by Honor James
“Okay,” he said. “Close your eyes for me. I hate to do this, but we need to see if we can’t prompt your memory. Close your eyes. You’re in the vehicle, driving along when the warning goes off for the tires. You place the call, and are talking to them. What were the road conditions? Did you have the radio on, or a CD playing?”
“The roads were fairly clear. They had just been salted. The snow had drifted away for the time and honestly the roads were perfect for the most part.” She was chewing her lower lip and said, “No, radio and CD are off. I preferred to talk to the babies as I drove. They liked it, too. They would roll and move, it was amazing,” she confessed with a tear sliding down her face. “I was off the phone,” she said with a frown. “When the, Jesus. The brakes gave out. I was starting to slow for a turn and the brake pedal went to the floor.” She shook her head and squeezed his hand. “I pulled the emergency brake like you taught me.” She nodded then. “The brake caught, but only for a moment, then it was as if it gave, too. By that moment I was at the curve in the road and—” She hit the blackness once more and sighed. “Son of a bitch, it’s there again. I can’t see past that moment.”
“That’s fine, you remembered more this time. Take a breath, and let your mind calm for me, Sadie. Breathe for me, baby. I’m right here, so are you, we’re just talking in your kitchen. You’re driving the road, the snow’s been cleared from the roads, you’ve finished the call to AAA, and you see the curve coming. You press on the brakes but they fail. Instinct clicks in, and you remember what we taught you to do. Reaching down, you grab the emergency brake and pull it up. Did you yank, or did you go slow like we taught you?”
“Slow. I could hear both of you in my head telling me what to do, how to protect our children.” She knew that was silly but it was utter truth. “I pulled it slow, with my foot off of the gas. It started to slow slightly, but then it, too, gave. I felt the lurch—wait.” She was panting, sweat rolling off of her as she went through the memories. “I was hit. Someone hit me from behind.” Her eyes flew open and she looked at Keagan. “Someone pushed me off of the road.”
He nodded with a grim expression on his face. “Kind of what I thought. At a guess it was your savior at the crash site. He likely had orders to ensure you died, but was screwed when someone else called for help. So he played the part of the good Samaritan instead.” He squeezed her fingers gently. “Given the location of the wreck, and what we dug up about the stretch of road, with all you did you should have made that curve easily. We taught you every trick we knew on defensive driving, so you would have made that curve. When you came out of it you would have been able to slow on the grade, and ease off onto the shoulder to wait for help.”
“And with me having just called AAA, they would have been there fairly quickly as well.” She knew that they responded as quickly as they could because of her condition. “So the person who saved me was actually one that wanted me dead.” She felt a bit sick by that. “I don’t understand. At all. I’ve done nothing to no one.” She had tried to always lead a good life, tried to be good to everyone around her, so for someone to want her dead was stunning to her.
“I know, baby, I know,” he whispered. Tugging on her hand, he got her to move to his side on the bench. Wrapping his arms around her, Keagan held her, her head against his chest, and rocked her gently. “This may have nothing to do with you, at least not personally. We’ll figure it out, I promise.”
“I know. I just—” She turned her face into the crook of his neck and was crying. She couldn’t have stopped the tears if she had wanted to. She let them out, wetting his shirt as she sobbed. She hated remembering that day, hated the loss that she always felt when she recalled that day. She wanted to forget it all. Desperately, but couldn’t.
“Let it out,” he whispered against her cheek. “I’m here, Sadie. I have you, and I’m never letting go. We’ll make those that did this to you, to our babies, pay. I swear it,” he said. He cupped her head, lightly stroking her hair as he continued to rock her gently.
She nodded and cried for a while. Once she was fully empty, she sniffed and pulled back. “I’m never letting you go, either,” she confessed as she lay there limp against him. “I could never part from you and Bryce, not ever again.”
“Good, because we’d never let you go even if you tried to kick us to the curb. We didn’t have a choice the last time around, but this time there would be all-out war.” He pressed a kiss to her temple and squeezed. “At least we know where to start digging now. Let me call the office and give Timmons his marching orders. I have to call anyway to update Harker.”
She nodded and let out a sigh. “I named our babies Harker and Bradley. They have a small grave at a local cemetery,” she said for the first time. “They had to have a funeral, and I wasn’t even there for them. For that.” She had been in a coma. “When I finally woke and realized what happened, I went to the graveside and all that there was was a small plastic stub showing that they were buried there. That devastated me. I had the marble headstone created at that time. It took them three weeks.” It should have taken months but she had pushed them, heavily. “This is the longest I’ve gone without visiting them. We should go, one day, the three of us.” She needed to go and ensure that the site was still perfect as her babies deserved.
“We’ll go this weekend,” he said softly. Brushing a finger over her cheek, he cupped her face and rubbed his thumb to her skin. “I’m sorry you had to go through it all alone. I know I’ve said it before, and I will likely say it again. But it’s the truth, sweetheart. No one should ever have to bury a child, let alone before they even have a chance to live.”
“I agree.” She sighed and leaned into his touch. “All that I know is that we will live life to the fullest from this moment on. We will be sure that we always live life. Right? That’s all that we can do from here out. Live life together.”
“Absolutely,” he said. Pressing a kiss to her lips, he loosened his hold on her. “Let me call all this in, and then we will go and lie down for a bit. You look like you need time to decompress, and I think that’s a damn fine way to do it. Plus, it makes Harker have to put all the groceries away by himself which I see as an added bonus.”
“He will wrangle someone else into doing it so that he can come up and hug me with you. Admit it. He will.” Which she was perfectly happy for. She wanted that as much as he likely would. “And yes, a nap would be good.”
“Good, then why don’t you go and splash some water on your face and crawl into bed? I’ll be two, maybe ten minutes explaining everything to Harker six times over before hanging up and turning my phone off before I join you.”
“Sounds good to me.” She touched her fingers to his cheek once more and, after leaning in and giving him another kiss, she was off for their bedroom.
Chapter Twelve
Sadie was lying on the bed practically asleep when Keagan finally joined her. Opening her eyes, she looked up at him and smiled. “Hey you. So I take it that Bryce kept you on the phone longer than you had expected?”
He looked at his watch and frowned. “No, most of that was Timmons. Though Harker definitely did his damnedest to get more info out of me. Not that I had any more to give. I fully expect him to call Cutter, though, and demand the lowdown on everything. Scoot over, sweetheart,” he said as he sat on the edge of the bed. Putting the crutches on the floor, he got himself on the bed and stretched out with a few pillows under his leg in the brace.
“Do you need for me to help you into the sock or are you good in the brace for the nap?” She moved so that she was curled up along at his side. “I love this part of everything. Being able to hold you close and having you holding me, too. It’s nice.”
“The brace is fine for a nap. Only when I have a full-on sleep that I take it off. It’s not exactly the most comfortable piece of equipment I’ve been saddled with in my life.” Wrapping her in his arms, he gave her a hug. “Harker should be squealing to a stop in about ten minutes at my esti
mation. Even with stopping at the market to get your goodies.”
“Poor guy is likely beating himself up right now.” Because he hadn’t been there when there had been an attack. “So we will just rest while we can. I look forward to simply relaxing with you and then with him when he comes here as well.”
“I wouldn’t bet on getting much rest by the time he arrives. He’ll likely be very loud, very annoyed, and pretty much on a tear when he gets here. I may have failed to mention when the attempt happened, but he’ll get that out of Cutter. It wasn’t entirely planned to leave that part out, kinda just happened really.”
“Good point.” She snuggled closer to Keagan and closed her eyes. “I love you.” She had told them that and showed them with everything she did, but sometimes it was good to reaffirm that knowledge and this felt like a good time for reaffirmations.
“I love you, too, Sadie. Relax, and sleep if you can. Not that you’ll get a lot. Harker doesn’t tend to be overly subtle when he’s in a highly excited state.” Letting out a breath, he squeezed her before relaxing his hold a little, his hand moving to rest on the curve of her waist.
Sadie felt herself dropping off and into sleep there against Keagan.
* * * *
She couldn’t have been asleep longer than a half hour when she heard Keagan and Bryce talking in whispers. She patted Keagan’s chest and whispered, “Shh, I’m sleeping.” She told him quietly, “Tired girl here.” She was teasing the boys and seeing if they would rise to the bait.
“Tell it to the idiot that came in to poke me,” Keagan muttered.
“I only poked you so I wouldn’t disturb her,” Bryce said.
“Yeah, that worked well, didn’t it?”
A low growl sounded. “I’d smack you except you’d play it up,” Bryce muttered. “Why the fuck didn’t you call me right away?”
“There was no reason, as I said ten or so times on the phone. The threat never got in, so there was no reason to panic you. I only told you because you had a right to know. Get over it, Bryce. She was perfectly safe. Hell, she even followed orders,” Keagan said, followed by a soft chuckle.
Sadie snorted. “Only because I was scared out of my mind that you were suddenly up and pushing me into the corner.” He had never pushed her or forced her to do anything so for him to push her into a corner, with a weapon in hand as well, it was enough to make her stop and listen.
“You still followed orders, which was impressive. I fully expected some huge argument from you,” he said. Laughing, he gave her a squeeze. “Go put the groceries away, Harker.”
“What?” Bryce said, and then he cursed. “Son of a bitch, I didn’t even stop for them.”
“Dude, we’re out of coffee, for the love of God, go and get them!” Keagan said in horror.
Sadie was laughing, she couldn’t help it. Shaking her head, she gave Keagan a kiss on the cheek and then looked at Bryce. “You really should go and get the groceries. I’ve ordered steaks for us for dinner tonight, too. So go and get the food. I’m going to go to the basement and have a swim, and I might even ask Keagan to join me.”
“Fine,” Bryce said with a huff of breath. “Next time call me immediately.”
“Why? You couldn’t have helped. Trust me, if things had gone down differently you’d have known about it. But Cutter had it in hand, and I happen to trust him with Sadie’s life. Now bugger off, and get me some damn coffee while you’re out, too. The woman keeps trying to feed me tea.”
Bryce let out a shudder and shook his head. “That is just so many ways of wrong, Sadie. So very, very wrong.”
Sadie snickered. “I happen to love tea. You both love me, so I would like it if maybe you might one day try tea before being all judgey and stuff.” She had the best teas made, they were smooth and blended perfectly. She loved them and wished that they might like them, if only one of the many blends she had.
“We’ve had tea,” Bryce said. “Properly brewed tea, the way the English do it. It’s not our thing. Yes, there are some that have caffeine, but it’s a taste thing for us. If you had a tea that tasted just like coffee we’d be there. But there isn’t, because it’s called coffee. Coffee is good, coffee is grand, coffee is the king. Sorry, love, but it’s not going to happen.” He shrugged and left the bedroom, leaving her and Keagan alone.
“He has a point, babe. And it’s all perfectly valid. Now, you said something about going down to your little pool?”
“Yes, I want to go down to the pool and all right, I relent. No more will I try to give you tea. Promise. That’s why I ordered as much coffee as I did,” she said with a grin. “Now, I don’t know about you, but I prefer to swim naked. Will you be okay with that?”
“Why wouldn’t I be? Another opportunity to ogle you and your sexy little body, hell yeah I’m okay with that.” Grinning, he pressed his lips to hers briefly. Releasing her, he pushed to a sitting position and swung his legs over the side of the bed. “What do we need to drag down there with us?”
“I will get the towels. If you need to change into swim shorts, now would be the time to do it.” Otherwise she would help him downstairs as well. “Is Bryce going to be okay? He seemed pretty upset when he left.” She pulled the towels from the cabinet and held them close while waiting on Keagan to tell her if he needed shorts or anything else of the like. She was going to walk down fully dressed and then redress before she came back up so that she wasn’t flashing the rest of their team that was milling around her house somewhere.
“Shorts would be great,” he said. “Should be a pair rolled in the pocket of my bag. Inside pocket, near the tail end of the zipper, pretty much the only soft and squishy pocket in there. I’ll have to ditch the brace, too, but not until after we’re down there. I can’t do stairs easily with my leg dangling free.”
“Sounds good to me.” She pulled the shorts out and looked at him. “Now, do you want to put these on now or downstairs?” she asked while looking at him. “Because I plan on stripping down there so that I’m not flashing people. Typically I would just walk down from my bedroom to the pool naked, but with not knowing who might be around, that’s not a smart idea.”
“I’ll change down there. Otherwise we have to get the brace off so I can strip, then put the brace on so I can do the stairs then take it back off. So yeah, let’s do this only once down there, huh?” He pushed to his feet, grabbed up the crutches, and set off. “Come on, sweetheart. Soon enough we’ll be able to ditch the watchers, and you can resume your natural streaker tendencies.”
That had her grinning and she nodded. “I do happen to really love being able to run wild and free, naked as the day I was born.” Sadie walked in front of Keagan, and she was hopeful that he would be able to walk okay with her in front of him. “And hopefully you will be joining me in my streaker tendencies.”
“Except for the brace, I’m there. Sadly we’ll be stuck with this for a bit longer. Don’t know how fast I’ll be, streaking wise, either, but I’m sure we can come up with something. Anyway, keep wiggling that ass for me, sweetheart. Damn, you have one fine bottom,” he said on a sigh.
Sadie was grinning. “You and Bryce have always loved my ass. I happen to love the way that you worship my ass at times as well.” Both of them had loved to spank her during their time together so long ago, turning her fanny a nice pink color and then the way that they would fuck her, oh hell yeah, she loved it. “Well, I can live with the brace as long as you are okay. That’s what matters.”
“I’m definitely doing great,” he said. “That may just be because all the blood has rushed from my brain to another part of my anatomy, who knows.” She could hear him hopping down the stairs on her heels.
When she was at the base of the stairs, she turned and looked up at him. She watched him as he slowly made his way down and grinned. “God, you are still so handsome. Even with the crutches you are about the sexiest man that I’ve ever seen. Well, you and Bryce both, that is.”
“Yeah, but you said me first, so t
hat totally puts me in as the frontrunner.” Hopping the last step, he tucked the crutches back under his arms and smirked. “I won’t tell him you put him in as second best, though, as long as you promise me extra kisses.”
Sadie snickered and walked away from him so that she could go to the door to the basement. Once she had the light on, she turned to face him once more. “Okay, come on, babe. The stairs are the same as the ones that go to the second floor. Are you okay?”
He glared at her and waved her on. Keagan mumbled something under his breath, but nothing she actually managed to catch. He was right on her heels, hopping down the stairs behind her into the basement.
Once she was in the basement she put the towels onto the shelf and began to strip, watching Keagan as he moved down the stairs toward her. Her eyes were on his as she pulled her shirt off and then her pants. Once she was in her bra and panties, he was at the base of the stairs. She walked away from him and pulled off the remainder of her clothes. “Now then, let’s get you undressed and into your shorts?”
“Yes, ma’am,” he said with a grin. “Do me a favor first, though, would you?” he asked. “Jump up and down a couple of times. Please?” His grin only got bigger and wider when she shot him a dirty look.
“You are bad.” Sadie did turn a little saucy turn and approached a bench. “Now, come sit your ass down so that we can get you stripped naked along with me. I want to see just how sexy you are as you stand there at attention for me.”
