Mace walked back several steps and slowly looked into the office until his eyes rested on Reece. “What’s going on with his face?” he asked.
“Jaw’s wired,” Ricky told him, not one for beating around the bush.
“Why’s his jaw wired?”
“Fight with Novikov.”
Closing his eyes and letting out a big sigh, the lion male demanded, “How many times are we going to have to talk to you about not fighting with Novikov before a big job?”
Reece gurgled something and Ricky translated, “He didn’t start it.”
“I don’t care!” the lion roared.
Ricky looked at Reece. “He doesn’t care.”
“Is something wrong with his ears?” Llewellyn asked. “Has Novikov hit him in the head so many times that he no longer understands English?”
“Just trying to be helpful.”
“No. You’re trying to piss me off.”
Maybe a little . . .
Llewellyn pointed at Rory. “Fix this, Reed. Fix. It.”
Once the lion stormed off, Rory glared at his two younger brothers.
Yeah, he looked mighty pissed.
“It’s no big deal,” Ricky said. “You just have to find one backup. I’ll still be there.”
That seemed to be something Rory might be able to tolerate until Reece’s eyes rolled to the back of his head and he passed out in the chair. Sweat beaded his forehead, and his entire body sporadically shook as it worked to heal itself.
The fever was actually a good thing for shifters. It allowed their bodies to heal quickly and with little additional damage. But healing shifters couldn’t be left alone. They had a tendency to shift to their animal form and back to their human form several times over. Nothing harder to explain to the general public than coyotes found hanging out in a restaurant’s cold storage or bears hanging out in someone’s pool. So Reece couldn’t go home alone and, at least in the beginning, Ricky couldn’t ask one of the females of the Pack to take care of him, because the fever could make a body a little . . . amorous. Now, if their baby sister, Ronnie Lee, was around, she could do it. Fever Love, as it was sometimes called, was never directed at one’s kin. But the other females in the Pack were fair game, and Reece had had enough trouble with them in his past. Which meant that Ricky would have to take his brother home . . . now.
Looking at Rory, his brother watching him with a slight sneer to his lips, Ricky argued, “I’m sure finding one more backup shouldn’t be too—”
“Get out.”
“But—”
“Pick up that idiot and get the fuck out of my office!”
Ricky shrugged. “All right.”
Standing, Ricky grabbed Reece’s limp hand and dragged him out of the chair and out of the office. He’d pick him up off the floor when they got to the elevator. Right now it was just kind of funny passing all those offices with his brother dragging along behind him.
That wasn’t a good attitude, was it? No. Probably not. Fun? Absolutely!
But not a good attitude.
The car pulled up to the front of a five-story brownstone in the heart of an expensive downtown neighborhood in New York City.
Toni stepped out onto the street and looked up at the building. She could only imagine how expensive this place must be. It wasn’t that her mother couldn’t afford it. She could. They could. Their mother’s career had been unbelievably lucrative over the years. But still . . . why? Why was her mother doing this?
“Are you giving me my cell phone back?” Oriana snapped.
The screen was cracked but it was still a workable technological instrument, which was why Toni immediately said, “No.”
“I’m telling Mom.”
Toni didn’t know why her siblings used that as some kind of threat. It was meaningless to her.
“Whatever.” She headed toward the house. “Get Zia and Denny,” she ordered Oriana. She didn’t look back. Didn’t check to see if her sister would do as ordered. No matter what they were arguing about, the youngest of their family would always be protected and taken care of. Even while the rest of them were yelling at each other like rabid rottweilers.
Toni walked into the house, horrified to find the front door open. This was New York City. One did not leave the door open in New York City.
Yet as soon as she stepped into the hallway, Toni realized how her parents and siblings could have become distracted.
“Holy shit storm,” Oriana muttered, standing beside Toni. She held Zia in her arms and Kyle held Denny’s hand. The five of them stood in the hallway and gazed up at the mile-high ceilings, and down at the marble floors. The staircase was made of mahogany and seemed to go on forever.
Toni walked farther down the hall and checked out one of the adjoining hallways. That’s when she realized that this brownstone had been opened up and was now connected to the brownstone next door. This place would easily fit her entire family inside it but still . . . why were they here? Why were they staying here?
A light breeze flowed in from the open doorway. Oriana sniffed the air. “Why do I smell dog?”
“That’s just us.”
“I know how my family smells.” And the “bitch” was implied. “This is dog.”
Thinking it was probably some stray, Toni lifted her head and sniffed. Spinning around, she walked back down the hall and out the door. She stared across the street. She watched children jump out of a big SUV, bags from a toy store in their hands. Screaming and laughing, they ran up the stairs of their own brownstone and inside.
But it was the adults following the kids inside that Toni recognized.
Snarling, she ran back into the brownstone. “Mom?” Toni called out. “Mom!”
“Upstairs! Come see, Toni! Come see!”
Toni raced up five flights of stairs and found her mother in an enormous room with a skylight. A bright open space that would be perfect for a practice room, something she was sure her mother had already noted.
“Isn’t this place amazing?” her mother asked.
Toni pointed at the window facing the brownstone across the street. “Are we here because—”
“Because I think a summer in New York City is just what this family needs. Everything we could possibly want is here. The classes, the training, the—”
“First off, Mom, what classes? The kind of classes these little brats want to take have already been filled for at least six months, if not at least a full year.”
Jackie chuckled. “Baby, come on. You forget what you’re dealing with here.”
“We still have to make calls, get recommendations from their Washington teachers—”
“I already have Jack on it.”
“Your agent?”
“Uh-huh. He’s already got the boys in some advanced classes at NYU. The twins in Berlitz at Rockefeller Center. Oriana will take her morning and afternoon classes with the Manhattan Ballet Company—”
“How the hell did he—”
“—Cherise will be studying under Herr Koenig.”
“I heard he’s an asshole.”
“A horrible asshole but a talented one who only takes the best performers as his students.”
Toni threw her hands up in the air. “Oh, well then . . .”
“Kyle will be taking master classes at the Steinhardt School at NYU and Denny will go to the School of Visual Arts.”
“How the hell did Jack—”
“He has the kids’ portfolios and recent video performances on file . . . just in case.”
Toni’s eyes narrowed. “Is he their agent?”
“No. He’s my agent. He’s just helping me out.”