Giving Steel a tight smile, Jackson handed him an email to read. When it arrived in his inbox just before lunch, he opened it thinking it was about some business matter, but as he read it, tears welled in his eyes. So many years had passed, that he’d forgotten all about them. The last time he could remember seeing his cousins was when he was five. Hell, Zane and Dakota never even met them and he doubted the triplets would remember who they were.
“Cousins? On your father side?” asked Steel, after he finished reading the email.
“No, on my mother’s side…her sister…my aunt. The last time I saw my cousins, I was five and they were moving back east because their father became Alpha of his home pack after the death of his father.”
“No visits between you guys?”
“None that I know of. They just kinda disappeared off the face of the earth. Nobody ever mentioned my cousins or aunt again after they left, at least not in my presence.”
“They found you through the High Council?”
“Yeah, I guess they found out about the complaint I filed.”
“Okay, so what are you going to do? Give them permission to visit the pack?”
“What’s your opinion?”
“They’re family and even though you guys haven’t been close, they’re still relatives and personally, I think it would be good for you and your brothers to meet them. It might help heal the wounds Zane and Dakota have from the loss of their parents. Just to know they aren’t alone in the world except for one crazy-ass, mean motherfucker of an uncle.”
“That I agree with…”
“But what, babe?”
“I just get the feeling there’s a lot left unsaid in their email. Why now? Why not last year or the year before?”
“The only way you’re going to have answers to those questions is to talk to your cousins.”
Sighing, Jackson said, “I know. What time is it? I want to call Logan and see if he remembers anything about them.”
“If you’re wondering if he’s up, the answer is yes.”
“And you know this, why?”
Snickering, Steel said, “Because your brother and his entourage…maybe not Lizzie and Ian’s parents…are presently enjoying themselves at The Meat Locker.”
“I’m guessing it’s a gay club.”
“Yup. And before you ask, they are very safe for two reasons; one, all of the enforcers are with them and two, the security in the club is also protecting them.”
“Really? How did you manage that?”
“Simple. We own the club.”
“What? You own a gay club in Edinburgh?”
“No, babe,weown a gay club in Edinburgh.”
“Yeah, yeah, but really…a gay club!”
“I…we have a chain of them throughout the world.”
“No shit! How the hell did you ever get intothatbusiness?”
“It was an accident. One day, I overheard one of my employees on the phone trying to find a family to take in a shifter who’d been kicked out of his pack for refusing to marry. When she hung up, I called her into my office, apologized for eavesdropping, and then asked her how I could help. She picked up a two-inch thick binder and put it in front of me. I was amused at her response, but once I opened it and read her report, there wasn’t any other choice except to figure out how to help hundreds of shifters who were homeless, usually living in cities, trying to figure out how to survive.”
“So you came up with gay clubs?”
Chuckling, Steel answered, “Not right away. I thought of several other ideas at first, but the numbers wouldn’t work because they needed jobs and a place to live. A couple of weeks later, she came into my office and told me some homeless shifters wanted to meet me. She’d told them what I was trying to do and they wanted to thank me. Thank gods for that because when they came into my office, I realized they were all gay and then everything made sense about why they couldn’t marry, and so on.”
