Page 31 of Midnight Rain

Orion shook his head as he jabbed his finger toward the floor. “I’m sorry. I know that’s your mom, but—”

“No, Orion,” Paloma interrupted him. “I’m just as livid about Beth acting this way, but she’s still Austin’s mom.”

Orion’s nostrils flared as his fingers flexed, but he didn’t finish what he was going to say. As furious as Austin was with his mom, Paloma was right. She was still his mother, and he didn’t want to hear whatever Orion wanted to say because, deep down, under all the pain and anger, he did love her.

“I’m sorry this has happened to you,” Izel said from across the room. “I’ve encountered more than a trillion of—”

“Izel,” Duncan ground out.

“I’ve just met his type,” Izel said. “They are among the worst humans I’ve—”

“Izel!” Duncan looked exasperated, and Austin had no clue why. He was missing something. What weren’t they telling him? It was clear the people in the room were hiding something, especially when Austin saw Santee actively avoiding him.

“Can’t you pay him a visit?” Hayden asked Izel. “Use some of your talents to make the problem vanish?”

Austin’s eyebrows squished together. Was Hayden implying that Izel was some kind of hitman? The look Duncan kept giving the guy said he would strangle Izel if he said one more word.

Izel glanced at Duncan as he spoke slowly and carefully to Hayden. “I will not use my Superman powers for darkness since the Iron Man might revoke my get-out-of-jail free card. Besides, you are well aware of my current issue.”

“What?” Austin wrinkled his nose as he stared at Izel. “That’s the worst code I’ve ever heard. You just mashed up DCU with MCU and Monopoly.”

Orion palmed his face. “No more code until you get your references straight.”

“Will you guys tell me what you’re talking about?” Austin hated to feel this confused, especially when a roomful of people were keeping an obvious secret from him. Austin’s life was in danger, and if they were going to try and talk in front of him using a fucked-up code, he had a right to know.

“I’d like to know, too,” Paloma said. “I might not know any of those references, but this is Austin were talking about.”

“How do you not at least know what Monopoly is, Mom?” Orion gaped at her.

“I think I hear a recipe calling us.” Milly guided Paloma to the kitchen.

Austin looked up at Cormac, hoping at least one person in the room would decode Izel’s alphabet soup of bafflement.

The guy sighed. “I need to take Austin upstairs and explain a few things.”

Austin did not like the looks everyone gave him as he followed Cormac toward the steps.

“Good luck!” Santee shouted. “You’re going to need it!

Austin looked over his shoulder just as Orion groaned and said, “You guys are horrible at this. If you and Izel were spies, we’d all be dead.”

Now Austin was definitely curious, though he wasn’t sure if he really wanted to know.

Chapter Nine

The entire walk up the stairs, Cormac tried to think of the best way to tell Austin everything. It was bad enough that the shifters in the house, along with the mates, had to be careful around Paloma, but Cormac was tired of hiding things from his mate.

Instead of going to Austin’s room, Cormac led them to his. That way, if Austin panicked and needed to escape, he could run to the guest room where he was staying instead of out the front door.

Though Cormac wasn’t going to let him run. They were going to face this together.

Normally, he was pretty good at talking since he’d been lecturing his brothers since the dawn of time, or so it felt. This was different. If he didn’t get a lecture right with one of his siblings, they razzed him for a while. If he didn’t get it right with Austin, things could go downhill very quickly.

Austin entered his room and looked around. “Very masculine. I like it.”

As stylish as Austin was, Cormac doubted his mate was enthused by the dark bedding, furniture, and accents. The only thing of a lighter color were the walls. The room had been this way for as long as Cormac could remember, a throwback from his days when he resented everything because of the burden on his shoulders. His small way of rebelling.

He really needed to so some remodeling since the color scheme was rather moody.

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