Man to Man [Wolf Creek Pack 3] (Siren Publishing Classic ManLove) (19 page)

“What happened to you, Virgil?” Ethan asked. “Where did Timmins take you?”

Virgil nervously ran his hand through his shoulder-length, straw-colored hair. “It doesn’t matter. I’m back, and that’s all that is important.”

Jim could hear a wealth of pain in those words, and he knew whatever had happened to Virgil while in Timmins’s hands, the man wouldn’t be getting over it any time soon. He suspected that Timmins’s obsession with Virgil had become physical.

“But—” Ethan started again.

Jim reached out and placed his hand on Ethan’s arm. When the man glanced up at him, Jim shook his head. He knew Ethan wanted to know what happened to Virgil, but it was obvious by his stiff posture that Virgil wouldn’t be talking.

Ethan pressed his lips together and glanced away, but not before Jim saw the sorrow on his face. He felt bad for Ethan. He knew Ethan could tell something was wrong, and he knew the man wanted to fix it, to fix his brother. Only time would do that.

“Virgil, do you know who all is involved with this plot to sell pack members to the vampires?”

Virgil looked relieved to have a change in conversation when he turned back to Jim. “I know Douglas is involved along with several members of the core families, but not all of them. Timmins’s son, Roland, is the one that set me free after his father tied me up. He wants nothing to do with what his father is trying to do.”

“Where is he?” Jim asked. “Does he need to be taken to Wolf Creek Pack?”

“No.” Virgil shook his head. “After Roland untied me, he took his mother and fled with her to her family’s pack. They’ll be safe there.”

“And you’re positive that Roland isn’t in on this with his father?” Jim asked. “Timmins and Douglas both hinted that all of the core families were involved.”

“Oh, all of the core families are involved.” Virgil’s laugh sounded nervous and somewhat disgusted at the same time. “Just not all of the members of all of the core families.”

“Can you give Alpha Reece a list of who is involved?”

“I can tell him what I know, but that’s not much.” Virgil kicked at the body lying at his feet. “Timmins told me some of his plan while he had me, but he was too busy trying to convince me to join him to spill it all.”

“Why does Timmins have such a hard-on for you?”

Virgil shrugged. “You got me. The man has been making passes at me for ages. Hell, I was still in high school the first time he tried to touch me. I kicked his sorry ass and stopped visiting his house. It caused a bit of a riff between me and Roland for a few years but—I don’t know. Roland seemed to come around when Timmins kidnapped me.”

“Doesn’t Timmins have a mate?”

“Look, I—”

Jim and Virgil both heard the same noise at the same time. Jim could tell by the way Virgil stiffened and swung around. He only seemed to calm down when he noticed the noise came from Donovan coming back.

And Donovan was dressed, although where he got the clothes from, Jim would never know. Donovan was more the jeans and T-shirt type of guy. He wasn’t slacks and dress shirts. And he had certainly never worn purple before, at least not since Jim had known him.

Then again, the man did like pink nail polish.

“Glad you could join us.” Jim snickered.

Donovan just flipped him the bird. He lessened the insult by blowing Jim a kiss before turning to face Virgil. Before Donovan could voice whatever words that balanced on his tongue, Joey let out a glad little cry and dove for Donovan. The man barely caught the boy.

His eyebrows were drawn together in a deep frown, confusion written all over his face as he cradled Joey to his chest. The boy snuggled right in, pressing his head against Donovan’s shoulder. His body slumped within moments as he fell asleep.

Jim grinned when Donovan glanced over at him. Payback was a bitch. “You look good like that.”

Donovan rolled his eyes.

“We need to get going,” he said as he looked at Virgil and Ethan. “Those two vampires I tied up won’t stay that way forever.”

“What’s your plan?” Virgil asked.

“We need to get back to the Wolf Creek Pack, or at least to a phone. So we can call in reinforcements.”

Virgil dug into his pocket for a moment and then pulled out his cell phone, holding it out to Donovan. “Here, you can use mine.”

Donovan chuckled. He juggled Joey to one shoulder and then reached for the phone. He tapped the dial pad and then held the phone to his ear. Jim knew he was trying not to wake Joey when the man began speaking in whispers.

“Devlin, man, things have gone to shit. We need backup.” Jim got an uneasy feeling when Donovan frowned. “He did what?” Donovan was nodding his head as he listened. “Okay, I’ll call Chase then. Just keep your ass safe.” Donovan had a grim look on his face as he hung up and started to dial again. “We got trouble. I have to call Chase for backup. Reece and Devlin have enough trouble.”

“What happened?” Jim asked.

“Douglas knocked Devlin out and took off.”

“Is Devlin okay?”

“Yeah, he has a thick head. He’ll be fine. But Reece as ordered them to hit the road. He says he’ll catch up with us at Wolf Creek Pack.” Donovan finished dialing and held the phone up to his ear again.

“You know it will take at least two hours for anyone to get here from Wolf Creek.”

“I know, but what other choice do we have? It’s not like—Oh, hey, Chase. It’s Donovan.” Donovan rolled his eyes. “Yes, I know you’re my brother and I know you recognize my voice. No, I—Look, smart-ass, this is serious. We need backup.”

Jim glanced over at Virgil when the man nudged his shoulder. “Huh?”

“Does he always talk to his brother that way?”

“Yeah, pretty much, but don’t let that fool you.” Jim snickered. “They are very close. I know once Chase understands that Donovan needs him, he’ll rally the troops and be on the road within minutes. He’s a good guy, just a little odd.”

“If you say so.” Virgil did not look convinced. In fact, he looked like he had just walked into the psych ward at a state mental hospital.

Donovan snapped the phone closed and handed it back to Virgil. He looked quite satisfied with himself. “Chase and a few of his friends are on their way. We need to keep heading west along the main road. Chase will pick us up and take us back to Wolf Creek Pack.”

He juggled the sleeping child in his arms, hitching him up a little higher. He looked left and then right, and then he looked at Jim, Ethan, and Virgil. “Which way is west?”

* * * *

Jim’s legs burned with exhaustion. If he didn’t know better, he would have thought that they were about to fall off. He felt like he had been walking for hours. Oh wait, he had. Well, it had only been a couple of hours, but lugging a limp child through the woods wasn’t easy.

Carrie was out cold as was Joey. Jim didn’t know whether to be grateful for that fact or not. The longer he carried her, the heavier she felt. But she might have been scared if she was awake, and that seemed even worse.

“What’s going to happen to the kids?” Virgil asked.

“Once we get back to my pack, we’ll try and find their family.” Jim felt a little tug of regret in the region of his heart at his words. He knew it was for the best. The children would need their family now that their parents were gone.

“Their mother told me that neither she nor her husband had any family. That’s how Timmins got a hold of them so easily. There was no one to protect them. Their pack was decimated, obliterated. There was no one left.” Virgil grimaced. “It seems this wasn’t the first pack that the vampires made deals with.”

“Damn!”

“Do you think your alpha can find a family for them in your pack?”

Jim’s eyes instantly went to Donovan, wondering if he had heard Virgil’s words. He was pretty sure he had when he found Donovan looking back at him, one of his eyebrows arched. Jim didn’t even want to begin to decipher what that look meant.

There was no way that they would be allowed to keep Carrie and Joey. They didn’t even belong to the same pack. They had no stable home to raise two small children, and they certainly didn’t have any experience. It just wasn’t going to happen, no matter how much the idea warmed Jim’s heart.

“My father will find someone to take them,” he said while looking directly at Donovan.

“Maybe us?”
Donovan asked silently.

Jim’s jaw dropped.
“Donovan—”

“Just think about it.”
Donovan chuckled before turning around and continuing to walk through the woods.
“We’d make good parents.”

“You’re out of your ever-loving mind.”
Jim shook his head and started walking again, trailing after Donovan.
“We can’t even decide which pack to live in. How in the hell can we raise two kids?”

“Well, I’m pretty sure that I now belong to the Wolf Creek Pack, or will just as soon as I ask your father for permission to join. So, that’s solves that problem. Next?”

“We don’t have a house big enough.”

“We can move. Next?”

“Donovan!”

“What?”
Donovan smirked as he glanced over his shoulder at Jim.
“Come on, you want kids. I know you do. And these two kids need parents. It’s a win-win situation in my book.”

“The pack would never stand for it.”
Jim was almost positive of it. They had a hard enough time accepting that the alpha’s sons were gay. Jim didn’t see them sitting back and letting two gay men adopt a couple of orphaned shifter children. Someone would pitch a fit.

“I think your pack is a lot more understanding than you give them credit for, Jim. I also believe that we would have the backing of your family if we chose to adopt Joey and Carrie.”

“Yeah, but—”

Donovan stopped and turned to look at Jim. “But what?” he asked out loud.

Jim glanced down at the sleeping baby in his arms. Carrie couldn’t have been more than two years old, Joey just a little older. They were so young, and they had experienced a hell that no child should go through.

“What if they don’t want us?” Jim whispered, sharing his biggest concern with his mate. “They’ve been raised with a mother and a father, not two fathers.”

“Jim, answer me something, and be honest with me.”

Jim nodded as he raised his eyes to meet Donovan’s.

“Do you want kids?” Donovan nodded to the sleeping children in their arms. “Maybe these kids?”

“Yes.” He did. He wouldn’t lie about that. But he also didn’t think they had a chance in hell of keeping Carrie and Joey.

“Then we’ll deal with things as they come along. We’ve already decided that I’ll join your pack if your father will allow it.”

“He’ll allow it.” Jim chuckled. “It means he keeps me in the pack. Mom loves being surrounded by her kids, and Dad will do anything to keep Mom happy.”

“Fine, then that’s a done deal except for the asking. And we’ve already decided that we need a bigger house. I am sure your family can help us find one. I’ll apply for a job at the sheriff’s department like Chase is doing, and that will give us two incomes, more than enough to care for two children.”

“In your dreams,” Jim murmured, not wanting to stop Donovan’s rant. The man seemed all worked up, like he was trying to convince himself as much as Jim.

“And, maybe if we ask real nice, your mom can babysit for us. She seems to love kids, and these would technically be her grandkids. Either that, or we could put them into daycare during the day.”

“Mom would be ecstatic.”

“And you have the added bonus of supplying your parents with their first set of grandkids. That should shut everyone up.”

Jim rolled his eyes. “Okay, I’m sold. We just have to see if this is something we can do before we get our hopes up. I don’t want to start thinking about these kids as ours if there’s someone out there that can take them away from us.”

“I know, babe, I don’t either. So, we pray for the best and plan for the worst.” Donovan leaned over to rub his head against the side of Jim’s. “I’ll move heaven and earth to keep make you happy, Jim.”

“I want kids, Donovan, but I’m happy with you. Don’t ever think otherwise. I don’t need kids to make me complete. You do that.”

Donovan grinned. “I love you, too, babe.”

“Damn, you guys are loud.”

Donovan growled and swung around, extending his claws to fight off whatever threat was behind him until he saw Chase and Ben standing there, grinning. He held up his middle finger and flipped them both off. Chase and Ben laughed and walked closer.

“It took you long enough to get here,” Donovan snapped. “What, did you stop for donuts along the way?”

“Yeah,” Chase said. He gestured toward Ben with his thumb. “The deputy was trying to eat his shoes.”

“Was not,” Ben grumbled. “Mr. I-can’t-stop-for-directions here got lost.”

Donovan’s eyebrows shot up in shock. “You got lost?” His brother never got lost. In fact, he was known for his sense of direction. He was elated when Chase’s face flushed and his brother glanced away. He would have ripping material for years of this one. He couldn’t wait to share this with Devlin. He’d laugh himself silly.