“Yeah. We have a few issues to work out. It’s gonna be rocky while we attempt to come to some sort of middle ground.” Melinda gently rocked back and forth. It didn’t seem to startle the baby at all that the three of them were chatting.
“Really?” Rebecca asked. She twisted her face to Miles. “That didn’t happen to us, did it?”
“No.” He kissed her nose. “But we had our own problems, if you recall. Namely the fact that you’re human and had no idea of our existence.”
“Yeah. That was weird. And then there were two of you.”
Melinda lifted her gaze from the angelic face at her chest. “Yeah, trust me. Even though I’m lupine, and even though I’ve always known wolves could mate in threes, nothing makes that part any easier. It’s downright weird at first.”
“Understandable. You’ll figure it all out,” Miles said. “So, what’s the deal with Keegan? You looked super chummy on the porch. I can’t imagine you two already coming up with something you don’t see eye to eye on in two days. How have you had time to discover such a thing?”
“He’s the building inspector in charge at the casino site.”
Miles cringed. “Yikes. Yes, that would do it.”
“What’s wrong with that?” Rebecca asked, tipping her head back to watch her mate’s expression before returning her gaze to Melinda.
“I hate that monstrosity. It’s like a giant, ugly scar in the middle of the reservation.”
“Oh. I hadn’t thought about it.” She winced.
Miles held his mate tighter. “My sister’s a tree hugger. She doesn’t like to see any abomination to our land. Especially not a mega-business.”
“I can see that,” Rebecca responded. “But won’t it provide jobs and help raise the poverty level on the rez?”
Melinda shook her head. “Not you too,” she teased.
Rebecca’s eyes widened. “I didn’t mean to be adversarial. I was just asking.”
“It does. But probably at the expense of small shops and restaurants in Sojourn that won’t survive the boom of giant chain stores that will go in to accommodate the patrons,” Miles pointed out.
“Right. Like your store.”
Melinda nodded. “Besides, I have a bad feeling about that construction. If you thought it was difficult to mate with two wolf shifters as a human with no prior knowledge of our existence, you can imagine mating with two large brutes who have little to no experience with a shaman. Their ability to take my concerns seriously is a joke.
“Normally, it wouldn’t matter. Over time, they would come to understand what I do, how my visions work, and they would learn to trust my instincts. But in this case, time is of the essence. I’m telling you that casino is much more than an eyesore. It’s a time bomb. Something horrible is going to happen.”
“And you don’t know when or what.” Rebecca knew from her own experience heeding Melinda’s advice that one could question Melinda until they were blue in the face, and it would change nothing. Fate had Her plan. Nothing would stop Her.
“Exactly. Try telling Trace and Keegan that.” She rolled her eyes and then tucked her cheek against the baby’s and inhaled her sweet smell again. “God I love babies.”
Miles chuckled. “Guess you can get one of your own now.”
“Lord, not yet. I’ve hardly accepted the logistics of this mating. The last thing I need is to get pregnant.” She felt the heat rise in her cheeks as she spoke. The reality was she and her mates hadn’t discussed the possibility of pregnancy a single time.
She prayed her mates were respectful enough to have used condoms if Melinda were ovulating. The males in her species could scent when a woman was able to get pregnant. Few females were capable of singling out such an intricately specific scent indicator.
Though Mimi probably is.
And chances were Melinda could probably hone the skill herself now that she was mated and had actually had sex. No one alive knew—until she shared with her mates the other night—that she’d been a virgin. That had severely dampened her ability to identify such specific scents.
“You doing okay?” Rebecca asked. “You’re quiet over there.”
“Just thinking.” Melinda gave the rocker another push and closed her eyes.
•●•
Keegan and Mitch poured over every inch of paperwork associated with the original inspections done on the casino. So far they had found very little evidence to indicate anyone knew there was anything shoddy occurring.
“Look at this file,” Keegan said as he lifted it into the air. It was labeled CONCRETE.