Brock (7 page)

“His father didn’t know he was any different and yelled at him for coming
into the house as a cat. He told his son then that he’d found him a mate that would bear him children and he’d forget the nonsense with the tiger. As he stood before the son, he noticed that he was different and dropped to his knees to beg him to tell him it wasn’t true. His son left the home he’d grown up in and lived with his mate. It was their child, a human-born child, that started our family. A human child born of two wild tigers.”

She read the last line three times before she looked at him. The hair on her arms danced as he starting typing again. She wanted to close the
connection; she wanted to tell him she didn’t want to know any more when he looked at her again. The words on the screen seemed to scream at her to read them.

“Every few generations a child is born that is stronger than the rest. He is
bigger than his siblings, as well as more aggressive. They are always male, and they usually end up being the enforcer of the streak, or at times the male. And according to the story, this male never finds his mate. And if one ever did, the teller of this tale believes that they will breed a cat that will be a ruler of our kind.”

He told her to open the file he sent her
, and she shook her head. “Please, Em. I need for you to tell me if this is the cat that Brock became when he shifted that day. I need you to tell me if you saw anything like this in Brock.

The first picture was that of a man. He looked like he could have been Brock’s twin but for his size.
Brock was taller and much wider. The next picture was of a tiger, and her breath caught when she looked at him. She looked at Keith, who was only half there because the picture had taken up that much of the screen. She nodded once.

“I knew it.”
He smiled at her. “I just knew it. Brock is that cat. He’s the only one in all our history who has ever found his mate. Christ, Em, do you know what that means?”

“It means that Brock
is meant for greatness.” He nodded and smiled at her. She nodded back and told him she had to go. He was still typing when she closed the computer. Em was suddenly more afraid then she’d ever been.

Moving through the house
, she ended up in the kitchen again. As she sat down, a glass of tea appeared in front of her and she looked up at Jules. He smiled at her and took a pad of paper out of his pocket and began writing. She couldn’t think and most certainly didn’t want to speak to him.

“I came by to see if you wanted to go to my studio.” She frowned at him
, and he took back his pad. “I have a large studio near here and wanted to see if you wanted to hang out with me. I have a few things to pack up and send out to some buyers, and there are a dozen people running around like…come with me?”

She had an idea that he was an artist but
was not really sure what he did. There were flyers in Brock’s den as well as Alistair’s, but she’d never touched them after seeing Jules’s name on them. As he led her out to his car, she wondered if she should ask him and decided that it didn’t matter. She had to make sure that Brock was safe, and having her family so close was not a good thing. When they pulled up in front of a large metal building with several cars out front, she almost asked him to take her back. She didn’t want to be around people right now. But he opened her door for her and helped her out. She walked behind him as he moved to the door. She would only stay for a few minutes, she promised herself, and moved into the building as soon as he opened the door.

The place was much bigger than it looked.
She entered and was immediately struck by how clean it was. The desk was manned by a woman who looked like she could lift small cars by herself. He introduced her as Max the Bear’s wife. She took her hand when it was offered and felt a small connection form. Before the woman could say anything, if she was, Em found herself being moved into a large open area that was simply chaos.

But the more she watched the people move
, she thought it was more of a dance. One where the product, whatever it was, moved from one side of the room where she couldn’t see it to the other where two men were forming wooden boxes around it. She was moved once, and then when someone moved her again, she pressed herself against the wall and stared. Jules handed her another note.

“They’re packing my pottery up for a show that’s coming up in a few weeks. This stuff is going to New Orleans for one of the largest shows I’ve ever done.”
He handed her another flyer, and this one told the reader that J. L. Golden was going to be the premier show caser, and that tickets were still on sale. He took it from her when she pointed to the ticket price, and he marked through it and wrote, “sold out.” She smiled at him, and felt very proud to know such a famous person.

He took her arm
, and she noticed that like the other men she’d come in contact with, he was careful only to touch her clothes. She’d asked Rayne about that and she said it was easier to wash out their scent from the clothes than it was their skin. She said that Brock, like all the others in the streak, were very protective of what they considered theirs. She said that few if any other males would touch her without asking Brock first…unless, of course, they wanted to die or wanted to piss him off. Brock had been doing it to her and Neal for weeks now, Rayne told her.

“Every
time he comes near me, he would touch my neck or my face. Used to piss Neal off to no end every day. But now that I think about it, he’s not done that.…” Rayne smiled. “Not since you and he bonded, he hasn’t. I guess I owe you something. Not that I didn’t enjoy being marked by Neal every night, but he was getting to be a tad more aggressive about it.”

Jules
took her into a smaller room and showed her some of his work in process pieces. She recognized his design and marveled at the larger pieces that he still had to finish. He wrote her so many notes that she was sure he was getting tired of telling her everything and wrote that to him.

“Are you kidding? I’m having a blast. My family is bored with me bringing them out here to show them something.
Having someone who’s never seen my work is refreshing.” She nodded at him and smiled. “Besides, Brock will be pissy when he comes back and smells me on you. Neal asked me to take over with you what Brock was doing to Rayne. It’s more fun than I thought it would be.”

She shook her head when he pulled on her ponytail and then ran his hand down her arm. She knew what he
was doing and thought if the man wanted to play with fire, who was she to stop him? When he put his cell phone to his ear, she wandered away. A few minutes later, he touched her arm and all his humor was gone. She waited for him to tell her, but he only handed her the phone. Not sure what to do with it, she looked at it and nearly fell over. It was her father and Shawn coming out of a house covered in blood. She watched his mouth as he took back the phone.

“I think she knows them.” S
he nodded. “She does. Hang on, let me see if I can find out. Can you give me their names for the police where this was taken?” She took out her own pad and wrote down their names. She knew it was from Brock and wanted to ask Jules if he would tell him to come home to her. But she knew that if he did, he’d tell her to stay and she had to let him become great. And being great with her around wasn’t going to happen.

Jules read the name of her brother and father. He nodded once and closed his phone. When he opened it a few seconds later and handed it to her
, she thought it was going to be another picture. He mouthed “Brock” and she looked down at the screen.

“I love you,” it said
, and she started to cry. “I will be home tonight. I miss you. And want to hold you.”

“I miss you too and
….” She wasn’t sure if he really loved her or not, but she typed the words on the tiny keyboard. “I love you as well. But your brother said you are deemed for something special. I should go before it’s too late.”

“I will only be special with you by my side. I cannot
—
will
not—live my life without you beside me. I love you, Emma Cole, and when I get home, I’m going to show you just how much.”

She
felt her body react to his statement and hoped he meant what she thought he did. She glanced up at Jules as he talked with the woman from the desk. When she looked down at the keyboard again, she nearly fumbled it.

“Will you be my wife?” It appeared twice more before he typed her name with several question marks.
Before she could think out to answer, he touched her mind.

“Marry me.”
She nodded and realized he couldn’t see her, and told him she’d think about it. When he growled, she laughed, and suddenly she felt his touch along her skin like he was standing next to her.

“Marry me
, and when you say ‘I do,’ I’ll take you into our backyard and let you run naked in the woods while my cat hunts for you.”
She moaned.
“Christ, baby you have no idea how much I want you right now.”

“Not nearly as much as I want you
here now. Hurry home, Brock. I need you here with me.”
He asked her again if she’d marry him. “
Yes; if you still want to marry me after my family leaves, then yes, I’ll marry you.”

She felt his love wrap around her
, and she knew that he really did love her. She handed Jules back his phone. He took her to his wheel and showed her how he made his art, but she was only about half paying attention. She was thinking up all the ways she was going to welcome Brock home. And what a home coming it would be.

Chapter
7

Brock decided to drive by the site that the boys were supposed to clean up on his way home. He pulled in and knew that it was a mistake, and actually almost went home to do it in the morning. But he was there and got out of his truck and walked to the building.

The lights on the second floor startled him
, but the smell of ammonia had him sneeze twice before he could stop it. Moving up the stairs, he pulled out his gun and held it to his side as he moved to the room where the lights were.

Someone was scrubbing the walls.
Brock stepped into the room cautiously and saw that while the kid was alone, he had a set of headphones in his ears, and even from where he was standing ten feet away, he could hear it blasting in the kid’s head. He watched as the kid scrubbed at the blood on the wall.

What was written there now
was new. The statement that had been put there before was on the wall closest to him and that wall was cleaned of the blood. He tried to read what it might have said and all he could see was a few words, but he got the meaning. More crap about the underdog and persecution. When the kid—Donny he realized his name was—bent to dip his rag in the bucket, he must have seen Brock because he jumped back and fell against the wall. He pulled the headphones out immediately.

“I was working on getting it cleaned up like you said.”
Brock nodded but didn’t put this gun away just yet. “They said they were going to keep it up until…I don’t want to go back there.”

“Back where?”
Brock moved into the room. In addition to the cleaning supplies he’d brought the first day they were to start the job, there was a sleeping bag and some clothes. He looked at the boy.

“They kicked me out.
My dad said that if I wanted to be a goody-two-shoes, I had to do it without living under his roof. They must have come here today while I was at school and put more blood on the walls.” Brock put his gun away but didn’t put the safety over the handle.

“How long have you been staying here?”
He told him four days. “And they know you’re here?”

“Yes, sir.
My dad said that no son of his was…I was going to leave when you okayed what I’d done. I don’t know where yet, but I was going to go.” He looked at his things, then at him again. “You think it would be okay if I stayed another night? I swear to you I won’t do anything to harm your building.”

Brock looked at the wall that had been painted with blood before. It was about as pristine as he’d ever seen it. Even the rug surrounding the area had been cleaned pretty well
, and there were three large trash bags sitting next to the door. He looked back at Donny.

“Did your brother help you at all?
I mean other than repainting the walls with pig’s blood?” Donny shook his head. “I want to help you kid, I really do. I know your dad is having some problems, but kicking out his own son goes over the line. Especially when you were ordered to do something by law that…you had nothing to do with the wall in the first place, did you?”

“I was here
, but no, sir, I didn’t do anything.” He started picking up his things. “I’ll come by after school tomorrow and finish up. You might want to put someone here to watch it. I don’t think they’re finished—”

The noise in the lot alerted them.
Brock put his finger to his lips and waved Donny into the corner where it was darkest. Brock went to the other side of the door and waited for the Owens to come up the stairs. He had no doubt who it was. While they were seemingly staggering up the stairs, he reached for Ryland to tell him what was going on and that he had someone there with him.

“You need to call the police and send them to the building on Decker.
The vandals are at it again. And tell them I’m on site.”
He asked if he needed him to come there, he and Bronwyn were close.
“If you wouldn’t mind coming in behind them, I’d like that. The more the merrier I think. But tell Bronwyn that we do this my way and not hers.”

She touched his mind
then, and he felt her laughter.
“You think I would do anything less? Shame on you, Brock. I thought you knew that I have your best interest at heart.”

“I do. But
there’s a good kid with me, and I’m afraid for him. Can you, I don’t know, use your powers for good and protect him? He’s human.”
She told him she would and also told him that she was going to kick his ass.

Harvey came through the door first.
He was drunk. And when his son walked in…fell in actually…Brock knew that he was drunk as well, and both men were carrying bottles of beer. Junior called for his brother and snickered when he found the cleaning supplies. He tossed them to the bloodied wall as he spoke to his dad.

“Our little housewife has been busy again.
Should we help him keep working, or do you think that we should trash the place and him too?” Junior laughed. “I think we should find him a good husband so they can live happily ever after, like that shit he’s always reading about. Who the fuck is he fooling reading those books anyway?”

“
They’re not fairy tales. They’re mythology, and most of them ended in tragedy. You should leave before the owner shows up. He might be mad at us again.” Donny kept his distance, but Brock was still afraid for him. The kid had balls, he’d give him that.

“I have him. Brave kid. And he didn’t give you up.
You think he’s working on something?”
Brock told Bronwyn he thought he was.
“Then let him do it. Might help him out too. The boy has some major self-esteem issues.”

“You think I give a fly
ing fuck what the owner has to say to me? He fucking fired me without reason. He took away our house and our livelihood.” Harvey advanced on Donny but didn’t touch him. “You think I like living like we are, with no money and having to rely on welfare to survive?”

“Yes.”
Brock nearly laughed out loud when Donny answered him. “You and Junior spend all the money that comes on that card every month. You have money for beer and drugs when you want them, even though there’s no food in the house anymore. And just last month you bought that car from Dino. How did you do that?”

“You think we don’t have our resources?
Hell boy, where do you think we get it? We been robbing the rich and keeping the profits. Them Goldens don’t have a clue that we been getting in that storage building there on Tenth for months now and taken what we want.” He started toward the wall that Donny had been cleaning. “I told you not to clean this here art up. I even told you what would happen if you did, didn’t I?”

“The police said we had to do it or go to jail.”
His dad looked at him. “I don’t want to go to jail again. They aren’t nice to you.”

“They’re not supposed to be
, you idiot.” Junior sneered at his brother. “For all your smarts you’re pretty fucking stupid.”

“Hum, Brock, the police are on the lot and waiting.
Do you think you have enough to get their asses hauled off to jail yet?”
Bronwyn laughed.
“Ryland is ready to adopt the boy, by the way. And Alistair is on his way too. He seems to think he has something more to add to the already overpowering evidence to convict these idiots. Oh, and Em is coming with him. She was worried about you, and I told her that you were on a hot case.”

He’d gotten so wrapped up in this
, he’d forgotten to call her. He reached for her now.
“I love you. And I’m so sorry.”

She laughed.
“I love you as well. And you really messed up this time. I was naked and waiting for you.”

His cock hardened and nearly took him to his knees.
“Em, you’re going to pay for that. I’m working here, and I have a hard-on so bad right now that I can hardly think about anything but burying it in you so deep you scream out my name.”

“I was planning on that
, too. I even went into town and got some silk scarves. Rayne showed me where to shop. I got us a few other…toys to play with too. Are you going to be much longer?”

He was a dead man.
Growling at her had her giggle, and he nearly told Ryland to fucking forget it, that he was going to find his mate and take her. But he heard something that made his cat stir.

“You know them others that what’s been coming around, Donny? They said that if we help them get that new bitch at that
fucking flower shop that they’d give us riches we’d never spend in two lifetimes.” Junior nodded when Donny shook his head. “They got fangs, too. Did you hear me? Fucking fangs, and they said that if we got her, they’d make us like them.”

“Bronwyn, are you—
?”

“I heard
, and I’m calling in your brothers. And Alistair and Em are going to the main house now and not here. She’ll be safe there, and Neal is headed that way, too. Your mom is with Gabriella, and they’re aware that she’s coming. Don’t move…Brock, I can feel your cat. He’s being pissy again.”

He felt him
, too. He was trying to take him again, and Brock was losing the battle. His skin began to burn with the need to shift, and his canines began to drop. He worked feverishly to get his gun in his holster so he wouldn’t drop it. Then Em spoke to him.

“I love you. Think of me in our bed.
I had plans…I had plans to tie you to it and have my way with you.”
He asked her for more.
“I bought this cute little outfit that has barely any material to it at all. It was really expensive, but all I could think about was having you tear it from me. Shredding it into ribbons while you held me down on the bed. Then when you bent me over the bed and took me, I was going to play with my nipples and…and then I was going to take your cock into my mouth. Would you fuck me that way, Brock?”

His cat snarled at him
, but he could control him now. The more she talked, even if none of it was really making sense, he could feel his beast back down. His hands still trembled, but he no longer felt the need to kill. He felt Ryland touch his mind, and he told him he was fine to come on up, and suddenly the room was filled with cops.

~~~

Em paced the kitchen of the main house. She’d been there once before but wasn’t really thinking of this as a social visit. The others in the room seemed to be talking, but for the life of her, she couldn’t think of what they were saying. She turned to look at Rayne when she touched her arm.

“He’s fine.”
She nodded.
“You probably saved his life by what you did tonight. Had he shifted when he did, the police would have shot him without a doubt. How did you know what to say to him, and do we want to know what it was?”

She flushed
, wondering where what she’d said to Brock had come from. She’d bought herself the outfit, but for the most part, she figured she’d just show it to him and that would be enough. As for her wearing it, she wasn’t sure she’d be that brave. As for the rest, she was just saying whatever she could think of to get him to calm down. She looked at Rayne.

“He was having trouble controlling his animal. It wasn’t like the last time he
brought him out, but like the very first time. He was…not meaner, but more like he didn’t care what happened to him so long as…I guess so long as I was safe.”
She looked at Sandra.
“She said it’s because of the baby that was born long ago. She thinks that Brock has some of him in him.”

“Probably.
I heard the story too. And I wouldn’t doubt that somewhere along the line Brock picked up more than his share of him. And finding you is what kept him from getting hurt. You’re the first mate of any of the others. Because of you, he didn’t end up like his ancestors—dead because he shifted at the wrong time.”
She smiled at her.
“You should really learn to play poker. There isn’t a tell on you when you speak. For anyone looking at you, they’d think you were as serene as hell. But I know that there is all this panic going on in your head.”

“What do you mean?”
She looked around the room and wondered what they were saying about her.
“They think I’m not worried about him? I am. He’s everything to—”

“We can feel your fear and
anxiety. Humans? Never. Maybe not even other supernaturals. But you look as calm as if you’re reading a boring book, and nothing is written on your face. That will be helpful when you have to deal with your family, I think. A sort of scary power that you can use against them.”
She asked her what she meant.
“They’re going to come here. We all know that, you more than others. But they expect you to be afraid, terrified even, because they think they’re going to take you back with them. But you can stand there and pretend it doesn’t matter to you one little fuck, because really, it doesn’t matter. Don’t you see? No matter what they say to you, you can make them think you just don’t give a flying fuck. And that will piss them off. And pissed off beings are sloppy beings. And that, my dear sister, is when we’re going to get them.”

Em
thought about that after Rayne left her to sit at the table. She’d always been able to piss her family off when she’d pretended not to understand them. Even when she lived at home, the only one that had ever made any attempt to learn sign language was her mother, and she’d only done what she needed. Mostly commands, like set the table, shut up, and leave me alone. She looked at the people around the table fussing over the little baby, who was smiling.