Page 14 of Werewolf in Shining Armor (Werewolf Knights Book 1)

Fourteen

Adrian was on his fourth cup of coffee when he heard this booming voice, ringing from the front room of the house.

“Where is that boy?”

Stan murmured an answer, but Adrian didn’t exactly hear it.

He couldn’t.

Everything in him stilled suddenly, and he needed to run. He wasn’t sure whether or not his instinct was to run toward the voice or away, though. So he sat there sort of frozen, like some panicked little rabbit, which was weird because he liked rabbits.

He’d had a rabbit boss. He knew rabbits socially.

Symon, on the other hand, didn’t seem to be having the same problem. He just rolled his eyes. “It’s Dad.”

Yeah, Adrian sort of figured.

Rian and Quin were still in bed, of course, and not here to help Symon with their father.

Adrian assumed that, when you were second-in-command of an entire pack, you were expected to be awake and functional once your father showed up.

He wouldn’t know.

“Should I go? Wait in the other room?”

Symon rolled his eyes. “Don’t. Just don’t. His bark is worse than his bite.”

“What did you say, boy?”

Suddenly, Adrian could see exactly what Symon was going to look like in thirty years—big, beautiful, silver, completely convinced of his own power. This man was effortlessly alpha.

“I said your bark was worse than your bite, old man.” Symon stood up. Meeting him chest to chest, their eyes locked.

Adrian was fairly sure he was going to pee himself any moment.

Then Symon’s father roared with laughter and grabbed Symon in a hard hug, clapping him on the back several times.

Symon laughed too, squeezing his dad in a way that might have broken Adrian’s bones.

“Good to see you, son.”

“You too, Dad. Thanks for coming to check on us.”

“Mmm. Who’s the little omega?”

“Mine.” Symon blinked like he’d just confused himself. “I mean, this is my mate, Adrian. Adrian, Thomas, my dad, the head of the Boulder River pack. Dad, this is Adrian.”

Adrian stood and held out one hand, and he was pretty proud of himself because it wasn’t shaking too bad.

And he wasn’t hyperventilating too much.

Basically, he was a great.

Totally not intimidated, completely not about to cry, because that would be bad.

“Pleased to meet you, sir.”

Go team him.

“Your mate.” Thomas looked at Symon with wide eyes. “You didn’t tell me that you were pursuing a mate.”

Symon shrugged. “I know I didn’t. I mean, I didn’t know. That I was… This is very new and sudden.” Symon looked over at him and smiled. “But welcome. Completely and totally welcome.”

“Well, okay then.” Thomas sat, and immediately Stan was there with coffee and a cinnamon roll the size of his head. When Thomas looked over at Stan, it was with a gentle, completely nonthreatening expression, the big alpha seeming incredibly careful. “Which pack are you from?” he asked Adrian. “I’d like to contact them and make our greetings.”

Oh man, that was a can of worms. Adrian went with the simplest, truest possible answer. “I don’t have a pack. I’m a solitary.”

“Okay, but where did you come from?”

“I hatched from an egg.” He wasn’t doing this. “It was a big egg.”

One silver eyebrow winged up. “It wasn’t that big.”

“Dad, stop. He’s his own wolf, okay? Well, and now he’s part of our pack. That’s all we need to know.” Symon reached for him, and he took that hand like a lifeline.

He held on tight, breathing, letting Symon’s strength really bolster him. In his experience, big alphas could be a real nightmare, so he had to work to keep his shit together.

“All right. All right, I just wanted to welcome your omega to our family. I meant no disrespect.” Thomas backed off, and Adrian was incredibly grateful for it.

It wasn’t as if Adrian was some sort of a criminal, or that he was on the run from an evil pack that were going to hunt him down like slavering beasts. That wasn’t the deal.

It was more like he was invisible. Like he hadn’t even actually ever been there. And when he’d walked away, no one even cared. So why make a big deal about it?

“I appreciate it. But there’s honestly no pack. Not to write to or to talk to. I’m on my own.”

Thomas frowned and shook his head. “Not anymore. My son’s mate is part of our family, part of our pack, and I won’t hear anything different.”

Then, to Adrian’s utter shock, Thomas pulled him into a huge bone-crushing hug. It was weird and sweet and dear.

Adrian just stood there, completely unsure of what to do.

It’s okay. He won’t hurt you. He’s a good man and a great pack alpha. I can only hope that one day, I do as good a job.

Do you intend to take his place?

What? Do you think I’m going to leave it to Rian? Or Quin?

Adrian didn’t say anything because…what was he supposed to say? Symon just didn’t seem like the wolfiest of all possible wolves.

I know I’m more corporate than fuzzy, but I can do the job. There was an unshakable certainty in Symon’s tone, and he had to grin. Wolfy wolf or not, Symon was an effortless alpha.

I trust you, was what he finally came out with.

Good. I love you.

His cheeks heated, and he was glad when Thomas let him go, because he dove back into Symon’s arms, needing the contact.

Rian wandered in, blinking, hair standing up all over, his pajamas covered in little saguaro cactus prints. “Hey, Dad. Did you bring pastries?”

Thomas stared at Rian, face so serious. “Who are you?”

Rian wrinkled his nose. “Are you going senile, old man? Do you not recognize your middle son?”

“I thought you were some fancy-assed high-dollar lawyer type.” Thomas pursed his lips. “You look like a ragamuffin.”

“Ragamuffin? Definitely senile.” Rian seemed unconcerned. “I was up all night playing grab ass with my brothers and this mountain lion.”

“Is that what you call it?” Now it was Symon’s dad’s turn to look unimpressed. “I want to know why no one called me and let me know if there was a threat to the pack.”

“Wasn’t a threat to the pack,” Rian announced. “It was a threat to money and business and possibly Symon’s new mate. Have you met Adrian?”

“I’ve met Adrian. Adrian’s part of the pack. The money, part of the pack. Business, part of the pack.”

Symon shook his head. “Dad, it’s not?—”

“Are you part of the pack?”

“Well, I suppose, but I?—”

“No. You’re part of the pack. Ergo, all the rest of it’s part of the pack. I’m the leader of the pack. I should have been notified.”

Quin came in through the kitchen somehow, the huge box of pastries in one hand. A cruller—no, half of a cruller in the other. “Eh, you’re here, aren’t you? I guess you must have been notified. In fact, I called and said, yo, Dad.”

Wait. Did Quin sleep in leather pants? Did he own anything that weren’t leather pants? That had to get sweaty.

Ew.

Quin winked at Adrian as if he knew he was being stared at. “Want a doughnut?”

“Please.” He wanted all the things. Sugar. Caffeine. For the earth to stop shifting under his feet.

Which might have worked, but then Isaac entered the room, kind of doing his slinky morning kitty walk. He looked all Pallas cat with his wide blinky eyes and morning hair. “Did I hear doughnuts? Whoa.” Isaac jumped back when he saw Thomas, kind of crouching. If he had his tail, it would be lashing, Adrian thought. “Who are you?”

“Thomas Lukos. Symon’s father. Pleased to meet you, erm…”

“Isaac.” Isaac stared at the big guy as if he would bite.

“It’s okay,” Adrian told Isaac. “He’s nice.”

“If you say so.” Isaac’s eyes never left Thomas. “Are you sure I can have a doughnut?”

“Dad brought like eighty-four boxes of doughnuts, man.” Quin tossed Isaac a doughnut, and he snatched it out of the air with reflexes that made them all blink.

Right.

Kitty.

It made sense.

“Well, eighty-four boxes should get us through at least ten a.m.” Rian nodded. “Good choice.”

“Yeah,” Symon agreed. “We’ll get Stan to make bacon sandwiches for everyone around noon, and then we can all decide whether or not we want to go out for Mexican.”

Adrian considered whether or not to just have a meltdown. This was all a lot.

He gave Symon a hard stare. “Okay. So, we have a gunfight with a big cat. He is now in jail. Are we thinking that this whole thing is over? It really doesn’t feel like ‘let’s have doughnuts and go out to eat Mexican food’ over. Also, my apartment got burned down. And I don’t even own a pair of socks now!”

“All right, the insurance has cut you a check.” Rian started, and Adrian held one hand up.

“That’s not the point, and I’m not finished. When is the office opening up? Is everybody at the office okay? What are we going to do about the code? What are we going to do about these back doors and how do we get rid of them? What do we do about the fact that there is another person out there who was obviously working with dickweed because he wasn’t smart enough to do all of this by himself, solitary cat or no? When am I going to get to buy another pair of jeans? And what about my video games? And my couch. My couch is gone!”

Thomas stared at him for a second. “What happened to your apartment?”

“Oh, Jesus Christ.” He stormed over to Quin and grabbed two doughnuts. “You said there were eighty-four boxes?”

“Eighty-three and a half now.” Butter wouldn’t melt in Quin’s mouth.

“Do any of them have apple fritters in them?”

Thomas cleared his throat. “Yeah.”

“Excellent, Isaac, let’s go eat.”