Page 52

Kieran

If I thought that was the end of intense family meetings, I was wrong.

I was lying in bed, Harper’s head on my stomach as she read one of the many, many smut books she had on her Kindle app, when a call came through for me.

I picked up my phone, glanced at the screen, and then went to toss it down on the bed.

“Your dads again?” she asked, looking up from a scene where a shadow daddy (what the hell was one of them?) was turning his girl into a puddle of goo. I may or may not have been getting some pointers. “You’re gonna have to talk to them at some point.”

“Nuh uh.”

She snorted at my immature response.

“You might have to go to work at some point.” Her eyes rolled up to meet mine. “I mean, if you’re independently wealthy, now’s a good time to let me know.”

“We’ve got enough.” I sucked in a breath, letting it out slowly. “But me and the guys have been talking.”

“Oh, yeah?” I knew I was in trouble when her phone was set down and she rolled over to face me. “About what?”

“So…” Why was this so hard to say? “We were thinking that we might quit working for my dads.” Her brows creased slightly. “And start our own business.” They jerked up as she stared at me in surprise.

“Yeah.” I didn’t know how much I needed to hear her say that until I did. Harper sat up. “I mean, it makes sense. But you’ve been working for your dads the whole time.”

“I have, but…” I remembered my mum’s words clearly. “I think it’s time we branched out, did our own thing. We’re not kids anymore.”

“No.” She ran a hand down my bare chest, waggling her eyebrows at me as it dropped lower. “You’re not.”

“And to be honest, if I have to listen to my dads read me the riot act one more time, we might not be a family anymore.”

“OK.” Harper picked up my phone and handed it to me. “So ring them back.”

“Oh, I thought?—”

“Ring them back.” Her expression softened. “They’ve been wanting us to come around since we were mated. Decide on an afternoon and let’s get this done.”

“Just like that, huh?” I said.

“Exactly like that.”

Easier said and done.

I’d rung my dad back, cutting off the lecture that came as soon as he picked up the phone with an offer to come around.

“We need to talk,” I told him.

“What about?” he said stiffly. “Is it going to be more of that bullshit you spewed in the quarry?”

This was where I apologised to soothe his and my other dads’ ruffled feathers.

“Maybe,” I said instead.

“How about you get to work and stop talking shit? We’re behind on the latest project.”

“And if you want us working on it, we need to meet up first,” I insisted.

A long sigh, then he snapped, “Fine.”

“You can come around here?—”

“Your mother has been on our cases, wanting you to bring Harper around. Apparently, the women at the community centre are concerned about her. They reached out to the friend.”

“Daria?”

Harper looked at me quizzically.

“Yep, her. They got her into some counselling service the women run, but…” It was like pulling teeth, getting the words out of Dad. “Your mother wants to make sure Harper is alright. So bring her and… that sleuth of yours around for dinner. Can you fit tomorrow night into your busy schedule?”

“I’ll make sure everyone’s free,” I replied, refusing to rise to the bait.

“Everyone?” Dad said. “You could?—”

“See you tomorrow night? Will do. Tell Mum to text me anything she wants me to bring.”

Before he could say another thing, I ended the call. Harper crept closer and I hated that reticence. Her throwing her arms around my neck? Yeah, I was down with that. I held her close, just breathing her in for a second.

“We can do this.” Her voice was muffled by my chest. “I mean, if it all goes pear shaped, we can invite Tor’s parents around to defuse the tension.” That just had me gripping her tighter, but when she finally pulled back, it was with a cheeky grin on her face. “You’ve got this, Bear Boy.”

“I’ve got this.”

I didn’t got this.

The next evening we all walked up the front path of my parent’s house.

It was the same one I grew up in, had called home, but now everything felt different.

The big tree me and my brothers used to climb was kinda oppressive, its dark shadow swallowing us as we got closer.

Harper squeezed my hand, looking up at me and that was enough to get me approaching the front door.

As I went to knock, the door was yanked open and Jim, one of my dads stood there, looking me up and down.

“What’re you doing, knocking on the door? And why’d you come in through the front, not the back door like normal.” He looked down at the bag I was carrying. “Did you grab the sour cream? Your mother is having a fit.”

“Not having a fit.” Mum smiled when we walked into the kitchen. “Just want to make sure everything’s perfect. How are you, darling?” She came over and gave me a kiss, then made a beeline for Harper. “And you, sweetheart? How’s those bruises?”

“Never should’ve been there in the first place,” Brenton muttered, then turned back to chopping salsa.

I glanced at Mack, seeing that same closed off expression he always wore around my family. Even Tor looked like a scared kitty cat, not a tiger. I loved my family and knew all this gruff bullshit was just my dads’ love language.

But that didn’t mean I had to keep subjecting my sleuth to it.

“So I’ve got some news,” I said.

“Hmm…?” Mum was at the stovetop, tasting the chilli cooking there.

“During dinner, son,” Fred said with a frown. “Now, set the table for your mother.”

“What’s the news?” We were now in the dining room, laying out the cutlery as Mack asked me the question. “Kieran?—”

I hadn’t talked about it with him or Tor. Some part of me was sure I didn’t need to. We’d put money away, had a nice little nest egg and owned our own cars and tools. Currently, we worked as subcontractors in the dads’ business, but… This would mean we would be cutting the cord far more formally.

“Here we go!” Mum walked in toting several bowls of chilli that she placed around the table. “I hope you’re hungry.”

I wasn’t. My mouth was bone dry, my heart beating too fast. Tor pulled out a chair for Harper to sit near him, but she moved to my side. Her hand in mine, that’s what it took for me to take my seat. If I just held on?—

“So we’ve got some news of our own.” Fred looked well pleased with himself, looking down the table at all of us. “We talked with your mother and…”

“We’d like you to take over the business.” Mum beamed over her bowl. “All three of you.” She nodded to my mate. “Four, if Harper would like to learn the paperwork side.”

“So whaddya say, son? Fred said with a frown.

“Thank you would be a good start.”

Brenton sunk a spoon into his chilli.

“Thank you.”

That came out of me on automatic, because my parents had taught me to be appreciative of kind gestures.

They just never taught me how to reject one when it wasn’t what you wanted.

I looked around the table and caught Mack’s stricken expression, right before I glanced at Tor. He stared fixedly at his bowl, moving his spoon around, but not taking a bite.

You’ve got this.

It was Harper’s words, the way she stared at me as if she believed that utterly, that got my lips moving. I had to force the words out and perhaps this was why.

“I’ve got news of my own,” I said.

“Can’t be better than this,” Fred grumbled.

“Fred…” Mum whacked him in the arm, then sobered as she stared at me. “Go on, darling.”

“I’m going to have to say no to your kind offer.”

“What?”

The dads spluttered as one, looking at me, then each other, when the answer didn’t come immediately.

“Y’see, we’re starting up our own business,” I said.

“We are?”

Tor looked up in shock.

“We are,” Mack echoed with a nod.

“And why the hell would you go and do that?” Jim said. “We’re handing you our business on a silver platter.”

“Because Kieran wants to be his own boss.” Mum sat back in her chair and then beamed at the lot of us. “Just like you lot did.”

“That was different,” Brenton huffed. “Times were easier.”

“In the middle of a recession?” Mum shot him a dark look. “And we were all in our early twenties, with no idea what we were doing. I was pregnant with Kai.” That was my older brother. “We didn’t have much other than energy and a dream and now Kieran’s gonna chase his.”

“So where does that leave us?” Fred spluttered. “We’re in the middle of a job.”

“We’ll finish the work we’re contracted to do.” Mack replied before I could, obviously warming to the topic. He leaned over, placing his elbows on the table. “But after that? I’d suggest getting some apprentices on to cover any staffing deficits you might have.”

“And who’s going to do your books?” Jim said. “It won’t be your mother.”

“Mack already knows what he’s doing there,” Mum said, “and anyway. Your mother taught me what to do, so I figured I’d do the same. Harper, love, bookwork and invoicing isn’t all that interesting, but it frees the guys up to be more present when they get home.”

“Well, seeing as I am no longer employed,” my mate said, “I’d be happy to take you up on that.” She grinned at me. “The family that works together, stays together.”

“You do know you have to follow pretty strict legal requirements when doing bookwork,” Mack said. “If we don’t, we could have the tax office on our backs.”

“Does this mean you’re gonna check my work for me?” Harper twirled her spoon around in her fingers. “I could sit on your knee and you could show me everything I did wrong.”

“How the hell do you make invoicing sound sexy?” Tor asked.

“So yeah, Kim, I’d be glad to take you up on your offer,” Harper said, turning back to Mum.

“You got it. So what’s your calendar look like…”

As the women worked out a time that suited them, I was left to face down my dads.

“Is this about Mack?” Jim said, but the others hissed at him.

“Look, we know we haven’t been super supportive of this… sleuth,” Brenton said. “But your mum has talked us around. Honestly, as soon as that Dax was out of the picture, we were a lot more open to the idea.”

“I’m thirty, Dads.” I nodded to each one of them.

“If I was human I’d have left the next ages ago.

It’s just we have this whole weird co-dependant thing going on in the bear community.

” I was dimly aware that everyone had fallen silent.

“It’s both amazing and terrible to know there’s a whole massive group of people watching out for you, ready to help you if you fall, but…

” I shook my head. “Always in your business, even when you’re standing on your own two feet.

Honestly, a little bit of distance would make a big difference to our relationship. ”

“He’s right.” The dads barely let me finish before they sucked in a breath to retort, but Mum cut them off. “You all know he’s right, even if you’re too stubborn to admit it right now.” She shot me a rueful look. “I love your fathers, but they are very set in their ways.”

“Never seen you complain about our ways before, Kimmy.”

“Gross…” I said.

My dads were all clustered around my mother, saying something I really didn’t want to hear, if the flush in her cheeks meant anything, but right now, it wasn’t their sleuth, but mine that mattered. I looked at Harper, Tor, finally settling on Mack.

“I didn’t run this by you all, but?—”

“I’m in.” Tor’s reply was so quick we all snorted. “I am so in. Being the boss.” He popped a bicep. “Yeah, I like the sound of that.”

“Boss?” Mack rolled his eyes. “You’d be lucky to be the gofer with your bullshit.”

“Going for coffee with Harper while you lot unplug someone’s backed up toilet?” Tor shrugged. “Where is the bad in this situation.”

“So we’re doing this?” Harper stared at each one of us. “Like really doing this? Sounds like it could be kinda tough.”

“Nothing’s so hard we can’t get through it together,” I said, grabbing her hand and that’s when I saw my mum smile approvingly. The dads, it took them a little longer, but whatever magic Mum wielded had them on board.

“Together,” Tor said, trying to take my other hand, then cackling when I knocked it away.

“So, now that’s settled,” Mum said. “How’s that friend of yours going, Harper?”