by Honor James
“Well, then.” Danel chuckled. Picking up the coffee carafe, he refilled her cup before standing up. Dropping a kiss to her hair, he collected his dishes. “Finish eating and then we’ll get out of here.”
“Toss those into soak while I change, and then I’ll do them up while you dress,” Byrne said, taking his own dishes to the kitchen along with hers. “You, missy, have until the dishes are in the drying rack to finish your coffee before you need to get dressed for work.”
She looked down and blushed. “I just don’t have on a bra.” She forgot her freaking damn bra! “Be back.” She took a moment to take another sip of her coffee and then raced off to get dressed. Maybe she would be able to snuggle and kiss while they were upstairs.
Danel’s laughter followed her even as she felt Byrne behind her. “Told you that you needed to get dressed for work. Around the house you can avoid those evil contraptions, but in the workplace you’d better have those gorgeous breasts all bundled up.”
She snickered and looked back at him. “I can’t help that you boys have made me a completely wild woman in less than twenty-four hours.” Since giving up her fears of the men and jumping into their relationship with both feet, she didn’t seem to want to have any type of clothing on. They were a bad influence on her, or a really good one. She hadn’t yet figured that one out.
“Do you see us arguing? Even a little?” he asked, shooting her a grin. “Trust me, we will not argue at all if you want to go all wild woman around this place. But in the workplace, a little decorum would likely be best, doctor. At least where the cameras can catch us.”
“I know, I know.” She rolled her eyes and then laughed. “Catch us doing what? What is it that you are thinking that we will be doing, you naughty, naughty boy?” Hopefully things she wanted to do, too. She really wanted them to be on the same page with things.
“Nothing much.” He shrugged. Moving around her to the closet, he grabbed his usual uniform of dark jeans, dark T-shirt, heavy boots, and socks. “Just tearing your clothing off of you and ravishing you until you can’t remember your name, the date, or anything you may have been doing for the last twenty or so years.”
“Good point. I do seem to forget most things when I have the two of you loving me. But can you blame me? I mean really?” She did, however, smile and lick her lips. “I love you both and I have a lot of years of missed time to make up for. So you will both allow me to attack you at any moment in time.”
“You don’t have to make up for anything, Briar,” he said. Dropping his stuff onto a chair, he moved to her and cupped her face. “We know why you were hesitant to be with us and we understand, completely. You are here with us now and that’s what matters. There is no need to make up for that time lost. You needed it to get to know us better and trust us, so really, it was time well used.”
“I have tried to use it and you are right. We did get to know each other and that’s quite amazing. I’m happy that we got the time that we did because I feel so much closer to the two of you than I think I would have if we had just jumped each other the first moment that we saw each other.” She hadn’t wanted to have anything to do with men at that point in her life, but seeing the two of them made her rethink everything.
“Then stop worrying about all that making up for lost time crap. We’re here, you’re here, let’s enjoy the here and now and whatever the future brings. Yeah?” he asked with a soft smile. “We’re not going anywhere, babe, not for a damned good long time.”
“Yeah. I think that this sounds like a very good idea.” She had her bra on and finally turned back to him as she stepped into her shoes. “I’m glad you aren’t going anywhere because I really, really adore the two of you.” She did, a hell of a lot.
“Good, now go and finish your coffee so I can get dressed. ’Cause I don’t trust you and those nimble fingers of yours if I turn my back.” Pressing a kiss to her lips, he urged her to the door with a hand on her back. “Git. Love you, babe,” he said and smacked her ass lightly.
That had Briar laughing. Giving him one final hug, she let him push her out of the bedroom and scooted off down the hall so that she could go back to the kitchen to finish her coffee and chat with Danel.
Chapter Twelve
“Damn.” Danel let out a low whistle. Her sentiments exactly. Her entire floor was beyond a mess. It needed a bulldozer to come through and just shove everything g out a window to start fresh. There were scorch marks everywhere, debris scattered, and holes in walls and the ceiling even. Which, given the building had been built to withstand bombs, told her just how lucky they all had been to get out when they had.
“Fuck me.” Byrne shook his head. He was crouched down over one large scorch mark, obviously one of the points where a bomb had detonated. “You were standing right here before you came out to find out what was going on.”
She shot him a surprised look. How had he known that? “I might not have been fully aware, but when it comes to you, babe, nothing escapes notice,” he said. That sort of comment should have had a grin attached, but he was looking far too grim and serious, as was Danel.
“They targeted all the key points to ensure as much destruction as possible.” Danel moved between the piles of destroyed furniture. “The tables, the coolers, your office, fuck me,” he bit out with desperation in his tone. “Anywhere evidence was likely to be they fucking blew up. What the hell are these assholes trying to cover up, Byrne?”
Dusting his hands off as he straightened up, the Luhpyne shook his head. “This has to do with Lilly, I know it does, but I just don’t know how or why. Whatever was done to her and all the evidence we’ve been gathering about it, that’s what they aimed for. Nothing else, no other bodies were blown up, just some collateral damage from the bombs set to destroy our proof. Whatever the fuck proof it is we have against whoever the fuck this is.”
Briar nodded and leaned hard against the wall that was thankfully still intact. “All of my recordings of the autopsies are gone. There was a destructive code that was put into the computer mainframes and took out everything. Even the paper files that Byrne and I hunted down from cold storage, it’s all gone.” She was at a loss. Never before had anything came so close to home as this had.
She stood staring at the spot where she was before Byrne saved her life. Literally. She looked up at him with tears shimmering in her eyes and whispered, “I would be dead if not for you. I wouldn’t have ever known what real love is. I can’t believe that there is someone out there so evil that they don’t care who dies as long as their parts in life are all hidden away. It makes no sense,” she added as she lifted her hands to rub at her temples.
“Ah, hell.” He took several long, quick strides toward her. Wrapping his arms around her, he rocked her back and forth in his arms, a hand stroking over her hair. “You are safe, you are with us and you will be for a long, long time. No one is going to get at you without going through both of us, babe. And we’re fucking hard to kill.”
“I wouldn’t worry about the files,” Danel murmured. “We have the originals of everything up on our office safe. Everything you had was copies, but they didn’t know that.”
“Thank God.” Briar’s relief was evident in the way that she all but sagged against Byrne. “So the case can still be made. Now we just need to find this jack-off and send him away for a very, very long time.” Forever wasn’t long enough in her mind, not for a monster that had tried to kill her twice and tried to hurt her men. Well, at least she had assumed that he had been the one that had done all of that. Not acceptable by any stretch of imagination.
“Yes, the case can still be made and the ones who did this punished.” Danel moved in closer to her and put a hand on her back, his cheek next to hers. “It will work out,” he told her quietly. Brushing his lips to her cheek, he slid his arm around her middle and squeezed.
This was where she was safest, in the arms of the men she loved.
“Come on, you need to make a list of everything that you need r
eplaced and by priority,” Byrne said. Leaning back, he cupped her cheek and rubbed his thumb to her skin. “Danel will stay with you. I’m going to go and check in with the captain and give him my accounting for the events. And then I plan on checking with the security guys and seeing just what they have from the cameras.”
Briar reached out and grabbed Byrne before he could leave her. “You will be safe, yes?” She hated that fear, but there it was. Dammit. “Promise me that you will come back to me, too?” Leaning into the soft touch of such a massive man, she simply held her breath and waited for his answer.
“Of course I will,” he said softly. He didn’t mock her for her fear, he understood. Both of them understood, she realized. “I’d never leave you alone with Danel for the rest of time. That’s just mean.” He smiled and kissed her gently. “I love you, Briar. Stay safe and I’ll be back soon,” he said against her lips.
Briar smiled and nodded. “Sounds good. Go. Go before I can’t let you go,” she said quietly. “I just need to ensure that you will come back. As long as I know that I’m happy,” she admitted. “Thank you. For everything. Oh, and on your way back will you stop at Vinnie’s on Ninth and pick up a jumbo all meats, double the meats and cheese please? Tell Vinnie it’s for me and he will know just how to bake it.” She was craving pizza, sounded so good to her in that moment in time.
“Uh, sure, I can run out for a pizza,” he said and shook his head. Pressing another kiss to her lips, he drew back. Running his fingers over her cheek, he winked at her and then left. Likely a good thing, she might have just grabbed him again if he hadn’t managed that little distraction method of his.
Briar shook her head and watched him leaving. Turning to Danel, she took a deep breath and smiled. “It’s seriously getting harder and harder to let either of you go. Before long the two of you are going to flip coins to see who gets to run the errands so that you don’t have me holding onto you.”
“Doubtful,” he told her. “We love you too much, darling. We would never argue if you want to hang on to us. We like when you are hanging onto us.” He smiled at her. “So don’t worry so much, Briar. If it ever becomes too much for us we’ll talk with you, all right?”
“Thank you. Just as if you guys ever become too much I will talk to you first. Always. We are a team because we communicate well.” Well, now they did at least. “Thank you for the assurance. I think that I needed that far more than I had thought.” Taking a deep breath, she looked back toward the destruction and sighed. “All right, let’s start to catalogue what was lost shall we?”
“I’ll get some paper and a pen and you can tell me what all I need to put on it. Pick an end and we’ll work from one side to the other,” he said. Winking, he smiled and moved to her office. He came back out a few minutes later with a clipboard and some paper he was tacking onto it.
“Sounds good.” Briar looked out over the destruction and sighed. Shaking her head, she looked to Danel and gave him a smile before she began to list off the things that she had lost in the blast, as well as things she still needed.
He jotted down everything she told him. Eventually he found a perch on a slightly mangled exam table. Propping the clipboard on his knee, he kept on writing, managing to somehow keep up with her near constant listings.
When she was finished, Briar turned to him and smiled. “And that’s it.” Finally. The list was extensive and she knew it just as he did. “Sorry I kept going on and on, but damn there is a lot of destruction here. Someone took great care to ensure they got everything didn’t they?”
Pocketing the pen, Danel nodded. “Yeah, they wanted to create the maximum amount of damage possible. Especially since they know some of these items will take some time to get replacements for.” He slid off the table and handed her the clipboard. “We’re looking at an easy two weeks to get some of these from what I understand. We might be able to cut some time off given who we are but—” He shook his head.
“Damn,” she muttered and rubbed her left temple. “So whoever this is has a timeline, they have a game plan don’t they?” She was extrapolating and she knew it, but somehow it felt right. Somehow she just simply knew that these people were doing this just so that they would get somewhere, somehow.
“More than likely. I have a feeling that this might have been a little desperate though. Well planned obviously, but they did it really fast,” he said, looking around before focusing on her. “We’re getting too close to whatever they don’t want us to know and are trying to slow us down.”
“I wish I had my recordings. I know that there is something there. There is something there. I just know it.” Why else would they have ensured that not only the recording bay but also the backups had been hit? “And how did they get in here? I mean I know that the morgue isn’t as secure as most places, but autopsy isn’t a place you can just saunter into.” Which was where they stood now.
“Likely the same way they seem to be getting into all parts of the building. They have access to places no one should, something the captain is working on to try and track and hopefully stop. This—” He waved a hand at the destruction around them. “This shouldn’t have ever happened and he’s really not a very happy human at the moment.”
“Oh I can imagine.” She shivered. “The captain terrifies me when he’s angry. I don’t know why but there is a darkness to him when he gets really and truly angry that has me wanting to back away.” Thankfully since the incident, the captain mostly left her alone because he didn’t want to scare her away. She was honestly that good at her profession.
“He wouldn’t hurt you, any more than the rest of us would. We all adore you, Briar. A couple of us more than the others, but you know that,” he smiled. Then he let out a breath and the smile slipped. “Shit. We better grab the requisition forms and start filling them out. And coffee, we are going to need a lot of coffee to get through this.”
“Yeah, like a whole freaking pot of it,” she muttered. Slipping her hand into his, Briar looked up at Danel and nodded. “Come on, let’s go down to the cafeteria and get our asses settled at a table with a pot of coffee and a fuck-off air to us so that we can get these done without too many people interrupting us.” Gods help anyone that did. She might castrate them.
“Not that hard to do really,” he said with a chuckle. “Grab some forms, love, and a pen for yourself. Maybe grab a couple of extras as well. We may end up burning through a few of them with this order.”
“I think so.” She walked over to her desk and pulled out a pack of pens and the forms needed. “Okay, let’s get this done shall we? It would be easier if we could use a data pad, but it’s the old-fashioned way for us this time.” Only because bureaucracy still demanded paper forms, which made no sense to her at all with their forests dying daily.
“It would be much easier, but your government is still very stuck in so many ways,” he said softly. Slipping his arm around her shoulders, he hugged her close to his side. “Don’t worry about it, at least they recycle now.” Under force and threat of huge penalties, including lengthy jail time, on one of the worlds who knew how to make their prisoners work for their keep. It was very nice to have a Realm where they lived to ensure that prisoners actually did their time and paid for their crime.
“Thank heavens for that. Or rather thank your side of the Veil for that.” Which was a good thing. It was one of the many fantastic things that the other side had given to her side without asking for anything in return.
“Thank whoever you want, darling. All that matters is things are better and you are in our life, which really is the most important part of this entire thing.” Walking together, they stepped onto the elevator and rode up to the cafeteria level.
“You are absolutely right there.” She had them. She had happiness for the first time in too long and she wasn’t going to question it. When they made it to the cafeteria she looked at him. “How about I take all of this to the table in the corner there while you get us coffee? And I could use a blueberry mu
ffin. Oh and if they have it cream cheese icing for the top of it. If not, lots of butter, please?”
“Babe, I know just what you like, go,” he said with a chuckle. Leaning in, he pressed a kiss to her lips and then gave her a little nudge toward the table. “I’ll be there in a few minutes, git,” he said as he walked toward the buffet.
Briar was grinning as she walked off to the corner table. Putting the wall to their backs, she spread out the paperwork and began filling out forms. No time like the present and all of that fun stuff.
“Here you are.” He slid a huge mug of coffee to her. The plate with a massive muffin with all her favorite fixings followed it. He, on the other hand, had a huge plate of food, a couple bottles of water, and another huge mug of coffee.
“You are truly a god among men,” Briar said happily and moved the paperwork so that she could cut into the muffin. She slathered half with butter and half with the icing, taking a bite of the one with icing first and sighing. “So good.” She loved this sweet treat, a great deal.
“I definitely like hearing you say that.” He grinned. “It’s a great ego stroker. You can proclaim that any time you want and anywhere you want. Loudly preferably, especially if Byrne is around.” He chuckled. Then he fell silent as he dug into his own plate of food.
Briar did laugh at that and shook her head. “I love you both. I think that you are both Gods among men because no one else would have had the patience to deal with me and my crap the way that the two of you have done. You two give me hope, you give me…” She paused and then smiled. “Everything.” That was all that she needed to say about that.
“Aw.” He wrapped an arm around her shoulders. Hugging her in close, he pressed a kiss to her forehead. “I would deal with all your crap any day of the week, love. You are in our lives and that is all that matters, babe. Doesn’t matter what baggage you have, you are with us and that’s all good.”
“That’s a very good thing.” She moved in a little closer to him, needing his touch when she realized that people were again staring at them. She sighed and looked up at him. “Will they ever get used to me being with the two of you and not looking as if they should lift weapons to fire?” It seemed as if the men of the compound were all ready to protect her and that felt odd to her, very odd.
