Slade smiled at her. “Do you want my job? You seem to be better at it than I am. I never would have thought of asking our women to help out.”
“She’s a doctor,” Brass chuckled. “She’s much smarter than we are.”
“I don’t know.” Slade grinned at Brass. “She couldn’t tell an asshole from?”
“Shut up,” Trisha laughed, cutting him off, and kicked him under the table. “I know the difference.”
Both men smiled at her while Trisha shook her head at them. “Don’t you have some calls to make, Slade? You should ask Justice before he goes to bed and give him time to 202
talk to the women before they are snoozing too. The faster a decision gets made, the faster you could have extra help here.” She flashed him a grin.
Trisha looked at the other man. “And you, Brass. There’s laundry that needs to be done. You said you wanted to do it all so I didn’t have to. Hop to! It’s not going to get done by itself.”
“I said I’d clean. I never said anything about laundry.” Brass stood. “I hate sorting and folding clothes.” He groaned. “But I’ll do it so you don’t.”
“I’m going to go lie down. Good night!”
“She’s so bossy.” Brass chuckled.
“I know but she’s got a great ass.” Slade chuckled too. “When she yells at me and gets demanding, she always storms away after. I watch her ass as she leaves and I just can’t seem to care anymore that she’s domineering.”
Trisha stopped on the stairs and laughed. She shook her head and retreated to the bedroom.
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Chapter Twenty-One
Trisha tried to hide her horrified and stunned reaction. She kept a forced smile firmly on her mouth until the muscles in her cheeks ached. Brass’ highly amused expression was obvious but he didn’t chuckle. Slade didn’t show any restraint when he bent over, held his stomach, and laughed until tears dampened the corners of his eyes.
Valiant growled. “Why is he so amused?”
“I have no idea,” Trisha lied. “I think sometimes he’s socially challenged.”
Slade stopped laughing instantly as his gaze flashed to hers and narrowed dangerously. He sent her a look that promised he’d get even with her soon. Trisha glanced away with a grin, hoping he’d attempt to lick her to death, but her amusement died quickly as she caught sight of the table again.
She tried not to gawk at the big hunk of raw meat wrapped inside plastic that Valiant had just placed in the dining room. She wasn’t sure what it was but it looked big enough to be a body.
“That was so kind of you to bring us…so much. It will last us a good week.”
“Slade informed me that you were the one who thought up asking our women to come here. Twenty of them arrived yesterday. I have seen some of them from afar and am very pleased with the selections. I asked you to find me one female but you brought many for me to meet. I wanted to say thank you. I knew it would be bad form to just bring the entire carcass so I skinned and gutted it for you. I even removed the limbs and head.” He motioned to the large thing on the table. “I wrapped it to prevent blood from dripping on your carpet.”
“That was so very kind,” Trisha got out, trying hard to be polite, despite her shock.
She stepped closer to him but then stopped. “May I have a hug to say thank you?”
He frowned. “Why would you want to hug me? You just said thank you.”
“It’s a human thing.” Brass grinned. “They seem to hug each other. Just deal, Valiant. She harasses me if I don’t allow her do that to me sometimes. It’s nice.”
Valiant sighed deeply. “I guess I should get used to being touched since I want a mate.” He opened his arms. “Go ahead.” He looked completely disgusted.
Slade suffered another fit of laugher but Trisha ignored him. She had to stretch up on tiptoe to put her arms around the huge man. Valiant held still while Trisha gave him a quick squeeze around his waist before she stepped back.
“That wasn’t so bad, was it?”
“No. You smell nice.” Valiant shrugged. “It wasn’t bad.”
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“Thank you.” She glanced at the wrapped hunk of meat before flashing her gaze to Slade. “Why don’t we have a barbeque? You and Brass can cut it up, freeze what we don’t use, and we’ll have some of that for dinner.”
Slade smiled at the big lion-like man. “That sounds great. Thank you, Valiant. Do you want to stay for dinner?”
Valiant shook his head. “I have women to meet and a mate to find.” He fled the house.
Trisha pointed at the plastic that blood stained from the inside and whispered in case Valiant remained within hearing range. “What is it?”
