Fisher (Prince of Tigers, #3) - Kathi S. Barton Page 0,68

mean, she’ll fall in love with me this night? I don’t have any plans to leave the house.”

“She is coming with her family for dinner tonight. Lady Piper spoke with her just today.” Kylan asked her what that had to do with him. “Why everything, my lord. You’ll be so happy with her daughter as well. Your mate’s daddy, he is most ill, but we can fix him up when he is ready.”

Kylan sat down and thought about what she was telling him. “What’s her name?” Summer asked him if he meant her daughter or his mate. “Both. For that matter, who told you she was my mate?”

“I know these things. But it was Lady Piper that told me about her. She is so very beautiful, sir. Her hair is like the sunshine, it is so bright. Her daughter has dark hair like yours. Also, your mate—her name is Emmaline, but her dad calls her Emmie—has one blue eye and one green eye. She covers it with contacts, but even without them showing, she is very lovely. A perfect match for you.”

Now he was headed to Fisher’s home for dinner and to meet his mate. The big rig in the drive of their home was the first indication of what she did for a living. Going to the back door, not wanting to be pushed into something that was wrong, he saw Piper there waiting on him. She looked too slick for his tastes.

“Summer told you, didn’t she?” He asked Piper if it was true. “It is. She’s very outspoken, but nice when it suits her.” She told him about the man who was now working for her.

“How are you finding this out, Piper? Did you get some sort of vision magic that you’ve not told anyone about?” She grinned and told him she had. “Is she going to be happy to find out I’m her mate? Or are we going to have a battle on our hands? Is her family going to come around and beat me up too?”

“The only family she has is her father and daughter. The father of her daughter, Olivia, is dead, killed by his father when he raped Emmie when she was only fourteen years old.” Kylan sat down at the table in the kitchen, waiting for the next part of Piper’s tale. He knew there was more to it than she was saying, but he didn’t ask. “There is no one chasing them—no bad people after them. They’re not wealthy like you are, but they have learned to stretch a dollar until it screams, as her dad says. There isn’t a bad skeleton in their closet that they’re going to keep from anyone. Collier, her father, is a recovering drunk, but has been sober for nearly eighteen years. They’re just a family that has had some bad things happen to them, but they’ve recovered nicely.”

“Who else knows she’s my mate other than the three of us?” She told him she’d not even told Fisher yet. “What’s going on here, Piper? I don’t know why, but I have a feeling things aren’t as cut and dried as you’ve made them out to be.”

“She’s an attorney. A damned good one too.” Nodding, he told her he and his brothers had been attorneys several times over their lives. “Emmie specializes in corporate law. Like I said, she’s damned good at it too. We need her in this family as much as you’re going to need her as your mate.”

“I don’t understand this.” She told him that was all right. He would. “You’ve told me I have a mate, then leave me hanging about why she’s so important to this family. That’s not very sisterly of you.”

“No, I suppose it’s not. What if I told you she needs to be a part of this family so you can save her father’s life? Make him have a good feeling about himself.” Kylan told her he could do that without taking a mate. “Why are you being so obtuse about this? I’m trying to do the right thing here and not give you too much information before you’ve met.”

“Is that important?” Piper nodded. “All right. I’ll not ask you anymore about her. But I do have to know, why is it that you’ve told me this? I can understand you’ve got rules about not telling too much of what the future holds, but you’ve told me a great deal.”

When her house phone rang, she told him it was for