Trent (4 page)

“If he’s an enemy of Fords, then he’s a
friend of ours.” Joe said nothing. Noah didn’t make friends easily, and he
seldom had enemies. If he did, they didn’t last long on this earth. He dealt
with men who tried to harm him and his just as he did most things…swiftly and
without any regret. And Max had made himself an enemy of her boss. “When will
he arrive?”

“I have.” They all turned to the doorway and
Noah smiled at them, not even bothering to hide his fangs as he usually did. “The
Calhouns. I have heard a great many things about your pack. It is my pleasure
to finally meet you.”

Chapter 2

Trent tried to focus on what the doctor was
telling him, but for the most part his mind was stuck on two words: heart
attack. He’d had a mild heart attack, and he would have more if he didn’t turn
his life around, and soon. He looked at his dad when he snapped his fingers in
front of his face.

“He’s talking to you. Are you listening?” Nodding,
Trent looked back at the doctor. He still didn’t have a clue what he was
talking about, so he looked at his dad again. “He’s telling you how lucky you
were that someone was there that could help you. Been up to any of us standing
around with our thumbs up our collective bottoms, you’d be a goner about now. He
was just telling you what sort of changes you’re gonna make or you’ll be dead.
And you will make changes, boy, or so help me...I can’t do that again.”

“Mr. Calhoun, I never said that. All I was
saying was had he not have the proper care right when it happened, he’d be in
worse shape than he is.”

Trent nodded. He knew that much. Someone had performed
CPR on him when his heart had been in an irregular rhythm. And by them doing
that, he’d been able to live, keep oxygen to his brain and his heart pumping
like it should have been. Trent looked at the doctor and wondered if the man would
just shut up a moment and let his mind grasp what had been said to him.

“Trent?” He looked at the doctor, just
realizing that he might have closed his eyes for a moment. They were giving him
something powerful, he had to admit that. Usually, meds didn’t even faze his
kind. “Trent, I need to talk to you about this. I sent your father away for a
moment so we could talk.”

“He can be a little much.” Doctor Sawyer
nodded and smiled. “Am I going to be all right? I mean, right now I feel sort
of loopy if you want to know the truth.”

“We’re giving you some pretty heavy doses to
keep you calm. You don’t have a lot of that in your life, do you, son?” He told
him that he’d been trying to keep himself in shape. “That’s not what I mean. You’re
fit and in good shape basically, but not your mind or heart. You need to...I
was going to say relax, but it’s more than that. You need to talk. To someone
that isn’t a family member. Blow off steam to someone you can trust. Run as
your wolf when you need to. Get out of the office more than you do. Go out on a
date.”

“You mean get laid.” The doctor smiled. “My
father. He said something like that to me the other day. I’m not sure he’s the
right man to suggest something like that, but he did. He’s only been with my
mom forever. He doesn’t understand how hard it is out there for a man like me
to date.”

Dating and going out with a woman for the
sole purpose of getting laid wasn’t the same thing. Dating meant you liked the
woman; at least that’s the way he equated it. You took her to dinner, a movie,
or even something as simple as a boat ride. The kind of women he usually went
out with wanted no more to do with marriage and long-term relationships than he
did. Trent wanted it, wanted it all, but he’d been working too hard to even
think about that lately.

“No, I would imagine that it’s not. But you
need to. Not just to get laid, as you said, but to get away from work. Go
fishing with someone. Where there is no cell service. Let your wolf have more
time in the woods. Regain that feeling of being one with nature. You’ve lost
that along the way of becoming a great man.” Trent started to tell him that he
and his wolf were just fine, but the doc looked around the room with a quirked
brow. “Don’t bother telling me that you’ve got this, Trent. You just had a
minor heart attack at thirty-three. You don’t have shit together but your
business, and that’s killing you.”

The doctor stood up and moved toward the
door. Trent lay there for several seconds before he called him back. “Am I
really going to be all right now? If I get my ass together and do what you say,
will I be okay?”

“Yes. But you have to make some major life
changes, Trent. Starting today. No more eating what you please. I’m to understand
that you had nearly a dozen biscuits before this happened?” Trent nodded,
embarrassed. “You can eat what you want
in moderation
. And if you have
fun, you can do more of that sort of thing.
In moderation.
You do
remember what that is, don’t you? Fun, I mean? When was the last time you went
on a vacation? Not a business trip where you ate at restaurants because it was
convenient, and slept poorly in a hotel. A vacation where you did site seeing,
ate at some place you might have read the menu over first. Went to a museum
because you wanted to.”

“I don’t remember.” He nodded at him. Trent
didn’t think he understood. “I just bought a house. Increased our business by
nearly triple, and took on two companies that I’m going to have to walk away
from because I don’t trust the man at the other end. That’s a lot of leg work.”

“Do you have people working for you?” Trent
told him that he had a few hundred. “And they can’t do this for you? They can’t
take over some of the stress and strain for you? If you don’t delegate, Trent,
you’re going to be pushing up flowers and out of work permanently.”

He lay there for a long time after he was
left alone, just thinking about everything and nothing at all. Trent didn’t
delegate, not even to his own brother, who had been begging him for more
involvement in the business since he’d partnered with him. Trent even did his
own payroll, when he knew there were companies out there that could do it in
half the time and for very little cost when compared to how much time he spent
on it. He was, in a word, stupid.

Someone came into the room a few minutes
later. Trent had closed his eyes and didn’t look up when the person cleared
their throat. It was a female, that he knew, and that she smelled of medicine. When
she touched his arm he felt her warm fingers as she grazed them over his elbow,
but he still didn’t look.

“They just checked my blood pressure a few
minutes ago.” Nothing. Opening one eye, he looked at the woman standing just a
few feet away from the bed and realized his mistake. Sitting up in the bed and
looking at her, his first thought was that she was gorgeous. The second was to
wonder who she was there for, because he was a lucky guy. “I thought you were a
nurse. Is there something I can help you with?”

“Your father sent me to see you.” He nodded,
wondering what his dad was up to now as she stepped closer to him. “He said
that I should introduce myself.”

Her scent made his wolf snarl at him. When he
moved along his skin, tearing at him, Trent only had a moment to try and
control him before the woman took two steps back. His wolf snarled at him again,
and Trent tried to calm him. The women turned to the door, her face full of
fear, and Trent leapt from the bed to stop her. She was his was all he could
think about.

Before he could touch her, or whatever he
intended to do, he found himself lifted up by his neck and his airway being cut
off. The huge fucking vampire in front of him looked ready to tear his throat
out when he snarled at the girl to run. The door opening and closing had his
wolf nearly take him.

“My mate.” The man stared at him for several
seconds before he lowered him to the floor. He didn’t let go of him just yet,
but his talons were no longer biting into his skin. “She’s my mate. I have to
get her.”

“You’ll do no such thing.” The sharp shake
had Trent fighting dizziness, but then he was let go. Staggering, he nearly
fell, then was lifted up and laid in the bed by the vampire. “You frightened
her, and she called to me. In all my years of being with her, she has never had
a reason to call out to me in fear.”

“I need to touch her.” Trent didn’t just need
to touch her…he had to or he’d die. And the need was making him hurt. Then he
looked at the man and thought for a second. “She.... My dad did this, didn’t
he? Sent her in here and made me think she was.... This is some sort of joke,
isn’t it? She’s not really my mate, and someone is just playing tricks on me
again.”

“I don’t think she would find this funny. Do
you?” Probably not, but he didn’t say that to the vampire. “Noah Stark, at your
service. And if she is your mate, you will have a great many things to explain
to her. Me as well, but more importantly her. I love her, you see, and I will
not see her harmed. Not again, and certainly not by a man that thinks to claim
her.”

~~~

Christine had no idea what had happened to
her son since he was released from the hospital, but she was sure that whatever
it was, she could fix it. She loved her sons more than she did her own life and
hated to see one of them like this. Sad, lonely...depressed. Even having his
favorite things made for him didn’t seem to make him come out of it. When TJ,
her husband of nearly forty years, came into the office with her, she knew that
he had seen it too.

“The doctor told him to take on a new life or
die.” Christine knew this as well. And she thought that her husband might want
to do the same. Well, “want” might have been the wrong word, but he needed to
take some precautions as well. She could not live without him either. “He’s
moping around like he’s lost everything. I don’t know what to do for him.”

“He needs to go home.” That much was
apparent. He was her son, and she loved him to death, but he needed to go home
and begin whatever he was supposed to be doing. And away from her too, she
realized. “I can’t help him...well, I can, but I think that’s not doing him a
bit of good. He needs to make his own way in this. We can’t do it for him.”

“I think you might be right.” She was always
right, but didn’t point that out to her husband just now. It was a joke between
the two of them and had been for some time. “He needs a good talking to first.
When you going to do that?”

“Me?” TJ nodded. “I see. And this talk, will
it be along the lines of him getting his ass in gear and getting out of our
house? Or did you want me to be harsh with him?”

“Just get his dander up a little. You can do
that. All he does is look at me like I’m not even there. I don’t like that.”
No, Christine thought, her husband would not like being ignored. “You suppose
he might need me to set him up again?”

“You do and I will leave you.” She knew what
TJ had done in hiring a date for Trent. He swore to her that he’d had no idea,
but she wondered. While she loved her husband, she worried about where his mind
was at times. “I’ll talk to him and then we’ll go from there. He needs to get
on, not sit around here where I’m waiting on him hand over foot.”

Christine made her way to the deck, where her
son was currently sitting, after asking Meggie to make him a sandwich. She’d
missed the young girl, Joe, a great deal the last few days, wondering if her
being there might have brought her son out of his funk. Just someone to talk to
or to argue with. Christine didn’t care at this point.

Trent had been on the deck off and on since
he’d come home from the hospital three days ago, and she wondered if he was
going to move back in with them. He couldn’t. Not now. The doctor had told them
that he needed to move, do things for himself. And living with them wouldn’t
get that for him. As soon as she sat down, Trent started talking.

“He said that he loves her. I’m not sure what
I should do now.” Before she could ask him who or what he was talking about, he
continued. “I had no idea what to think when my wolf recognized her before I
did, so I scared her. And she called for Noah. Now she’s gone and he’s pissed
off and in love with my mate.”

“Joe? Joe Samuels is your mate?” He nodded without
looking at her. “Trent, are you sure? Well, that’s a silly question, of course
you are. That’s the reason for the long face and moping around here, I take it?”

“She and Noah are leaving soon. If they haven’t
already. Max Ford is giving him some trouble, so they have to move before he
hurts them. He wouldn’t...Noah wouldn’t give me much in the way of information
about her because he said that was up to me.” Christine stood up and walked to
stand in front of her son. Telling him to stand, she slapped him hard across
the face. “What the hell was that for?”

“Did he say he was in love with her or that
he loved her?” Without waiting for him to answer, she did for him. “He loves
her. Like I do you...most of the time anyway. Right now I want to turn you over
my knee and paddle you but good. And don’t you think I can’t do it either. Noah
and Joe, the two of them have been together for decades, he told us that. And
here you sit on your bottom, acting like...well, I’m not sure what you’re
acting like. A spoiled child perhaps? Maybe a baby who’s not had a nap? A wolf
gets one shot at this, and you’re letting it slip through your fingers like it’s
nothing. Or is it nothing to you?”

“I don’t know what this is.” He sat back
down. “I thought Dad had set it up. And before you hit me again, you know that
I have good reason to think that. The man is positively insane to keep me
between the sheets for some reason. And then Sawyer comes in and tells me that
I need to get out more. Date and see the world with other people. Women, he
meant. I was thinking about that, really I was, about how I’ve not had a
vacation in ten years. I don’t even enjoy going on business trips because I’m
there for as little time as possible. I don’t delegate, either, but do it all
myself, even ignoring the pleas of my partner, my own brother who I trust with
my life to take on more. Then this beautiful woman comes in and I scare the
crap out of her by letting my wolf rule my head. To be honest, Mom, I’m
thinking that she might be better off without me.”