Chapter 8
“Y’all home?” Ronan called out, tapping on the door of Brandt’s home.
“Come on in!” Brandt answered.
Ronan opened the door and peeked around its edge into the room. He laughed when he found Brandt seated in the middle of the living room having a mani-pedi and a complete makeover.
“Hey! Don’t be laughing. I’m willing to bet I got prettier fingernails and toenails than you do,” Brandt said.
“You’d win that bet,” Ronan said, as he closed the door behind himself.
“Stop talking Unca Bant. I putting ya lips on.”
“Oh, okay. Sorry,” Brandt said, puckering up so the little girl could plaster bright pink lipstick across his lips.
“Where is your momma?” Ronan asked.
“Her’s frowing up.”
“Ohhh. Well, that explains it,” Ronan said.
“Daisy’s sick as a dog with all day and night twenty-four hour sickness instead of morning sickness, so we’re watching Penny and Carson for the night to give them a break.
Tempest ran over there when Charlie called to ask about her helping Daisy out, and brought them back with her.
But at the moment, she and the boys are out picking up pizza, since we live in BFE and nobody delivers out here, and Penny decided to stay with me. ”
“And now you’re so beautiful,” Ronan said.
Penny grinned and immediately applied more lipstick to Brandt’s lips.
“Daisy's having a rough time of it, huh?” Ronan asked.
“Yeah. This pregnancy is worse than when she had Penny.”
“I’m sorry to hear that. I’ll have to go pay her a visit, see if there’s anything I can do to help out.”
“Don’t go tonight. Tempest just got her feeling better a couple of hours ago. She’s sleeping, hopefully. But I’m sure she’d appreciate seeing you tomorrow.”
Ronan nodded. “Alright. In the meantime…”
Brandt looked up at Ronan. “You want to tell me you worked out a deal with Emmalyn and ask when we can start on your house.”
“Why does nobody allow me to handle my own business?” Ronan asked, raising his hands in question.
“Everybody is always in everybody’s business around here. You know that.”
“Anyway, I’m taking the land between her house and the parking area. Leaving an acre next to her, the rest is mine. She won’t let me pay, but if you want some kind of payment for the land transfer, I’m prepared to pay it.”
“Don’t need it. The money to cover the land was already paid when Emmalyn bought it. She’s giving it to you, there’s no return of money to her, so it’s fine as it is.”
“Alright. If it changes, let me know. I’m supposed to sign the papers to transfer it to my name in the next day or two.”
“Sounds good. Glad you’re coming home, and glad you’re building a life here. It’s why I bought the land originally. Glad it’s serving the purpose I originally saw it for.”
“When can we start building?”
“You know it’s the slow season, so we can go ahead and get a jump on it in the next week or two. But I can’t just start putting things together. I need a blueprint. I need something to go by or we’ll all be building different things and not a one of them are going to match up.”
“I was thinking about it. I really like your parents’ house. The Acadian style. I don’t want anything as big as Havoc or Emmalyn have. It’s just not necessary. But I love your parents’ home. So, something along those lines,” Ronan said with a slight shrug and a raise of his eye brows.
“Three bedrooms two baths?” Brandt asked.
“Can we do four bedrooms and two baths?” Ronan asked.
“Sure. But I thought Giada only had two kids.”
“She does. But I’m thinking that I can use the fourth as an office while I’m finishing whatever schooling will be left. And if there’s ever another kid, we’ve already got the room. Just have to redecorate it.”
“We can do that.”
“I’ll help, you know that.”
“I figured you’d want to be involved. But you’ll only be there when you’re not in school, so I want to be sure we get it right,” Brandt said.
“Every minute I can be,” Ronan said.
“Were you able to get all your credits transferred to Tulane?”
“They don’t leave a damn thing for me to share, do they? You know about Giada. You know about transferring to Tulane. You know about me and Emmalyn and the land.”
Brandt adapted a booming, all-knowing voice. “I am Brandt — the Alpha — I know all!” he said dramatically before he started laughing.
Ronan laughed, too. “I’m temporarily registered to start classes in a week, on a probationary basis.
Once all the necessary documentation is received after everybody is back from holiday break, I’ll be moved to full-time, an official student in the master’s program.
After I achieve that, I’ll start on my doctorate. ”
“As long as you don’t let it go.”
“Oh, no. I’m definitely going to achieve it all. I just have to readjust things.”
“I understand. Now, tell me why you’re wanting the safest place for your mate and her kids. What’s that situation?”
Ronan sighed. “I honestly don’t know it all. But I know that she’s terrified to let anybody in. I barely convinced her to have dinner with me earlier this evening. If she hadn’t realized my mother is my mother, I don’t think she would have.”
“You’re kinda getting ahead of yourself, then, don’t you think?”
“No, I don’t think that. I think that preparation is the best plan in all things. Even in this.”
“Alright. Tell me what else you know about her situation.”
“One of her boys told me that ‘Daddy hurt Mommy’.”
“Ohhh. Okay. So we got some killing to do,” Brandt said.
“Yep.”
“What else?”
“She was trying to convince me that I didn’t want to be anywhere around her. She said that if they’re found things could get really dangerous, hoping that it would keep me away. She also said that she’s afraid to even enroll the boys in school because if she does she’s afraid they’d be found.”
“So, she ran from their father, presumably her husband, and she’s been in hiding ever since,” Brandt said.
“That’s my take on it,” Ronan said.
“And she don’t know she’s yours.”
“Not yet. I was trying to earn her trust, or at the very least her tolerance before I did the whole, ‘You’re mine and I will not take no for answer’ thing.
I figured an obsessed male is the last thing she needs to contend with.
Not that I’m obsessed, but I’m kind of obsessed, you know what I mean? ” Ronan said.
“Only too well.”
“What’s plan B if plan A goes to shit?”
“I don’t really have one. I’m thinking I’ll move them into Remi’s with me, and we’ll just go from there.”
“That’s not plan B. That’s what you’re planning regardless, to have them there until your house is ready, right?”
“Yeah.”
“What are you going to do if she gets spooked and runs? What are you going to do if her husband finds them?”
“Track her down, come clean about what we are and what she is to me — if nothing else it’ll prove I can protect her. And kill him sooner rather than later.”
“I suppose if she’s really hell bent against being with you, Tempest could erase her memory of you and what you and the rest of us are and let her go. She’d be relatively safe considering her husband would already be dead.”
“I don’t want her memory erased. I want her to know I’m here and how to find me if she needs me.”
“I understand that. But it might not be the best scenario.”
“How would she know to come back if she doesn’t remember me?”
“If she doesn’t stay, Ronan, what makes you think she’s coming back?”
Ronan’s jaw hardened as he rolled Brandt’s question around in his head for a moment or two. “I have no answer for you. I just know that I don’t want to be erased from her memory if she doesn’t accept me, even if she knows what I am.”
“Hopefully it won’t come to that. If it does, we worry about it then. But you know I will not leave us vulnerable in any way. If she runs from you, with information on what we are, that could make us vulnerable.”
“She won’t.”
“Hopefully not. Now, have you told your parents?”
“Yes. Mom is on board with it. Dad, not so much.”
“Why?”
“I don’t really even know. Because he thinks I’m not going to finish school. Because he thinks I’m in over my head because she’s older than me and has kids? Because he knows she’s hiding from something? Pick one.”
“Knowing what we all know about your dad and his past, I’m pretty sure he’s not really bothered about her age and her kids. I’d bet on the other two things.”
“Regardless, I don’t care.”
“Maybe you can mention it to those of Kaid’s clan that are regularly around the shelter, or ask your mother to. They can help you keep an eye on her and make sure she’s okay until things between you are settled.”
“Yeah, I think I’ll do that.”
“The rest of us will of course do what we can and more, but they’re the ones who are volunteering at the shelter most often, so they’d be there more than we are.”
“I’ll definitely let them know.”
“Good. In the meantime, I’ll talk to my dad and find out if he’s got blue prints of his house. If not, we’ll draw up a set including the extra bedroom and get to work as soon as we can get the materials delivered.”
“Thanks, Brandt. I appreciate it. I’ll get to the bank tomorrow and see if I can take out a loan. I’ve got some cash saved up. Even with what I took out to pay for the upcoming semester today, it’s still a healthy balance. If I leave it there, hopefully they’ll give me a loan against it.”
“Maybe. If not, we can swing it until you can start making payments.”
“I don’t want to do that,” Ronan said.
Brandt shrugged. “How do you think I pay for the guest houses I built when I first bought this place, and still build so we have extras for family to stay in when they come visit?”
“I figure you’re doing well. Eventually I will be, too, but I don’t want to accept charity. I’ll pay for it.”
“I know you will. And this ain’t charity. This is family helping family, knowing eventually you’ll make the loan from us good. Don’t go to the damn bank. We got this. You got this. It’s just that you don’t have to pay us in advance.”
“I don’t feel good about this.”
“Why shouldn’t we help you when we’ve helped everyone else? Too damn proud, just like your father and your brother.”
Ronan laughed. “I just don’t want to be a burden, and I want to pay my own way.”
“You are not a burden, Ronan. We’re glad to have you home. And you’ll pay your own way. Just not right away. Besides, it’s not going to cost what you think it will because we get builder pricing on everything.”
They heard the car pull up outside and just minutes later the sound of footsteps coming up the steps as Tempest and the boys made their way upstairs.
The door opened and Carson led the way in, opening the door for Tempest since she was carrying the pizzas.
“Hi, Uncle Ronan,” Carson said, in his ever even tone.
“Carson! How are you? I haven’t seen you in forever!”
“Cahson, I can paint your nails,” Penny said.
Carson looked at his little sister like she’d grown two heads. “No.”
“Unca Bant did!”
“Then you don’t need to do mine,” Carson said, waiting for Tempest and Eli to come in so he could close the door.
“I thought that was your truck,” Tempest said as she walked in and went straight to the kitchen table to put down the four pizzas she carried. She came back into the living room and hugged Ronan, before she glanced over at Brandt.
She burst out laughing. “Oh, you look good.”
“See!” Penny said to Carson.
“No,” Carson repeated.
“But whhhhhyyyyyy?” she whined.
“Because then I have to get it all off. And the stuff that removes it makes my fingers burn,” Carson explained.
“Ooo, you might be allergic to it, baby. You better be careful with that,” Tempest said.
“I’m trying. But she doesn’t understand,” Carson said.
“Mom! You forgot the cheesy bread sticks!” Eli said, finally coming though the door carrying them, too.
“I did! Thank you for remembering, sweetie,” she said.
“I got the spaghetti sauce, too,” Eli said, carefully balancing two small containers that obviously held something red.
Carson waited until they were both in the house, then closed the door. ‘It’s marinara sauce.”
“It’s red, and it’s just like the spaghetti sauce.”
“It’s still called marinara,” Carson insisted.
“Eli, put the bread sticks over on the table, along with the marinara spaghetti sauce,” Tempest said, when he tried to divert toward his bedroom with them.
“But, Mom, we have two bags! And two sauces!”
“And there are twice as many of us this evening. Put them on the table.”
“They're my favorite,” Eli said, pouting a little.
“Yes, I know. And you’ll have some. But you’re going to eat pizza, too.”
“Fine,” Eli said. After putting the bread sticks and sauce on the table, he walked over and flopped onto the sofa. He took a good look at his father, then at Ronan, with his brows raised in a perfect recreation of the expression Brandt wore whenever he was thinking ‘you see this shit?’.
Ronan started laughing.
Brandt started laughing.
Even Eli cracked a smile.
“Everybody better be good or I’ll let Penny do your makeup next,” Tempest said.
“Please be bad,” Penny said, clapping her hands right in front of herself with hardly any sound at all.
Tempest rolled her eyes as she set out paper plates and cans of soft drinks. She put a large piece of pizza on each, then opened the cans and set one by each plate. “Dinner’s ready!” she called out.
The kids rushed the table and chose a place to sit.
Eli immediately realized there was no cheesy bread stick on his plate.
Tempest addressed it before he even had a chance to complain. “Help yourselves to the bread sticks, guys. But eat your pizza first.” Once her orders were given, she sat down near Brandt and looked over at Ronan. “I heard you were thinking of staying. Is it all worked out?”
“It is.”
“Good. We miss you. It’ll be nice to have you around.”
“I’m feeling really good about the whole thing,” Ronan said.
“Then stop worrying. It’ll all work out.”
“I hope so. I’m just not sure how to move forward with Giada. She keeps trying to shut me down.”
Tempest shrugged. “Valentine’s day is coming up. Maybe you can invite her out for Valentine’s day.”
“That’s not a bad idea,” Ronan said.
“Of course, not. It’s my idea,” Tempest said, waggling her eyebrows.
“Listen to her, she knows shit,” Brandt said.
“Oh, I know only too well,” Ronan said.