The One Thing Money Can't Buy (Custom Solutions Book 1)

by Lisa Oliver

  Quaid lifted his lips, showing more of his impressive teeth. There was only one person holding him back, and Quaid caught his scent as the door to the lab room opened.

  “Oh, kitty cat, are you playing with your food again?” Only Christian would ever get away with calling his lion form a kitty cat. “Dr. Loup, I have to confess I am very disappointed in you. I brought you in here, in confidence, to conduct a serious study on my behalf and I find you here lying on the floor.”

  “The lion attacked me.” Loup tried to get out of his grip, but Quaid didn’t budge. “I was just, just….”

  “Injecting Cari with a fucking syringe, you asshole. As if we didn’t see it.” Sweeping past Quaid, Dolph checked on Cari who was still motionless where he fell.

  “You can’t be too careful with white hedgehogs,” Loup babbled. “The subject was getting upset. I didn’t want him to see me as a threat. I injected him for his own good.”

  “You were trying to save your own fucking ass, that’s what you were doing.” Christian held up a small flash drive. “Everything you said, everything you did, captured for posterity.” He slipped the drive into his pocket. “You were right about one thing though. If you’d kept your mouth shut about this research, respected the true mate bond between Quaid and Cari, and done the job I paid you for, your career would’ve been made. That international speaking circuit would’ve been yours for the taking.”

  “It’s not too late.” Loup tried to push Quaid out of the way and Quaid tightened the grip with his teeth. “We just got off on the wrong foot. I didn’t know the lion and the hedgehog were true mates….”

  “Kill him, Quaid,” Christian said in disgust. “If there’s one thing I can’t stand it’s liars. They’re just a waste of space. How else would Cari have come into his powers, if he wasn’t true mated, you fucking moron?”

  Of course, Loup couldn’t answer. Quaid was busy spitting out parts of his chewed up throat. The man tasted disgusting. Shifting back to his human form, Quaid took the glass of water Christian handed him. “Did you hear all he said?” Quaid looked over to where Dolph was checking on Cari. His mate’s eyes were still closed and had barely moved.

  “Every last word.” Christian sighed. “So much for plan A. Do you know how freaking superior our paranormal scientists think they are? Half of them wouldn’t take my calls because they were too busy. Those that did had never published any papers, had no credibility and were only interested in how much I would give them in grant money.”

  “So, you went with this guy,” Quaid pushed Loup’s body over, so he didn’t have to look at him. “His only claim to fame is a dick study. A grossly overpaid for study.” Putting down his glass, Quaid reached for Cari who was being carried in Dolph’s arms. “Will he be okay?” Dolph had more medical training than he did which was the only reason Quaid wasn’t getting huffy about the way Dolph held his mate.

  “There was enough bloody tranquillizer in that syringe to take down a herd of elephants.” Dolph spat in the direction of the body. “Cari will be fine, he’s just going to have to sleep things off. I’ll go through the notes this asshole left behind, but I’d say he totally got the wrong end of the stick, thinking Cari’s power came from you, or some dumbass thing. I don’t know. But I will. And we’ve got to fill out more fucking forms now he’s dead.”

  “Don’t go filling out any forms just yet,” Christian cautioned, pulling out his phone. “Loup’s been a blabbermouth about his work for me, obviously. Let’s see who else comes out of the woodwork, when he doesn’t start updating his benefactors. I’ll order a discrete cleanup for now.”

  Quaid stroked over Cari’s pert nose, his mate’s eyes were still closed, his limbs totally relaxed. “What are we going to do boss? Now Plan A’s gone bust, is it desert island time, or what? My poor mate hasn’t even had a chance to spend any of his winnings yet. All he wants is a home, somewhere safe.”

  “And he’s going to get it, god damnit.” Christian thumped his heart. “You have my word. I will not rest until you two can walk down the main street of any town, anywhere, and be safe. That little mate of yours deserves nothing less.”

  Touched, Quaid nodded and rose to his feet, keeping Cari tight against his chest. “We’ll go back to the suite. Let me know if you learn anything new and thanks.”

  “Yeah, go clean your teeth,” Christian chuckled darkly. “I should’ve known that guy would be an asshole. Studying bloody penis size, for fuck’s sake.”

  As Quaid took Cari through the grounds to their suite, uncaring about his nudity, he pondered on Christian’s promise. The man never made one of them lightly, and although Quaid knew he and Dolph were amazing people, that gesture, the heart pump, the sincerity in Christian’s voice resonated with Quaid. “It seems a lot of people have fallen under your spell, precious,” he whispered, ever conscious someone could be listening. “We will work this out. You will be safe.” Even if we do end up living on a deserted island somewhere.

  Chapter Twenty Three

  “What if we stage something like what you two did back at the steakhouse? But for the media this time?” It’d been dark when Cari finally woke up, a worried lion curled around him. After a meal, shower, and a ton of Quaid’s kisses, Cari was happy to meet with Christian and Dolph in their kitchen to find out what they’d learned.

  It turned out Loup had his own agenda when he agreed to do the study on Cari. His benefactors, who Christian and Dolph were still trying to track down, paid him to prove Cari was the ultimate shifter weapon. Which was why Loup had a large syringe of sedatives handy. Other drugs in his arsenal included shifter suppressants, adrenalin, and an illegal concoction of drugs designed to drive a shifter feral. Any concern Cari had about Loup’s death didn’t last long. But the unwavering support he had from the three men he was sitting with, did a lot for Cari’s confidence.

  “What do you think?” Cari smiled up at Quaid. “Your bosses could still hold their party, and we could still be the guests of honor. It’s not as though either one of us have done anything illegal and the council and people like that can’t just abduct us in full view of everyone. Not if the media is there too.”

  “Cari’s right,” Dolph agreed. “If the council want you to disappear, they wouldn’t want anyone knowing about it. They’d do it in secret and then deny all knowledge. Preempting them with a public event would get them off your backs.”

  “It could work,” Christian said thoughtfully. “Our company could put out a press release saying we have the proof that white hedgehogs have been maligned all these years and they’re not the killers everyone suspects they are. Then, instead of getting a scientist to use a power point presentation and graphs, some of our own men could try and abduct Cari and Quaid from the party, and you can do your thing Cari.”

  “Not us, this time though, aye?” Dolph winked at his mate. “I don’t want to attack Cari again. We’ll get some of the undercover boys to do it.”

  “Yeah.” Christian’s grin had an evil twinge. “That would be worth watching.” When Quaid and Dolph laughed, he corrected himself. “Sorry, what I meant to say, is it would be a worthwhile training exercise for them.”

  “It would work, don’t you think?” Cari needed Quaid’s opinion. “It’s not as though the men who attack us will be really hurt. Nothing a shift wouldn’t cure. And if people see I’m not the ruthless weapon they think I am, they’ll leave me alone then, won’t they? I won’t be worth anything to them anymore.”

  “I think, if the point’s made that the only people impacted by your power, are people who harbor ill against you or me, then yes, it could work. My only issue, is if others in the crowd, like from the Fanshaw pack, or Cari’s prickle also get knocked around even though they’re just standing there, won’t that cause a panic? What if the guy who was paying Loup is there?”

  Cari hadn’t thought of that. “Can we just not invite them?” He asked hopefully. “The pack and my prickle representatives at least.”

  “The counc
il elders are also going to be harboring a grudge against you,” Christian pointed out. “You didn’t turn up to the dinner we invited you to – they’re going to be pissy about that. And for this to work, I’d have to invite them.”

  “We’d need every available man around the ballroom,” Quaid was clearly considering the option. “High spec cameras with audio so everything is recorded from every angle. We’re trusting that Cari’s power is going to fill the room, so there could be a few fallen bodies dotted among the crowd, not withstanding hysteria from others who just fall because the person next to them does.”

  “We can organize the security – that’s not a problem,” Christian nodded.

  “It wouldn’t hurt to have a medical team on standby as well,” Dolph added. “There’s going to be a mix of humans and paranormals in the crowd. We don’t want someone falling, or getting knocked by someone else and having a heart attack or something.”

  Cari hadn’t considered that either. The idea that someone could be seriously hurt hadn’t crossed his mind. “If it’s too risky…” he started to say, but Christian stopped him.

  “No, Cari. It is a good idea. This has to be done. Think of the alternative. Living on a deserted island, not able to enjoy your new found wealth, or go for dates or do anything that mated couples do. You didn’t choose to have this power, you were born with it, the same as you were born with multi-colored hair. You should be moaning about the hundreds of begging letters a lottery winner would receive, if they knew it was you. You should be deciding on a house with a pool or not, or what size.”

  “Definitely a pool,” Quaid smiled. “Besides, don’t you want to show your prickle members just how far you’ve come? You’re an independent free omega, with over a billion dollars in the bank and a lion for a mate.”

  Looking down at his sweat pants and holey t-shirt, Cari sighed. “It might be time to do some online shopping. I don’t even own a suit.”

  “Then it’s decided.” Christian stood and reached for his mate, helping him stand. “The party will be Saturday, three days from now, and don’t worry. I assure you everyone invited is going to turn up, including the media. You just have to look cute, and unthreatening. I meant you Cari, not Quaid.”

  “I’m going to be working on being extra threatening,” Quaid mock growled, his arm heavy on Cari’s shoulder. “No one is touching my mate.”

  “Then we’re all done. I’ll send you the invites, in the meantime, stay out of trouble.” Christian smiled. “Any questions?”

  “Just one,” Cari couldn’t believe he had the balls to ask, but he had to know. “Why are you doing this for me?” He asked quietly. “I know Quaid works for you, but you could’ve just given us a safe house to stay in and ignored everything else. Why are you working so hard to make me safe?”

  Christian’s smile disappeared, and the look he shared with Dolph was both intimate and questioning. Dolph nodded, and Christian sat back in his chair. “You have a right to know, but it’s not a pretty story. You’d better put the coffee pot back on.”

  /~/~/~/~/

  Quaid listened as Christian haltingly told his story, completely stunned. The last thing he expected to hear was that Dolph and Christian used to have a third mate. An omega warlock who’d been persecuted for who he was, and who he loved, and died because of it. “You have to remember, it was over a hundred years ago,” Dolph explained. “Paranormals weren’t out yet. There were bible pushers on every street corner blaming homosexuality for everything from the homelessness to the plague. Anyone who wasn’t married was whispered about. That’s without the magic side of things.”

  “Tim would have been burned at the stake for being a witch if the humans had ever caught wind of who he was and what he could do,” Christian shook his head. “We didn’t know things were that bad in his life. He wanted to be with us, but he kept making so many excuses. I didn’t know…”

  “We didn’t know, because he didn’t tell us,” Dolph said firmly. “We’ve spent decades playing the ‘what if’ game. The truth of it all was Tim wanted everything – us and the wretched family he came from. It’s a harsh thing to say about a mate, but he was greedy, he wanted to hide us away and keep up the façade of being straight to his family….”

  “Which was understandable at the time,” Christian interrupted gently.

  “But he didn’t consider the toll on us, or factor in how psycho his family truly was.” Dolph shared a sad smile with his partner. “But that is why we do what we do now. Because no one should be persecuted for who they are, or who they love. Because Tim should have lived in a world where magic and his love of two men was as acceptable as chicken wings and fries.”

  “Instead, he was beaten, gutted, and the remains tied up and burned at the stake.” Christian closed his eyes, shaking his head. “By his own family, on his family’s estate, and the only people who questioned his disappearance was us. I’m not going to let you disappear the same way, either of you.”

  “That is so sad.” Cari was crying. Quaid knew he would. His sweet mate had a heart as big as the ocean. “I’m so sorry. I didn’t mean for you to share something so upsetting to you.”

  “You had a right to ask the question,” Christian said, leaning on his mate’s shoulder. “You’ve trusted people who’ve wanted to use you for their own gain in the past. You’ve been hurt and people tried to take advantage of you. But I strongly believe Fate has a plan. She always does. She led you to Quaid and by extension to us. And we will make things safe for both of you. Now, you know why.”

  “Did you ever think, do you think it’s possible, about Tim, I mean?” Quaid wasn’t sure how to phrase the question. Dolph and Christian had always presented as a solid couple. But losing a mate, even an unclaimed one, had to leave a hole in their soul.

  “Christian is right, the Fates have a plan,” Dolph said simply. “We mourned Tim a long time, and yes, things would have been worse if he’d taken our bites. But if reincarnation is a thing, or if the Fates see fit to send us another mate, we’ll be open to it, if it happens. But a third isn’t something we’re actively looking for.”

  “We’ve got a lot of other things to do.” Christian seemed more like himself. “Because of what happened to Tim, we set up this business, although back in the day it was more of a vigilante group than a security business. The first bastards we took down were Tim’s family, and boy, were they surprised. We’ve kept up with the technological advances and even contributed to them. We’ve networked and built a business we can be proud of. We help people, every single day. And we have each other, just like you have Cari. We plan on ensuring things stay that way.”

  The talking broke up not long afterwards, but Quaid still felt restless and uneasy. All he could keep seeing in his mind’s eye was Cari laying motionless on the floor. It wasn’t strange at all that Cari picked up on his unease.

  “I’m not dead,” Cari whispered quietly. In the comfort of a warm bed, with only the pale moonlight disturbing the gloom, it was easy to forget that the rest of the world existed.

  “I can’t help thinking,” Quaid confessed, because the dark was good at keeping secrets. “If Loup had picked up one of those other syringes by mistake. If you’d been shot up with adrenalin, your heart would’ve stopped. The drugs – my gods, you could’ve turned feral. You might not have even known me anymore.”

  Quaid expected a lot of things – Cari laughing wasn’t one of them. “Oh, my goodness,” Cari was shaking with it, “Can you imagine me as a feral hedgehog? Running about on my three inch legs, trying to bite everyone’s ankle. Maybe if I leaned up on my hind legs, I might be able to hit a calf muscle, maybe, provided my big ass didn’t drag me down first.”

  Okay, when you put it like that…. But Quaid wasn’t convinced. “Ferals don’t recognize anybody. They can’t shift back to human form, because their mind is completely animal. You wouldn’t even know I was your mate.”

  “I would, and knowing you are my mate would have allowed me to shift
back.” Squirming around in his arms, Quaid was faced with a very determined mate. “There is nothing on this earth, no spell, or drug, or special potion that will stop me loving you. I would chew my own foot off rather than hurt a hair of you anywhere.”

  “Ew… do hedgehogs do that?” Quaid couldn’t get the visual out of his head.

  “I haven’t got a clue. It’s not something I want to try. But I know this. The only way I wouldn’t know you, is if I was dead, and even then, I’d haunt you till you joined me on the other side. I don’t know what the hell poor Tim was thinking. I could no more deny you, than deny the sky was blue.”

  “It was over a hundred years ago,” Quaid offered although in his heart he’d thought the same thing. “Maybe he was under pressure from his family – a lot of men were back in those days. Maybe he had super genetics like yours, and his family wanted him to marry a suitable breeding partner they’d picked out for him. Maybe he just didn’t have your inner strength.”

  Wrinkling his nose at his mate, Quaid leaned in for a kiss. It was a long time afterward he heard Cari whisper, “And with you, I’m even stronger.” But he might have been mistaken. Two orgasms would do that to any man, paranormal or otherwise.

  Chapter Twenty Four

  The remaining days before the party passed quickly. For Cari, his life became a blur of online shopping, getting fitted for a suit, because according to Christian one did not turn up at one of his parties in an off the peg garment, and trying to stay out of everyone else’s way. Quaid spent every waking minute huddled in rooms filled with technology, with guys roughly his own size who seemed to talk in code, and who stopped talking the moment he stepped into the room.

  Not wanting to disturb his mate, although Quaid never made him feel like a nuisance personally, Cari spent his time cleaning the suite, making meals for whenever Quaid bothered to turn up for them, and pondered about where his life was going to go when the party was over. Christian and Dolph had both emphasized over and over again, that once paranormals and humans alike saw that his power was protection based only, that he and Quaid would be left alone. But Quaid had a job, something he seemed to really enjoy, while Cari… Cari wasn’t sure what he had anymore.