank you. You have a way of calming people. It’s truly a gift.” He did, too. It was odd. He was huge and looked more like a biker hit man, but he could calm a person with a touch. “I can’t wait to see Kat,” she admitted softly. “The sooner that we can get there, the better,”
“Couple hours,” Trey said, returning from the bathroom, and smiled. “That little devil tried to claw me, but I just proved who had bigger teeth.” He chuckled. “We came to terms and he’s eating happily with the others now.” Glancing up as the others moved into the room, he sat down on her other side to ensure she didn’t feel too trapped by those she didn’t know.
“All right, lads, since we all want to get home at some point tonight, report,” Talon ordered, turning to face the others. Listening as they talked, he made a comment now and again before he finally stood. “Reports in my in-box tomorrow by ten. Go home and sleep, people. You did good and you didn’t get us slapped with any restraining orders, major bonus in my book.” Glancing down at Rimi, he grinned as she sat with her chin propped in a hand ready to pass out. “That means you, too, missy. Head out and get some sleep. Trey, grab one of the trucks. You can swap back out for the bike tomorrow when you come in for your shift.”
“Yes, boss,” he said, getting up, and gently touched her shoulder. “You ready to head out, ma’am?”
“As long as you call me Rimi instead of ma’am, I’m ready,” she said and looked up at the beautiful man. “Goodness, you are a handsome one. I bet that Kat has you eating out of her hands, doesn’t she?” she asked with a smile and stood. “What about my kittens? Are they staying here or do we take them with us?”