Their Pup to Tame (The Lactin Brotherhood #33)

1. Aspen

ASPEN

“Thus, we conclude this week’s Dungeons and Kitten campaign with our faithful party of miscreants and malcontents bedded down beside The Disenchanted Forest,” Dorian declared.

“Just remember that you’ll all need to roll a saving throw at the beginning of the next session to see if you made it through the night without being harassed by flying foxes and trash pandas. ”

As we gathered our dice and secured them in Crown Royal pouches, I was ready to do battle with far more than sentient winged foxes with klepto tendencies and a marauding band of thieving racoons

Non-gamers will never know the frustration of designing a character to your exact specifications only to have a tragic incident catapult you right back to square one.

It sucked, which wasn’t even a strong enough word.

“Why is it that every cute thing in this game is hell-bent on killing our party?” Parker grumbled.

“Because our best friend is a sadist,” I pointed out, since he seemed to have forgotten that unseemly quirk about Dorian.

“No, he’s not,” Murry declared. “He’s too sweet to be a sadist.”

“To you two, maybe,” I muttered. “But only because he’s your Daddy. To the rest of the world, he is the embodiment of cruelty and the bringer of abject misery.”

“Wow, talk about character assassination,” Dorian complained. “I’d better count myself lucky that I already collared these guys, or you and Parker might scare them off with all of this talk about me being a dastardly fiend from the fiery pits of Hades.”

“You know what you did,” Parker hissed, side-eyeing him on his way out to the elevator.

I was relieved when Parker didn’t hit the button, since I needed to talk to him before he took off.

“What?” Dorian asked as I shot him the stink eye.

Our characters would have bedded down safely at the inn four miles back up the windy road we’d been traveling on, but no, none of the intel he’d allowed us to gather said anything about flying foxes that pillaged characters’ weapons while they were sleeping or the trash pandas who stole everything that wasn’t nailed down.

What were we thinking when we decided, as the biggest party of dumbasses to ever venture forth on a quest, not to take turns standing guard while the rest of the party slept?

It just showed how badly we’d been suckered by the cute aspect of damn near everything in this game.

I’d sent Parker countless memes with bears and big cats, suggesting that my death would come during an attempt to pet one, just to show him exactly what was in store for us if we didn’t start respecting what these adorable floofballs could do.

I hurried to catch up with Parker at the lift, hoping for a few minutes of privacy before Phoenix joined us.

If he joined us.

Damn.

Fuck leaving. We could just stand here all night as far as I was concerned. I could barely tear my eyes away from the sight unfolding in front of me to glance at Parker, whose mouth was half-hanging open.

“You’ve Got Another Thing Comin’” pulsed from the smart speaker while Raleigh and Phoenix danced like they were on stage at the strip club they both worked at.

When Murry joined them, I could see why he and Raliegh had been the biggest draws in the place before they’d quit to model pet gear for Dorian.

I’d known Phoenix was a dancer before he’d started bouncing at the club, but until now, the only moves he’d shown me were when he was striding down a runway, acting as Raleigh and Murry’s handler when they modeled Dorian’s gear.

I waited until the song was over and the trio collapsed against one another, laughing about something, to turn my attention to Parker, who still hadn’t picked his jaw up off the floor.

“Did you see the bruises on Phoenix’s neck?” I hissed the moment I had his attention.

“Yup, and the ones on his knuckles too,” Parker growled. “Seems like every time he shows up for game night he’s got a new mark on him.”

“What the fuck do you think is going on down at that fucking strip club?” I grumbled. “I know his family runs the establishment, but I wish they’d do something about the rough element the doorman is letting in there. This is getting ridiculous.”

“He did say something about an influx of out-of-towners these past few weeks,” Parker pointed out.

“That’s right, some kind of tech seminar and trade show,” I remarked. “I’d forgotten about that. He was bitching about all the yuppies coming in with attitude and no home training.”

“If they’re the cause of the rash of bruises all over him, then I hope they hurry the hell up and take their business elsewhere or, better still, take all their gadgets and apps down the road and peddle them there,” Parker said, casting a glance at Phoenix as if to ensure he wouldn’t accidentally overhear our conversation.

“Do you think he’ll tell us what happened if we ask? ”

“Doubtful. He’ll probably just brush it off like the last time I asked,” I said, leaving out the part about my plan to catch a ride and a nightcap with him later in the hopes that Phoenix would open up when we were alone.

“I’ve got half a mind to start going down to that strip club and hanging out,” Parker declared. “And I don’t mean for the entertainment.”

“You just remember one thing,” I hissed.

“What’s that?”

“If we both get arrested, we’ll have to deal with Dorian when he comes to bail us out,” I reminded him. “Knowing him, he’ll take great pleasure in never allowing us to live that down, so if something does happen, you feel free to jump in; I’ll come sign the bond if you get hauled out of there.”

“And why am I the one elected to throw hands?” Parker asked.

“Because mine are far too delicate, as you well know, and besides, you know how,” I reminded him, feeling smug when the smile slipped off his face as his shoulders slumped, mere inches away from admitting defeat.

“Uh-huh,” Parker remarked, glowering at me, “and you have taught classes in how to disarm grown men armed with all kinds of instruments of pain and destruction.”

“True, but shhhh…that’s supposed to be a secret.”

“From the bad guys, yes. From your friends, why hide it?”

“It just hasn’t come up yet,” I grumbled.

“Well, maybe it should,” Parker declared. “At the very least, he might let you teach him a few moves to help get the idiots out of there faster.”

“I wouldn’t want to overstep,” I explained. “Not when I’ve finally gotten him to stop calling me sir for all the wrong reasons.”

“You do know you’ll have to retrain him all over again to get him to say it for the right ones, if he chooses you, anyway.

Personally, I’m holding out hope that he’ll choose me.

Just thought I should mention that formally so there would be no miscommunications between us,” Parker explained.

“I’m coming to enjoy my chats with him as well as our game nights together, and I can tell by how flustered you are over those bruises that you feel the same.

Once, I’d have almost thought that he…well, that’s neither here nor there now, is it? ”

“Hard for me to say when you didn’t finish your statement,” I reminded him.

Our eyes met, and his lips parted, but before words could spill out, his expression changed.

I’d spent enough time in enough theaters to tell when something was taking place just out of view, so I smothered my frustration beneath a grin, because if he’d been about to say what I hoped he was about to say, the answer was yes and a long time coming.

“Do I even wanna know what fuckery you two are hatching over here?” Phoenix asked when he reached us. “And please say it’ll help us deal with the threat of the flying fox and trash panda brigade if they show up.”

“Something like that,” Parker muttered as he hit the button to summon the lift.

“Are you in a hurry to get home tonight?” I asked Phoenix as soon as the door closed behind the three of us.

“Nah, I’m off tomorrow, so I’m probably gonna flop on the couch and watch television until I pass out with it watching me,” Phoenix admitted.

“In that case, would you mind giving me a lift?” I asked. “I’ve got Cherry 7-Up cake in the fridge and a whole unopened jar of maraschino cherries if you’d like to have some with me.”

“Whoa, that sounds delicious.”

“I’ll even whip up cherry-blackberry refreshers and spike them to sweeten the deal,” I offered. “We can see what’s streaming if you’d like to stick around for a while?”

“Why does the whole Cherry 7-Up cake thing feel like a ploy to get another ride on my Harley?” Phoenix muttered as the door to the lift opened to let us out.

Parker snorted and moved aside to let us leave first.

“No one asked for your two cents,” I muttered, elbowing him in the side as I stepped past him.

“Doesn’t matter,” Parker replied with a grunt. “I felt that the moment called for it anyway.”

“You two used to date, didn’t you?” Phoenix asked, a knowing smirk on his face as he leaned against one of the display racks, watching us.

“If you knock that thing over, you’ll be the one rearranging it in the morning,” I warned him, prompting him to straighten up and check to make certain he hadn’t displaced anything.

“Date, as in actually keep the plans we made to go out one on one?” Parker grumbled. “No, we were never mature enough for that. But we’ve known each other for what feels like forever and spent enough time together that people have occasionally mistaken us for an old married couple.”

I held my hand up, pointing at my ring finger. “You see this? Total blank canvas. Until it’s sufficiently adorned, I’m nobody’s house queen.”

Phoenix’s eyes glittered as he chuckled, shaking his head at us when Parker eyed me up and down.

“Even with it sufficiently adorned, I could never see you being anyone’s house queen,” Parker declared.

“Right answer,” Phoenix blurted at the same time as I did.