Page 79 of Collin: Episodes 13-15
Holden followed him across the room. “Good spot. You’re getting better at this.”
Collin flashed him a smile. It was nice to have Holden back. The man’s confidence had been shaken, and he’d thought he’d be fired for being the missing link in Collin’s protection, but Collin, Mr. Reevesworth, and Holden’s employer had emphasized to him that they trusted him. He’d been taken down by tranquilizer darts designed to subdue zoo animals. And even though he’d tried to reach his walkie-talkie, the frequency had been jammed by a nearby handheld device, something they’d found once they collected the van that had been used to kidnap Collin. He’d been an easy target for Mikhail to overpower when Mikhail had showed himself.
Émeric came and sat down across from Collin, placing pretty blue mugs of coffee on the table. “Let’s see if those two can wrap up and pull themselves together.”
“They need to unplug.” Collin stifled a yawn. “Work will still be there when we come back.”
Émeric smiled and raised his mug in a toast. “How far you’ve come, pet.”
Collin blushed and dropped his eyes. They sat in comfortable silence for a while.
“Did your mother decide where she’s spending Christmas?”
“Teotihuacan in Mexico. She wants to see the solstice at the Pyramid of the Sun.”
“Does that day have any ritual significance to the site?”
Collin shrugged. “Not that I know of. I don’t think we even have the name of any deity the pyramid was built for, if it was built for one. I think she just picked something she’d been wanting to do and the nearest significant date and planned it as a gift for herself.”
“How long until the house closes?”
“Arturo and his girlfriend and a cousin and their spouse collectively qualified yesterday. So, I think they plan to wrap everything up come mid-January or so.”
“I’m glad your mom feels good about where the house is going.”
“Me too. She and her friends are planning a ritual cleansing, and then I think a priest is going to come over and bless the house. The feds are finished digging around for anything. She says Arturo had a head start on redoing the landscaping by the time they finished. He’s been over there cleaning up.”
Émeric made a face. “I’m certain she was happy she was already planning to move, then.”
Collin raised his cup and tilted it in confirmation.
The house was every bit as beautiful as Collin had been led to believe. At the end of a long winding and very private drive, the woods opened up on a grassland lawn through which a creek flowed. The house was built into the landscape with one wing connected by a bridge over the creek. There was a covered bridge on the second story and an open bridge framed by an arch on the first story. The landscaping was all-natural worn stone, local trees and shrubbery, and bits of stone-built statuary, picnic tables, and carved-out grottoes.
Collin slid out of the SUV and put his foot on the ground with a feeling of awe. The air smelled crisp, clean, and fresh with the scent of trees. The house itself was rambling, two and three stories in various places, and fronted a three-car garage at the end of the drive. The peak of a high roof pointed south, hinting at massive windows somewhere, but the house curved away, and the driveway didn’t grant a view into the house. Even right there, getting out of the car, it felt like the house was keeping its secrets from anyone casually approaching.
Holden and the rest of the security team pulled up. They checked in with Richard and then took off again, going back down the driveway to the cabin allocated to staff. The groundskeeper had her own house somewhere nearby. Holden and the rest, including the two-man team that had come up two days earlier, would be watching the cameras and checking the perimeter, but the house itself would be just for Richard, Émeric, Damian, and Collin, and eventually their guests in another week when Linda’s crew and Hypatia and Matthew joined them. Hypatia and Matthew were coming a bit earlier so they could play.
Collin was looking forward to that with both excitement and trepidation. He was fairly sure Richard and Émeric were entirely too thrilled at the idea of turning him into a whimpering, embarrassed mess in front of friends.
They only had a few bags to bring in. Most of their things had been sent ahead, and Émeric had ordered groceries delivered, which Collin had been told the housekeeper would put away. Collin carried his own bag in and an extra sack of wrapped presents he’d bought last minute.
“You get to pick a room to be yours whenever you’re here,” Mr. Reevesworth announced, letting them all into the house through the garage. They went up the stairs and over the bridge into the main house.
Collin chose a third-floor room under the eaves with a view of the lawn and the creek, but he didn’t bother to leave much there. He changed into lounge clothes and padded barefoot toward voices until he found Richard and Émeric in a master suit. They’d also changed and were making out, Richard kneeling over Émeric’s lap in the window seat.
The room was dominated by a massive king-size bed built entirely out of what appeared to be steel. It was high enough that there were steps to reach the top of the mattress, and beneath, it was enclosed as a cage, perhaps two. Collin wasn’t sure if he was seeing bars separating the space down the center or not.
He left his doms to each other and explored the rest of the house. Damian was in the great room, where massive three-story tall windows framed the grassland lawn and a giant fireplace filled the center southern wall. From there, he found a stone staircase down to a vast kitchen crafted in old-world pavers, rockwork, and wood with deep sinks, large pantries, and four ovens.
A little beyond that was a beautiful breakfast cave of a room with pink, green, purple, and blue stained-glass flowers and hummingbirds worked into half of one wall and part of the ceiling. A large raw-edge table filled most of the space surrounded by benches built into the wall on two sides and a freestanding bench on the side by the glass. The bottom half of the exterior wall was stone, and the top half was glass and stained glass. It felt like a cave had been cracked open and then enclosed in crystals. Indoor plants spilled down from shelves built near the ceiling, taking advantage of the treehouse-like effect of all the light.
The house had clearly been built as both a retreat and a place where one could entertain. There was a large deck but also a lofted ledge for a single person built halfway up a wall in the living room where one could hide, complete with handholds built into the log wall. There were half a dozen half-baths on the first floor but also a small TV room with a sunken pillow nest for no more than four. It was almost as if the house had gone through multiple owners and each had left their mark, and then someone had come along and harmonized it.
If Collin had to guess, it was Émeric who had made the place make sense and Richard who had guided some of the authority and imposition that some of the rooms offered.
A few rooms were locked. Collin left them alone. He ended his tour on a massive blue couch in front of the fireplace in the great room with Damian. He crawled over to his kink brother and nuzzled his way into the lawyer’s lap, demanding snuggles.
Damian gave in by degrees, eventually spreading his legs so Collin could lie between them with his head against Damian’s belly. “Are you trying to tell me something, kitten?”
