Chapter Nine
Brodie
M y head was filled with everything Kye.
It turned a bit problematic when I was supposed to be making plans for the renovations and I realized I’d been staring at the list I kept on my phone for several minutes without seeing it. Instead, my brain was giving me a replay of the books he’d bought the previous day, the way he’d acted as if it was completely normal, and anyone would do it. But most of all, my wolf was flashing me glimpses of the way it had felt to wake up another morning with Kye wrapped around me.
I heard the telltale sound of a beater driving up to the house, so I put my phone back in my pocket and pushed away from the side of the truck I’d been leaning on.
Ben and Max were finally coming to visit, and we needed to have some hard talks about everything.
It was mid-afternoon, and the cleaning crew had finished work an hour ago. The people I’d hired to tear down the barn would arrive on Monday—expedited because I wanted that fucking building gone.
The car was around the same amount of junk held together by duct tape and hope than Kye’s, except this one was still running.
It stopped nearby, and I couldn’t help but to smile at the sight of my cousins as they got out.
They gave me almost identical grins. Most people thought they were twins even though Ben was a year and some change older. With their blond hair that curled a little around their ears and hazel eyes, they looked so similar that the only difference at first glance was the fact that Ben was a few inches taller than Max’s 5’8’’. They even had similar builds, with both being on the slimmer side but with the muscle tone that came from being born wolf.
“It’s so damn good to see you guys,” I said, grabbing them both into a hug.
We clutched each other for a while, the emotions running high in a good way for once on this property.
When I pulled back to look at them, there was no dry eye to be seen.
“Fuck we missed you,” Max blurted out, then burrowed back against me.
Ben smiled and wiped his eyes, always the more stoic of the two of them. He put a hand on his brother’s shoulder in support.
“I missed you guys, too.” It was the truth, I realized now. “I’m sorry I was away for so long.”
Ben shook his head. “We get it.” Then he glanced at the house and frowned. “None of us could’ve known it would get this bad.”
The door opened and Kye stepped out. He walked to the edge of the porch.
Max stepped back and moved closer to Ben.
“Kye, these are Max and Ben, my cousins,” I introduced them.
I could tell Max, especially, was taken aback by Kye’s looks. Ben went to shake his hand.
“Good to meet you,” he murmured, clearly feeling a bit awkward for a reason that became evident in Kye’s next words.
“Good to meet you too. Thank you for letting Brodie know my sister was held here,” he said in an earnest tone.
Max’s steps toward him faltered, but he caught himself at the last moment and went to shake his hand as well.
“We should’ve acted earlier, but we didn’t believe the rumors,” Ben, always the spokesperson of the two of them. “I’m sorry it took us that long to act.”
“Better late than never,” Kye replied easily, but I could tell he’d thought of that, too.
Max cleared his throat, his gaze anywhere but on Kye. “We didn’t come by often. Not even monthly. Tried to stay away….”
“And nobody blames you.” Kye walked down two steps so he could look the guys in the eye. “I don’t. Neither does my sister.”
As if on cue, the door opened again, this time with Carys peering out. She stepped out but stayed on the porch. Her gaze was conflicted, but then she smiled ever so slightly.
“I’m Carys.” She gave her full attention to both of the cousins in turn. “I don’t blame you for anything,” she said firmly, in a tone that brooked no argument. “I learned to know your dad, and I know why you didn’t come by more often and why it took you time to alert Brodie and his sister.”
Ben frowned. “I wish—"
“If wishes were horses, right?” she said, smiling sadly. Then she nodded decisively. “I’ll be okay. I promise. Just….” She glanced away and gnawed on her bottom lip.
The cousins stared at her, waiting for anything she might want to say.
After a few heartbeats, she turned her gaze to them, and I saw her steel herself. She straightened her posture and pulled back her shoulders. She appeared proud and capable in that moment, and both Ben and Max’s expressions suggested they would follow her through fire.
“Take care of yourself,” she told them. She smiled at me, then back at them. “If you’re part of this pack, then you make sure you’re the best you can be. I’m sure Brodie has some thoughts on how you can do that.” She took in a deep breath and let it out, then added, “Let’s not let Rusty’s legacy define us.” With that, she turned on her heel and slipped inside the house.
All three men turned to me, seeming a bit stunned.
“And that’s my sister,” Kye said, sounding proud but dumbfounded.
I chuckled. “She’s a great asset to the pack, as are you,” I told him. Then I concentrated on Ben and Max. “You two, let’s take a stroll.”
Kye took that as a dismissal, gave me a smile, and went after his sister.
I headed where the beginning of the perimeter path had once been. It wasn’t there now, it had overgrown and seemed barely trodden by my attempts to keep the territory guarded in the last few days.
Ben made a disgusted noise when he realized the state of it. “Jesus fuck… I know we’re not angels, but did those bastards even care?”
“I think they were more concentrated on cooking.” I snorted. “I didn’t plan any of this, as you know, but now that I’m here….”
“For what it’s worth, we’re glad you took over,” Max murmured quietly.
I patted his shoulder. It couldn’t have been an easy thing to admit for either of them, given that to “take over” I’d killed their father.
“What Max said,” Ben agreed. “Look, we know our dad was a piece of shit. Always knew it, right? But it took Mom leaving him for us to truly realize how bad he’d gotten.”
“How is she?” I asked.
Mickey had tried in our childhood, but she was too submissive of a wolf to have been able to do anything against her husband and alpha’s will.
“We finally managed to get hold of her a few days ago. She’s clean. Found a pack that takes in strays. I think she’ll be happy.” Ben shrugged. “She feels like shit that her leaving made him do what he did to Carys, though.”
I shook my head vehemently. “It wasn’t her that made him do anything.” I turned away so they wouldn’t see my face as I grimaced. “He’s the reason Bella left the pack when we were kids.”
Ben had been walking next to me with Max at our back, but now they both stopped.
“No,” Max whispered.
Turning back to make eye contact with both of them, I nodded seriously. “I don’t know how long it went on, but it started at some point after our mom died. I don’t think Mickey knew, though. Or maybe she suspected when Bella ran away, but it’s all bygones now.”
Ben wrapped an arm around his brother, and they stood in silence for a while. Sometimes it felt like they communicated without words. They’d done it a lot when we were kids. I’d always assumed it boiled down to their wolves being intrinsically tied to their sibling while living in such an unsteady pack.
We continued to walk in silence for a while.
“Are Carys and Kye staying?” Ben asked when we jumped over the shallow creek that ran through the property.
“Yes.”
“Good.” After a moment, he added, “I always felt weird about not having humans in the pack.”
“We’ve met others who have mixed packs and they have seemed more… balanced,” Max piped up.
“They’re assets to the pack.” I cleared my throat, because this was the harder part of the conversation to me. “Are you guys willing to be my betas?”
Max tugged at my jacket sleeve and we halted on the barely there path.
They looked at me seriously, then exchanged a glance, and Ben nodded for Max to speak.
“We want to come back home, if you have us,” he started, then sought more encouragement from his brother again before continuing. “But we think we’re not ready. Not like this.”
He gestured at the slight gauntness of his face, the telltale unkempt appearance that, while nowhere near as bad as Rusty’s betas or the man himself, was still noticeable if you knew them.
I smiled. “I have a proposition for you guys. I have a friend, his name is Rian. He’s filthy rich and he’s basically bankrolling everything we need to get the pack running.” I lifted a hand before they could speak. “He insists. The guy has the energy of a Golden Retriever puppy even though he’s nearly two hundred years old and a vampire.”
Their eyes widened and they glanced at each other, then back at me.
“Okay?” Ben seemed dubious.
“He’s my best friend. I trust him with my life.” I’d trust him with my mate’s life. “He knows someone back in Seattle who runs a rehab clinic for non-humans. He wanted to offer you guys a chance to go there for a month or two. All expenses paid, including getting you there.”
Ben grimaced. “That’s….”
“A lot,” Max concluded.
“It is. All he wants in return is for you to get clean and come back to be my betas. Protect this property with all you got.” I knew that would make their wolves perk up.
“Is he going to come here?” Max asked.
“Yes. But he’ll stay in Seattle until you’re ready to head back, just so you guys have someone that I trust there if you need him. He’ll visit you when you’re allowed visitors and such.”
They did their silent conversation thing again, then Ben nodded for both of them. “Okay. When?”
“As soon as you can. He’s got spots for you in the program.”
“How quickly can you get us flights?” Ben asked, smiling, with a new kind of hope in his eyes.
I hugged them both, then asked, “How about I give you Rian’s number and you call him while I check on those flights, eh?”
I took Max’s phone and put Rian’s number in, then gave him a heads up that we were calling him. Max put him on speaker, and I chuckled quietly at Rian’s excitement.
“Oh my deity, am I glad to hear from you guys!” he started the call.
The guys gave me a wide-eyed expression and I smirked.
“It’s good to hear from you, too.” Ben remembered his manners. “I’m Ben.”
“And I’m Max. Nice to meet you.”
“And I’m Brodie, but I’m going to check on the first flights we can get them on while you talk and we walk,” I concluded.
T he cousins didn’t stay for dinner but opted to go pack their bags instead. I’d told them I would take them to Pittsburgh to the closest airport that would give them a shorter flight and they’d tried to insist on going on a bus. Rian had even told us he’d pay for a cab, for fuck’s sake.
I put my foot down and told them that it was only a few hours drive each way. I could grab a few hours of sleep before I’d go get them around four in the morning, so they’d make the first possible flight out. I’d be back home for a late breakfast.
“But you’re leaving the pack for us. I’m not sure I’m comfortable with that.” Ben frowned as they were getting into their car.
I shook my head. “You’re missing the point. You two are pack.” That shut them up. Max’s eyes got a bit watery, so I added, “Besides, I’m the Alpha so what I say goes.”
They chuckled and drove off. Mission accomplished.
Since the family room was still a mess, although in a different way now, Kye, Carys, and I sat in the kitchen most of the evening. She cooked dinner while Kye concentrated on his “wolfy research” and I made plans for the renovations.
At one point, Kye moved his feet and bumped into mine under the table. Without looking up from his book, he left his foot against mine. I could see the tiny curl of the corner of his mouth though, and snorted softly.
I liked submissives that were a bit bratty, and he was starting to relax enough to show that in small ways. I hoped we could explore that more at some point once things settled a little.
After dinner, Kye dug out a deck of Uno cards from somewhere and we went to a three-way war. The game interspersed with laughter and the siblings swatting at each other made my whole being hum with happiness.
We wrapped things up around nine, so I’d have enough time to sleep before the drive.
“Oh, I’ll go grab something from my car,” Kye said when Carys headed up to shower first.
I followed him out, glancing up at the sky to see the moon phase. I felt it instinctively, of course, and it worried me a little that Ben and Max would only have a few days at the rehab place before the full moon.
Kye closed the car door around the corner and the dumpster, then walked to me with a bundle in his hands.
“What’s that?” I asked, nodding at it.
He unwrapped it and revealed a handgun.
Somehow that shocked me to the core. “I… uh….”
He grinned, his teeth glinting in the moonlight. “Don’t worry. I know how to use it and I follow a strict safety protocol.”
I hadn’t been around weapons much. Werewolves and vampires didn’t need them, after all. Nobody I knew had ever had shooting as a hobby, either.
“Well, I guess it’s understandable you’d have one,” I finally blurted out.
He wrapped it up in the cloth again and shrugged. “I was never into guns and I’m not now, really. But then Carys went missing and….” He gave me a searching look. “Is it okay that I have it? Just for protection.”
It hit me that this was his way to keep his sister safe in my absence if it came to that. Before I had time to speak, he gave me a self-deprecating little smile.
“I know it won’t do much unless I hit someone in the head and if they’re not human, even that won’t necessarily stop them for that long, but….” He searched for words for a while. “This isn’t to kill anyone. It’s to give her time to run.”
The heartbreak in his gaze told me everything I needed to know, right then. He would do anything for her. Anything at all to keep what happened to her from happening again.
I closed the distance between us and hugged him. “You’ll be safe. I won’t be gone for long. You lock the front door and block the bedroom door with the dresser, and you’ll have enough time to act if it comes to that.” I kissed his head. “It won’t, but just in case.”
“Just in case,” Kye agreed.
We went inside and he hid the gun in the bedside table drawer on my side of the bed. Carys wouldn’t look in there.
“We’ll need to have a better place for it,” I told him quietly as the shower turned off in the bathroom.
“A gun safe would be great to have.” His cheeky little grin made me roll my eyes fondly.
“I wonder where you’d get one of those.”
“I dunno,” he deadpanned, then snickered.
We took turns showering, and then went to bed. Carys was out like a light, her psyche was still healing—she and Kye were going to look into therapists the next day—and I tried my best to settle as well.
I couldn’t, though. I had a shower fresh Kye next to me, his natural scent mingling with some herby shower gel that was one of the milder ones that people who lived with wolves often used. I’d seen the bottle in the shower. It was a new one, which meant he would’ve bought it when they went shopping together.
I wondered how much of the fluttery, falling-for-him feeling was the mate bond and how much came from the fact that he was wonderful. He was physically appealing to me, of course, but he was also such a good, thoughtful person.
Sighing, I turned to lie down on my back.
“What’s troubling you?” Kye whispered quietly.
He moved closer to me until I lifted my arm so he could cuddle against my side and put his head on my shoulder.
“Nothing,” I murmured back and squeezed him closer. “Not anymore.”
He thought about my response for a few seconds, then lifted his head to make eye contact.
The light that we always had on during the night illuminated his features. He seemed to be considering something, then his shoulder jerked up a little as if he was shrugging.
Before I knew it, he’d pressed his lips to mine in a chaste kiss.
I let out a quiet, wounded sound and had no way to prevent my whole being from latching onto the connection. My fingers slid into his hair, my hand cupping the back of his head as I held him to my lips.
Neither of us tried to deepen the kiss, but we stayed like that for several seconds, just concentrating on the sensation.
Then I pulled my hand back and opened my eyes. He opened his at the same time, and we smiled at each other a bit stupidly.
He lowered his head back to my shoulder, then moved until it was on my chest before wrapping his arm around me.
“Good night,” he whispered.
“The best,” I whispered back.
I could feel his silent little chuckle in the vibration of his body against mine, and closed my eyes, smiling. The happiness in my chest, in my wolf, was indescribable.