Page 15 of Nightfire

“Marisa.” With any other woman, Sam would have maybe laid a sympathetic hand on her shoulder. They were all affected, Marisa as much as anyone. But Marisa didn’t like being touched by a man. She still had scars from her husband’s touch.

She stood ramrod straight, was back to her prim and proper persona. She nodded her head soberly at Sam. “Mr. Reston.”

Sam looked at Harry, in a knot of happy women, Chloe, Ellen and Nicole, all of them talking loudly and happily, then met Mike’s eyes.

Sam had clearly taken a decision. He turned to Marisa. “RBK closes for the next two days. Full pay for all employees. Cancel all appointments for today and tomorrow, with apologies. We open again on Monday.” When Sam looked at him, Mike nodded his approval.

Oh, yeah. Finding the sister you thought long dead—yeah, that qualified for a holiday. And when that sister was Chloe Mason…hell yes. Celebrations were definitely in order.

“Yes, sir. Thank you, sir.” Marisa’s voice was bland, but there was a rosy blush under her olive skin. She’d caught the Bolt happiness bug.

They all had.

“Well, then Wordsmith closes down, too,” Nicole said, smiling. Her translation agency was across the hallway from RBK. “I’ll sub-contract out my own translations for the next couple of days. I can always check on things from home. This calls for a real celebration. And you, Ellen—” She looked sternly at Harry’s wife, a notorious workaholic. Sometimes you had to pry Ellen from the spreadsheets of Wordsmith and RBK with a crow bar. “No accounting. None. I don’t want you near a computer until Monday.”

Ellen laughed. “Absolutely! Are you kidding? Working when I have a sister to welcome to the family?” Ellen was hugging Chloe. “Oh man,” she said. She had that rosy blush too. “Wait till you meet Grace, Chloe. Your niece. You’re going to love her. This is so great! Another aunt for her. Nicole can share aunt duty!”

“I love aunt duty.” Nicole bent down to kiss Chloe’s cheek. She was much taller than Chloe and Ellen, and moved a little awkwardly, her belly starting to get in her way. “But I’ll happily share. And I can’t wait for you to meet our daughter, Meredith. Merry.” Nicole smiled at her husband, then Harry. “This is so great. I have no words.”

Which for Nicole, a professional translator, whose stock in trade was words, was really something.

His brother’s wives were great. Mike knew both his brothers realized how blessed they were. Two beautiful women, particularly Nicole, who had a blinding kind of beauty, with that Snow White ivory and ebony thing going on. Though Ellen was a looker, too, and a world-class singer. Sam and Harry were lucky men because their wives were not only gorgeous and smart and talented, but also loving. They’d both created happy homes for his brothers, given them constant, unwavering love and beautiful children. Neither Sam nor Harry had ever had a happy home, and they lapped it up.

But neither of the women held a candle to Chloe. Mike couldn’t keep his eyes off her. He edged closer to see whether he could pick up on whatever it was that surrounded her. There was some kind of force field around Chloe, something he couldn’t in any way define or explain but that was as strong as a tractor beam.

Nicole had a cellphone to her ear, snapped it closed. She clapped her hands. “Okay everyone, listen up! Manuela is going to start cooking lunch for us just as soon as she stops crying. So we can take this show down to Coronado Shores. Chloe, where are you staying?”

“With us,” Harry and Ellen said at the same time. “No question,” Harry added.

Chloe was looking overwhelmed with joy. Mike had been bowled over by her in the office lobby, this pale, anxious beauty. Now she was glowing with happiness, eyes gleaming with tears of joy, cheeks flushed. Absolutely irresistible.

“Oh!” Chloe covered her mouth with her hand. “I don’t mean to impose! I booked a room at the Del, you don’t need to put me up, for heaven’s sake. You have a small child and…” Her voice trailed off when she saw that Harry and Ellen weren’t even listening to her. Ellen absent-mindedly gave her shoulders a squeeze while talking to Harry about beds and space, then turned to give Chloe another kiss on the cheek.

“This is so exciting! It’s the best Christmas ever!”

“No, really.” Chloe stepped back, just one tiny step, but it was the first step back anyone had taken. Her hands clasped in front of her and she pulled them apart. A sign of distress.

Harry glanced at Sam and at him and they drew closer, closer to him and to Chloe.

It was a look they’d shared all through their adolescence in a brutal foster home, a look they all understood instinctively, down to the bone. Harry wanted Sam and Mike to have his back. It was a call both Sam and Mike were incapable of resisting. They’d have Harry’s back no matter what. Mike would willingly take a bullet for him, and for Sam, too. He loved them.

He’d walk into the jaws of death for both of them.

Coming closer to Chloe, something he wanted desperately, was a no-brainer.

Harry took Chloe’s hands in his, carefully. Harry had big strong hands, they all did. They were all careful not to hurt women or kids with their hands.

A hot flush of grinding guilt shot through Mike at the memory of holding down the cokehead during the fuckathon last night. Hurting her. She was a whack job, true, but she didn’t deserve even one second of pain from him.

It was a memory that shamed him, made him feel unclean. Unworthy, of his brothers, of their wives. Of Chloe.

“Chloe,” Harry said gently, watching her face carefully. “You need to understand something really important. We’re all your family now. Sam and Mike and me, we’re like brothers. More than brothers. We’ll have all the time in the world for me to explain why, but for now—all you need to know is that they are your brothers, too. Together with Nicole and Ellen and Merry and Gracie. We’re all one family. Yours.”

Chloe burst into tears again. Mike could see that she couldn’t contain her emotions, which made sense. When she’d told her story, he could hear a longing for connection in her voice. Almost feel her yearning. He’d had his family until he was ten. He knew what it was like to yearn. She’d had it harder than he had because she’d never known family except for the first years, when Harry protected her. Years she couldn’t remember.

Sam bent to gently embrace her. Sam was tall – six four. He had to bend down low to her. He kissed the top of her head. “I’m your brother, too, Chloe. It’s just like Harry said. Nicole and Merry and me—we’re your family now, too.”

Chloe smiled up at him and swallowed, the muscles in her long, graceful neck moving. She swiped at her face. “Thank you, Sam,” she whispered.