“Enough so that if I’m ever forced out of the Pack, I’ll have ample places to stay.”
“Your Pack do that a lot to its own?”
“The Pack as a whole . . . no. My father?” He shrugged, not really wanting to talk about him when he was having the time of his life with Dee. Although, he’d never felt safer talking about the man except with Lock.
“Don’t worry,” she teased. “If you ever need a place to stay, there’s this apartment you can share with a lovely family I know. If you don’t mind beady red eyes.”
He glared down at her. “That’s not funny, Dee-Ann,” he said while she laughed. “Vermin is never funny.”
CHAPTER 14
“Someone just got laid.”
Dee froze in her tracks, her hand on the plain front door that led into the Group office. Slowly, she turned and faced Malone and Desiree.
“She appears freshly laid to me,” Desiree said, grinning. “It’s the walk.”
“The ‘I just got laid walk.’ ” Malone nodded. “Yep. Saw that, too.”
Dee-Ann moved away from the door and over to the two females she was currently forced to work with. “Is there a reason y’all are here?” she asked.
“Avoidance,” Desiree observed. “Must be kind of serious.”
“So are we getting a name, Smith? Or is it just some poor loser wolf from whatever backwoods coughed you up?”
Dee was in Malone’s face, the two snarling at each other, but without fangs since they were on the street in the full view of God and everybody.
“Cut it out,” Desiree sighed. “We’ve got a line on a fight. And I don’t mean you two.”
Stepping back, Dee gave one last bark at Malone before focusing on Desiree. “Where and when?” she asked, already looking forward to hurting some people who deserved it. Not that Malone didn’t deserve a good beating, but Dee couldn’t really get away with it at the moment, so beating someone else would have to do . . . for now.
Ric was busy changing into his black sweats, black T-shirt, and black chef’s coat when his cousin Arden entered the employee locker room.
She smiled at the others getting changed for the dinner service and she walked up to Ric. She placed her hand on his shoulder and he came down a bit so she could whisper in his ear. “Did you know your father’s here?” she asked.
Ric briefly closed his eyes. “No. Did he ask for me?”
“No. Just went to the manager’s office and started going through the papers there. Do you want me to get Adelle?”
“Don’t.” She’d only make it worse in her attempt to protect Ric. “I’ll go see him.”
“Okay. Dell is with him.”
That made Ric snarl. Wendell. Ric’s brother. He liked to be called Dell because he hated his name—which meant that Ric called him Wendell at every given opportunity.
Ric finished changing, wrapped a black bandana around his hair since he felt the same way about chef hats as he felt about chef clogs, and headed to the general manager’s office.
His father sat at the small desk, scanning papers, his small round glasses perched on the end of his nose. At the four-drawer file cabinet stood his older brother, Wendell, searching through all the folders. What they were looking for, Ric could only guess.
“Dad,” Ric said to his father and to his brother, “Wendell.”
His brother scowled. “It’s Dell.”
Ric closed the door behind him and leaned against it. “What can I do for you two?”
His father glanced at him over his glasses. He was a singularly fussy wolf, with his receding hairline, pinched features, and too-small eyes. Blayne called those eyes beady and she was right.
Among the American Van Holtzes, there were two kinds of wolves: The fussy, smaller East Coast wolves who kept their territories safe by being extremely sneaky and devious with absolutely no regard for what the long-term effects of their actions might be; and the bigger, more direct, but much meaner West Coast wolves that kept their territories by tearing apart anything that tried to take what they believed belonged to the Pack.
Yet Ric represented neither side, taking after his mother who hailed from a small Pack located in the Colorado Rockies. He got what his father referred to as his “pretty girl” looks and “weak nature” from “that side of the bloodline.”
Ric, however, didn’t believe he had a weak nature. Having a soul didn’t make one weak and he felt his father knew this because he only pushed his son but so far. Then again, that could have a lot to do with his Uncle Van. Because Adelle had been right. Niles Van Holtz had always done his best to protect his young cousin from Alder. For every attempt his father made to break Ric down, Uncle Van was right there to build Ric right back up. It had meant a lot to him growing up and both men knew now that if push ever came to shove, Ric’s loyalty would always be with his Uncle Van. Always.
Something else his father resented Ric for, but really, what did the man expect?
“You’re paying Fortelli too much for the fish.” He raised a recent invoice and slammed it on the desk. Pulled out another invoice. “And the seal meat.”
Ric didn’t reply. He simply did that thing he did when his father got like this. He “went away.” He just thought of something else. Something more pleasant or more interesting or more anything than the old bastard muttering at him in that fussy tone about something Ric didn’t control—that’s why they had a general manager—and knew wasn’t true anyway.
Instead, he thought about Dee. Gorgeous, sexy Dee. She wouldn’t be easy to make his own. Dee-Ann Smith would be a challenge for any wolf, but for Ric especially because he was a Van Holtz. It was rumored that Smiths warned their pups away from Van Holtzes from birth and something told Ric that Dee’s father had definitely been one of those. Of course, that wouldn’t stop Ric from trying. Just because the bone he wanted was on the other side of the fence didn’t mean he would ever stop trying to get over, around, or under that fence until he got what he wanted.
A rather antiquated reference to the well-known Van Holtz determination, but still true today.
“What are you smiling at?”
Ric looked up and realized his father was standing in front of him, Wendell on his right. Not the best position for any wolf to be in.
“Nothing. Is there anything else?”
His father stepped closer, studying him from behind those small round glasses. “Are you sure there’s nothing you want to tell me about . . . son?”
Ric shook his head. “No, sir.”
Another step closer, Wendell moving in from the other side. “Really?” Another step. “Not even about what I saw washing the dishes not more than twenty minutes ago?”
Damn. So concerned over those bloody books, Ric had completely forgotten about Stein.
“I don’t see what there is to discuss.”
“Is that right?”
“I have full discretion on whom I hire and whom I don’t.”
“Have you forgotten what he did? Why he was removed from the Pack? From the family?”
Christ, his father made it sound like they’d had a tumor surgically removed before it got too big. Stein was a lot of things, but not something to be coldly and callously excised from those he knew and loved. And not only that, but talk about the pot calling out the kettle. At least Stein had his youth as an excuse to stealing from his Pack. What was Alder’s excuse?
“I’ve forgotten nothing,” Ric replied simply.
“And?” his father pushed.
Ric shrugged. He wouldn’t elaborate. He wouldn’t argue this any further. There was no point. Besides, it was when Ric was trying to defend himself that Alder Van Holtz went in for the kill. He could do with words what many could do with knives or claws. Even Uncle Van didn’t go toe-to-toe with Alder when it came to words. In fact, the only one among them brave enough? Van’s wife, Aunt Irene. One of the many reasons Ric adored her like the moon.