Page 8 of My Haven (Bewitched and Bewildered #16)

“If you’ll excuse me for a moment,” he said, stepping away from his brothers. In unison they moved closer to one another, blocking him from view.

He quickly made his way to the parlor and shut the door behind him. He cast a soundproofing spell and called his eldest brother.

Thane answered on the first ring. “You know?” he asked.

“Yes, and I’m fucking pissed I had to find out from Meryn.”

“Forgive me. We have been working around the clock for forty-eight hours.”

“What do we know?”

“We have been trying to reach her since the enforcer bullshit, right before the portals were closed. You know her, she’ll be off grid looking for relics for months, so her not getting back to us right away wasn’t concerning.

Three days ago, I invoked our password, and we heard nothing.

You know that spell. It’s the one she created that if our chosen word is spoken with our magic backing it, we will connect to her immediately.

We’ve used it before with no issues.” Thane growled.

“You got nothing?” Caiden asked, feeling a sense of dread.

“Nothing.”

“Thane, I need you home.”

“We are heading that way. I know Meryn is working on the logistic side for us.”

“I found my mate, brother,” he whispered.

There was silence. “We are coming to you now. We’ll figure this out, I swear Cai.”

“Should I even claim her now? We don’t know where mother is, and I don’t even recognize Storm Keep anymore. It may be safer for her to not be brought in, especially as my mate.” Caiden’s stomach clenched at the idea of his mate’s perfect world shattering because she was now mated to an Ironwood.

“She’ll be infinitely safer with us and Kendrick.” He paused. “What is she like?”

Caiden, despite everything, felt himself smiling. “She’s freedom personified. Oh, and she loves food.”

Thane gave a short laugh. “Good thing she has you then, isn’t it?”

“When will you get here?” he asked, feeling like he was five again.

“Less than an hour.”

“See you soon.”

Thane hung up and Caiden stared at his phone. He allowed himself a few more moments, then rejoined his brothers in the kitchen. “They’re on their way.”

Both Tristan and Kyran visibly slumped forward in relief.

“Good, cuz Law owes me dirt,” Meryn said, munching on a small roll.

“Are those the spring rolls I made?” he asked.

“Yup. Fucking killer good. My body has been craving a lot of Asian food lately,” she said, then shrugged. “Probably because of the veggies.”

Caiden straightened a bit at that. “I got the recipe from a place I used to go to, right around the Gold Rush. It was a migrant camp working on the rail system.”

Her eyes widened. “That’s so cool.”

He saw the excitement in her eyes and realized that she felt for him, the same he felt about Thane. Amelia had grown up with them, so the adoration only went so far. It was different for Meryn who had grown up so far from them.

“Kyran, Tristan, we’re keeping her.”

Aiden just laid his head down on his crossed arms at the table. “Not again.”

“Sir, you’ve had her for a while now, and technically she’s our sister, we should have time to get to know her,” Tristan argued.

Meryn pointed to Pip, Nigel and Neil. “Did you know I adopted them and Jaxon and Noah.”

Caiden shook his head. “Amelia said you adopted them, but I thought it was just a different way to say you were friends.”

“Nope, adopted them for real. Got papers and everything,” she explained.

“Yeah, we even got to bleed on her tree,” Nigel added.

“Holy shit, we have little brothers,” Tristan whispered. “We didn’t even have to wait for mother to have them.”

Kendrick sat up. “Now wait a minute.” He looked from Nigel and Neil to them. Then closed his mouth.

Meryn just laughed. “You gotta share too.”

Kendrick just crossed his arms over his chest and sat back glaring at them.

Caiden realized that Kendrick had always looked after the twins and now he had usurped his place with them. “Ha! Now you know how I have felt all these years when you doted on Amelia.”

He turned to the twins. “Abuse this shamefully, so we can both aggravate him.”

They just blinked.

Meryn pulled out her laptop. “Before Law gets here and starts overloading me with information, who else are we adding to the kill list? I have that Karl dude and Andrei.”

Caiden turned to look at his unit, their eyes were wide at Meryn’s cavalier murder plans.

“Meryn, you’re having a boy, right? One like our commander?” Kyran asked.

“Aiden wants a girl kidlet,” she informed them.

Tristan looked from their mother, to Meryn, to Meryn’s rounded belly.

Caiden sighed. “What’s one more?”

Meryn looked up. “Are you free tomorrow night?”

He had to stop and think. “I believe so, why?”

Meryn wiggled in her chair. “So, my idea for your mate, is to open one of those flash restaurants that are super popular right now. Word goes out in secret channels, that a chef is serving is some random location and invites are scarce. We’ll invite her and you will be point of contact.”

“Two problems I see with this. One, we don’t have a restaurant and two we don’t have a chef,” he replied holding up his fingers.

She held up a finger. “One, I had Rex buy us a place this afternoon. The éire Danu warriors are making it look suitably clean, decorated and secret-like.” She held up another finger.

“Two, Leon and Aeson are two of the best non-squire cooks I know, they will be creating a set menu, and the guys can serve it.”

“She’s right sir, Aeson has been cooking for the éire Danu warriors for over a millennia, if anyone can pull this off it’s him,” Aedan added.

“You organized all this since I called Amelia?” he asked, incredulously.

“Well, yeah. That’s what you’re supposed to do right? Help family?” she asked, sounding small. She stared down at her laptop.

“Oh, my fucking god, I can’t,” Tristan whispered.

He and Kyran scooped her up and began running around the kitchen. “Ours! You live here now!”

Caiden placed a hand over his heart. This tiny girl-child had worked miracles just to give him a chance to meet his mate. He turned to Aiden. “Sorry, Commander. You’re not getting her back.”

“Like hell! Give her here!” Aiden said, chasing Kyran and Tristan who were laughing like lunatics.

Kendrick stood and walked over to him. “She needed this.”

Caiden ground his teeth, thinking of all Amelia had told him about Meryn’s childhood. “She could have been raised here.”

“She was safer where she was.”

Aiden wrestled Meryn away from his brothers and growled at them to stay away. Meryn batted at his chest. “Aiden! Don’t growl, they’ll hate me.”

Aiden stopped immediately and looked down at his mate. “No, they won’t.”

Caiden walked over and met his commander’s eye. Sighing, Aiden handed Meryn over to him. Caiden sat down with Meryn sitting sideways across his lap. “Meryn, you are our sister…” he started.

“Not really,” she whispered. “That’s why I have to help, so you’ll kinda overlook the cousin thing like Amelia does.”

Kyran and Tristan knelt on either side. “That’s not how that works in this family, Meryn.” Kyran replied.

“Technically Thane, Law and Justice are our half-brothers, do you have any idea what would happen if we were to say such a thing?” Tristan asked.

“All three of you would get sense knocked into you,” a deep voice said from the door.

Caiden heard his brother’s voice and all the tension he had been holding on to evaporated. “See. Do you think they feel the same for Amelia?” he asked.

Meryn shrugged. “She was raised here and stuff.”

“What caused this?” Thane asked, his voice tight.

Kyran looked up and pointed to Meryn. “She thinks she has to solve all our problems, so we’ll overlook the tiny detail of not being blood related and like her.”

Thane scowled. “Meryn have you forgotten you are blood related to Amelia?”

“No. But that doesn’t mean they hafta like me,” she said, pointing to him.

Ryuu stepped forward. “Meryn do you love Pip, Nigel and Neil, even though they are adopted?”

“Duh.”

“You aren’t blood related,” he pointed out.

She thought it over for a moment. “But we chose one another, I kinda got forced on them,” she said, nodding to them, then the Ashleighs.

“Forced?” Justice whispered.

Caiden turned to his older brothers. “I am disappointed in you three. You’ve been around her the most and you made her feel like she was tolerated?”

The Ashleighs stepped forward to circle behind where Kyran and Tristan knelt.

Thane spoke first. “Meryn, you are my godsdaughter, there is nothing I wouldn’t do for you.”

“Yeah, but that’s more because of my dad,” she said.

Law looked like he wanted to reach in to take her, but hesitated. “Meryn, I have known you the longest. If anyone can claim you as a sister, it’s me.”

“I was keeping you alive, so I figured that’s why you were nice.”

Caiden had never seen his older brothers at a loss for words.

Pip wedged his way into to stand next to them. Pip laid a hand on her head. “She is nervous, because you’re the first blood-related brothers she has met. She wants you to like her, but because you are related by blood, she is haunted by how she was treated by her grandmother.”

Meryn stared into her lap. “I figured if I like, top-loaded favors, then when I did something that made you angry, you wouldn’t…”

“Wouldn’t what?” Caiden asked, rubbing her back.

She shook her head.

Pip smiled sadly. “Beat her. Starve her. Ignore her. Take your pick.”

“You weren’t that way with me,” Lily said, looking distressed.

Meryn looked up. “You didn’t really give me a chance to get nervous, you just swept in like a small tornado.”

Law eyed Meryn. “Fine, we’ll adopt you.”

“Huh?” she asked.

“You have the Eirleas in éire Danu, your father’s side of the family, right? We’ll claim you on behalf of your mother’s side of the family,” he explained.

“No way, we called dibs,” Kyran refuted.

The arguing began immediately.

Caiden leaned in. “Doubt that we’ll want you no matter what now?”

“What if I burn down the house?” she asked.

Caiden laughed. “It can’t be any worse than when Tristan was mastering fire.”

“What if I say really embarrassing, awkward things to important people?”

Caiden looked around the room. “Meryn any important person that isn’t family or friends, we want to kill, so I don’t think that will be a problem.”

“Oh.”

He waited.

“What if…”

He leaned in and kissed her forehead. “I will love you no matter what Meryn. You are my sister, you are my family.”

When she started crying, he knew she was finally listening. Aiden paced in agitation at seeing her upset, but Caiden was used to dealing with Amelia, so tears were nothing new.

He gently wiped her tears with his sleeve and settled her against his chest the way he did Amelia when she was younger. When she gave a long stuttering sigh, he knew she was feeling better.

“Kyran scoot her spring rolls over here and grab her an electrolyte drink from the fridge.”

Kyran jumped up and grabbed her food and drink.

Sniffling, Meryn sat up straighter and began to devour her spring rolls. She looked up at him. “No wonder Amelia is so nice.”

“How can I not take care of the amazing little sister that is helping me with my mate?”

Meryn snorted. “Just don’t lock her in your trunk.”

“What?”

Thane turned to Aiden. “What?”

Aiden swallowed hard. “Funny story.”

Caiden felt his magic begin to merge with Thane’s as the very air flexed and pulsated.

Kendrick laughing, held up his hands and stepped between them and Aiden. “All is well. He never hurt her, and she did a significant amount of property damage to his car.”

“And armory,” she added.

“Armory?” Kyran asked, in a choked voice.

“Yeah, almost got blown up by pulling the pin from a grenade,” Meryn explained, as she chased sauce around the plate with her spring roll.

Heat came off of Tristan in waves.

Kendrick shook his head. “If the six of you are going to be upset over every small thing, we’ll be here all night.”

Thane looked at Kendrick. “Small things? Getting locked in a trunk, blowing up an armory, those are small?”

Meryn scratched her head. “I mean compared to getting attacked by ferals, surviving a vampire plague, making frenemies with a demon and wearing a ring from a being from the lower realms, that shit is small.”

Nigel covered his face as he laughed. “Not helping.”

Thane, Justice and Law lined up. “Kendrick we will need a complete list of everything she has been through.”

Kendrick dropped his head back. “Gods!”

“Do you also want info on the mouthy tunnel escort that kept calling me a cow or when Daphane Bowers lunged at me in the sewing circle?” Meryn asked.

“Holy shit!” Zev said, staring.

“Your Highness, does our queen know about all of this?” Aedan asked.

“Probably? Maybe,” Meryn shrugged.

Caiden looked to Aiden. “A list of events, chronologically please.”

Aiden scrubbed his hands over his face. “Before we go into old problems, let’s get everyone caught up on what we’re facing.” He looked to Caiden. “We will be working out of the Nu warrior house, your call on what you want to do.” He jerked his head over to where his unit stood off to one side.

“I trust them with my life,” he replied.

“Do you trust them with mine?” Kendrick asked.

Caiden nodded. “You couldn’t ask for better.”

Kendrick turned to his unit brothers. “Things will be revealed that may ultimately put you in danger. But, as most of our meetings will happen here, pussyfooting around certain known secrets will get old fast. If you do not think you can keep these secrets, tell me now.”

Konstantine, bowed. “You know my family sir.”

Hunter laughed. “My mama lives here. If I mess up, you’re free to go to her.”

Aedan smiled and bowed to Meryn. “I would never do anything that would put our princess in danger, nor betray a trust she has vowed to keep.”

Zev looked like he was going to pass out. “I have no idea what the fuck is going on, but I won’t tell secrets or blow up any armories.”

Kendrick looked satisfied. “Alright men, sit down. We’ll start from the beginning.”