Melindas Wolves (22 page)

Nevertheless, Rebecca smiled. “There you are. I was wondering how long you could stay away.”

Melinda reached her friend’s side and lifted the screaming baby out of her arms, bringing the sweet, chubby bundle to her chest. The first thing she did was inhale her scent—that glorious new-baby smell that melted all human beings and shifters alike.

Rebecca’s shoulders visibly relaxed as she relinquished McKenna. “Coffee?” She wandered toward the kitchen. “I’ve never been so tired in my life.”

“Where’s Griffen?”

“Sleeping I hope. It was his turn. I can’t imagine how two parents handle an infant.

There are
three
of us. And we’re barely able to function after only a few days.” She giggled, but the tone was off, not quite humorous.

“I’m sorry I haven’t been here.” Melinda instinctively bounced the baby up and down. The screaming slowed to a soft whimper.

Rebecca chuckled again. “I totally understand. I’m surprised you’re here even now.” She tugged the refrigerator open and stared inside. “No idea what I was going to do,” she mumbled.

“Juice? Milk? You need to eat and drink properly,” Melinda suggested.

“Good plan.” Rebecca kicked the door shut, a jug of orange juice in her hand. “Shit.

I already forgot about the coffee.” She slapped her forehead with her free palm.

“It’s okay. I’ve had enough already this morning. Don’t worry about me. I’m good.

Just let me hold this sweet baby while you take care of yourself for a bit.” She glanced up and down Rebecca’s frame. She wore a pair of spandex running shorts and a tank top. Except for the fact that her boobs were enormous, no one would ever know she’d given birth two days ago.

The front door closed and Miles wandered back into the house. He was laughing.

Melinda glared at him. “Whatever Keegan said, it probably wasn’t true.” She continued to bounce, even though McKenna was fast asleep, her sweet face now tilted to one side, her mouth open in slumber. Melinda traced the edge of the baby’s forehead, smiling at the tuft of red hair that matched her mother’s. She was light complected and undoubtedly created from Griffen’s seed, though Melinda knew there was no contest here. Both men would love all of their children and give each one a hundred and fifty percent.

Miles stopped a few feet from Melinda, closed his eyes, and tipped his head back.

“Shh. Do you hear that?” he whispered.

Rebecca froze and tipped her head to one side as though listening intently for whatever Miles was referring to. “What?” she finally asked.

“Exactly,” Miles added. “Silence.” He turned to face his sister. “How long can you stay?”

Melinda grinned. “I promised Trace we’d have lunch together. So, I’m all yours for a few hours.” She narrowed her gaze at her brother and then shot a pointed look toward Rebecca. “Don’t you let your mate at least shower? She’s exhausted.”

Miles lifted both hands in the air. “Hey, don’t blame me. Griffen and I have done everything we can think of to get her to rest and take care of herself, but she has some supermom complex going on. There’s no reasoning with her.” He stepped behind his mate and wrapped his arms under her breasts, tugging her tight against his front.

Melinda flushed as she watched her brother kiss Rebecca’s brow. “She’s right, love.

You need to sleep. You’re no good to the baby if you’re worn out.”

Melinda loved seeing her brother like this. He’d been a different man since the moment he’d met Rebecca. Softer. So loving. But now, he was even more awesome. He was wrapped all the way around her sweet finger. He brushed a long lock of hair off Rebecca’s forehead and held her tighter. “Love you,” he whispered against her temple.

“Go nap. If you don’t trust me alone with our daughter, at least have faith in Melinda.”

He grinned.

Rebecca elbowed him in the side, wincing. She wiggled free of his touch, cupping her boobs. “Get your hands away from my chest.” She wheeled around, dodging his grasp. “They hurt. They’re tight and swollen and dripping. They’re not yours right now.”

He grinned sheepishly. “They look so fucking fantastic.”

Rebecca dropped her hands and stepped farther away. “Look. Don’t touch. And you know all that crap about me trusting you is bullshit. It isn’t true. Stop it. You’re both great with McKenna.” She lifted her gaze to Melinda. “Give me some time with an adult female first. I’m itching for the interaction.”

“Half an hour, and then you go to bed and sleep for a while.” He took her hand and led her to the couch across from them in the giant great room.

Melinda followed with McKenna and sat in a rocking chair that hadn’t been there on Saturday.

Miles sat next to his mate, tugging her into his side. He buried his hand in the bottom of her braid possessively.

Melinda smiled. Finally she understood what her brother felt toward his mates. For the last year she’d found the three of them to be almost nauseating, especially her brother. Suddenly, she had some clarity.

“So how’s mated life?” Rebecca asked, leaning her cheek against Miles’s chest.

“Weird. It was so unexpected.”

“It always is,” Miles said as he lifted his feet, set them on the coffee table, and leaned back. “Keegan seems like a nice guy.”

“Yeah. We have a few issues to work out. It’s gonna be rocky while we attempt to come to some sort of middle ground.” Melinda gently rocked back and forth. It didn’t seem to startle the baby at all that the three of them were chatting.

“Really?” Rebecca asked. She twisted her face to Miles. “That didn’t happen to us, did it?”

“No.” He kissed her nose. “But we had our own problems, if you recall. Namely the fact that you’re human and had no idea of our existence.”

“Yeah. That was weird. And then there were two of you.”

Melinda lifted her gaze from the angelic face at her chest. “Yeah, trust me. Even though I’m lupine, and even though I’ve always known wolves could mate in threes, nothing makes that part any easier. It’s downright weird at first.”

“Understandable. You’ll figure it all out,” Miles said. “So, what’s the deal with Keegan? You looked super chummy on the porch. I can’t imagine you two already coming up with something you don’t see eye to eye on in two days. How have you had time to discover such a thing?”

“He’s the building inspector in charge at the casino site.”

Miles cringed. “Yikes. Yes, that would do it.”

“What’s wrong with that?” Rebecca asked, tipping her head back to watch her mate’s expression before returning her gaze to Melinda.

“I hate that monstrosity. It’s like a giant, ugly scar in the middle of the reservation.”

“Oh. I hadn’t thought about it.” She winced.

Miles held his mate tighter. “My sister’s a tree hugger. She doesn’t like to see any abomination to our land. Especially not a mega-business.”

“I can see that,” Rebecca responded. “But won’t it provide jobs and help raise the poverty level on the rez?”

Melinda shook her head. “Not you too,” she teased.

Rebecca’s eyes widened. “I didn’t mean to be adversarial. I was just asking.”

“It does. But probably at the expense of small shops and restaurants in Sojourn that won’t survive the boom of giant chain stores that will go in to accommodate the patrons,” Miles pointed out.

“Right. Like your store.”

Melinda nodded. “Besides, I have a bad feeling about that construction. If you thought it was difficult to mate with two wolf shifters as a human with no prior knowledge of our existence, you can imagine mating with two large brutes who have little to no experience with a shaman. Their ability to take my concerns seriously is a joke.

“Normally, it wouldn’t matter. Over time, they would come to understand what I do, how my visions work, and they would learn to trust my instincts. But in this case, time is of the essence. I’m telling you that casino is much more than an eyesore. It’s a time bomb. Something horrible is going to happen.”

“And you don’t know when or what.” Rebecca knew from her own experience heeding Melinda’s advice that one could question Melinda until they were blue in the face, and it would change nothing. Fate had Her plan. Nothing would stop Her.

“Exactly. Try telling Trace and Keegan that.” She rolled her eyes and then tucked her cheek against the baby’s and inhaled her sweet smell again. “God I love babies.”

Miles chuckled. “Guess you can get one of your own now.”

“Lord, not yet. I’ve hardly accepted the logistics of this mating. The last thing I need is to get pregnant.” She felt the heat rise in her cheeks as she spoke. The reality was she and her mates hadn’t discussed the possibility of pregnancy a single time.

She prayed her mates were respectful enough to have used condoms if Melinda were ovulating. The males in her species could scent when a woman was able to get pregnant. Few females were capable of singling out such an intricately specific scent indicator.

Though Mimi probably is
.

And chances were Melinda could probably hone the skill herself now that she was mated and had actually had sex. No one alive knew—until she shared with her mates the other night—that she’d been a virgin. That had severely dampened her ability to identify such specific scents.

“You doing okay?” Rebecca asked. “You’re quiet over there.”

“Just thinking.” Melinda gave the rocker another push and closed her eyes.

 •●• 

Keegan and Mitch poured over every inch of paperwork associated with the original inspections done on the casino. So far they had found very little evidence to indicate anyone knew there was anything shoddy occurring.

“Look at this file,” Keegan said as he lifted it into the air. It was labeled CONCRETE.

“What is it?”

“What it is—is empty.” Keegan turned it over. Not a single paper was inside. He thumbed through the rest of the files and found four others like it. All suspiciously involved in the building materials aspect of the site.

Mitch looked in the drawer and furrowed his brow. “This can’t be good.”

“Exactly. And my question is when did these files disappear? They were there last week. I’ve only been assigned to this job a few weeks, but I would have noticed if any of the files were missing. And so far I’ve found nothing in the computer to back up the files. Surely these weren’t the only copies.”

“Shit.” Mitch righted himself and paced the office again. It was becoming a habit.

The man was worried, and he often nervously paced around, running his hand through his hair. “Maybe someone else has the files for some reason?”

“Who would that be?”

Mitch shrugged. “No idea, but I can’t stomach the alternative.”

“Me either.” Keegan leaned back in his chair.

“How about if I work on locating the previous inspector while you continue combing the files? We need to find someone who knows what happened.”

“Good plan.” Keegan exhaled a long breath as he turned back to the file cabinet.

Mitch headed around the desk to the other side and opened his computer.

Thank God Keegan wasn’t dealing with this insanity by himself. Even though he usually preferred to work alone, having his boss around in this case was a relief.

Trace watched his mate from across the room as she tipped her head back and laughed at something his boss said to her.

Under normal circumstances he would be jealous, but there was nothing normal about this arrangement. Chief Bergman knew the score. Most of the detectives on the force were human. But Terrance Bergman was not.

The second Melinda arrived at the station that afternoon, Bergman had grinned.

Without a word, he slapped Trace on the shoulder and muttered words of congratulations. No way would the man even come close to hitting on Melinda.

And besides, the pheromones Melinda emitted were strictly reserved for Trace and Keegan. It was Nature’s way. His woman smelled fantastic, but that scent would only attract her mates. No one else would find it so intoxicating.

When she’d stepped into the station in a short sundress, a sweater slung over her arm, his jaw dropped. The dress was sexy as hell, and he liked knowing he had easy access to what lay beneath. But he also nearly groaned with the knowledge that her pussy was wet and silky and so easily accessible.

“Since when do you have a serious girlfriend?” The teasing voice from behind Trace made him turn his head. Mark—a human guy he’d worked with on several projects for the last year—had his gaze on Melinda, appraising her from top to bottom.

If the man had been lupine, Trace would have slammed him into the wall and taken a chunk out of him by gouging his face. But Mark knew nothing of their species, so Trace swallowed his displeasure and responded amicably. “A while.” The vague answer would suffice. Especially since Mark still hadn’t taken his eyes off Melinda long enough to glance at Trace. Why on earth human men accepted such blatantly disrespectful behavior was beyond him. But he’d witnessed it his entire life. It seemed as though men thought it was a compliment to their fellow brethren if they openly admired their women as though they were a fine piece of ass.

“She’s hot.” Finally he grinned at Trace. “You stud.”

Trace narrowed his gaze, not returning the smile. In nearly every encounter with regular human population, it was possible for shifters to keep themselves in check.

After all, it was important to the survival of their species. But Trace had never had to deal with someone hitting on his mate before. Or ogling her. Or even thinking about hitting on or ogling her.

It didn’t sit well. Trace fought to control his desire to punch the guy. “You can stop drooling over her now. She’s taken.”
Claimed
.

“Taken? You can’t possibly have known her that long. I’ve never seen her before.”

He jerked his gaze back to Melinda. “That long black hair must be like spun silk running through your fingers.”

It was. And the fury Trace felt rose to a new level. “You’ll never know.”

Mark turned back again, chuckling. He set a file he held on the edge of Trace’s desk.

“Relax, man. I’m playin’ with you.” He cocked his head to one side and narrowed his gaze. “You must really be into her. How long did you say you’ve been dating?”