Aaron's Kiss Series Boxed Set (Books 1 - 7) (94 page)

Chapter Three

“Sure, I’d love to visit. It’s been what, sixty or seventy years?? Heard you got yourself caught and truly shackled.”

Kyle Dixon was really surprised to hear from his oldest friend Aaron. He and Aaron had been turned about the same time, a little over fourteen hundred years ago. Over the ensuing years they had become very close, as close or closer than brothers, coming to the aid of one another whenever the other called. He was also a good friend of Colin Larimore’s, having helped with his very touchy change when he been nearly beaten to death for taking the blame for a stolen loaf of bread a woman had taken for her children.

“I have a few things I’d like to go over with you before you look into something for me. Also, if Sara hears you call her a shackle, she cut you to ribbons, and I my dear friend will laugh my ass off when she does.”

Kyle was incorrigible. He knew it and so did his friends. But with Aaron, Kyle would freely admit that he dearly loved the man.

They set up a time to meet at the end of the week. Kyle hoped that Aaron would ask him to be a part of his Kiss. He had been wandering for some time now and was ready to settle down. He couldn’t’ think of any place he’d rather be than with good friends and hopefully new ones.

~~~

“Maddy, I took a phone message for you. Some sexy male voice would like for you to call him back as soon as you can. I told him you were in a meeting. Why that skinflint Schaller won’t give you a phone in that dungeon he puts you in is beyond me.”

Caroline Peters worked as Mr. Button’s personal secretary. She was also sleeping with him. It was a part of the job description. She would work in this position and whatever other position the nasty old man wanted until someone new came along, and then she’d be shuffled off to another part of the building or bought off. She was taking the buy off, Maddy remembered her telling her once, she had big plans for that money and was planning to retire on it, and hell she’d said she was only twenty-nine. Maddy really liked Caroline. Maddy was the only person who treated her as a person, a person of worth, not some two bit whore, she knew. She couldn’t help but here the gossip about her. They had never talked about what she did on the side and Maddy certainly didn’t want to know either.

“Don’t worry about it. This way, when he wants me he has to come to me to yell at me instead of just calling. And I’m sure there are times when he doesn’t think it’s worth the move off his big butt to do it.”

She looked down at the pink message slip and wondered at the name and number. She didn’t know a Colin Larimore. Oh well; she’d just have to find a pay phone somewhere.

Twenty minutes later she was still trying in vain to get in touch with him. Her frustration was making her talk to herself more. “If you leave a message to have someone call you back, the very least you could do is be there when they call.” She left him a second message.

“Mr. Larimore, this is Madison Harm with Schaller and Schaller again. You called the office today looking for me. I don’t have one, an office I mean, nor do I have a phone, cell or otherwise. I will be at this number for another hour. After that, well it’s up for grabs. Okay.” That said, she hung up.

Maddy hated leaving messages with strangers. You didn’t know whether they were a legitimate call or someone cranking your chain from the office, but she trusted Caroline. Plus, she tended to babble when she was nervous, on top of talking to herself; she was a cracker short of a picnic basket.

“You want to tell me why we are taking personal phone messages for you on company time?” She didn’t know how long Mr. Butt Hole had been standing there, but from his mood she would guess it had been a while. Did he truly expect people to fall to the floor and kiss his feet when he entered a room? Sometimes she took her time acknowledging him just to piss him off. A girl just had to have fun once in a while.

“Well, as I don’t have any friends, I’m pretty sure that it wasn’t a personal message. I do, however; have a call into a potential client, a Mr. Larimore. Was it him that called and got your panties all in a bunch?”

Maddy had no respect for Button and didn’t bother hiding the fact. She couldn’t stand that he was the laziest man she knew and that he would take advantage of every situation. Not unlike most people, but he was particularly good at it.

Rather than answer her, he slammed the slip down on the table and huffed out of the room. He had to have heard her laughing all the way down the hall. She was still grinning when she got to the now empty reception desk to use the phone there.

“Mr. Larimore, please? This is Madison Harm returning his call. He called just a few minutes ago.”

She was watching the birds on the tops of the trees while she had waited for the phone to be picked up by him.
Oh to be out of doors on a day like today
she thought,
or to at least have a little window to look out of once in a while, or a nice breeze on a pretty day.

“Hello Ms. Harm. I’m sorry we have been playing phone tag, but I’d like to talk to you about some property you talked to Aaron MacManus about, he’s a good friend of mine. I’m interested in purchasing four of the empty buildings that are on Merchants Way and was wondering if you’d act as mediator for me? I have some daytime conflicts and am unable to call the banks during their hours.”

Maddy would have gotten a shock out his “daylight conflicts” had she of known what they were. Colin, like Aaron and Kyle was a vampire. She was blissfully unaware of any non-human creatures.

Vampires didn’t really fry to ash when the sun hit them; it heated them up from the inside out. Starting with their bones, it cooked them, boiling their insides to the point of exploding. If they got to ground, or into a deep lair and plenty of fresh blood they could survive, if they hadn’t been out too long, but it took weeks, sometimes months for them to recover.

“Sure, but he did explain to you that I don’t have my own practice. And that I work for a larger firm. You would have to go through them first before I could legally help you out.”

You never knew when the phones were bugged in the office, so she always made sure to cover her butt. She wasn’t unethical, just smart.

“Yes, yes he explained all that. You’d only be acting as a go between, but I understand what you are saying. Who would I need to talk to in regards to this? Sara mentioned a Mr. Button, is that who I’d contact? Or Mr. Schaller? I’d like to get started on this right away, Ms. Harm. Is either of them in their office right now?” Apparently Colin had a clear plan and he was the type to forge ahead and get it accomplished, Maddy thought.

“Mr. Button is still in his office as a matter of fact, and he’d be the one you’d contact, yes. I have his direct phone number, so you could call him whenever you want.”

“Could you transfer me to him now? I like to do things when I have all the players in front of me Ms. Harm, now would work out very well for me.”

Mr. Larimore did indeed want to get the ball rolling. So Maddy called her boss and started to explain to him what Mr. Larimore wanted and that he was on the three-way with her when he got nasty with her. Again.

“You know we aren’t a real estate office, right? Out front of the building it says, in very large letters as a matter of fact, ‘Schaller & Schaller, Attorneys at Law’ no where does it mention ‘call us up if you need to have some dumb cunt help you buy some worthless property’. Tell your lover boy that if he wants you to help him, as long as it’s on your own time, I don’t give a flying fuck what you do.” He was actually much nicer this time than he had been in the past; the problem now would be he had a witness.

“Okay, is that your final decision on my helping Mr. Larimore?” Even she could hear the barely concealed humor in her voice, but this was just too great for caution.

“You are a fucking pain in my ass,” he practically screamed into the receiver. “I don’t give a shit. Did you understand me that time, bitch.”

“Did you hear that Mr. Larimore, I have Mr. Button’s approval in helping you so long as it’s on my own time? Shall we set up a time to get together tomorrow?” Her voice was sugar sweet and ever so polite, and if she sounded just a tad breathless it was because she was holding onto her all out laughter with every fiber of her being. She didn’t figure it would be in her best interest to start screaming with laughter at this point.

“Yes, Ms. Harm, that is quiet all right. Mr. Button, you are…there are simply no words to describe you. I run several very, very large corporations and looking for a law firm to help us diversify. If you were the last firm on this Earth I would not use you. And I will be sure to tell everyone I know just what sort of person you are and how you treat your employees. Ms. Harm, I look forward to hearing from you now that we have it established you are a free agent.

Maddy hung up the phone as soon as Colin did and made a dash to her little dungeon, hoping to get out of the building before Mr. Button had a chance to corner her. She didn’t make it. She was just picking up her bag and turning when he was right there. His hard slap across her face knocked her backward. She hit her head on the corner of her table as she was going down blackness engulfed her.

Chapter Four

“I’m telling you, you should have heard him, Aaron. He talked to her like she was trash, way beneath him. And the language he used…well hell Aaron, it made me blush to know she was listening.” 

Colin had been talking about nothing else since he’d gotten off the phone with Maddy.  He couldn't abide by them being mistreated, verbally or physically. He loved women all women.  But he especially loved Shade, his mate.

“How did she take it, lose her temper? I would have, I’d of gone right into his office and cut his dick off.” Sam, Tucker’s mate could be a little, well let’s just say she didn’t have a lot of love for abusive men, women either. She was a part of a large underground system that helped get abused spouses out of their homes and into safer areas. She’d been doing it for years, simply using the bakery as a front.

“Nah, if anything she seemed to think it was funny. I could hear her trying her best not to laugh. She’s a gutsy little thing. She’s supposed to come by tomorrow night sometime after six. I hope you don’t mind, but I’m having her meet me here. She said she had a very bad sense of direction and she’d been here before.”

“No, that’s great as a matter of fact. There are a few things I’d like to ask her about anyway. Kyle will be here tomorrow too, but I don’t expect him until after midnight.” Aaron mentally rubbed his hands together. He and Colin needed her help and if Bradley and Kyle were in, they had one hell of a deal for the girl and for themselves.

~~~

‘Turn right at the next stop sign and poof, I should be there, ha!! I said that ten minutes ago. You’d think a house that friggin big would be easy to find, especially since I’ve been there before! But oh no, not for me. Sheesh, Maddy you really could get lost in your own bathroom without a map.’

She still hurt from what Button had done to her last night. She had woke up this morning on the same floor where he’d left her, covered in blood, her blood, and sore as hell. Today her left eye was black all the way down her cheek and her jaw was bruised as well, knowing tomorrow and the next day she be sorer didn’t help. She also had a knot the size of a golf ball on the other side of her head that hurt so bad she had left her hair down because pulling it into a pony tail had hurt too badly.

She saw the blur of movement about ten seconds before she hit it. Or it hit her. The car slammed to a stop and jolted her so badly she hit the window with her sore face. This time her nose bloodied as well.

She staggered out of the car and limped over to the heap of dark clothes. It was big friggin heap of clothes too. She knew it was going to have a body in there somewhere and the way her luck was running, she killed the body too. She started reach out and touch when he moaned. She knew it was a male because unless there was something seriously wrong with this woman’s vocal cords and she’d been on steroids for, well years, then she was a guy. Well, she thought, at least I didn’t kill him, yet.

She fell to her knees beside him, not caring what she was doing to her pants. They were covered in blood anyway. Her shirt was ruined as well; blood from her nose marred the front of it. Her hand had just touched his shoulder when he turned and grabbed her wrist in a tight hold.

“Hey, bones, bones, bones! Well, I guess it’s safe to assume you didn’t hurt your hand. Let me go, that fucking hurts!”

Maddy started smacking him with her other hand. If he didn’t let her go soon, she’d have a broken wrist on top of everything else.

“You hit me…you tried to kill me, well it won’t work. It won’t be that easy. And you are not going anywhere. I need help.”

The man’s voice was deep and had an accent that made her spine tingle. But that didn’t make her any less pissed off at the stupid man.

“Really? Could have fooled me! I don’t know why I didn’t think the puddle of blood you’re lying in was an indicator of that fact. Dumb ass.” She began searching his pants pockets, then his shirt.

“What the fuck are you doing now, looking for a place to stick a knife? My wallet is in my back pocket. Want me to roll over for you so you can rob me easier?”

She noticed that accent again and the fact that it got stronger the madder he got. She was sorely tempted to really make him mad to see if he’d slip into the language that he was falling slowly back into.

“Look you overgrown prick, do you see a knife? I’m looking for a phone. I need to call you an ambulance. I have insurance, not great insurance, but I have enough to cover your injuries; at least I hope I do provided you don’t linger in a vegetative state for too long. For just another limb and maybe my left eye I suppose I could have had really good insurance, but silly me, I thought that eating would be more beneficial.” She snorted as she was still patting him down when he grabbed her other hand.

“You’re weird. No, no ambulance and no police. I’ll be fine in a few minutes.” He said to her still holding onto her hand. He had laid his head back onto the pavement and closed his eyes.

Maddy looked at him, what else did she have to do when he was holding her hands hostage. His hair was a very dark black, almost blue, it was so shiny. His face was tense now, probably from pain, but no less handsome, a jaw that screamed to be caressed, a nose that was narrow and straight. His mouth was full and sensual, sexy and…holy shit, back up girl. Where the heck had that come from? Picking up their conversation where he’d stop talking she went on.

“Oh. Well of course you will. How stupid of me to be concerned. Well, if you’re sure, I’ll take my leave while you bleed to death in the middle of the road. Stop being a macho jackass and let me call someone for you.”

She struggled in vain to get her hands free, but he just tightened his grip. Her moan of pain stopped him short. It was then that he looked at her.

“You are not going to claim that I did that to you. I do not beat stupid women. I know how your types of women are. Well, you won’t get a dime out of me.” His voice sounded so bored as if dealing with her ‘type’ happened to him every day.

Maddy stared at him for all of twenty seconds and jerked her hands from him, his nails tearing into her tender flesh. She stood, staggered for a moment and hobbled back to her car. She was trying her best not to cry. She hurt everywhere. Her nose was still bleeding. Her new pants and shirt were ruined and she had an appointment she was going to be late for. Before she got inside her car, he was already getting in the passenger side. She looked back to where he’d just been to her car again. S
heesh! He could really move fast. Shi
t! Now he was getting into her car. Oh no. No, no he was not.

“What do you think you’re doing? Get out of my car, you maniacal bastard!
Get out right now.

He just ignored her and climbed in. He had to adjust the seat as far back as it would go and then he was still squashed in there like he was a sardine. She knew she couldn’t make him budge. She was surprised that he’d even been able to get up. Maddy would have sworn he was hurt really bad. She just got into the driver’s side and started the engine. She resolved to not speak to him all the way to her appointment. And she would not take him anywhere else. She just hoped he didn’t go into shock or anything while in her car. This was all she needed, a dead man riding around with her. Just her luck Schaller and Schaller would probably be the ones suing her for his family.

“Where are you going now? I have a right to know where you are taking me. Are you going to answer me when I speak to you? Hey! Are you in there?”

He had asked that four times now and she still had not said a word to him. It’s not that she didn’t speak, she did, but all to herself. Mostly it was to put her down or to comment on the wrong turn she’d taken but never anything directly to him.

When she pulled up in front of the MacManus mansion gate, he started laughing. He was still laughing when she was trying to make herself heard over his laughter into the speaker at the gate.

“Mr. Duncan, its Madi…its hummm…I have an appointment with Colin Larimore and Aaron MacManus. I don’t suppose you remember me from last week?”

No way was she giving this guy her name. It was bad enough he’d gone through all her trash, making snide comments about the fact that she folded it nice and neatly, and did you do that for her house trash as well. As a matter of fact she did, but she didn’t tell him that. For all she knew he was some sort of mass murderer or a slasher or something equally hideous.

“Oh yes, Miss Harm, we’ve been expecting you.” So much for keeping her name private she thought. She turned to glare at the man next to her when he began laughing in earnest again.

“Did you think I wouldn’t get it? What business could you possibly have here? Aaron is a good friend and I won’t let you do anything to his reputation or his family.” He said this with a sneer and a grin. Who would have thought that was even possible?

“Fucking dick head. All men should all be castrated and left to the wild animals to feast upon.” She had been talking to herself and had lowered her voice a great deal, but he had heard her she knew it.

It was nearly full dark when she pulled up in front of the house. She hated driving at night, but this couldn’t be helped he’d told her he has a problem that prevented him from working with her during the day and she wanted to be as accommodating as possible for him. She wished now that she had called and rescheduled. She hurt worse now than before she’d hit this man, and she was dizzy too.

As soon as the car stopped he was out and to the door. She was still struggling with her seatbelt when Mr. Duncan was leading the man in. “
Well, he must not have been lying when he said he knew the MacManus”.
Mr. Duncan came out to help her gather her stuff, but she shooed him off saying she was used to lugging it around. Half way to the door she realized she should have taken his help, she wasn’t gonna make it. Stopping not six feet from the doorway, she just couldn’t go any further, her entire body was screaming in pain.

“Master Kyle said that you had a slight accident and you may need my assistance. He said that you tried to run him down on an otherwise open highway. I do not believe that for a moment, and told him so.”

He simply took her Wal-Mart bag from her in one hand and lead/dragged her inside with the other. It made her happy that someone believed her. But she couldn’t concentrate on that right now. Pain riddled her body like bullets being shot into her everywhere.

They were just inside the open hallway when Duncan turned to take a good look at Maddy. She thought she must look really bad if the expression on his face was any indication. He nearly fell over in his haste to take the rest of her things from her and have her sit down in the large church pew right inside of the entrance hall. It was too much, within seconds of his kind words, she was sobbing.

“Oh, Miss Harm, there, there, let me get you something to dry your eyes. Do not move. I will return momentarily.” And off he went toward what she could only assume was the kitchen.

She grabbed her big blue Wally World bag and started for the door. She had humiliated herself enough for one night and decided nothing could make her stay. She had the car started and was turning it around when someone slammed on the window next to her. She screamed and jerked around in time to have none other than Master Kyle himself opening her door and turning off her car.

“Get off; what…give me back those keys. I mean it, I’ve had enough of you for one night and I hurt in places you can’t imagine.”

When he simply held them over his head, she shut the door on him, nearly getting his hand. The car was on enough of a downhill swing; she just let it roll and popped the clutch. When the engine turned over, she put it into gear and started off. But not before she turned to him and stuck her tongue out at him. Childish? Yes, but she wanted to go home. Too bad she didn’t make it much further than a few inches; it was a very nice parting shot though.

Kyle stood in front of her car and she really hoped that she wouldn’t run him down, again.