Every Sunset Forever (21 page)

“How long are you here today?”

“I’ve got three clients back-to-back, and then I’m going to take Whisper out to dinner.  But not in those pants.”

She winked at him and gave him a devilish smile.

Sydney promised to come out to the front desk and keep Whisper company, and he escorted his sweetheart out into the gym.  “Did you always want to be a trainer?” she asked as she sat down behind the reception desk.

“No, but I like it.  Or, rather, I like working with people, and it seems to be the family business now.”

“My family business was alcohol.  And singing.”

His heart panged a little at the wistful tone.  Damn, he needed to talk to Nyte again about where they were going to live permanently.  “Do you miss the bar?”

“You wouldn’t think so, but yeah.  It’s not just my dad and brothers, but I miss the pack.  It was fun hunting with you on the full moon, but the pack is such a different experience.  I spent every full moon since I shifted hunting with my dad and brothers and then hanging out with Bliss and Angel until the sun came up.  Doing anything else seems foreign.  Don’t change the subject; we were talking about you and your training career.”

She rolled the chair over to him, reaching for the hem of his shirt and lifting it up to expose his stomach.  “You have amazing abs.  Did I mention that the other day when I was licking them?”

Grinning up at him, she wiggled her brows suggestively and ran her thumb along one of the ridges of his stomach.

“Please don’t grope the help,” Dante said as he came to the front desk.

“Help can’t grope help?” she asked over her shoulder, not relinquishing her grip on his shirt.

“Only in the locker room,” Dante said with a laugh.

Az saw his first client come in, and Whisper stuck out her lower lip as she let go of his shirt.  “Mine,” she said, making a soft, growling sound.

He bent and kissed her.  “One hundred percent yours.”

With a happy hum, she turned to face the front doors and waited for clients to come in.  He waved at Nyte, who was already working with a client, and Fade who was sitting at his desk in his office, working on another promotional project for the gym.

“I’m ready, Azrael,” his client said.  He reached for her folder, which was in his slot on the desk, and greeted her, winking at Whisper as she turned to look at him.

He wished they were still home. Or that she actually did work at the gym.  It was nice for the other clans’ mates to work there, but Whisper just didn’t care for it.  He knew the only reason she’d come to the gym that day was because she was going stir-crazy, and she felt guilty that they were putting off their jobs, in part because they were taking turns staying home with her.

In three hours he could take her away from the gym and make up for the cooped-up feeling.  He felt like he was not being a very good mate for her, and that was the last thing he wanted to happen.

* * * * *

Whisper turned in a slow circle and looked around the gym.  Nyte and Az were both working with clients.  Nyte’s client was a young male in his twenties who was trying to get back into shape after losing a lot of weight.  Az’s client was a middle-aged woman who had been injured in an accident and was trying to get the strength in her arms back.

“I’m looking for a woman with the last name of Callahan,” a male voice said, startling Whisper from her musings on trainers.

“Who are you?” Dante asked, as Whisper turned around and found herself staring at three men who appeared to be in their twenties.  There was something oddly familiar about them, but she didn’t know what.

The one in the center, who appeared to be the youngest, looked at her sadly and said, “It’s you.”

She stood slowly as Dante moved next to her behind the desk and pushed her behind him.  “I’ll ask you again.  Who are you?”

The center man seemed unable to speak, so one of the two behind him put a hand on his shoulder and said, “We wanted to speak to Whisper Callahan about the attempted kidnapping.  We…have some information.”

It took a moment, but she suddenly realized where she knew them from.  “You’re related to him.  The guy that attacked me.”  She gasped and stepped backwards, worry streaking through her.  In a heartbeat, Fade was in front of the males, growling furiously as Nyte and Az surrounded her.

“Get away from my mate,” Fade snarled.

“We don’t want to hurt her or anyone else, we just want to talk,” the second one said as all three backed away slowly.  His eyes sought Whisper’s, and he said, “Please, Whisper.  I swear on my life that I mean no harm to you, and neither do my brothers.”

Her heart pounded in her ears.  She looked at the three males that Fade was about two seconds away from tearing apart and saw genuine worry and sadness, but no anger.  She wasn’t sure why, but she believed him.

Looking up at Nyte, she said, “I want to hear them out.”

Dante said, “I’ll handle your clients.  Cai’s upstairs; I’ll send him down to your office to help out.”  Then he looked at the males and said, “If you touch a hair on the heads of any of my people, there won’t be enough of any of you left to bury.”

“We don’t want any trouble,” the second one said.

Nyte led the three males into the office.  Whisper, Fade, and Az followed and Cairo joined them a moment later. They introduced themselves as Quill, Ian, and Brin, sons of Davion, the man who had attacked her.  Fade stood slightly in front of Whisper with his arms folded and an angry frown on his face.  She leaned against him, hooking her arm through his and reaching for Nyte’s, who stood next to her.

“I’m ready to listen.”

Quill said, “First, I want you to know that our father is dead.  He died in the car on the way to the hospital.  He chose to die.  If he had stayed with the paramedics, he would have been saved, but he didn’t want to live anymore.  I think he…realized that his plans had ultimately failed, and he didn’t want to face another day.”

She opened her mouth to say she was sorry that he died, but she closed it before she said anything.  It was sad that he’d died, but the man had attacked her and she didn’t want to start wallowing in guilty feelings again.

“Our parents died when we were little.  My father was the only one in the clan left alive.  I think if we hadn’t been there, he would have killed himself back then.  Our clan wasn’t part of a
baro
, so there was no support system for him or us.  After a few weeks, he took us on a vacation to get away from the house, to Ocean City.  When we came home, he told us that he’d found our mate and she was going to come and live with us soon.”  Quill paused and looked at Whisper.

She sucked in a sharp breath.  “Me?”

Ian said, “He made arrangements to have you kidnapped.  The man who did it was human, and he delivered you to a woman who was a prostitute.  She was supposed to watch over you for a few days until our dad came for you.  When he went to get you, the man said the woman wanted more money to turn you over to our dad, because she liked you.  He never heard from the man or the woman again.”

“Our whole lives we’ve been told that you were the one who was meant to be our mate.  We were told that hyena parents always chose their cubs’ mates, and we weren’t allowed to question him.  We’ve been to
gatherings
all over the country looking for a young woman with caramel-colored eyes and dark hair,” Quill said.

Brin, the one who hadn’t been able to continue speaking earlier, looked at her forlornly and said, “It wasn’t until we finally saw you at the
gathering,
and you seemed to have found your mates, that we began to question our father.  But he became obsessed with finding you.  We followed you here and were staying in a hotel about an hour away.”

Their dad had some sort of mental break when they began to question him again about her, and then they found out the truth that had been hidden from them all those years.  They’d never known that he’d arranged her kidnapping.

There was a long pause, and Whisper absorbed what she’d learned.  “There’s a part of me that hates your dad for what he did and hates you by extension.  I was just a baby.  He had no right to do that to me and to my family.”  Az moved from his place next to Nyte to stand behind her, placing his hands on her shoulders for support.  She shook her head.  “But the bigger part of me is ready to close that chapter and move on.  I never knew what happened to me or why I was taken, and knowing now doesn’t erase the damage…but it does soothe some of the old wounds.”

“Why did you come here?” Nyte asked, squeezing her hand.

“We thought she deserved to know the truth of her abduction and also that there isn’t any more threat to her well-being.  We’re leaving town right now to go back home, pack up the house, and start over somewhere new.  Somewhere our demons won’t follow us.  You deserve to know that you’re safe now, and we understand you’ve found your truemates.  We would never dream of trying to take that away from you,” Quill said.  “For what it’s worth, we’re sorry for our father’s actions and for our part in them.  We didn’t know all of the truth, but that’s no excuse.”

Ian and Brin also apologized.

“I accept your apologies. Thank you for coming to see me.”

“Take care, Whisper,” Brin said.  The three brothers walked out of the office, escorted by Cairo.  Fade leaned over and shut the door, pulled her into his arms, and then hugged her tightly.  “You okay, baby?”

Nyte and Az watched her, identical worried expressions on their faces.  “Yeah, I am.  They could have just gone off and left us wondering forever about what happened to the man that attacked me.  I’m glad they came here, and I’m really glad that you didn’t tear them into pieces.”  She looked up at Fade.  He grunted.

Nyte rubbed her arm.  “He was a depressed, misguided male.  Hopefully he’s found peace now, and his sons can, too.”

She hoped they would.  For her, though, the news brought not only answers she’d been seeking her whole life, but a light at the end of the tunnel for them to leave Dante’s home.  “I know where Az is taking me after he’s done with his clients.”

“Oh?” Az asked with a smile.

“Yeah, to the house to pack so we can spend the night in our own bed tonight.  It’s been far too long.”

“What about dinner?”  Fade nuzzled her ear as he spoke.

She shivered as his breath cascaded over her skin.  “Pack first, then dinner.”

“Then?” he teased.

“Come home and find out.”

* * * * *

Nyte stood in the kitchen of the apartment that Whisper had shared with her brothers and listened to Az and Fade argue in low tones about their living arrangements.  Whisper was asleep after staying up for the long drive from Dalton to Beyton.  They’d had a late dinner with Mack and her brothers, and Fade had needed to carry her up to bed because she fell asleep before dessert was served.

“Guys,” he said finally, wanting to join Whisper in bed before the sun came up.  “We can’t have a real conversation about our future without our mate.  I agree that she’s happy here; only an idiot wouldn’t notice that.  But right now, we’ve got a lot of stuff to accomplish tomorrow without her knowing.  Let’s focus on Saturday
first,
and then when we’re through that, we’ll talk to her about what she really wants.”

“Could you live here?” Az asked.

“I could live anywhere that would make Whisper happy.  But she may want to be in Dalton.  She likes Sydney and Alyssa, and she likes being part of a
baro
.”

“You’re acting like I’m the only one that doesn’t want her to be happy.”  Fade frowned.  “She’s never said she didn’t want to live in Dalton.”

Az opened his mouth – to argue, Nyte was sure – and Nyte put his hand up.  “For fucks’ sake, we’re tired and stressed out.  Let’s get some rest and get our asses in gear for the weekend.  I’m putting a pin in this conversation until Sunday.”

His brothers grudgingly agreed, and they went over the plans for the next two days.  Whisper was going to be kept busy by her best friends and brothers during the day so that Nyte and his brothers could get Mack’s house decorated for the wedding.  It was going to be a hectic day, but it would be worth it to surprise Whisper.

After punctuating a sentence with a yawn, he declared it was well past his bedtime, and his brothers agreed.  They turned off the kitchen light and walked back to the bedroom where Whisper was sleeping in the center of a queen-size bed.  As he settled next to his sweetheart, he could hear the soft thud of music from the bar below and wondered when last call was.  Before he could wonder how Whisper ever got any sleep, he passed out.

In the morning, Nyte and Az took Whisper to a little diner in town while Fade played the part of being too tired to get out of bed.  Once they left, though, he was heading straight to Mack’s home to help with decorating.  Their leisurely breakfast ended with a driving tour around town.  They’d managed to keep her away for several hours, and were able to take her straight into the bar for rehearsals with the band. Her brothers, Angel, Bliss, and her clan, were going to be decorating the bar for the party that night.

Nyte and Az watched Whisper sing a few songs, and then they left to go pick up their rental tuxes for their wedding and run a few more errands.  Nyte hung up his tux in the closet of the spare bedroom in Mack’s home.  He and his brothers were spending the night at Mack’s house, since Whisper, Bliss, and Angel were having a girls-only sleepover.