Page 22 of At Their Mercy: Part I

Em shook his head in amusement. “Son, don’t apply Danny’s annoyance to me. Of course we would have loved seeing you more often, but I know you two. You keep your world smaller—and I know why. I accept that⁠—”

It was my turn to shake my head, but it had nothing to do with amusement. “We don’t. Anymore. We did, but…” I released a breath. Fuck. Reese should handle this conversation. “We don’t want to. We’ve been out of the game for over two years, and we’re still acting like every piece of information is classified intel. Shay knocked some sense into us earlier today after we neglected to tell him our real birthday.”

He smiled a little at that. “Shay—that’s the guy you’re seeing, yeah?”

I nodded once. “We live together too. We just moved in to our new house a few weeks ago. And, uh, we wanna have you over.”

He smirked. “You’re struggling right now, aren’t you?”

A breath gusted out of me. “Like you wouldn’t fuckin’ believe. So many words, man.”

He let out a laugh at that—and then he finally put me out of my misery. He rounded the bar and steered me toward the seating area, and he put an arm around my shoulders.

“Listen to me, River. If you and Reese wanna get together more often, nobody’s happier than me. I admit we miss you. But don’t put too much pressure on yourself—and don’t feel bad.”

“I don’t miss them!” Danny yelled.

Emerson ignored that. And Reese’s growled response that nobody could decipher.

As for me not feeling bad…? Easier said than done. While we’d built our kinky family at Mclean, so few people had seen every side of us. In fact, it was down to three. Not even Nana. Shay, Emerson, and Danny.

“One more thing,” Em said. “I herded you together professionally for twenty years. I can do it privately too.”

I sat down next to him on the sofa and scratched my arm. “No herding necessary. We don’t want it to fall on your shoulders.”

Reese and Danny picked that moment to slam the door open and appear in the doorway, looking like they’d had a pillow fight. Which I supposed was sort of the truth. Reese’s bed head was even more impressive than Danny’s, and they had a fuck-ton of scratches all over. Did they have a fucking cat in there? Reese’s arms were torn up, and Danny had marks across his arms and torso.

I felt my forehead wrinkle.

“Good Christ, lads,” Em muttered.

Reese righted his clothes, breathing heavily, and aimed for the chair. “Everythin’s good again. Danny forgives us.”

The man in question stayed in the doorway with nothing but a duvet wrapped around his middle. It pooled by his feet.

“You forgot to mention my conditions, fuckface,” Danny huffed.

“Oh, right.” Reese scratched his nose. “We have to put Danny in our will. If we—and Shay—die, Danny will get custody of any and all dogs we own at the time.”

“And a minimum of three major holidays per year,” Danny barked out.

“Jesus, yes! That too!” Reese showed his palms in surrender. “Dogs and holidays, you got it, bro. Chill. We want this. There’s no need for threats.”

“Seeing is believing,” Danny bit out. “Daddy, I’m going back to bed.”

“Hold on.” Reese flew up once more, stopping Danny as he turned. “Gotta hug it out for real.”

My brother had never been subtle or opted for finesse. He trapped Danny in a bear hug and nearly lifted him off the floor.

“Good, so you admit the last attempt was more like assault,” Danny bitched. Except, Em and I could see the tiny smile he was trying to hide. He clapped Reese on the back. “All right, that’s enough. I gotta be up at six.”

“Then why the hell are you up in the middle of the night?” I asked, fucking with him.

I could play too.

Danny stepped back and narrowed his eyes at me. “Don’t you fucking start too. Goodnight.” He bunched up the duvet some and turned away.

“Oh come on, at least give us a glimpse of that ass,” I called.