Gilbert (4 page)

Chapter Three

But first, Gilbert had to find him. There were a dozen questions buzzing in his head—like how’d his mate found him, what would he look like, was he a shifter, too? Well, Gilbert could figure that one out himself, he thought. A deep inhale and he let that tangy scent fill him, flow from his nostrils to his lungs and permeate his bloodstream. He was able to parse out a hint of feline shifter, presumably his mate. How had he got here? Was he looking for Gilbert? Who was he, what did he look like?

Gilbert muffled a groan. At the rate he was going, he’d think himself in circles! Gilbert loped up the drive, following the scent. How’d the guy get into the garage? Gilbert knew the door had been down when he left. He stopped and backtracked, but no, that was where the aroma led to.

“Well, all right then.” Who was he to question? He had his keys and the control for the door. He stepped back and pressed the button. As soon as the rolling door began to rise, the scent became stronger. Gilbert dropped down on his haunches and leaned to look under the door, impatience prodding him.

“What the fuck?” There was an unfamiliar car in the garage, and it looked like it’d seen better days. The paint on the car was scratched to hell. Gilbert went under the door, examining the vehicle. The driver was gone, and he smelt something besides his mate, but he wasn’t sure what the heck it was. It was fucking rank, though, and he cringed when it registered—poop.

“Oh hell.” Gilbert dropped onto his butt beside the car. He scrubbed his hands over his face as he tried to rid his nostrils of that scent. “Just my luck I get a mate with stomach issues. God.” Okay, if his mate had eaten something bad, well, that’d explain the stink. Except now Gilbert could smell pee, too and he absolutely could not fathom what the hell kind of mate Fate had given him, and panicking was sounding like a damn good idea.

Especially when the crying started. Gilbert froze, not even drawing a breath, as he scrambled to put the pieces of this puzzle together. Once he thought he had it figured out, he was more terrified than he’d ever been before.

* * * *

Jihu wanted to weep. Jesus, he was exhausted, and scared, and hurt, and…and he didn’t know why his son was crying—and he really needed to pick out a name for the baby! “Argh!” Jihu threw up his hands and tried to unfasten the car seat straps. He had managed to get the baby into the damn thing, he should be able to unfasten it.

Once Ye-sun hadn’t shown, Jihu had no choice but to take off. He was so confused. Ye-sun had helped him, yet Jihu was afraid to truly trust him. But, he guessed he didn’t have to. He’d probably never see the man again.

“Come here,” Jihu murmured, his frustration fading as he lifted his son into his arms. “Oh, yuck!” Jihu thought his entire face must have wrinkled. Fucked-up shifter senses or no, he could still smell the nastiness coming from the dripping diaper. “No wonder you’re screaming. I’d scream too, buddy.”

Jihu carried the baby over to the nearest flat surface then turned back around for the bag. The diaper bag. He’d seen some in there when he’d had to stop and fix a bottle—and hadn’t that been a particular initiation through fire as a parent? Thank God for directions and pre-measured bottles of water. Luckily it seemed the little one didn’t care what temperature his formula was served. He’d slurped down the stuff in no time. And promptly started hollering.

And from there had come Jihu’s first diaper-changing lesson. Now he got to refine his skill…if you could call using half a pack of wipes and ruining a formerly good diaper skill. He’d get it right quicker this time though.

Jihu was concentrating so intensely on what he was doing that he didn’t even hear the garage door opening. His pulse had been roaring in his ears when he’d first arrived here. He and the baby had both taken a nap, Jihu on the floor beside the car seat his son was strapped into. Somewhere, he’d heard a parent had to nap when the baby napped, and Jihu was well past worn out. Arriving here to find his half-brother gone had been both a letdown and a relief.

At least Ye-sun had left directions in the car explaining how to work the GPS and what address to enter. And he’d left a set of keys to the house that he’d said Bae had given him, just in case he needed to leave the lepe. Jihu wondered how Bae would feel about it being an unknown sorta-sibling instead of his known and obviously loved brother popping into his house. He guessed he’d find out as soon as Bae came home.

Unless Bae’s mate came home first.
Yikes. That could be really bad. Bae probably wouldn’t kill me, but his mate
—
he could be another story. There’s no guarantee Ye-sun was able to contact Bae and warn him of my arrival. And no guarantee Bae will even tolerate me here, or the baby.

Jihu tried not to sniffle or let any tears fall as he cleaned up the mess stuck to the infant. How in the world something so little could make such a disaster, and smell so bad on top of it, was beyond him.

And how he could look into those beautiful eyes and feel like he’d loved this child forever, that was a mystery as well, but it was true. Jihu would do anything to protect his son. Anything. Including change millions of dirty diapers.

“There you go, all nice and dry and de-stinkied.” He lifted the baby up and cradled him in his arms. “Hey, hey, we’ll be okay.” Jihu grimaced at the accidental rhyme. Maybe that was a parent thing and soon he’d be babbling like one of those kids’ authors. “Let me put you on a blanket.” He fished one out of the bag. It wasn’t big or thick, but he wouldn’t take long. “I’ll put you down then toss this nasty thing.”

Jihu took care of making a temporary pallet then squatted and laid his son down. “I’ll be right back.” He kissed one soft cheek and his heart turned over in his chest, joy despite everything he’d been through filling him. “I love you, little man.”

He stood, wiping his hands on the borrowed pants he’d found in the car. Ye-sun had taken care of just about everything, even leaving him money for gas and cheap food. Jihu really wished he’d been able to talk to Ye-sun and find out if he truly was a nice guy or if he had been setting Jihu up. His head was too much of a mess right now to figure it out.

Jihu lifted the diaper, used wipes sticking out here and there. He turned his head aside and took a deep breath then rushed to the door leading into the garage. He’d seen trash bags in there and assumed that was the place for the diaper. His attempt to keep the dirty diaper’s tainted scent out of his nostrils was doomed to failure. Jihu had trouble opening the door, his body going weird on him and making his heart palpitate and his head kind of spin.

“The hell,” he muttered as he finally got the knob turned.
Diaper fumes must be toxic—gross diapers, anyways.
Jihu shivered one second and was flushed and hot the next. He needed to ditch the diaper, ASAP. He stepped out of the door into the garage and turned to his left—and froze. A scream started in his diaphragm, bubbling up his chest and into his throat, but Jihu clamped his teeth down around it and refused to release the sound.

Instead, he did what any brave man would do in such a situation—one where he feared that he was hunted and had someone besides just himself to protect. Jihu flung the diaper at the man’s head and spun around.

“God damn it!” the stranger yelped.

Yeah, Jihu could totally understand that sentiment. He dashed inside and slammed the door, flicking the locks into place an instant later. He didn’t hesitate, turning and running to pick up the precious child, who was now wailing.

“Hungry again, aren’t you?” Jihu grabbed the diaper bag and sped through the house. Two puppies were barking up a storm and he debated letting them out of their boxes. They might stop the intruder but they also might try to harm him. If it were just him, Jihu would take the risk, but he couldn’t now.

He found a bedroom he thought was Bae’s and wondered, once he was in there with the door locked, what, exactly, he was going to do. He’d left the paper with the instructions, including Bae’s phone number, in the car. He’d just caged himself, and his son, for an unknown man to find. And he’d probably really pissed off the unknown man by smacking him in the face, if his aim was true, with a shitty, sopping wet diaper.

“I’m fucked.” He cooed at the baby despite his fear, and tried to fix a bottle with one arm, all while listening for the stranger. He spilled formula on the bed where he was sitting. Jihu hoped Bae wouldn’t care.

Head cocked to the side, he growled when he realised his senses were all fucked up. Even if they hadn’t been, the stench of the diaper might have stilted his olfactory abilities. Ever since he’d been given those shots, he hadn’t been functioning at a hundred percent, and his leopard seemed sluggish as well.

So when there was a knock on the door, a very calm, regular knock, not a pounding, rage-implying one, Jihu almost screeched, startled as he was. What kind of intruder knocked on the fucking door? That Jihu himself was an intruder, kind of, was beside the point. Ye-sun had given him keys and—

“Hello? Hey, I’m not gonna hurt you or the kid, even after you tried to kill me with toxic fumes.”

The good humour in that deep, rough voice was more surprising than the knock on the door had been. Jihu frowned and glared at the door. His body was doing that crazy cold-hot head-spinny thing again, and if his heart beat any faster it might just blow up.

“I mean it. I’m sorry I scared you, but you gotta know—well, can you open the door? I can pick the lock but I somehow doubt you’d be happy about that. Hey, my name is Gilbert, by the way, Gilbert Trujillo.”

Jihu shook his head, trying to clear out some of the lightheadedness he was feeling.
Gilbert Trujillo…why does that name seem familiar?

“Is the baby…” The man on the other side of the door shuffled his feet, and it sounded like his knee whacked into the hard wood. “Uh. It’s your brother, right? I mean, you didn’t kidnap a baby, I hope.”

Jihu gaped in the direction Gilbert’s voice was coming from. What the hell was he supposed to say? He had actually kidnapped a baby, but it sure wasn’t his brother.

“You’re a shifter, aren’t you? You smell like one, kind of remind me of Bae, you know? Will you open the door?”

“You know Bae?” Jihu asked, unaccountably jealous that this stranger knew a brother Jihu had never met. Was Gilbert Bae’s mate? Jihu’s body felt flushed with arousal. He didn’t think Gilbert was Bae’s mate.

“Yeah, of course. He’s my brother’s mate. I’m assuming you know Bae since you’re here and all. With a baby. That you still haven’t explained the presence of, or however I’m supposed to say that tactfully. Will you open the door now?”

That deep, sensual voice was doing all sorts of things to Jihu. He was sporting a hard-on for the first time in ages, since he’d been forced—Jihu gave himself a mental shake. He couldn’t go there. Jihu was ready to freak out, except he couldn’t because he had a baby to take care of.

A wailing, upset baby. “Shh, shhh, it’ll be okay, little one.” He cuddled the infant close and kept an eye on the door.

“The more tense you are, the more the baby’ll cry,” Gilbert called out, raising his voice. “Why don’t you open the door and let me help?”

Jihu felt like crying himself. He was terrified on so many levels. If his shifter senses weren’t fucked up, he could get a better feeling for whether he could trust Gilbert Trujillo. As it was, his body was acting the traitor, and his mind was a mess. And he wasn’t sure how he was supposed to calm down the child in his arms or—

“Please. I—” It sounded like Gilbert dragged his hand down the door, rattling it slightly and scraping along part of its length. “I think you’re my mate.”

Jihu couldn’t breathe. His chest felt tight and his pulse raced. Sweat suddenly coated his skin and he began to shake. He put the baby down in the centre of the bed and stared sightlessly at the door. His dick was still hard as stone despite the building panic. How could he have a mate? Who would want him when he was such a mess? And it wasn’t just him. Jihu wouldn’t give his son up, ever.

Mates are drawn intrinsically to one another. I just didn’t think…it’d ever happen to me.
Jihu knew of very few people who’d found their mate. In his lepe there was only the leader, Shin-Il, and his mate Hika They were also one of the many childless couples in the lepe, but mated pairs weren’t required to breed with anyone else. They couldn’t. Neither they nor their leopard would tolerate it.

“Please, open the door for me.” Gilbert’s soft plea made Jihu’s eyes burn and tears spill in a rapid waterfall. He was so, so tired and scared, and he didn’t know what to do about this new curve ball thrown at him. Did having a mate, even though he was gay, mean he couldn’t be forced to breed again? Was that how Bae had got out of it?

The baby cried out again and Jihu sobbed as quietly as he could right along with his son. He lay down and curled around the tiny body, tenderly rubbing the hard little belly. Jihu felt around for the bottle. It’d fallen somewhere, on the bed, off it, he didn’t know. His world was reduced to the screaming of a newborn and the fear and sorrow smothering any embers of hope he’d felt.

“Here, let me help, please.”

Jihu cracked open eyes he hadn’t known he’d closed and saw a blurry shape in front of him. He didn’t even have the strength to move just then, and the soothing voice discouraged him from doing so.

“It’s all right, I won’t hurt either of you. Please don’t cry.”

Jihu sniffled and rubbed at his nose. He thought Gilbert—he recognised the cognac-smooth voice—was talking to the babe then, but a big, warm hand landed on his back, rubbing gently. It’d been longer than he could remember since he’d been touched in any way other than force. Jihu flinched and started to roll away until he realised Gilbert was picking up his son.

“No!” Jihu shot up and promptly swayed, dizzy from rising too quickly and who knew what else.

“It’s okay, dude, I promise,” Gilbert murmured, touching his shoulder. “This little guy here needs to be fed, and you’re freaking out. Just, try to stop, okay? It scares him.”