He waited until he heard Erik leave to open the door again. He needed to get his stuff loaded and head back to the office. He had to arrange to rent a moving truck for Saturday morning.
* * * *
Erik seethed as he drove to meet with Joseph again. He had almost missed following Sean to work that morning. He’d just turned onto the street when Sean’s crappy truck passed him. Startled, Erik had managed to get turned around and follow him. Sean had headed to I-75, up to Sarasota. It was there Erik realized Sean was part of the survey company working on a road construction project. Morita Survey Technologies. Erik watched for a little while from a distance and assumed Sean was in charge based on the company name on one of the other vehicles, and Sean’s last name.
He had copied the company name and phone number off the truck and called Joseph with the news, as well as Sean’s home address.
“Good. I’ll follow up on this myself.”
“Do you think I should try talking to Emery again?”
Joseph had let out a sigh on his end. “You can try, but my son is stubborn. I’m certain he’s either mistaken or lying about the mate-bond, but you can try. I don’t suppose it can hurt.”
I want that human out of his life. His knuckles turned white around his steering wheel. I’ll do whatever it takes to show Emery he’s meant to be with me.
* * * *
Erik stood nervously shifting his weight from one foot to the other in Joseph Nadel’s study and related what had happened when he talked to Emery. Joseph sat behind his desk, lips pressed into a thin line, hands clasped together on the desk blotter.
When Erik finished, he sat back in his chair and mulled things over. “I will take it from here, son. It’s time for you to back off for a while. I’ll talk to this Morita guy myself. See if I can talk some sense into him. If nothing else, I’ll offer him money to go away.”
“What about the other option you mentioned?”
Joseph waved his hand, dismissing his words. “That’s only for me to decide. I won’t speak of it. Thank you for all you’ve done, Erik. I won’t forget it.”
Erik knew that was a dismissal. “You’re welcome, sir.” Inside, however, he seethed.
He also had an idea.
* * * *
When Erik left, Joseph stood and went to pour himself a drink. He didn’t want to think about his other option, about exiling his own son from the pod. Especially when it meant it would leave a gap in their line. Emery was his only Alpha son, the only one he could hand control over to.
He sadly stared at the family photos hanging on his study wall. He loved his son. Now that he was over his initial shock of the news of Emery mating with a human, sadness filled him.
I let my anger get the better of me.
But he couldn’t turn his back on the way things were done. That wasn’t how he’d kept his pod safe. How his ancestors had kept the pod safe.
Exile my son?
He stared at a picture taken at Emery’s high school graduation, all of them gathered around him.
He had to find a way to talk sense into his son. Or at the very least, into Sean Morita. Besides, everyone knew mate-bonds were a myth, just magical thinking. Hell, he didn’t even have that with his wife and they’d been happily married nearly forty years.
Chapter Thirteen
Sean sat in his truck with the laptop on and his phone in his ear, talking with the construction foreman who’d managed to disappear after lunch. “Dude, I’m telling you, I need you back here ASAP. This guy you left in charge doesn’t know what the frak he’s talking about, and we’re stalled until we get this cleared up.”
He caught sight of the older guy approaching his truck out of the corner of his eye, but didn’t pay any attention to him. He scrolled through PDF files of plans on his laptop. “That’s not what we were told yesterday. I’m serious, I don’t want DOT coming down on my ass because of y’all’s screwup. If you don’t get back here and help us get this cleared up, I’m sending my crew home and you’re still paying for a full day. There’s no reason to have them standing out in the hot sun all afternoon with their thumbs up their asses.” He hung up and took a deep breath to try to control his anger.
The man now stood by his open door. “Can I help you, sir?” Sean asked him.
“Are you Sean Morita?”
He shut down his laptop. “Yes. Please tell me you’re here from the construction company to help me get this mess straightened out.”
“No, I’m sorry, I’m not.” He held out his hand. “My name is Joseph Nadel.”
“Nice to…” He made the connection just as their hands connected. “Nadel?”
“Emery’s father.”
Sean swallowed hard. “What can I do for you?”
The older man glanced at Sean’s work crew, who were now standing around another company truck and getting water from a large Igloo cooler. “May I talk to you for a few minutes in private?”
Sean glanced at the guys. “Um, sure.” He locked his truck and led the man over to a stand of oak trees nearby. “What’s this about?” Sean suspected he knew exactly what this was about but would hear the guy out before he told him to go fuck himself.
“My son is apparently under the mistaken notion that the two of you have…eh—”
“Mated,” Sean finished for him. It surprised him he had no qualms saying it. He wasn’t a person to hold on to disbelief when proof was shown to him. He’d seen Emery shift with his own eyes, and it wasn’t his imagination that they could now talk without speaking when they were together.
He also didn’t imagine how much he loved Emery.
“Yes.” He reached into his shirt pocket and pulled out a piece of paper and handed it to Sean.
When Sean took it, he realized it was a folded check. He unfolded it.
Made out to him, in the amount of five hundred thousand dollars.
Sean looked at him. “What is this for?” He also suspected he knew what it was for, but would make the old man say it.
“That’s for you. Take it and walk away from my son and it’s yours.”
Bingo. He refolded it and ripped it in half before tucking the pieces in the man’s shirt pocket. “Fuck you.” He pushed past him and tried to walk away, but the man grabbed his arm and spun him around.
“Listen to me. You have no idea what will happen if my son doesn’t drop this foolishness!”
“Yeah, I do. He said you’ll be an asshole and exile him from the family or pod or whatever the hell you call it. I love him, and I’m not walking away from him. So go fuck yourself.” He shook himself free and stormed back to his truck. He unlocked it and threw his hardhat inside. “Jimmy, I’ll be back in ten,” he called to the crew. “Call me if the foreman shows up before I’m back.” Without a look behind him, he pulled out and headed down to a McDonald’s where he locked himself in a bathroom stall for a few minutes.
He’d wanted to punch Emery’s father, to smash his nose and make him bleed.
And he wasn’t a violent person, normally. He’d only ever been in one fight in his life, and that had been in high school.
He finally emerged from the stall, washed his face, and went out to order himself lunch and a shake. He usually didn’t eat fast food, but today he’d make an exception. He thought about calling Emery but didn’t want to upset him. I’ll tell him when I get home.
Fuck. I should have kept the check to show him. Maybe he wouldn’t believe his story.
No, he chided himself, Emery will believe me.
He made his way back to the construction site, happy to see Joseph Nadel had left. Unfortunately, the construction crew foreman hadn’t returned, either.
He sat in his truck and ate his lunch.
* * * *
They were about to knock off at four when Emery called him. “Hi, handsome. You about ready to head this way?” Emery asked.
Sean looked around. His crew had nearly finished stowing their gear. The foreman had returned earlier and they were abl
e to get back to work. One more day, and this job would be done. “Yeah. You?”
“Guess what? I signed the lease for a house.”
Sean smiled at how happy Emery sounded. No, he couldn’t tell him about his father yet. “That’s great.”
“Stop by my office on your way home and I’ll take you there. Besides, I want to introduce you to everyone here. My receptionist says I look disgustingly happy.”
That made Sean laugh. “I’ll be there in twenty minutes. Love you.”
“Love you, too. Drive fast.”
Sean stared at his phone. No, he wouldn’t walk away from Emery. Not for any amount of money.
He had the address to Emery’s office and when he pulled into the parking lot, he saw Emery’s Mustang. Feeling a little out of place in his sweaty work clothes, he walked in.
The receptionist smiled. “May I help you?”
“I’m here for Emery. I’m Sean.”
She let out a happy-sounding gasp. “You’re Sean? Oh my gosh, it’s great to meet you!” She rounded the desk and gave him a hug despite how grungy he must have looked. “He’s told me a lot about you.”
He wondered how much she really knew about Emery when the man himself walked out of an office and immediately grinned when he saw Sean. As he walked over, he winked.
“I want to strip you out of those clothes and lick every inch of your body.”
Sean nearly let out a startled squeak before he realized Emery had said it silently. His cock had once again immediately hardened. “I see you’ve met Kim,” Emery said out loud after pulling Sean in for a hug and kiss.
“You didn’t tell me how cute he was,” Kim scolded Emery.
Emery draped an arm around Sean’s shoulders. “I most certainly did.”
Sean felt his cheeks heat. Standing there, after having been out in the sun all day at a dusty, dirty road construction project, he didn’t feel very cute.
Especially with the dark memory of Emery’s dad trying to bribe him to leave weighing down his heart.
After Emery introduced Sean around to everyone, he took him to his office to show it to him. He closed the door behind them and pulled Sean into his arms.
“I want to fuck you over my desk right now.”
Sean was down for that, except that he felt grody and needed a shower. It did feel good, however, to have him close so they could use their little psychic connection. “Can we do that on a day when I feel less grungy?”
Emery cupped his cheek with his palm and kissed him tenderly. Sean wanted to melt against him. “Of course. I’ll take a rain check. But don’t make me wait too long. I’d love to sit here working and have the memory of my cock in your ass over my desk.”
“Maybe I want that, too. I mean my cock up your ass.”
Emery ground his hips against Sean. He was fully erect, his cock straining against his slacks. “I want that, too.”
Sean finally whispered aloud, “How close do we have to be for that to work?”
Emery’s lips quirked in a delectable smile. “I don’t know for sure. Fairly close, I think. There’s no dolphin mate-bond handbook. No one usually talks about that stuff. You ready to go see our house?”
That one word drove all bad thoughts out of Sean’s soul.
Our.
“Yeah. Let’s go.”
* * * *
It was an older house, but in great shape, and just a few streets north of Sean’s apartment, less than two miles away. He especially liked its close proximity to Lemon Bay Park. That meant the thick stand of pine and palmettos on the other side of the eight-foot wooden stockade fence that surrounded the backyard wouldn’t be disappearing anytime soon.
“This is great!” Sean said as Emery showed him around.
Emery grinned. “I hoped you’d like it.” He handed him two keys. “And those are yours.”
Sean looked at them in wonder. “I woke up Tuesday morning in a totally different world than I’m in now.”
Emery tilted his head. “Is that a bad thing?”
“No, I like this world a lot better.” He shoved the keys in his pocket and grabbed Emery, turning him and backing him against the kitchen counter. “I don’t ever want to go back to the old world.” He grabbed a handful of Emery’s hair and laid a bruising kiss on him that left them both gasping. He felt his voice go hoarse, his feelings threatening to bubble up and overwhelm him. “I don’t want to live if you’re not in my world.”
“Neither do I,” Emery softly assured him. “Are you okay?”
Sean quickly nodded and kissed him again. He didn’t want to tell him about the confrontation with his father yet. This was too good a moment to spoil.
“I already got a rental truck for Saturday morning,” Emery said. “I’m going to take tomorrow off and go get boxes and get everything packed up. We can have my stuff moved out by noon.” He grabbed Sean’s hips again and ground against him. “Then we’ll have the rest of the day for play on the water. I’ll get the truck again when you’re ready to move your stuff over. Unless you want to do it Saturday, too?”
Sean swallowed hard, emotion swelling his heart to the point where it felt it would burst from his chest. “Yeah. Let’s get me moved, too. I only have two months left on my lease. As long as I leave the apartment clean, they won’t care that I’m leaving early.”
Emery ran his fingers through Sean’s hair. “This is real. And I’m not going anywhere.” Emery smiled again. Sean knew over the years that smile would be his undoing. He’d do anything Emery asked just to see that sweet, sexy smile of his. “I’m all yours, and you’re all mine.”
* * * *
Erik knew what this meant. He’d followed Emery all morning as he toured houses. Now, he’d showed his little human whore one of them. That should be him with Emery looking at houses, not that monkey man.
He hadn’t heard back from Joseph yet, but Erik wasn’t one to wait around. He would save his pod Alpha the trouble of having to make the hard decision he hadn’t wanted to talk about.
It was what was best for the pod.
Chapter Fourteen
They showered together, making love under the spray and leaving them both spent. They ate leftover baked ziti for dinner as they sat and discussed their plans for the weekend…and their lives.
By the time they finished eating, Sean couldn’t stand keeping it back any longer. “I need to tell you something.”
Emery frowned. “What’s wrong?”
The only way to tell it was to plunge in. “I had a visitor today.” As Sean told him what happened, Emery’s expression darkened until his eyes looked nearly black with rage.
“That fucking son of a bitch,” Emery said, his jaw clenched. “That’s it. He won’t have to fucking exile me from the pod. I’m done with him and them. Fuck him.” He grabbed Sean’s hand. “I’m so sorry he did that.”
Sean’s overwhelming relief at how Emery took the news suddenly relegated it to the basement of his concern. “It’s okay. I’m a big boy. I can handle myself.”
“Why didn’t you call me when it happened?”
“I was…” It felt foolish now admitting all he’d felt, the doubts, everything. “I was too upset.” Well, that was the truth. “And then I didn’t want to ruin the moment when we were at your office and looking at our house.” Emery’s sudden, face-splitting grin took him by surprise. “What?”
Emery leaned in and kissed him. “You said ‘our’ house, baby.”
* * * *
Emery lay awake long after Sean had fallen asleep. When Sean had told him what his father had done, he’d wanted to go over to his parents’ house and beat the crap out of him.
How fucking dare he?
Pod Alpha or not, he couldn’t get away with trying to fuck with peoples’ lives.
He wondered if his mom even knew anything about what was going on. Surely she would have weighed in with an opinion if she did.
He also wondered who his father’s spy was, gathering information about Sean. It
wasn’t hard for him to raise Erik to the number-one place on the list.
Fucker.
Any sympathy he’d had for his former friend vanished. This was beyond the pale.
There was also no way in hell he’d do anything like offer to work with his father on alternate ways to produce the desired heir. He and Sean would live their lives, have their friends, and be happy. If they decided to have kids, they’d make the decision together. Maybe even adopt.
He thought he’d feel at least a little bad about walking away from the pod, then realized it didn’t bother him in the least. He already had lots of friends who were human and knew nothing about his true identity. Besides, he spent very little social time out of the water with anyone from the pod.
The more he thought about it, the better he felt. Like a weight had lifted from his shoulders.
Relief to have the issue settled once and for all.
With a smile on his face, he nuzzled the top of Sean’s head and closed his eyes.
* * * *
Sean groaned when the alarm went off the next morning. At least he’d remembered to set up the coffeemaker before falling into bed with Emery. He shut off the alarm and sat up.
I hate these damn early mornings.
Tomorrow morning, he was looking forward to sleeping in a little before they picked up the moving truck.
That was a good enough thought to make him smile as he swung his legs out of bed and made his way through the darkened apartment to the kitchen. He hit the button on the coffeemaker to get it started before heading to the bathroom. He’d stepped into the shower when he saw the bathroom door open.
“Someone want coffee?”
Sean stuck his head out the shower curtain. Emery had fixed him a cup exactly the way he liked it. Sean crooked a finger at him, beckoning him closer. When he was within range, he kissed him. “You’re like a dream man.”
“Well, you’re my fantasy come to life,” Emery replied.
“Come join me.”
“My pleasure.”
By the time they finished showering, they’d both spend the day with asses full of each other’s cum. Sean managed to make it out the door only five minutes later than he’d planned. He rolled down the windows, blasted the radio, and headed toward River Road to get to I-75.
Accidentally on Porpoise Page 8
