Trent (7 page)

“Yes.” Max thought he knew the voice. It was eerily
quiet on the other end, but he was pretty sure that Noah was calling him. “Who
is this?”

“Oh, I’m sure you’ve figured it out by now. Please
tell me that you’ve not forgotten our little play time together. I will be very
hurt if you have.” Max wanted to hang up, but fear made him pull the phone
tighter to his ear. “What do you think you’re doing, threatening my friends? And
lying too. You should know that liars always get what’s coming to them. And you
are one of the biggest ones I know.”

“Look, Noah. I don’t know what she told you,
but I just wanted to hire her as my...to come and work for me.” He had no idea
what the woman could do other than predict the market better than most men he
knew. But getting her in his home had seemed like a good plan at the time. “I
had no idea that she was related to you.”

“Then why did you tell her that you were
going to need to talk to me? What reason could you think that I’d want a thing
to do with any of your business dealings?” Max tried to think what he’d told
the woman when he’d seen her on the streets that day and again at the hospital.
“Come now, you must have had a reason to have one of your henchmen hold her
while you spit on her with your anger. Bad move on your part, that. You do know
that I can trace a man through his scent, no matter what he might have done to
his physical appearance?”

“What do you mean you can trace someone
through their scent?” He was trying to think if he’d ever heard that Noah was a
shifter, and hadn’t. The man was a recluse and a pain in his ass, but he’d
never known anyone to say he was anything but a human. “Did you have someone
take my DNA, Noah? Is that what you’ve done?”

“No, my dear boy. I tasted it. And that alone
gives me all kinds of information that most people I know would never have
realized about you.” Max tried to think what the fuck he was talking about when
he spoke again. “Being a vampire affords me all sorts of gifts that you should
be finding out about soon enough. But I will tell you right now, I have a memory
like a steel trap. You can change your looks, but I know you better than you do
yourself.”

The laughter echoed in his head long after
the man hung up on him. Max laid the phone back in the cradle, and his hands
shook. He also felt the beads of sweat as it rolled down his back and pooled at
his spine. He was in so much trouble here. More than he would ever thought he’d
be in. Noah Stark was a fucking vampire. And he knew everything.

~~~

Trent tried to make the stupid pole work, but
all he seemed to be able to catch was the trees around him or some hidden log
or weed in the bottom of the lake, just waiting to tangle him up. He looked
over at Joe when she laughed. Who would have thought that someone having fun at
your expense would make you feel so good?

“You’ve never done this before, have you?” He
shook his head and handed her his pole again. She had a magical touch with it.
Every time he was tangled, she just make a few adjustments and he’d be free to
get it messed up again. “How could a man that has such a lovely home here not
know how to do something as basic as fishing? Not to mention baiting a hook, or
even untangling a line when it is just above your head?”

“My dad tried to teach us when we were boys.
He’d haul us up here and we’d make a weekend of it. It never was a very good
adventure for us. We’d fight and whine and he’d end up coming out here to fish
on his own. I think it was simply a way to give my mom a break. She needed it
with us. Not to say that she didn’t love us, but I would imagine that six boys
running full tilt around a house would make any woman a little tense.”

He watched her rather than try to cast out
again. Twice now he’d had to go out into the warm water and retrieve his pole,
and both times she’d stood on the dock and laughed. Tomorrow they were going to
go out in the boat. He was terrified to think how that would end. Sure, the water
was warm and it felt good on his poor beaten body, but he just knew he was
going to tip them and he’d drown her trying to save her. He wasn’t the
outdoorsman type.

“When Noah and I were on the run, we’d do
this for my food. It was less fun then, wondering if I’d be able to get a meal
or not.” She cast her line in and watched the tiny bobber on the end as she
continued. “Then one night while I slept, he went into town and got me some
food. I woke the next morning to eggs and other treats that we usually could not
have carried with us after we fled his home. It was hard at times, but Noah
always took care of me. And I him. Michael has been with us forever, as well as
Meggie’s relatives. We’re all the family we ever needed, I guess.”

“I would imagine that you had to run a great
deal. Do you still?” She shook her head and smiled at him. “Christ, you’re
beautiful.”

“Thank you, but you’re not going to eat if
you don’t catch something.” He nodded and tried his best to imitate what she
was doing. “Slowly. Cast it out slowly, remembering that there are trees above
you and things lurking beneath that you can catch but not eat. Take your time
and think about putting the bobber out there, not above you.”

He tried what she suggested and was quite
proud of himself when he had not snagged the branches that seemed to jump in
his way, or his body. Twice now she’d had to come and cut the line from his arm
or his leg. It was most embarrassing to say the least. Keeping his eye on the
little red and white ball out further than he’d ever been able to make it go,
he spoke to Joe.

“Tell me about your life with Noah. I’m sure
it’s been an adventure living with a vampire.” He wanted to ask her if he’d fed
from her, but he was pretty sure that was how she’d saved his life. Noah had told
him that he was indebted to Joe more than he could ever repay her. “How long
have you lived with him?”

“Nearly eight hundred years.” He glanced in
her direction when she said that. “Careful. I was about seventeen at the time.
I was never sure of my birthdate, but I think that was about right. He was
being hurt by a man that I knew. Abraham. He was going to kill him for some of
his money. It wasn’t much, I don’t think, but we were always so hungry. I
bargained for their lives.”

“And he was killed later. I think Noah
mentioned that.” She nodded and pulled on her pole. A fat fish nearly leapt up
on the shoreline as she reeled it in. She’d be eating well tonight while he was
going to have potatoes at this rate. He was really hungry too. Eating smart had
a way of not—

“Trent, you have a bite.” It took his fuzzed
mind a few seconds to register what she’d said to him, and he looked at the
ball as it went under again.

He nearly dropped the pole in his excitement.
The bobber was nowhere in sight, and the string on his pole was as taut as he’d
ever seen it. Reeling it in as he’d seen her do, she told him to set the hook.

This was where he had problems. Setting the
hook in the mouth of the fish meant jerking on the line hard enough to make it
stick in the fish, yet not pull out so that he would escape. This time he tried
for gentle and laughed when the fish took off again, still at the end of his
line.

Reeling and pulling was a lot more work than
he’d thought it would be. Joe just seemed to bring the fish right in, but he
was having to pull and reel over and over. When she went to the water’s edge
with the net, he knew it was going to be the smallest fish in all the lake
despite the fact that he’d been working so hard.

When she laughed, his embarrassment grew
until she pulled the net out of the water. He stood there with his mouth open
as she turned and laid the net with his catch in it on the bank. He’d caught a
monster. His first thought was that she’d blown up a fake fish and put it there
for him.

“I think he weighs a bit more than seven
pounds.” She pulled it from the net like an expert and put it on the small
scale that she’d unearthed from the tackle box. It was real, he knew it then,
as it flopped and jerked to get away. Trent had no idea what most of the crap
in the tackle box was for, but she seemed to know what she was doing. “Oh
Trent, he weighs nine pounds, four ounces. Here, hold him so that I can take
his picture with you.”

She’d been allowed to bring her phone. Not
that they’d made much use of the phone itself, but they had taken a great many
pictures with it. And last night, after their dinner, she’d pulled out her
laptop and they’d downloaded them onto it. After he posed for a half dozen
pictures with the fish, he asked to see them.

“I look like a kid.” She told him he was to
her. “I suppose so. Can you send them to my parents? I was supposed to be up
here relaxing and taking pictures of me doing that. She gave me this antiquated
camera that I was supposed to use, and then.... Ahh. She knew you were coming.
See, this is coming to light more and more. Relax, Trent, she said to me.”

“You feel relaxed?” He told her he did. “You
do look better than the first time I saw you. I was afraid for you, if you want
to know the truth.”

She’d told him last night that she had been
the one to give him CPR. He might have been told that before, by his dad or
doctor, but he didn’t remember. But now, even if he had known, it meant more to
him.

They fished for a little while longer. He
heard her phone go off once or twice, but he never thought to ask her if it was
important. Trent found he didn’t really care if anyone came to see them again. He’d
already contacted his brother and asked him not to come up, and had found out
that he’d been wrong about his dad. He’d known about the plan to throw Joe and
Trent together, of course, but it had not been solely his plan.

“Mom planned this? I don’t believe it. She’s
not the devious type.” Sterl laughed when he did. “I thought I was in deep shit
when she told me to get out of the house that day. I guess she knew all along
that this is what I needed.”

“Apparently. Oh, before I forget to tell you,
the paper ran a false story two days ago. About the time you left, as a matter
of fact. Anyway, it says that you’ve closed your doors. Elijah has been working
to find out who might have done it. But for now, instead of trying to get a
retraction, he’s letting it ride. I think he thought it would give you both a
much needed break. I guess he thinks it might be the work of that guy, Ford,
anyway, a way to get back at you for turning him down.” Trent said he could see
him doing that. “Whatever happens, he’s got it under control, so don’t worry about
it.”

And he hadn’t. Not even to worry about
whether or not this would hurt his business. Trent was loving every single
moment he was up here even if it was under dubious reasons. He looked over at
Joe when she said his name.

“This house, does it belong to you or your
family?” He told her his parents. “I love it here. Would they sell it to me,
you think? I could live up here forever with all the quiet and no neighbors. I
know that I have a job, but this is a place I could come and let go.”

“Me too. Although when I first came up here,
all I could think about was going home again.” He moved over to where she was standing
and put his arm around her. He’d put his pole away when she said she was tired,
and was glad now that his hands were free to do this. Looking out over the
lake, he thought about the house he’d just bought and wondered what he’d do
with it if his parents would sell the cabin to him and Joe. “I don’t have a lot
of on-hand cash right now. But I’ll ask them. Would you live up here with me?”

“You don’t have to worry about money now.” He
said he rarely did anyway. “What I mean to say is, I have enough for us. We’re
mates now, and what’s mine is yours. I know that much about your kind. I think
I like that rule too.”

“I don’t need your money.” He felt her
stiffen in his arms and remembered something that had happened between his parents
long ago regarding money.

His mom had a great deal when she and dad had
first gotten together. She’d inherited it from her family, and his dad had been
a little touchy about it. He’d had it in his head that he was the provider, his
mom had told him years later, and she’d had to point out to him that they both
provided for their family. They were a team on this.

But one day, Scott had needed some money for
a class trip. It hadn’t been a great deal, if he remembered correctly, but his
mom had gone to the bank and taken it out of the account, her account as it had
turned out, because his dad had been stubborn about signing the card to give him
access. His dad had been livid. Apparently, he’d thought it was fine for him to
go to the bank and ask for a loan rather than to just simply admit that the
money would have been all right, no matter the account it came from. So his mom
had gone to the bank that afternoon, withdrawn as much as she could, and put it
in the fireplace. When Dad had come home that night, she started a fire with some
of it and told him if it wasn’t their money, there was no point in keeping it.
As far as Trent remembered, it was never brought up again, and the money had
been put in the family account. Now he’d done the same thing with his own mate.

“What I mean is, we don’t need to spend it on
this place. I’m pretty sure that they’ll cut us a good deal. And if not, then
I’ll let you buy it for me.” She turned in his arms and looked up at him. “I
don’t want to ever fight with you about money. It’s ours. Right?”