Page 35 of Lover Forbidden (The Black Dagger Brotherhood #23)

Stabbing his coffin nail into a nub, he lit up another one and got to his feet. As soon as he stepped out of his office and looked down the modern barn’s spanned central space, heads popped up over the monitors along the rows of his team’s workstations.

All typing stopped.

When he put his palm up in a no-not-you way, the work immediately recommenced.

The males and females had been cherry-picked from hundreds of applications, and he had to say, they’d never let him down.

The two dozen or so IT experts monitored about a hundred properties as well as countless databases of civilians.

They also aided in the investigations of crimes, kept up with the human world, and were available for special projects at the drop of a hat.

This was a 24/7 operation, with people coming in at sundown and staying for forty-eight-hour shifts.

Down on the lower level, there were plenty of sleeping quarters, a kitchen that the doggen kept stocked with prepared meals, and a gym.

And in a move hearkening back to the good ol’ days of the human tech boom, you were allowed to bring your dog to work if it behaved itself, with the servant staff more than willing to take them out during the daylight hours as required.

It had taken a lot of thought, facility construction, and hiring to put this living organism of an IT department together, and he took great satisfaction in the service they provided the Brotherhood, the King, and the species at large.

Not that he was feeling good about tonight.

That shit didn’t have anything to do with his people, though.

Rounding the corner of his office, he stared over at the desk that had been set right against the barn’s back wall.

There were even more monitors on its surface than the other workstations, and the dark-haired, underdeveloped male who was bent over one of three keyboards and comparing four different tables of data at the same time was probably smarter than Vishous himself.

Take out the “probably.”

When there was no response to his presence, he cleared his throat—something that should have been unnecessary given his exhale of Turkish smoke.

Allhan glanced over his shoulder in surprise and took out one of his earbuds. “Nothing of value yet.”

V lowered his voice. “You eat tonight, son?”

As a blank look softened those dark brows, V was pretty sure it was a “no.” Besides, that long, lean face was longer and leaner, and paler, too.

“I think so?”

Crooking his finger, V shook his head. “Come with me.”

Allhan glanced with panic at his screens. “But I haven’t found George. Or Gheorge. Or Georghe. Or Georghes—”

“Now.”

Like he’d been called to attention in a military school, Allhan ditched the keyboard and scrambled to his feet, his gray SUNY Caldwell t-shirt waving like a flag from his bony shoulders, his loose jeans flapping around his stickpin legs.

His shoes were black Crocs that had more scuffs on them than a dance floor, and his socks were mismatched. Dark green and light blue.

“Yes, sir.” The kid took his other earbud out and started forward with an earnestness that was heartbreaking. “What did I do?”

Vishous took a drag on his hand-rolled and wished he’d never met the young male. “Nothing. You’re good. I just want you to come with me.”

One of the two stairwells down to the lower level was next to the back side of V’s office, and as he opened things and stood aside, Allhan jangled by him and hit the steps like his arms and legs were only loosely attached to his torso.

As V followed, he had no fucking clue how he’d gone from a hard-ass Dom to a… dad.

Was that what he was, though? Except goddamn it, what else would someone call it. He was constantly worried about whether some pretrans had put a fork in their mouth. Whether Allhan had slept. If he was feeling okay, was he sick, did he need more clothes, or less time in front of those monitors…

Oh, and that was just the little shit. The big one was stark terror over a biological process that was as unstoppable and untreatable as time itself.

Or death, for that matter.

FFS, whether Allhan made it through the transition was totally out of V’s control—and he knew this terrible reality was keeping Jane up during the day, too.

As Allhan bottomed out in the break area, the kid seemed lost, like he’d never seen the tables and the buffet line before.

“I’ll go with you,” V said.

Walking around the kid, he went over to the food that was on offer. Tonight it was pizza, sandwiches, salad—

“Good evening, sires,” the doggen cook said as he came out from the kitchen. “How may I serve you? Any special requests?”

“I think we’re going to see what appeals,” V replied. “Thanks.”

As the cook waited patiently, Allhan wandered by the platters that were under the warmers. Official lunch break time for the B team was coming up in about eight minutes, so everything was fresh and fully stocked—but it was like the kid was looking at roadkill.

“Do you happen to have any white rice and gingerroot?” V said softly to the cook.

The doggen bowed low. “Yes, sire. Right away.”

“Yo, Al, let’s sit down over here.” V pointed to one of the tables that was away from the others. “They’re going to bring you something.”

“Yes, sir.”

The kid went right away and sat down, facing the wall. Putting his hands together, he placed them in his lap, and lowered his head like he was in some kind of church.

As V sat down across the way, he scrambled his brain for what the hell to say. Sixteen fucking languages, and he had no clue how to make small talk.

No interest, except when he was around Allhan.

As the silence between them stretched out, he pinched his hand-rolled out and reflected on how he’d always had some latent masochistic tendencies. Maybe that explained why he was putting himself in this position with the kid.

“Don’t stress if you can’t find that name,” he said.

Allhan’s eyes lifted. “I’ll find it.”

“Sure you will. But if you don’t, it’s not—”

“I’ll find it.”

As things got quiet again, V stroked his goatee and decided he might as well tackle the obstacle in the room. “Listen, Al. I think it’s time to choose.”

“Choose what?”

The doggen chef swooped in with a plate of sauced white rice, a fork, and a napkin. “For you, master.”

Allhan looked up, but kept his eyes on the cloth buttons down the front of the cook’s white uniform. “Thank you,” came a small voice.

The servant’s face grew gentle. “Anything you wish, I shall make for you.”

The doggen bowed and headed back to his station.

As the kid started to eat, V imagined where Allhan would be without him and Jane taking him in.

Fucking hell, V’d seen a lot of depravity in his life, but the idea that Allhan’s parents had abandoned him?

Just fucked the kid off without any money or clothes, no place to live, a pretrans about to go through the change with no one to help him?

He’d literally shown up at Safe Place six months ago because he’d heard about it online in one of the private groups for the species.

He’d been dehydrated and starved, and his shoes had been worn through because he’d walked all the way across town.

After having waited like a dog for a week for his parents to come back for him, outside on the doorstep of the house they’d been renting.

They’d locked him out when they’d left, and he’d been too polite to break in because he hadn’t wanted them to be in trouble if he damaged the landlord’s doors and windows. Fortunately, as a pretrans, he could still handle daylight, and he’d literally just sat there by himself.

Thank fuck he’d had a phone that still worked—

“This is good.”

V refocused on that too-lean, too-pale face. “It’ll settle your stomach.”

“Did your father give it to you when you were nearing the change?”

V thought back to his youth in the war camp. His sire, the Bloodletter, had set up fights for him. And when he’d won, he’d had to fuck the loser in front of everybody.

Oh wait, that had been after his transition.

“Yeah,” he said roughly. “He did. Handy, huh.”

“You must have had really good parents.”

An image came to him of his mahmen in her black robe, a diminutive, disagreeable entity who didn’t allow anyone to question the great Scribe Virgin. Ever.

“The best,” he muttered.

Refusing to go down the rabbit hole of his past, he let Allhan get through half of what was on the plate before repeating, “So, yeah, it’s time to choose.”

“For what?”

V narrowed his eyes on the plate that was getting mercifully cleaner by the moment. “You’re too smart to play dumb.”

Allhan took a deep breath and sat back. “I don’t like to think about the change.”

“I know.” V rubbed the center of his own chest. “But we have to be practical. Is there anybody you want to be there with you—”

“You.”

The answer was shy, but the speed with which it came out of that mouth was a kicker. And fuck him very much, V was absolutely, positively not blinking faster all of a sudden.

“I’ll be there. Wherever, whenever it happens.”

I’m not going to drop you like trash on the curb and drive away like I stole something. Not like those fucks you won’t tell us anything about.

The kid had steadfastly refused to give his parents’ names or tell where they’d all been staying.

What little history they had on him had come out as the social workers had counseled Allhan over the first couple of months he’d stayed at Luchas House.

The little peeks of his backstory with the abandonment had breached his silence only occasionally. For the most part, he’d stayed quiet.

He was still like that.

V cleared his throat and went for another hand-rolled. But he wasn’t going to smoke down here. It was just something for him to fiddle with. “There are Chosen who can come to you. Their blood is very pure. It will help make sure you… do well.”

“So that’s what you meant.” The kid pushed the plate away, with only a little rice left on it. “By choosing. A Chosen.”