Melonee Bracs Mistletoe Madness 30 (10 page)

Maverick took in deep breaths, telling himself he couldn’t kill his daughter’s mate, no matter how badly he wanted to. The Ultionem had already met when Maverick had discovered what was in Adam’s briefcase.

He had told Micah and Ludo to find out what they could about Adam Nyte, and the two sentries had gone through the human’s belongings to find the files on everyone in Brac Village. The Ultionem had voted against Maverick killing Adam—which he was still debating on whether he should listen to the other leaders or not.

What they had to figure out was how to get Mr. Kenyon’s eye off of Brac Village. Adam’s files were pretty damn detailed. That meant the head vampire hunter knew more than he should about Maverick and his town.

“Did you just say vampires?” Adam asked as he turned a little pale. “I could have sworn you just said vampires.”
“You’re a goddamn idiot,” Ruttford snapped at Adam. “Do you know what you’ve done?”
Even though Maverick wanted to pound Ruttford into the floor every time he either heard the man’s name or laid eyes on him, he liked that the elf knew how grave the situation was. He would never tell Ruttford that, though.
He would rather be beheaded than admit that Ruttford had just gained a small grain of respect from him.
“But he said vampire,” Adam repeated. “And what’s with his teeth?” Adam waved toward Maverick.
“You have no clue what’s going on here, Adam,” Melonee said. “You have no idea the crap you just stepped into. If Mr. Kenyon confirms his suspicion, Brac Village will be crawling with vampire hunters. What if he finds out there are more than vampires in the world? What if he finds out about the different preternatural creatures? We are so screwed.”
Maverick could hear the hurt in Melonee’s voice and knew she was still reeling from Adam’s betrayal. He wanted to gut the man for making his little girl angry. And she wondered why he was so against her mating these idiots.
Everyone thought him dimwitted in this house, which pissed Maverick off. He knew about Ruttford’s brother being held in one of the rooms. Did they think he wasn’t aware what went on under his roof?
Right now he would deal with Adam.
Then he would deal with Ruttford.
Then he would deal with everyone else who thought he was a fucking idiot.
“How could you do this to me, Adam, to us?” Melonee yelled as she fisted her hands at her sides. “How could you come into our town and think you could destroy it? What kind of monster are you? Don’t you know how hard it was to build this place up, to make jobs for the townspeople relying on my dad for their income? Who in the hell are you to come in here thinking you can take that away from us? You are one sneaky bastard, and I’m starting to regret mating you!”
That
, Maverick hadn’t known about. He threw his head back and howled as the three stared at him for a second and then took off from his office. He felt his timber wolf trying to break free as he tore from his office and chased them down.

Oh shit, oh shit, oh shit!
Ruttford could already feel his balls being torn from his body as he raced to get away from the alpha. He had told Melonee over and over again she needed to work on her subtlety.

And he couldn’t even shimmer his ass out of here.
“What’s going on?” Hawk asked as he walked out of the den. “Maverick just found out we mated Melonee!” Ruttford shouted

as he and Adam followed Melonee down the hall, racing to get away from Satan. He could hear Hawk curse as they rounded a corner and kept going.

“Wait!” Melonee shouted as she came to a skidding halt. “He’s not going to kill us.”
“Us?” Ruttford asked in astonishment as his eyes flickered toward the hallway he knew Maverick was coming down.
“Okay, me, but he won’t kill you two because I’ve mated you.”
“Are you willing to bet our lives on that?” Adam asked, looking as if he were about to faint.
“You are still in the doghouse,” Melonee snapped. “How could you?”
“I didn’t know you when I took the damn contract,” Adam defended. “And I sure as hell didn’t know about vampires and…what is Maverick?”
“A timber wolf shape-shifter that you just pissed off,” Ruttford said. “I can hold my own, able to defend myself in a fight, but even I’m terrified of that man. Do you know how damn big he is in his wolf form?” And Ruttford couldn’t shimmer out.
Fuck
.
The three spun around when they heard nails clicking on the wooden floor. Ruttford swallowed when he saw Maverick slowly come around the corner…in his wolf form. His head was hung low, his grey eyes filled with murder and locked onto Ruttford.
Pushing Melonee and Adam behind him, Ruttford stood in front of them, his arms out wide. “You can kill me, Maverick, but I won’t let you hurt them.”
The hallway seemed to flood with sentries as they surrounded Maverick. The wolf gave a low, warning growl, but the sentries didn’t budge.
“You can’t kill them,” Storm said as he stood in front of Ruttford. “Trust me, you’ll regret it in the morning.”
Maverick snapped his jaws at Storm, but never took his eyes off of Ruttford.
“You have to let her grow up,” Gunnar said. “You can’t keep her under your thumb forever.”
Maverick whipped his head toward the sentry, his growl growing deeper.
“Think about this,” Remi warned. “As badly as you want to mount their balls on your wall, you
will
regret it.”
Ruttford tried to keep Melonee behind him, but she shoved her way forward, dropping to her knees in front of the extremely large wolf, cupping Maverick’s face. Ruttford couldn’t breathe. She looked so small compared to Maverick.
“I love you, Dad. You took me in and gave me a home, showed me what being a part of this family was all about.” Melonee ran her hands through his fur. “I’ll always love you for that. I remember getting into so much trouble with you, the pranks we pulled, the fun we had staying up late and watching horror flicks.” Melonee wiped at her eyes and then hugged him. “I may be grown up now and mated, but that doesn’t mean we can’t still get into trouble and watch latenight movies. I want to live under your roof, but I can’t if you don’t accept my mates.”
Maverick nuzzled her neck and then moved forward to stand in front of Ruttford. He snapped his jaws, a loud growl rumbling up from his chest. Ruttford just knew he was about to be eaten. Maverick’s head was level with his. To stand there and stare the alpha in his face was truly terrifying. The fur around his muzzle crinkled as he bared his teeth.
It was not comforting that Maverick’s ears were laid back. Ruttford knew for a fact that meant the wolf was about to attack.
To his surprise, the horse-size wolf backed away. Ruttford wasn’t sure if he should be relieved or brace himself for an attack. He wasn’t taking shit for granted right now. He nearly collapsed in relief when Maverick disappeared around the corner.
“Go sit in the den until we are sure he isn’t going to kill you,” Kota said as the sentries strode away.
“What…in the fuck…was that?” Adam asked from behind Ruttford.
“My dad in a very pissed-off mood,” Melonee snapped as she walked away.

Adam sat on the suede sofa, trying to figure out how he was going to get out of this mess. When he had accepted the contract from Kenyon Corporation, he had no clue he was being used. It was all clear to him now. The reason the files were incomplete was because Les and Mr. Kenyon hadn’t a clue what was going on here. They had wanted Adam to fill in the blanks.

He was nobody’s lackey. Adam didn’t appreciate being used this way, any kind of way. But he wasn’t sure if saying he was nullifying the contract would work in this situation. There were bigger players here than Adam had ever come up against.
Vampire hunters? Really?

And what in the hell had Maverick turned into? Ruttford had said that Melonee’s dad was a wolf shifter, but
that
did not look like any wolf Adam had ever seen on television. He was so big that he looked like he could have swallowed them whole. Adam had never been that damn scared in his life.

And Kenyon had sent him here like a sheep to the slaughter. How in the hell was he going to get out of this?
“Who are you?”
Adam looked up to see twin boys staring at him. They both had dark-blond hair, but one had blue eyes while the other had grey. “I’m Adam.”
Adam had never dealt with kids before and felt a little awkward as they stood there staring at him. Where in the hell were Melonee and Ruttford? They were supposed to be in here with him.
“Are you here visiting?” the one with the blue eyes asked.
Adam clasped his hands together, glancing around as he nodded. “Sort of.” He wasn’t about to tell them he had been kidnapped.
“Sort of?” the grey-eyed one asked. “What does that mean?”
“It means Maverick thinks I should stay here for a little while,” he answered. He was a bit surprised when then gave him an
oh
look.
“He grounded you, didn’t he?” the blue-eyed one asked. “My dad grounds me and Matthew sometimes.”
“What about your mom?” Adam asked, trying to keep to topics they should be familiar with.
“We don’t have a mom,” Matthew, the one with the grey eyes, replied as he climbed up onto the couch next to Adam. “Just two dads.”
The twin brother climbed up on Adam’s other side. “How many dads do you have?”
Before today, Adam would have said this was the weirdest conversation he had had. But after dealing with Melonee and Ruttford, and then Melonee’s family, this was mild in comparison. It still shocked him that these two were being raised by two fathers. “One.”
“That’s weird,” Matthew replied. “Me and Maddox have a whole bunch of uncles, too.”
Adam couldn’t help it. “Any aunts?”
Maddox shook his head. “Nope, just Melonee. We have a sister, though.”
“Wanna see a trick?” Matthew asked as he scooted off the couch and pulled a deck of cards out of his back pocket.
“Sure,” Adam replied as he sat forward.
Matthew flipped the cards in his hand. They flew up into the air and then landed on the floor, scattering everywhere.
Adam waited for Matthew to finish his trick, but the kid just stood there. “What’s the trick?”
“It’s called fifty-two pick up. Uncle Tryck showed it to me,” Matthew announced proudly. “But I hate when I have to pick the cards up.”
He sounded so downtrodden that Adam moved from the couch, knelt on the floor, and helped the young kid pick the cards up.
“Thanks,” Matthew said when Adam handed him the cards he had gathered.
“I know a trick,” Adam said as he held out his hand. Matthew gave him the cards and took a seat on the couch with his brother.
“Show us,” Maddox shouted.
Adam chuckled as he shuffled the cards. “My grandfather taught me this.” Adam set half the deck aside, shuffled them some more, and then held them out to Matthew. “Pick a card.”
Matthew scooted forward and plucked one from the deck.
“Don’t tell me what it is,” Adam warned him. “Just look at it, remember what it looks like, and push it back into the deck.”
Adam smiled when Matthew concentrated really hard on the card in his hand, nodded, and then pushed it back into the deck. Shuffling a few times, Adam pulled a card free and flipped it over. “Is this your card?”
“How did you do that?” Maddox shouted as he bounced around. Matthew was looking at Adam like he was Harry Houdini.
“If I show you, you can’t tell anyone else.”
“We promise. We promise,” Maddox exclaimed excitedly.
Adam spent the next half hour showing them what his grandfather had shown him. The twins grabbed the other half of the deck, trying the trick out on each other until they got it right. A strange feeling came over Adam. It almost felt like pride as the two laughed and performed the card trick over and over again.
“You two causing trouble?”
Adam glanced up to see a man with short blond hair and a bit on the muscular side walk in. He had the same eyes as Matthew—a deep, intense grey. This had to be their dad.
“No,” the two answered quickly. “Adam was showing us a card trick.”
“Your dad is looking for you two,” the man announced. “I think he wants you to clean up your room.”
“Aw, man,” Matthew mumbled as he lowered his head and walked out, his brother close behind.
“Cute kids,” Adam replied as he took a seat on the couch.
“They’re a handful,” he commented and then stuck his hand out. “I’m Murdock.”
“Adam,” he replied as he shook Murdock’s hand. “Can I ask you something?”
Murdock shrugged. “Go ahead, although I can’t promise I’ll answer.”
“Fair enough,” Adam said. “Your sons are being raised by two fathers?”
Murdock nodded.
“What happened to their mother?”
“Nothing,” Murdock replied as he walked behind what looked to be a juice bar. He began to pull things down from a cupboard as he continued to talk. “Heaven is their father. He gave birth to all three of our children.”
Adam sat there in total shock. “A man gave birth?” That was totally impossible. Adam would have called the man a liar, but after what he had seen, he wasn’t so sure it couldn’t be true.
“It’s a long story,” Murdock said as he added some fruit to a blender. “But yes, a man gave birth.”
“That doesn’t freak you out even just a little?” It was freaking Adam out big-time.
“It did at first,” Murdock admitted. “But when it’s your mate, you learn to accept the unexplained. I love Heaven just as much today, if not more, than when we first met. Although,”—Murdock chuckled— “I thought Maverick was going to kill me when I first met Heaven.”
“I’m in the same boat.” Adam sat back, still unsure how he was going to get out of this mess.
“Do you know how to get out of trouble with Maverick and earn his respect?” Murdock asked as he added ice to the blender.
“No.”
“Fix the mess your damn self. Don’t wait on anyone to help you.” The blender began making a loud crushing noise as Murdock watched the ingredients mix together. How was he supposed to fix this mess himself when Maverick had him on lockdown? And how could Adam fix the mess when Mr. Kenyon was the leader of some vampire hunter group who was using him for information?
Vincent.
“Do you have a phone I can use?” Adam asked.
Murdock took his phone off his clip and tossed it toward Adam. “Don’t tell Maverick I let you use it, and don’t make me regret letting you make a call.”
Adam thought about Murdock’s twins and he knew he had to fix this. Somehow, in the short span that they were in the den, they had wormed their way inside of him.
For the first time in Adam’s life, he considered what it would be like to have children. He could honestly see starting a family with Melonee and Ruttford, and that thought was scary as hell, especially after the way his parents raised him. But after learning that it was okay to be with a man and a woman, that the people in this house not only accepted that, but lived alternative lifestyles themselves, Adam was kind of looking forward to the prospect of becoming a father. He was brought out of thought when the line clicked, but Vincent didn’t say a word.
“It’s me, Adam.”
“Little Bo Peep get lost?” Vincent asked.
“I need a favor.”
“I was already working on a favor for you.”
“This takes precedence.” Adam glanced at Murdock. “It involves my family.”