Twin Wolf Trouble (Shifter Squad Six 2) (2 page)

Now, that life was far behind him, but the work ethic and the camaraderie had stayed. A man didn’t serve years in the military and come out of it the same way he went in. Tex and Thatch had served together and as many shifters did, they rose through the ranks like wildfire, swiftly being snatched up as candidates for SEAL training. As with most things, they excelled at it.

A twinge of discomfort went through Tex as Thatch finally stopped and picked a door to enter through.

“Did you see those guys?” he asked, keeping his voice low and his hand firmly on his bag.

It was loaded up with essentials. Handguns, an assault rifle, some basic communications and explosives devices – everything a warrior on the go might need. No one checked their bags and the security checks didn’t blink an eye, which had told Tex already that whoever Thatch had picked up the job from had been expecting them.

Seeing the company on the train, Tex wasn’t sure whether this was going to be a small errand anymore, something to ‘waste time’ on the drive like Thatch had claimed it to be.

“I did,” he noted dully, in his infuriating calm voice that he used when he knew Tex wanted a straight answer.

“And?”

“And it means we have less work to do. If there are Marines onboard, I don’t see any reason why two worn and weary paid brutes are needed,” Thatch said drily, shrugging.

“Liar,” Tex scoffed. “You want to tell me what this job is really about or am I to find that out when something goes horribly wrong around us?”

“I know what I told you,” Thatch said, his step much lighter than Tex’s at this point. “The client is someone who doesn’t want to deal with The Firm directly, but the contacts came from within. They wanted to keep it discreet. There’s something on this train that they want an eye kept on and I wasn’t privy to what it is. Our problem is to make sure nothing, you know, goes to shit.”

“So, you’re telling me,” Tex started as they walked through the dining car, looking for a place to sit down and start the long journey. “That we’re on a train going across the country, protecting
something
from
someone
for
someone
and we don’t know any of said three unmentionables? And on top of that, you dragged me off of a perfectly hot blond for this?”

He could feel the anger bubbling in his tone and he didn’t bother to hide it. Thatch glanced over his shoulder and Tex could have decked him then and there for the shit eating grin he was presented with. Leave it to his brother to know how to get a rise out of him.

“Astute observations, brother.”

“I’ll astute right up your ass when we get to New Orleans,” Tex huffed.

Thatch chuckled and despite his irritation, Tex felt the weariness lift off of him. It always happened when he felt like there was something
real
going on. Seeing those Marines had lit a fire under his ass. This wasn’t any joyride, even if he could keep hoping to the last moment that it was.

Hell, he could at least pretend to enjoy this. Who knew, maybe he’d find
his
future mate in the middle of a mission too. Apparently that wasn’t completely unheard of in Squad Six these days and spirits above, Tex could use a woman to team up against Thatch with.

This better be worth skipping the after party,
he thought grimly.
 

CHAPTER TWO

Madeline

Madeline sighed, looking out of the window. The countryside was rolling by, speeding up bit by bit between the stations. The train shook and coughed as it trundled on, always on path, always moving forward. It seemed like a sorry cliché compared to her current state of affairs.

She tucked her thumb between the pages of the book she’d been reading—though truthfully, she’d been chewing on the nail for the past five minutes without making any headway. At that point, it was pretty obvious that she was not all about concentrating on her research, and staring listlessly out of the window seemed like a lot more fun.

Slouching on one elbow, she watched the gradual change in colors, moving from California to Arizona and onward through the whole forty-eight hour ride to New Orleans. She knew how it would be—the tiny slivers of greenery, kept up by people blissfully ignoring the water conservation pleas, would soon turn back into the emptiness of the desert, until moving east the green would return. She’d done it before.

Madeline had always loved the trip from west to east, but this time, it made her uneasy
somehow. There wasn’t any good excuse for why she was feeling like that, other than the fact that the hours she usually spent with a good novel tucked away in a cushy sleeping car had now turned into an eternity working on her thesis. She loved the work she was doing and she loved the fact that she was on the homestretch even more, but recently, there was just a little bit too much of everything.

You got to get through this, Maddy. You can’t work as a waitress forever,
she told herself, rolling her eyes at the fact that her internal voice was starting to sound a lot like her Dad.

“A woman’s nothing without her education!” he would say, and she’d be damned if it wasn’t the first thing he was going to say the moment he heard that she still hadn’t finished all of her prep work.

Of course, he wasn’t wrong to do it. Madeline Beaumont was the last woman to say that she had everything under control lately. She definitely did not. From the crazy hours she had to work at the restaurant, the oddly named Lazy Tuxedo Frog, to the constant fear of getting kicked out of her already too-expensive room in a shared apartment in San Francisco, to her recent man drama. It was the last bit that kept her the most distracted, she figured. And the part she needed to purge the fastest.

God, it’d be so much easier if men just came and went at the snap of your fingers,
Madeline thought glumly, snapping her fingers for effect.

Just then, the door to her so-far private sitting room was thrust open and two decidedly masculine figures practically fell in, chatting and laughing
amongst themselves loudly. She tried to throw them a hateful glare for disturbing her peace, knowing that half the train was empty, but that notion was soon lost on her completely when she got a good look at them.  

Tall as hell, with shoulders too wide to reasonably fit in through the doors leading into the sitting room, they cut the kind of images of men she would definitely not mind popping in and out of her life. They both had deep green eyes with flecks of gold in them and strong jaws. For a moment, she thought she was seeing double, but when they sunk into their seats across from one another, she managed to wrap her brain around the situation.

Twins. Really, really hot twins. Just my luck,
Madeline thought, smiling privately.

This was not boding well for her attempts to get any work done that day.

“Sorry, Miss. Hope we’re not disturbing you,” one of the green-eyed devils said, leaning toward her.

He had a little bit of that Mississippi-Louisiana twang she missed so much and it wasn’t hard to pinpoint him as a down Southern kind of man. Sigh. There it was. Butterflies in her stomach.

Maddy, seriously. Stop it. No goo-goo eyes at the hunky guys!
she chided herself, smiling shyly at the two expectant-looking brothers.

“No, not at all,” she said, trying to keep her voice clear.

She noticed one of them looking at her a bit too long, a glint in his eyes telling her that he was definitely trouble. It didn’t help that she
loved
trouble. Doing her best to keep to herself, she opened her book again and mentally scrolled down to the last line she’d been reading. There was something about mechanical physics that could really make her mind wander all over the place, even though that particular bit she was reading now about friction in metals was crucial to understand for her thesis. The fact that she kept sneaking glances at the brown-haired hunks sitting within a few feet of her was not aiding her in her quest for knowledge, though.

“I thought Connor would burst out of that damn suit, I swear,” the troublemaking one said, chuckling as he leaned back and undid the first two buttons on his dress shirt.

She hadn’t noticed that they were both wearing suits and that they looked damn good in them too. Then again, they were definitely the kind of men who would have looked mouthwatering in anything. Working at a restaurant for the past six months had really made her appreciate the occasional piece of eye candy—it seemed like the kind of guys who could fill out a suit were paradoxically the only ones who never came by the Lazy Tuxedo Frog.

“You can give the guy a break, Tex. Him being off on his honeymoon is the only reason why we’re getting to go down home,” the other one said, shrugging off his black jacket and folding it next to him.

They both had just two light duffels with them that seemed half-empty. She thought with almost painful discomfort at the two huge, hulking suitcases she had waiting in her sleeping car. And her trip was only supposed to be two weeks long.

“True. I’m happy for him. The whole raising-a-family thing is sounding more and more like a good idea,” Tex commented and it was then that Madeline snuck another glance at them, Tex locking eyes with her.

She blushed like a schoolgirl, quickly looking back at her book. Of course, he wouldn’t let her get away with it.

“What about you, Miss? What’s your take on families? Yay or nay?” Tex asked, smirking knowingly.

Yeah, he had her. No point in pretending like she hadn’t been sneaking looks at him and his brother like a love-struck puppy. Closing her book again—at the same location as before, no surprise—she looked up and glanced from Tex to his brother and then back again. It was certainly the first time two guys who looked like they were part of the Olympic swimming team had asked her how she felt about babies and marriage. So she had to give them a point on creative openers!

“I’m Madeline. I like kids. I like the idea of having a family – I have three brothers and a sister, so you can imagine I’m used to the idea of having a big pack around me.”

That seemed to strike them as amusing, as the men shared a quick smirk. Madeline frowned slightly but kept going, using the excuse to get away from her work for a second longer.

“But I think kids can only come to a household with love. I don’t want to bring a new life into a situation where he or she is not at the heart of a family, surrounded by affection. I don’t want to be the kind of woman who has to be supermom, doing it all alone.”

She bit into her tongue, trying to make herself shut up. Why the hell was she telling them all of that? She didn’t even know their names, not really, so sharing intimate details about her twisted little mind was not exactly kosher behavior. Tex’s brother seemed to share her opinion, though, nodding his head.

“I’m Thatch. That knucklehead over there is Tex,” Thatch introduced them and Tex gave a short wave and a wink that seemed to be a lot more loaded than she could have expected.

“Pleased to meet you,” Madeline said, smiling genuinely and feeling some stress lifting from her shoulders.

So far, so good. She hadn’t made a complete fool of herself yet! Not that she was trying to impress these godlike creatures that the train spirits had decided to shove in her path, but there was something about the whole exchange that made her feel warm and fuzzy inside for not having fucked up.

“So, are you two from Louisiana? I think I recognize the accent,” she said, feeling a little more confident.

“Creole, born and raised,” Tex announced, grinning. “And I bet you’re a New Orleans girl too, right? I never miss a pair of Louisiana legs,” he said, that bad boy smirk glued on his lips.

Madeline tucked her legs underneath her a bit more, sort of happy with the fact that she’d chosen to wear a yellow and white sundress that day that looked nice even with her pale complexion. She had the bad luck of being a Louisiana redhead—the heat killed her every time. And of course, to get away from it, she’d moved to California for school. The hits kept on coming.

“Yup, I’m from New Orleans,” she said, very aware of the pink blush that must have been lighting up her cheeks and making Tex grin even wider.

She glanced at Thatch, the brother with sterner features and more gold in his eyes, and she was not at all surprised to find him camouflaging a slight wry grin too. Great, they were both bad, one of them just hid it better. This had all the makings of being one fun conversation. Or a really awkward one, depending on how she managed to play it.