Thomas grimaced. “That’s not an answer.”
“Thomas Mulvaney has never thrown a bad party. And this one will go down in Mulvaney history.”
“So it was a good party?” Thomas said, not really looking for an answer.
“Well, as one of the lizard elite you do have a reputation to uphold,” Aiden teased.
Thomas laughed softly, the sound rolling into the dark. “You’re right, as always.”
Hand in hand, they crossed the yard toward the mansion. Behind them, the bull cooled in silence, finally still. He knew Zane’s grief wasn’t likely to cool as quickly as the tomb currently holding his mother’s body, but he hoped that knowing it was finally over would be enough to help him move on, to help him heal. He deserved to live a life without that woman poisoning every good thing he ever had.
“He’s going to be fine,” Aiden said, squeezing his hand.
“I know. He’s tough. I just hope I did the right thing.”
“You did.”
They were almost back to the house, when Aiden pulled him into his arms and kissed him thoroughly. “What was that for?”
Aiden grinned. “Happy Halloween.”
Thomas shook his head with a laugh. “Yeah, Happy Halloween.”
Matthew—Matty to his friends—stretched his arms overhead until his joints popped. He glanced over at the shop counter where there was a full display of fresh baked goods and another ice coffee if he just had the energy to get up and walk over there. He’d been waiting for his friend, Jordan, to arrive. But, as usual, he was late. Jordan called it being on ‘Hispanic’ time. Matty had learned to work around it.
He put his elbows on the table and dug the heels of his palms into his eyes until sparks danced, hissing at the faint pain of his almost healed black eye. He really needed caffeine and sugar. Now.
“Matthew Kendrick?”
Matty’s head snapped up, not expecting to be government named at two o’clock on a Tuesday afternoon. He frowned as he eyed the tall, broad man looming over him with trepidation. Was he about to be hate-crimed in the middle of a coffee shop called Bean Me Up? That would be humiliating.
He did his best to look bored. “Who’s asking?”
The man seemed surprised that Matty didn’t recognize him. There was no way the guy was a professor or something. Helooked like a Tik-Tok lumberjack and dressed like one too. “My name is Aiden Mulvaney.”
The name sounded vaguely familiar, but Matty couldn’t put his finger on just why. “And…” he prompted, preemptively annoyed at being interrupted mid-caffeine cycle.
The man took a deep breath, looking back at someone over his shoulder. When he looked back, he said, “And I’m your brother.”
Matty couldn’t stop the bark of laughter that escaped. “My brother? He’s dead. Died before I was born. So unless you’re a ghost or a vampire, that’s not actually possible.”
The other man’s eyes went wide, seeming faintly amused. “Is that what he told people? That I was dead?”
Matty’s pulse jackrabbited. If the guy was a scammer, he seemed genuinely surprised to hear that his brother was dead. Weird. “Who are you really?”
The man sighed, shifting his weight from one foot to the other. “I’m exactly who I say I am. My name is Aiden Mulvaney, I’m your brother. He turned and pointed to a hot old man with silver hair and ice blue eyes, holding an adorable Gerber ad of a baby. “And that’s my husband. We wanted to meet you.”
Matty returned his attention to the man still hovering above him menacingly. “Who’s the kid?”
His lips quirked up at the mention of the baby. “My son, Theo. You’re an uncle.”
Matty shook his head. “Look, man. I don’t know what scam you’re running but my dad’s dead and my mom is rapidly running through her inheritance getting hammered at the country club and banging her tennis instructor like the world’s biggest walking cliche. I’m on scholarship and I get an allowance that pays just enough for me to eat. And not well. If you think you can get money out of me, there isn’t any. If you want totry and seduce my mom, I can shoot you her address, but she’s usually swimming at the bottom of a gin bottle by ten am, so...”
The lumberjack snorted out a laugh, then pulled his phone from his pocket. Matty’s pulse thudded hard in his neck, weirdly afraid his mother was going to show up out of nowhere and slap him for telling all their family secrets. Instead, he hit a few buttons, then slid the phone to Matty. It was an article from some trashy tabloid. There was a picture of the man in front of him and the man he claimed was his husband, standing in tuxedos. The headline read:FromWard to Wedding: Billionaire Thomas Mulvaney Marries Former Adopted Son.
Several things stood out to Matty in that moment. Billionaire. Married. Adopted Son. His heavy heartbeat shot to the moon as he realized where he’d heard the Mulvaney name before. His father’s files. The Watch. Project Watchtower, to be exact. Had Aiden been working with their dad the whole time? The thought was a bucket of ice water on his preconceived notions. Matty had never seen Aiden’s name in the files, but he hadn’t exactly had time to peruse them before they’d come to collect the things from his home office.
Still, he couldn’t let on that he knew anything about that. It was a top secret project. The kind that gets people killed for knowing too much. Once more, he shrugged. “All this proves is you can use photoshop. So can I. Give me five minutes and I’ll have you standing next to Bigfoot in that tux. Bonus points for the effort though.”
