Maniac - Necessary Evils #7 - Ch. 10 (Patreon)

This was a lot of people to keep track of and its unedited, unbeta'd. Hopefully everyone is where they were supposed to be in the chapter, but I'll correct it later if not. Hope you guys like it. 

Aiden

Thomas sat in the passenger seat, ashen and fidgeting, likely distressed over his impending revelation to the family. Aiden was stressed too, but not over Thomas’s confession. No, Aiden’s brain wouldn’t stop focusing on something else entirely. Something most people would find rather insignificant in the grander scheme of things.

Sex.

More to the point, the sex he’d had with Thomas. Possibly the only sex Thomas would ever let him have with him. And he’d lasted barely five minutes. Five minutes. He was almost positive he’d lasted longer than that when he’d lost his virginity. It had been over so fast. Had Thomas noticed? Had it upset him? Had Aiden taken advantage of his fragile state? Had Thomas fallen asleep to avoid talking about it?

Aiden made a noise of frustration, earning a confused look from Thomas. He gave him a tight smile, but Thomas’s frown only deepened, before he turned to stare out the window once more.

Aiden shook his head. Like…what did the man expect? Aiden had been fantasizing about having sex with him for two decades, picturing it in painstaking detail—Often. So fucking often. Embarrassingly often—and it had felt better than he’d ever fucking imagined it could. Was it really Aiden’s fault it had been over so quick?

No.

It was Thomas’s fault.

It was his fault for dragging it out, for building that level of anticipation, for feeling so fucking good Aiden had barely even had time to enjoy it before it was over. He hadn’t even grabbed a condom. Not that they’d had any. But still, when it came to Thomas, Aiden was an idiot in every sense of the word. He lost all control.

By the time they pulled into the mansion’s drive, there was barely enough room to park his jeep. While his brother’s had opted to park in Thomas’s airplane hanger sized garage, others, like Jericho’s kids had parked their cars along the sand colored pavers. Most of the cars were beaters, junk cars abandoned at Jericho’s garage and fixed up by his boys. Despite their appearance, Aiden knew most of them could beat Asa’s Audi R8 in a street race. Jericho’s kids might not be rich, but when it came to cars they might as well be wizards.

Aiden exited the jeep, expecting Thomas to follow. He didn’t. He just continued to stare straight ahead until Aiden went around and opened his door, taking his arm and pulling him to his feet. Thomas gave Aiden a look of dread like he was walking the green mile to the electric chair.

Aiden wanted to tell him he was being dramatic, that his children would never abandon him, that they certainly wouldn’t blame him for what happened with Shane. But Thomas wouldn’t believe him. No matter how high his IQ was, he lacked the capacity to see people’s motives like Aiden did. He believed in his heart he would lose his children after his confession no matter how absurd the idea was. It was real to him.

Aiden opened the front door, rolling his eyes when he realized they’d left it unlocked. What good was asking the family to come home for safety if they were just going to roll out the welcome mat for whatever lunatic they were dealing with. One would think a family filled with serial unalivers, would take security more seriously, but with a lack of remorse or guilt came a heavy dose of hubris and audacity. This family really thought they were invincible.

When Thomas once again didn’t budge, Aiden pushed him through the door. Thomas fought for a brief moment, then fell into the foyer, eyeing the potted palm in the entry just long enough for Aiden to fear he might vomit in it. Aiden closed the door and locked it, relaxing only once the automatic lock engaged. Anybody they wanted inside, had the code for the front door.

It wasn’t hard to find the others. They followed the cacophony of voices to the large drawing room deep within the house, stopping short in the wide doorway. There were people everywhere, more than Aiden had ever seen in one place at the same time. He did a mental headcount. Zane sat in Asa’s lap on the sofa, Felix sat on the arm, Avi by his side. Noah and Adam stood with some of Jericho’s kids. The blue haired boy was Arsen, the one beside him was…a number. Seven. They called him Seven. He couldn’t remember the name of the one sucking on a lollipop, but the quiet boy with the long hair was Cree.

Jericho sat in one of the armchairs, hypervigilant. His husband, Atticus, slumped in the other, chin on his hand, surveying his family like a bored prince surveying his subjects. Lucas and August were missing, but Aiden had seen their SUV outside. They were probably in the nursery settling the girls in their mini-palace.

There were no women in the room. Had Calliope refused to come? Was it that important to keep her identity a mystery? It seemed a weird hill to die on. They knew her son, they knew his last name. Twenty five dollars and a google search could have found her.

He shook the thought away. That was a problem for later. Thomas was his current problem. Slightly hungover, sweating and rooted in place, refusing to move further into the room with his family. A blur broke from the sea of bodies and launched themselves into Thomas’s arms. Noah. It was always Noah. If ever there had been someone meant to be Thomas’s biological child, it was him. Nobody—possibly not even Aiden—loved Thomas as much as Noah did. Like a father. A father who could do no wrong.

“Why did you leave?” Noah asked, his muffled voice accusatory. “You wouldn’t have let us run away.”

Thomas stood as still as a statue, not hugging Noah back, not doing anything at all. Just staring at his children, while they stared back at him, all with varying degrees of confusion, hurt and betrayal etched on their faces.

Thomas shook his head. “I-”

Before he could finish whatever he was about to say a female voice echoed throughout the marble halls. “Hello?”

Noah stepped back, his expression going from misery to excitement far faster than any sane person could manage. “Calliope?” He looked to the others, bouncing on the balls of his feet. “Calliope!”

Then he was gone—they all were—rushing back towards the main entrance, all desperately curious as to Calliope’s true identity. Aiden was curious too. He followed the others, dragging a near catatonic Thomas along with him. “You really need to get it together, Tommy. You’re scaring the shit out of the kids.”

Thomas nodded,but said nothing, letting Aiden pull him along. By the time they made it back to the entrance there was a weird stand-off of sorts happening. A woman—Calliope presumably—stood flanked on either side by Dimitri and his boyfriend, Arlo.

Over the years, Aiden had pondered what Calliope might look like. He’d imagined her to be a blond woman in her fifties, quirky, but matronly, maybe a lot of makeup and teased hair, a bit rough around the edges. He’d been wrong. Dead wrong.

If Calliope was over forty Aiden would eat his left boot. She had long black hair with a shock of white framing her face. She was taller than average and curvy in an hourglass figure kind of way. She wore ripped jeans, a Ramones t-shirt, a leather jacket and a pair of black unlaced Doc Martens like she had just stepped out of a‘90s teen drama.

“Calliope’s…” Noah started, then trailed off like he wasn’t sure what to say.

“Young,” Jericho supplied, his surprise evident.

“Goth,” Seven added.

Aiden rolled his eyes as the twins chorused, “She’s hot.”

Dimitri took a threatening step forward, glowering at the twins. “Fuck off.”

“It’s okay. Relax,” Arlo cautioned, rubbing the younger man’s arm until his shoulders sagged.

“No wonder you didn’t want us to meet her,” Asa said under his breath but loud enough for everyone to hear.

Calliope ignored them all, scrutinizing Thomas beneath false lashes before marching up to him and slapping him hard in the face. “Snap out of it.”

The gasp from the group was audible, like something out of a movie. Nobody moved. Even Aiden. He could have defended Thomas from one of the boys but what was he going to do to Calliope? It was…Calliope. And, honestly, he agreed with her. Thomas needed to snap the fuck out of it.

“What?” Thomas muttered.

She put both hands on her hips in a stance that looked weirdly maternal on a woman who looked like a roadie for a metal band. “I said snap out of it. I don’t know what you did or why you did it but not a soul here believes you capable of killing children. You’re not that kind of person. You never have been and you never will be.”

“You don’t know that,” Thomas said.

“Of course, we do,” Noah said, like the idea of Thomas as a bad man was ludicrous.

Thomas shook his head adamantly. “You don’t. You really don’t.”

“I, for one, don’t care who you killed,” Asa said with a shrug.

“I do.”

Everyone turned to see Lucas and August coming down the stairs. It was Lucas who had spoken.

“Lucas…” Thomas started, trailing off when Lucas raised his hand to silence him.

“I don’t care about your excuses. If you killed children, you’ll be dealt with per the code.” Thomas nodded, but Lucas wasn’t done. “But none of us believe you killed children. Not by accident or on purpose. We do think you’re being uncharacteristically cowardly about this.”

“That’s super harsh, Lucas,” Felix said.

Lucas’s gaze cut to Felix. “A man with a grudge against our family handed a dead snake to my children in broad daylight. It's not harsh enough.” Once more he turned his attention to Thomas. “You need to get your shit together.”

Thomas blinked at him. “What?”

Lucas’s lip curled, shaking his head. “You’re Thomas fucking Mulvaney, the head of this fucked up little family. Start fucking acting like it before something happens to my children and I have to fucking kill you myself.”

“This is stressful,” Zane muttered. “I think I’m gonna be sick.”

Felix flung an arm around his shoulders, patting his head in a gesture that contradicted his next words. “If you throw up on my fifteen hundred dollar sneakers, I’m not speaking to you for a week,” Felix promised in his sweetest tone.

“This place looks like a museum,” Arlo said, turning in a circle, very much sounding like he was trying to appease a crowd about to turn violent.

“Yes,” Arsen said in heavily accented Russian. “That's why we came. The others didn’t believe only one person could live in a house this big.”

Thomas ignored the boys and looked to Calliope, who cocked her hip, nodding towards Lucas. “I’m with him. We need the old Thomas back. The ‘fuck around and find out’ Thomas. I’ll smack you again if I have to.”

Thomas blinked like he was coming out of a trance, then heaved a heavy sigh, scrubbing his hands over his face. “That won’t be necessary. Just give me a few minutes to shower and I’ll explain everything.”

“Fine,” Calliope said as if she was doing him a favor. “While you’re up there, look for your big boy panties so we can figure out who threatened your grandbabies.”

“She’s mean,” Arsen whispered. “I like it.”

When Thomas turned towards the stairs, Aiden said, “I’ll go with you.”

“Oh, no you won’t,” Calliope said, catching him by the ear.

What the fuck? Not even his mother had ever done that. Why the fuck did it hurt so bad?

“Ow,” Aiden growled.

Calliope scoffed. “You will not be distracting him with your pelvic sorcery.”

Aiden blinked at her. “My what?”

“He definitely doesn’t have Tik-Tok,” Felix said to Zane, his stage whisper conspiratorial.

“Of course not,” Atticus sniffed. “He’s an adult.”

Adam folded his arms and sneered.  “We all know your cat has a Tik-Tok, Freckles.”

“What? He does not,” Atticus protested, his face turning as red as his hair. “And don’t call me that. Only my husband can call me that.”

Calliope pushed Thomas towards the stairs, ignoring the others. Aiden watched until Thomas was out of sight before turning back to the clusterfuck that was his family.

Jericho chuckled. “Ignore them, Freckles. We have bigger fish to fry.”

“What does that even mean?” Arsen asked. “Like what does a fish’s size matter?”

“Don’t let them lie to you,” the boy with the lollipop told Arsen. “Size matters. Even in fish.”

“Oh. Right,” Arsen said, his face a mask of confusion even as he nodded. “So what bigger fish do we need to fry?”

“Let’s ask our new step dad,” Adam crowed. “Can we call you daddy? Do you still call Thomas Dad or is it Daddy now?”

Aiden launched himself towards Adam, his fist flying, a grunt of satisfaction leaving him as it connected squarely with the younger man’s jaw sending him stumbling backwards.

Adam laughed and rushed forward like he was ready for a full on brawl, but Noah stepped in front of him, jabbing a finger into his chest. “Enough. You had that coming. Leave him alone.”

Aiden’s fist throbbed, but if the little shit wanted a fight, he was more than happy to beat his ass. It would be a pleasant distraction from worrying about Thomas who hadn’t been out of his sight in days.

“It’s not my fault he can’t take a joke,” Adam muttered.

“You’re the joke,” Aiden snapped.

“Oh, great comeback. Are you a comedian?” Adam asked, giving Aiden the finger.

“Oh, my God,” Calliope shouted. When they all gaped at her, she gave them a deceptively sweet smile that matched her sickly tone. “Mouths shut, ears open, eyes on me,” she said like she was talking to a bunch of toddlers.

Miraculously, it worked. They all stood still and quiet, waiting for her to say something, but before she could Zane floated forward, almost like he couldn’t help himself. He didn’t stop until he was just in front of Calliope, studying her through his thick lenses. “Wait…I know you.”

She gave him another patient smile while he seemed to try to place where he’d seen her before.

Finally, he said, “Yeah, you were at our wedding. Dad said you were a business acquaintance.”

She shrugged. “Am I not?” She looked at them all in turn. “Did you think I would miss any of your weddings?”

The twins rushed forward, stopping short when they were just behind Zane, leaning over him to get into her face like she was a slide they were studying under a microscope. She didn’t so much as flinch.

“No fucking way,” Asa muttered, reaching up without thought like he was going to touch her hair.

“If you so much as lay a finger on my mother, I’m going to remove your lungs with a rusty fucking spoon,” Dimitri promised, voice a low purr. “Honestly, I don’t even like you breathing that close to her. Back up.”

Avi scoffed. “Easy Benjamin Button. Nobody is going to touch your mommy.”

Dimitri’s lips curled into a snarl, but Calliope held up a hand. “Boys. We have shit to do.” She looked at Zane. “Be a doll, would you? Take Felix and my boys and show them to the war room. I need to set up.”

“Set up?” Felix echoed, stepping forward.

Calliope gestured to four black metal cases, similar to the black boxes musicians used to move equipment. “I don’t go anywhere without my babies.”

“You carry your pets in those?” Lollipop boy asked.

Adam frowned, still rubbing his jaw. “Why the war room?”

“Yeah, Atticus’s trash goblin is in the laundry room,” Noah said.

“How dare you?” Atticus said imperiously. “Boots is not a trash goblin. Besides, she smells better than the gassy bio-weapons you keep pilfering off our dead clients.”

“I meant trash goblin in a good way,” Noah said to Adam, pouting.

“I know, baby,” Adam said. “Freckle’s bowtie’s just on too tight.”

Atticus made like he was going to attempt to punch Adam in the face, when Jericho snatched him by the arm. “Easy, killer. Just let it go.”

“Boots isn’t a trash goblin. She’s a lady,” Atticus muttered.

“I know, Freckles. I know,” Jericho said, squeezing his arm.

“My babies are my computers. I can’t do what I do without them.” She looked at them all with a dubious expression. “And trust me. You all need me.”

Aiden couldn’t argue with that. When Zane and Felix had left with Calliope’s boys, he asked, “Are the girls okay?”

August nodded, wrapping an arm around Lucas’s waist. “They’re fine. They’re in the nursery with Cricket. We’re going to take turns keeping watch. Just in case.”

“Do you really think someone would have the balls to walk in here to Thomas’s house and take the children?” Atticus asked.

“Well it doesn’t help that you left the door wide open,” Aiden muttered.

“Yeah, someone could be living in here for a year and you’d never know it,” Seven said, looking around dubiously.

“Right?” Noah agreed. “That’s what I said. Like this house is too big.”

Aiden agreed with them but kept it to himself. It hardly mattered. Thomas would never get rid of the place. But that was an issue for another day.

Those who were left, returned to the drawing room. Noah and Jericho took his kids and found snacks, bringing them to the ornate coffee table in front of the antique sofa. It seemed absurd but also weirdly accurate to see Frito’s and Funyun’s sitting next to cheap beer and expensive whiskey on a table that had probably belonged to a king. If that wasn’t some kind of metaphor for their whole fucked up family, Aiden didn’t know what was.

When Thomas re-entered the room, Aiden’s heart tripped behind his ribcage. Thomas wore white linen pants and a navy sweater, his hair was dry and styled, his face clean shaven. That was the man he knew. The man he loved.

That was Thomas fucking Mulvaney.