by Kathi Barton
Ivy told Dylan and Carter what she’d found out through their newly established links. The woman seemed to be mounting up charges right and left. Sunny asked her to ask Nathan if he knew where they’d lived. All they could find out about her address was that she had a post office box. She had a feeling that there was more to this than a little boy and stealing.
After she asked Nathan the questions, and he gave them the answers that the women needed, Nathan reached for Meghan’s hand too. When he closed his eyes, falling asleep quickly, she looked over at her sister when she started to sob quietly.
“He’s been dealt such a shitty hand, Ivy. I want to bundle him up and take him home with me right now.” Ivy told her if she was serious, she and the Whitfields could make that happen. Ivy hoped that they’d help her, anyway. “Yes. The first time I saw him, I just simply fell in love with him. I don’t know why I think this, but I believe we could be good for each other.”
Reaching for Adam, she told him what was going on, the information that Nathan had given her, and how his sisters were looking into it. He told her that he was there for her should she need him, and that Blake had said that he was as well. This was what she loved about this family—they were a united front when necessary, but also knew when to leave someone alone.
Ivy examined Nathan as best she could without waking him. When his dinner tray came in, all the silverware plastic and nothing on it to harm him, the nurse who brought it in said that she was to watch over him the entire time. Ivy told her who she was and that she’d not allow him to harm himself. Not ever again.
“I hope not. Those people that brought him into this world, they need to be handed their asses if you don’t mind me saying so. They’re just not deserving of this little boy.” Ivy agreed with her and told her that they were doing something about them as well. “I was down there when they brought him in, Doctor Whitfield. You’d not believe what they said about him. And right there in front of his face. Telling us that he just wasn’t the same. They’d not been able to see him grow up, and they didn’t know if they could be a part of his life. I wanted to strangle them right then and there. Some people should not be allowed to breed if you ask me.”
“I understand what you’re saying. Being a surgeon and putting a few children back together when their parents did something horrific to them gave me nightmares.” Nathan woke, and Meghan moved to help him set up his meal while Ivy took the nurse aside. “Could you make sure that Meghan is allowed to stay here with him? I think he’ll do much better now that she’s hoping to be a part of his life.”
“I heard that she was going to adopt him. Adam and his brothers are on the phone right now getting her registered as a foster parent. Nice group of people, you Whitfields. I’ve never seen a one of you being hurtful or mean. I think it’ll do them both some good, don’t you?” She told her that she did. “All right. If you need me just pull the nurse’s cord there. And I’ll see what I can do about getting your sister another bed in here, or at least a comfy chair. Thank you.”
“No, I thank you. Nurses like the ones here at this hospital are about the best that I’ve had the pleasure of working with and beside.” Rachel, the nurse, told her that she appreciated that and would pass it along to the other nurses. “I’d like that. Again, thank you.”
“I’ll be bringing in Meghan another meal too. There isn’t any sense in making her starve when she’s doing such a good deed for us.”
Ivy thanked her again and pulled Nathan’s chart into the room with them. Writing orders for him to have Meghan there would save the butt of any of the nurses when questioned. Ivy put the chart away just as Meghan’s tray was being delivered.
Finding Adam in the hallway near the closed off section that handled people and children like Nathan, she went to him willingly and wrapped her arms around him. In that moment Ivy knew that she loved him and would for the rest of her days. Looking up at him, she could see his love for her as it seemed to reflect back to her.
“I love you, Adam. I don’t know what I would have done had you not been there for me. I think well before we even met that you had a place in your heart saved for me, and I did for you as well.” He kissed her, gently and lovingly. “I want to have children with you. Lots and lots of them. I don’t care if they’re ours or someone else’s that didn’t deserve them in the first place. All right?”
“Yes. Blake, he’s taking in children too, did you know that?” She shook her head. “Yes. Right now, he has it in the works to get two boys, both of them from a broken home. Neither of them have any trust for anyone, not even Blake. When he rescued them, he said that he wanted to find their parents and kill them.”
“Are you telling me that we’re going to have to be able to have an alibi when we take some in? I’m game if you are, but if push comes to shove, buck-o, you’re on your own if it comes between you and the kids.” He was laughing as they made their way to the elevator. “Oh, before I forget, we’re hosting Thanksgiving this year. Your mom is kind of pushy about that sort of thing, isn’t she?”
“You have no idea. But it’ll be fun. And it’s not like we don’t have enough people to help prepare. I think that Nate will enjoy it as well. He’s been complaining about feeding just the two of us when he’d like to feed the entire family.” They held hands all the way to the car.
Not that she thought she’d leave, but Meghan promised to call if she wanted a break. As soon as they were home, Ivy opted for bed and Adam said he’d join her.
Once she showered, washing off the germs and other smells from her body that she’d picked up at the hospital, Ivy crawled into bed with a sleeping Adam. He wrapped her into his arms as soon as she laid down and kissed her on the back of the neck. For some reason that made her more relaxed than the shower had. It wasn’t long before she was asleep.
~*~
Ollie loved his new job. It gave him a sense of pride, helping out at the restaurant, and he got to talk to people all day long. Now, today he was going to learn how to set up the coffee pot and brew the dark liquid that a lot of people seemed to crave. While Ollie had never acquired a taste for it, there were a lot of people that swore it was the nectar of the gods.
It was cold this morning as he walked to work. He didn’t drive anymore. Ollie could see just fine, but he couldn’t move the way he had when he was younger. His reaction time was much slower than he was comfortable with, so he walked when he could, or asked for a ride when he wasn’t up to it.
“Good morning, Ollie. Are you ready for the day?” He grinned at Mildred and said that he was. “I’m glad to hear that. Oh, there is a man here to see you. I think he’s in the bathroom. I’m not sure. Can you have a word or two with him before we open? I don’t think this man is as kind as other vampires that I’ve known.”
Ollie didn’t know but a couple of vamps. One of them was living right here in town, having a house upgraded for himself. Tanner was about the best friend he’d ever had. And Ollie was so happy that he’d decided to hang around.
Ollie started reading the instructions for making a pot of coffee as the man came to sit on the barstool in front of him. It wasn’t anyone that he knew. The smile on his face didn’t hide the fact that he had some very long and sharp fangs. Ollie let his cat take a little of him, something that he rarely did, to show the man that his teeth were by far much more dangerous than his were.
“Say what you gotta say and move on. I don’t have time to mess with you, and even if I did, I’d not waste any of it hanging around with you.”
The man looked around then back at him.
Ollie wasn’t falling for that little trick, the man making him think there were others with him. Instead, he repeated himself—another thing that he did not like doing. Repeating himself got tiresome, and he wasn’t into that today.
“I’ve been sent to talk to you. Or rather, have a conversation with you regarding the whereabouts of Tanner. You are acquainted with him, I’m to understand.” Ollie didn’t so much as blink at the
man. “You will tell me where he is, or I’ll make your life very difficult if you don’t cooperate.”
“Compulsion doesn’t work on me. It might have at one time, but I’m immune to such things. Now, you tell me what it is you want with this Tanner feller and if I have any idea who or where he is, I might tell you. But I’d not count on it if’n I was you. I don’t take kindly to being forced into anything at my age.” The man looked around again, and this time Ollie could see just a little fear in his way of doing it. “I said, tell me what you want.”
He felt it—the age-old feeling of youth, having a little more gumption that he’d had in the last twenty or so years. When Ollie stood up the man started to as well. But with a point to the chair from Ollie, the vamp sat down and put his head low on the table.
“He has a great deal of magic. It is said that he is more than likely the first of our kind. His power would be more than any vampire of my age to have and he’d know what to do with it all.” Ollie asked him his name. “Sheppard.”
The room suddenly tightened—Ollie had to sit, or he’d pass out. As it was now, he was having a hard time holding onto his cat, trying his best to understand what was happening. When he saw Tanner, he looked as if he was bigger than he remembered him being. His body was wider, and muscles were twitching around his flesh. Ollie could also see his fangs, sharp, like weapons that anyone would know meant their downfall. Even he felt fear of the man a man that had been his friend for more years than he could remember.
Sheppard was lifted from the chair, even going so far as to be plastered against the ceiling above them. Tanner neither moved nor spoke as Sheppard was sobbing for forgiveness, begging for his life. Ollie stayed where he was as five more men, all vampires, appeared there. He held his breath, he supposed so that they’d not see or even remember that he was in the room.
“You dare come here. You dare to even say my name while you are in my realm.” Sheppard begged once again for his life. “I’m going to kill you, have no doubt. You’re a worthless piece of dung, and you’ll pay for the wasted time I use in dealing with such a creature as you. The council of vampires, they have been searching for you for a great many years. And I’ve been given full authority to destroy you.”
Ollie would have gladly told them whatever they wished to know. He might have been just as happy as a pup getting his ears rubbed if they’d forget he was around. Even going so far as to tell them that he was a woman in the last days of breeding if they wouldn’t harm him. He’d tell them in a way that not only would they believe it, but he would as well. Might even be willing to go into labor to prove it.
But they didn’t even look in his direction, didn’t make a single noise as Tanner dangled Sheppard over his head. Ollie glanced at his friend, and in that moment, he was terrified of the gentleman. Even though he’d done nothing to him, ever, Ollie could see his blood-filled eyes. The way that his fangs were just over his lower lip. His nails were as long as the fingers that they were hanging from. So, when Tanner turned to him, Ollie had a feeling that he wasn’t so much seeing him, but that he only just realized that he’d forgotten him.
“Ollie. You are all right?” Ollie nodded and told him that he thought so. “Yes, I’m afraid that I’ve taken my anger out on this man and have frightened you. I meant you no harm, Ollie. You are now and will forever be my friend.”
“I know that. I surely do. I might have soiled myself hadn’t you of been.” Ollie felt his face heat up in embarrassment. Not for what he’d said, but that he’d said anything at all. “You’re a good man, Tanner. What did this here man want with you? If’n you don’t mind me asking.”
“He is the child of the man that I have been looking for. Randal. You remember him, do you not? And I have one of his children as well. She has given me a great deal of information, and I only need to know where he is staying. Wanda, she only managed to escape Randal’s rule by a small margin. This man, he is another of his children, but he is as stupid as Randal if he thinks to catch me unawares.”
Ollie had heard of this man Randal. He had met Randal once long ago, when Ollie was nothing more than a small cat finding his way in the world. Randal had captured him while he was out wandering around on the very land they lived on now. Another man, not a vampire, had saved him then, but had been killed in the process instead of Ollie. The last he’d heard, the council had been looking for Randal, as well as the kiss that he’d managed to force into coming to him in the name of power. Which, Ollie remembered, hadn’t been that much then. He doubted that he’d had any more given to him—not the way that he acted today, anyway.
The man, Sheppard, was destroyed. It wasn’t a slow death, as Ollie was sure that was what Tanner wanted. But watching his dust rain down around the room, Ollie knew that the next time Randal sent someone, it might well be Randal himself. Tanner sat down at the table Ollie had been sitting at and watched him try to get the coffee machine running.
“Here, my friend, I shall show you.” The two of them worked on making the machine do what he needed it to do. Tanner, knowing him as well as he did, showed Ollie the way that he’d learned a great many things. But from Tanner showing him step by step. Ollie learned just how to put the glass pots on and how to change out the huge coffee filters and fill them again, and by the time the doors were opened, Ollie had five pots of the vile brew going and was sitting with Tanner again. “I shall have to kill him. You know that, do you not?”
“I do. He’s been pestering you for some time now. While I trust your judgment in this, what will the council say about you doing so?” He told him that he had permission to kill Randal and to take his kiss. “How many are they? And I’m betting this upsets you so much, on account’a you think that you’re going to have to kill them as well.”
“Yes. From what I have learned from Wanda, most of the ones in the kiss were changed without permission. Nor did a very large portion of them take well to it. Many have died due to the man’s evilness, going into the sun rather than face their time forever being a vampire. There are a great many of them that were meant to be something productive. Had families that could no longer be a part of their everyday lives. And many of those left behind, they starved or were killed by Randal when he didn’t get his way. He is a horrific man and should have been put down many years ago.” Ollie shivered. It was terrible to be treated like a plaything for such a monster. “All that to say, there are fewer than a dozen of them left from the hundreds that answered to him when he was a better person.”
“I’m surely sorry about that. Gotta ask you though—how did you know that Sheppard was here?”
Tanner smiled and told him that he’d felt his anger. “And to have you that pissed off, as Dylan is so fond of saying, I knew that it had to be something terrible. I’m only glad that I was able to leave my home and come here. You have saved me a great deal of time and effort.” Ollie asked him if he’d read Sheppard’s mind. “I raped it so that, if he had lived through this, he wouldn’t have been the man that he started out to be. I believe you call them a vegetable. He would have been much worse.”
Ollie nodded. and as soon as the doors were unlocked, Tanner said that he had to go. Ollie asked him, just before he left, if he was safe. With a quick hug, the older man said that he would be now, but that he must be careful from now on—Randal was not one to give up so easily. Ollie told him that he would be.
The breakfast crowd was heavy this morning. It was almost lunch time before he had a spell where he could sit and enjoy his own meal. Looking around at the townspeople, Ollie wondered for a brief moment why he’d ever thought of leaving this place.
He surely did miss his wife and mate. She’d been his rock, his teacher, as well as the one person in the world that he could talk to like none other. Of course, Ollie made it to the cemetery that was at the back of their land, but it was getting a might cold for that, and he wasn’t able to go as often. He knew he could ask someone and they’d do it without saying a word, but Ollie didn’t want to be a bu
rden when he didn’t have to. So, he’d taken to talking to her picture in his room, so that he’d have someone to talk to.
Today he’d have plenty to tell her. He could almost hear her laughing at some of the antics that them boys got into. And Oliver and his Eve, they didn’t treat him like he was an old man that needed help from them. Eve had even started to call him Pop, just like Blake had since he’d been a toddler.
As he was finishing up, he was asked if he could help them through lunch if it was as busy as it had been this morning. Having nothing better to do and liking being needed, Ollie said that he would. As he was filling the pots up again, Ollie felt his grandson touch lightly on his noodle. He asked him what was up.
I have a favor to ask you. He told Adam that he’d give him the world if he could. Thanks, Grandda, but nothing so big. But I’ve been asked to ask you if you’d mind giving Ivy away at the courthouse on Friday. She is nervous, I guess, about asking you, so I told her that I’d ask. I didn’t think you’d have any problem with it, would you? Ollie couldn’t speak for a few seconds, his heart so filled up that he could feel it spilling from his heart by way of his tears. Grandda?
I’m here. I am. And I’m so plumb proud to do this for her that I can hardly stand it myself. That girl of yours, you tell her that I’m there any time she needs me. And I’d be honored to do this for the two of you. He had to pull out his handkerchief and wipe his face with it. The feelings that he had at that moment made him feel like he’d done went and won the biggest pot that there was. I’ll be there with bells on my toes, Adam. Tell her that I love her to pieces, all right?
I will, Grandda. She’s going to have her sister stand with us too. Mom is putting together a party at their house after we’re married. I have to tell you, Grandda, I love this woman so very much.