The Big Game

by Sarah Jaune

  “Rebecca is shy,” Nanny said as she put her hand on the doorknob, cutting off their argument. “You’ll have to go slowly with her. She’s… she’s been through a lot,” she explained as she swallowed hard. “Your father really wanted a boy.”

  Eli knew exactly what she would have gone through. “Okay, let’s go.”

  Nanny gently pushed the door open, and they went into the room that had two cribs and a rocking chair pushed off to the side. Eli moved first to the bed that held a tiny girl with dark hair, and with what Eli knew would be skin close to his own color. She slept with a small, pink bunny in her arms and had her thumb in her mouth.

  She was stunning. Eli couldn’t breathe as he stared down at her. She could have been Naomi as a baby. Eli had seen pictures… he carefully ran a hand along her soft, downy hair and tried to remain calm. He didn’t want to look away from her, but a noise from the other crib caught his attention, and he glanced over his shoulder to see Cole and Ivy standing back, close to the door. He appreciated it more than he’d ever be able to express.

  Eli moved over to the other crib and nearly gasped at the minuscule baby who was dwarfed by everything around him. He had no hair, just a bit of fuzz on his head that was peach colored. His clothing was huge on him. The baby squirmed and grunted, thrashing out a small fist.

  This was his brother. Eli stared down at his baby brother and felt a hollow ache in his chest. He slid his hands under the baby and picked him up, marveling at just how light he was. Eli cradled the infant, just as he’d done with Ava and Alexi years before. It came back to him now, as though it were yesterday. This time, though, he was bigger and it was easier. Jonas settled down in his arms and let out a whimper before falling back to sleep.

  “He’s beautiful,” Ivy said as she came over to see him. She touched the baby’s cheek gently. “I’ve never seen a baby this small.”

  Cole came over as well. “Can I?” he asked Eli as he held out his arms.

  Eli reluctantly transferred the baby over. Cole grinned down at him. “Okay, Jonas…” he whispered to the infant. “I’m your dad, now.”

  Staggered, Eli almost stepped back. He’d have tripped if Ivy hadn’t grabbed him. He stared in wide-eyed shock at Cole.

  Cole had said he was taking them, but it hadn’t sunk in what that had meant. He wasn’t just rescuing them. Cole was committing to a life of raising them.

  “I need you to tie me up and gag me,” Nanny said as she produced the ropes. “Eli, those bags are going,” she said as she pointed to a bag and two backpacks. “One of them has some books for you that I think you’d like, but the others are for the children.”

  Eli hated doing it, but he tied Florence to the rocking chair. “Are you comfortable?”

  She nodded in thanks. “I was going to have you hit me, but I think I’ll just say that Naomi came with a gun.”

  There was absolutely no way, under any circumstance, that Eli would have been able to hit her. She seemed to read that on his face, too, because she smiled sadly. “You’re a good boy, Eli. You remember that.”

  He glanced away from her and took the gag from Ivy. Nanny opened her mouth and Eli stuck it in, but not too deep. Then he kissed her cheek and whispered into her ear, “I love you. Thank you for everything.”

  Nanny’s eyes filled with tears as he backed away. Ivy grabbed one of the backpacks, then handed it over to Eli. It was clearly the one with the books, and he slung it over his shoulders.

  “You can get Rebecca,” Ivy told him. “I’ll take the other bags.”

  Cole wrapped the baby up in a blanket as Eli moved over to the crib and carefully picked Rebecca up. He set her head against his shoulder and made sure she still had her bunny. Ivy draped a blanket over the toddler, then picked up the other bags.

  Cole led the way, with Ivy bringing up the rear. They stopped so Ivy could close and lock doors as they left the house, trying to be as silent as possible. Thankfully, neither baby made any noises.

  Eli had put a toddler into a car seat just the week before, when he’d driven Lex to a doctor’s appointment for Maia, so it was second nature for him to secure Rebecca into her seat. Cole did the same for Jonas, in the other seat in the rear of the van.

  “I’ll sit back here with them,” Eli told Cole as he placed himself in the seat between the two car seats. “You drive for a while.”

  “I want to drive,” Ivy said as he took the keys from Eli. “You can both look after them while we’re on the road. Of the three of us, I know the least about babies.”

  They drove out of the city quickly. Eli could barely see the buildings around him, but if anything the houses looked more rundown than they had before. His father had left the city to rot, and he’d ditched his small children to go somewhere when their mother had just died. Noelle’s death wasn’t a tragedy for Rebecca and Jonas, as it would be unlikely she’d have had much to do with them, but it was still a cold-hearted thing to do.

  “How do you know so much about babies?” Cole questioned him quietly, startling Eli from his thoughts.

  “I have younger sisters in my foster family,” Eli explained. “Pablo was your Pursuer, right? They have two daughters. Ava is six and Alexi is three. Maia made sure we all knew how to care for them. She said it was part of our training.”

  Cole nodded thoughtfully. “You really aren’t what I expected.”

  Which was probably a good thing, except that Eli didn’t want to think about what Cole had anticipated. “I’m trying to be a good person. I want to be a better man than my father, but that’s not saying much.”

  “It isn’t,” Cole agreed evenly. “Beth is struggling.”

  “I know,” Eli said heavily. “I’m sorry for it. I wish I could help her.”

  Cole didn’t reply as they continued on.

  Ivy broke the silence. “The children both have three powers, Cole. You need to know that.”

  Cole didn’t look surprised. “I was thinking that they might.”

  “Can you tell on the strength level?” Eli asked her.

  Ivy shook her head. “If I had to guess, I wouldn’t say they were very unevenly matched, but it’s difficult to tell. My impressions grow as a person ages closer to having their power come in. Jonas is weeks old, so there is a lot of time between now and when he gets his magic.”

  They passed under a street lamp and Eli saw a trashcan on its side as Ivy swerved the van around a pothole.

  “I’m sorry about your mother,” Cole told Eli quietly. “I know she wasn’t the best, but that’s still hard.”

  Eli still didn’t know how he felt about all of it. “I can’t say I’m going to miss her, but I think I’m still in shock.” He placed his hand on the tiny baby next to him and stared at his miniature features. “I think the worst part is not having my family around me. I have three sisters and a brother,” he continued sadly. “I’m not going to get to see any of them, maybe ever again.”

  He didn’t care that his father would have called him a wimp for crying. Eli let a couple of silent tears slide down his cheeks. He was so tired of letting go of the people he loved. He hadn’t known Rebecca or Jonas before that night, and he already loved them. Unfortunately, for their own sake, he had to let them go. They did deserve a normal life and Eli couldn’t give that to them.

  He scrubbed away the tears and stared defiantly out the window. Eli had twelve hours with them and he wasn’t going to waste it by crying.

  CHAPTER 5

  EVERY PAINFUL MILE

  They didn’t end up having only twelve hours. At the rate they were going, it was going to take them a week to get back to the jeep. Rebecca and Jonas both slept until light was breaking at around six o’clock. Rebecca opened her pale blue eyes first and stared at Eli in alarm.

  It was only then that Eli remembered he looked a lot like his father. He smiled, tried to keep his face relaxed as he spoke to her. “Hi, Rebecca. Are you hungry?”

  Tears welled up in her eyes as she pressed the bunny to her face.
She didn’t cry out, but Eli still called to Ivy to pull over. He didn’t know what he was going to do, but he knew he couldn’t do anything in a moving car.

  Ivy pulled off quickly at the next exit, by which point Rebecca was crying hard into her bunny, but the only sound she made was the soft puffs as her breath was forced from her.

  The second they were stopped, off on the shoulder, Eli undid her car seat straps and pulled her into his arms. She held onto him like he was the only thing keeping her afloat.

  “Shhh,” he whispered into her dark hair as he rubbed at her back soothingly. Eli met Cole’s gaze as the man sat helplessly in the seat in front of them. Stealing himself for what he knew was going to be one of the most difficult things he’d ever done, Eli waited her out. When the cries started to ebb, Rebecca settled her head against his chest, and he saw her looking towards Cole. It was now or never. “Did Nanny call you Becca? I bet she did.”

  Rebecca nodded. “Becca,” she said in a tiny voice, repeating what he’d said.

  “Becca,” Eli said as he smoothed down her flyaway hair. “This is Daddy,” he explained as he pointed to Cole.

  Cole smiled tremulously at her. “Hi, Becca.”

  “Eli,” Ivy interrupted hesitantly, “she might not like that word.”

  “She’ll know that word as f-a-t-h-e-r,” he explained as he spelled out the letters rather than saying, ‘father.’ “Daddy won’t mean anything to her yet.”

  Rebecca didn’t respond, or really say anything.

  “Are you hungry?” Cole asked her.

  Finally, she nodded. They sat there, in the van, for a good forty-five minutes until Rebecca had eaten. Eli handed Jonas to Cole, who changed and fed the baby a bottle. When she was done eating, Becca patted Eli’s hair and babbled at him quietly.

  “She probably thinks you look familiar,” Ivy said with a grin as she handed supplies over to Cole.

  They were back on the road at seven, but stopped again for an irate Jonas not even three hours later.

  Eli studied his brother’s red, angry face as he cried for all he was worth, which wasn’t much. He wasn’t very loud.

  “It sounds like a mouse that’s having a tantrum,” Ivy told him. She wasn’t driving any longer, and had taken the middle seat to hand things to Eli if he needed them. Currently she was hanging over the back of the seat so she could see the tiny, howling baby.

  Rebecca silently studied her baby brother until Eli took the baby from his seat. Then she reached over to gently pat his tiny head.

  Ivy took a turn feeding him a bottle this time. “I really don’t know about this,” she muttered as she held the bottle.

  “You’re doing fine,” Cole assured her. This time Rebecca went to him and allowed Cole to hold her for a while.

  On and on it went. They stopped every three or four hours, for at least an hour, to change diapers, and feed them.

  “This is exhausting,” Eli said as he slid into the driver’s seat. Ivy was in the back now. As much as he’d have liked to get back there, Cole was too tall to fit in the third row. “Are you sure you can handle this? You already have one baby. It will be like having twins.”

  “I know,” Cole agreed as he scrubbed at his face. “My wife is amazing, though, and we have two other foster kids who are a little older and can help out. It will be okay. The part that will be miserable is we’re going to have to move once I’m back so that no one will question these extra children.”

  Eli tried not to think about splitting up again. The next time they stopped, he asked Cole, “Will Naomi help?”

  “Probably,” Cole answered offhandedly as he turned and rocked Becca, who was starting to droop in his arms. He nodded to Eli. “Thanks, by the way.”

  Surprised, Eli held out his hands. “What did I do?”

  Cole inclined his head to Rebecca. “You handled her perfectly. You introduced us… it was what needed to happen for her.”

  Eli felt his cheeks flush. He didn’t know what to say.

  Ivy, however, laughed. “His sister, Lex, is a handful, and she loves to boss him around. He’s used to dealing with toddlers. We were sparing a few days ago and—”

  “Don’t tell him about that!” Eli interrupted her as his cheeks flamed hotter.

  “Now you have to tell me,” Cole said with a grin. It was the most relaxed that Eli had seen him.

  “I knocked Eli out,” Ivy explained, and beamed at Cole’s appreciative whistle. “I’m proud of it now, but it was scary at the time.”

  “I’ve seen what Beth can do, so I understand how impressive that is,” Cole assured her.

  Eli tried to hold his annoyance at their teasing, but it wouldn’t last. “I came awake to Alexi sitting on my stomach.”

  “She’d wandered in when I started yelling for Maia,” Ivy explained. “She walked over to him, and then just sat on him like he was her convenient stool.”

  “Laugh it up,” Eli said as Cole chuckled appreciatively.

  “Both of his baby sisters go to him when they want something,” Ivy told Cole. “I’ve watched them bypass Graham and Oliver to go get him. Ava hates bugs, and Eli is her designated bug remover.”

  When she said it like that, Eli felt stupid. “Yeah, well…”

  Cole shook his head. “It’s a good thing, Eli. That’s something your sisters will like hearing about you.”

  It should have made him feel better, but it was difficult knowing he couldn’t tell them himself.

  By the time nightfall hit, they were still only halfway to where they’d left the jeep, but all three of them were so tired that they couldn’t think about driving on through the night.

  “I know a place,” Cole told them as he directed them off the road. “There’s a woman we can stay with for the night. She won’t ask questions and you cannot volunteer any information. Understood?”

  “Yeah,” Ivy yawned hugely as she pulled the van into a long, tree-lined driveway. The house at the end was huge, and beautifully maintained. “Where should I park?”

  “Out front is fine,” Cole said as she pulled to a stop. “Give me one minute, then we’ll get the kids out.”

  Cole jogged up to the painted, white door and knocked. A minute later it was opened by a woman that Eli couldn’t see well from her position behind the partially opened door. They spoke, then Cole came back and beckoned them to get out.

  “We can stay,” he said as he unbuckled Jonas from his car seat while Eli gathered up their things and Ivy took Rebecca.

  Eli finally caught a good look at the woman as they were heading up the front steps, and he nearly gasped at the sight. She wasn’t old, maybe forty, with thick brown hair that was cut short. She had blue eyes that studied them carefully, and when she saw Eli, he saw recognition cross her face. Eli was sure he’d never seen this woman before. The scarring all over her face was unbelievable. Her skin was stretched tight at three separate, thick scars that ran in a slash down her face. She was tall, at least two inches taller than Eli, and willowy, much like Maia.

  She didn’t speak as she opened the door wider for them, not until she caught sight of Jonas. Her inhalation was involuntary, and clearly full of shock. “I… that’s not a full term baby.”

  “No,” Cole agreed sadly. “It’s a perk of coming here. You can take a look at him.”

  She inclined her head and pointed up the steps. “We will put your stuff upstairs and then get something to eat.” The woman, who did not offer her name, inclined her head to Eli. “Follow me.”

  Eli hauled up the bags with the baby’s items, plus the three backpacks that Eli, Ivy, and Cole were living out of until they were back home. The woman pointed to the first room on the left. “I shall put Cole in here with the children. You and the girl can have the next two rooms.”

  After Eli put the stuff down, she didn’t lead him downstairs like he expected, but instead up to an attic that was fancier than any attic Eli had ever seen, including his father’s in Chicago. The room was spacious, airy, and full of
old furniture that was all covered in white drop cloths. She pointed to one. “Please, take that down for me. I am not as strong as you are.”

  Eli shot her a glance, but didn’t say anything as he uncovered a small crib. Inside of the crib was a small box with what looked like a tiny mattress pad.

  “This is for very small babies,” she explained as she pointed to the box. “It’s what they used to do in the old world.”

  “Right,” Eli said as he hefted the crib and carried it down to Cole’s bedroom.

  It wasn’t heavy for him, but it was awkward, and none of that was helped by the woman saying to him, “Mind you don’t scratch my walls.”