Sawyer: Quintessence: The Sequel

by Serena Akeroyd

  It took every ounce of composure she had to push the panic down and to toddle over to Sean so she could reach over to brush Tin’s hair away from his forehead. “You sleep well, little monster.”

  Tin beamed at her. “I’m not a monster.”

  She forced a grin. “I am.”

  He narrowed his eyes. “Takes one to know one?”

  “Exactly.” She rounded her hand into a fist, amused when he did the same without prompt, and they gently bumped knuckles. “Night, baby.”

  “Night, mommy,” he murmured, kissing her lips with a swift peck before Sean started to climb the stairs toward Tin’s bedroom.

  With the scent of Tin’s baby shampoo in her nose, she watched them climb the period staircase. She’d stripped it a few years ago because the dark varnish made the hall gloomy. The men didn’t give a shit what she did with the house, so long as she left their offices alone.

  She wasn’t sure if they’d appreciate her turning everything hot pink, but as that wasn’t her color of choice, they’d never had to worry on that score.

  Stripping off the dark varnish had been an arduous task, she remembered now, brushing her fingers over the honey-colored wood. They’d asked her several times why she hadn’t just hired someone to do the job—and though she definitely could afford it—Sascha liked doing things by herself.

  Such a hobby was why she was dreading going upstairs.

  On the second floor, Devon’s bedroom had been turned into a nursery before Tin’s birth. Devon barely slept anyway, and when he did, he usually slinked into whichever bed Sascha was in that night. None of the men minded sharing her with him, because they all knew how tempestuous his sleep was. But, more than that, it was Devon.

  Back in college, they’d created this household of five to keep Devon safe. There was no way they’d ever resent anything that Devon needed to stay fit and healthy.

  She’d been the one who’d turned the room into a nursery for Tin, and though he was still in the bedroom, she’d used these really cool building blocks she’d found online, ones that were like giant Lego, to separate his room from where she’d put the crib and had decorated again.

  She’d painted it herself. Had put the crib together, and had everything prepared in plenty of time for the birth.

  Five months had passed in the blink of an eye, and she liked being prepared.

  Now?

  She wished she’d been lazy about it.

  Now, she had a world that was in stasis. A reminder of something that should have represented the future but was firmly fixed in the past.

  Kurt being Kurt, aka wonderful, reached for her elbow. “Let’s have some tea.”

  She blinked, shaken from her thoughts. “Tea?”

  He nodded. “It’s too late for coffee.”

  “How about wine? Is it too late for that?” she asked, her tone rough and only half joking.

  “No. It’s not. Do you want some?” he countered, only he wasn’t joking.

  As she looked up the stairs again, she let out a heavy sigh. “Yes. Please.”

  He pressed a kiss to her forehead and guided her to the steps that took them down into the basement kitchen.

  She hated how unstable she felt on her feet. She guessed it was a mixture of the induced labor, which she’d still be recuperating from for several weeks, and the fall. She hadn’t just hurt her back when she’d slipped. Her knees ached, and she’d twisted the left one slightly. Her lower back killed her and her stomach was one big bruise.

  Grimacing with each step, she let out a shrill yelp when Kurt, huffing, swept her off her feet just as easily as Sean had Tin, and carried her down the rest of the stairs. “Why didn’t you say you were hurting?” he grumbled.

  “You could have warned me,” she chided, even as she squirmed in his hold, the knots of pain in her back connecting, unfortunately, with his forearms.

  “You would have refused,” he said, haughtily. And Kurt knew how to be haughty.

  It wasn’t just in his German DNA, but it was ingrained. He came from an aristocratic German family, and his mother shouted that fact to the world.

  Well, from what the others had told her, Margritte did.

  She’d never met her, although, technically, Margritte should be happy Sascha was in Kurt’s life. The woman was terrified her son was gay, and Sascha was proof that he was anything but.

  Within seconds, she was down in the basement kitchen; her favorite place in the world.

  She looked around at the new refurb that had been completed eight months ago, the new furniture and the new patio that opened up onto the yard so they could sit outside on the rare occasions it wasn’t freezing cold.

  It was home, and yet, it didn’t warm up the bleakness in her spirit.

  “Take a seat,” Kurt directed, and she did as he bid, glad to let him do something.

  Her men were like that.

  They worked better when they had a task to do, a challenge to overcome. Just hanging around and hovering wasn’t good for them.

  More steps sounded, and she turned around, then regretted it. Slowing down as she twisted in her seat, the move triggering an ache that she ignored, she smiled, a tad wanly, at Sawyer and Andrei who had followed them to the kitchen.

  The table was oak now, scrubbed down just like Cinta’s. When she’d first moved here, it had been a white smorgasbord. A delight for any minimalist. Now? Nope. It was like a country kitchen with minimalist quirks to satisfy her men.

  She had a station, not just a counter, and the station contained the oven and sink. The thick marble tops were a delicious amber/cream color and had gorgeous gold striations running throughout them. What she loved most though was the wide farmhouse kitchen sink. It was a nightmare to wash the dishes in—one drop and either her plates would crack or the sink itself, but it was worth it.

  Unlike Cinta, she didn’t have an Aga, but she had a wide eight-top stove and an oven that would make any professional chef weep.

  The cupboards were a sleek cream that reminded her of the freshly churned buttermilk Jacinta bought from the local farm store, and everything was so warm and cozy that she spent most of her time down here even when she wasn’t cooking anything.

  And with five men and one small, growing boy, she cooked a lot.

  As Andrei and Sawyer settled at either side of her at the table, she eyed them both. They looked drained, their skin pale.

  Under their eyes, they each had bruises. The shadows were dark and told a tale of their own—they hadn’t been sleeping.

  That wasn’t too unusual in their household, no one seemed to abide by any particular time zone, but still, this seemed a little more drastic than usual.

  “Where’s Devon?” she asked, even though she knew the answer.

  “The office.” Sawyer’s tone was blank even though she saw his jaw tense.

  He was angry with Devon, and she wasn’t sure why.

  Well, she knew why, but she didn’t understand it.

  Sascha had never stepped into a relationship with Devon expecting his reactions to be anything close to normal.

  She knew he was a workaholic, and she knew he had control issues. He was always very likely to become obsessed with any puzzle he couldn’t easily crack.

  They were all well accustomed to him working eighteen-hour days, and carrying on for a full twenty-four if she didn’t drag him out of his study. Either to eat, fuck, talk, or do something fun.

  He didn’t have enough of the latter, and Sascha had long since made it her duty to see that he had some downtime.

  Being with Devon was quite overwhelming.

  That didn’t mean it wasn’t worthwhile, because it was. His ability to love outshone most men’s, but the difficulties stemmed from his brilliance.

  Devon was a walking, talking, world-changer. And that was strange to be around.

  He had the Midas touch, even if he wasn’t interested in it. Whatever impossible problem he set his mind to, he solved and managed to alter the world with i
t. Be it a nation’s economy or the way cryptologists handled their code.

  Looking after him was more than that of a woman looking after her man. It was about protecting the potential in him too.

  That was how this house had come about, after all. The five of them living together to make sure Devon was safe, to make sure that he was protected.

  And when she’d fallen for him, fallen so deeply in love with him that she hadn’t been able to see straight, she’d taken on that task too.

  So, why Sawyer was angry, she wasn’t sure.

  Devon coped through work. He used it as a means of controlling his moods and his emotions, and she was used to that. She hadn’t expected him to react any other way than how he had—by pouring himself into his work with a fervor that outclassed anything she’d seen of him in the past.

  Not that it didn’t sadden her. She didn’t want him to emote that way. She’d have preferred for him to come to her, for them to talk things through, and for them to work things out as a team.

  But that wasn’t Devon, and there was no way Sawyer would ever change that.

  She studied him, curiosity dragging at her heels as she murmured, “Aren’t you working with him?”

  Sawyer scowled. “No. I’m here with you.”

  She snorted, her amusement bleeding into the sadness that was weighing her down. “I can see that, honey. I just mean… you can be with him if you want.”

  Sawyer frowned, and she saw a flash of hurt bolt through his eyes like a streak of lightning. Before he could say anything, she tutted. “Now, don’t be acting like that. I love your company. I always want more of it, but if you have things to do, things that will make you feel better, then you go do it.”

  He stared at her a second, then he shook his head. “We don’t deserve you.”

  “You do, sugar.” She winked at him even as she lifted her hand and moved it over to his. Cupping the balled up fist, she murmured, “You do what you need to do to heal.”

  He licked his lips. “What about you?”

  “I’ll do the same.” She reached out with her other hand and grabbed a tight hold of Andrei’s. “The same goes for both of you,” she said, looking over her shoulder at Kurt too, needing him to be included in this. Needing them all to know that they had to think of themselves, not just her.

  They were grieving. The lot of them. Her pain wasn’t any less than theirs.

  She turned to Andrei, aiming for a bright smile and failing if his doubtful look was anything to go by. “What’s the game plan tomorrow?”

  He tilted his head to the side in that way Tin had come to mimic; his golden beauty was as strong as it had been since the beginning. Lines of strain were etched on his eyes, and there were the faintest strands of salt and pepper interweaving with the golden hair on his head, but he was still her Adonis. Still one of the most beautiful men she’d ever seen, with his gem-like eyes that could pierce her to the quick, and his strong, slender form that she loved to wrap herself around. And that accent? Oy vey.

  “Why should there be a game plan?” he asked, his voice a rumble of Russian that, had she been capable of it, would have had her body stirring. Instead, there was the faint ache reminiscent of what she’d just gone through.

  What that felt like, she’d never get over.

  “Because you’re you and it’s Monday tomorrow,” she mumbled, trying to sound positive and knowing she failed.

  He narrowed his eyes. “It might be Monday, but I’ve had Jane cancel all my app—”

  Before he could finish, she glowered at him. “You canceled all your appointments? What the hell for?”

  “Because you need me. You need us.”

  “Yes. Of course I do,” she snapped, her patience breaking. “And I’ve always had you. Look, you’ve never had to mollycoddle me before, and you don’t have to now.

  “You’ll drive me crazy if the five of you hover around me, honey. You know that. You know how I work.”

  Andrei shook his head, and for a second, he seemed wordless. “This is different. You… we… blyad, the baby. You need us close.”

  She squeezed both their fists simultaneously then released them. Moving her hands to her lap, she pressed them between her thighs and asked, “What’s going on?”

  Sawyer’s scowl was as big a giveaway as Nessie suddenly popping out of Loch Ness. “Nothing’s going on. We want to be close to you. Not a crime, is it?”

  “No, but it’s out of character. Even when I got run over, you didn’t hover. You came and went, and that’s how I like it. How I’ve always liked it. You check in wi—” She stopped, her thoughts coming to a halt. “You feel guilty.” Her tone was flat, mostly with irritation. She couldn’t believe it had taken her so fucking long to work it out, but she’d hardly been on her best game this past week. And, even more so than she’d had with Tin, the baby fog had triggered some seriously dumb moments.

  One time, she’d forgotten where she’d parked her car in the center of London. Only Sean, being the security conscious pain in the ass he was, had saved the day.

  Without her knowing, he’d planted a GPS tracking device on the bottom of her Caddy. She hadn’t had it in her to be pissed at him for being a stalker, not when she’d had to use the GPS tracker twice since that first time.

  The whole ‘baby turns you stupid’ thing was a serious issue.

  At least, it had been this time. Was that, she wondered, because she’d been having a girl?

  A perfect little girl who should have graced the world with her presence? And would have, if her mother hadn’t been stupid?

  God, why would her men feel guilty when this was all her fault?

  “No, don’t be crazy,” Andrei started, but she held up one of her hands to stall him. It was difficult with the tears burning her eyes like acid, but she needed to eradicate their guilt. Now. They had important work to do; she wouldn’t fuck that up like she’d fucked everything else up.

  “Don’t say another word. I wasn’t pissed before, but if you lie to me, I will get angry.

  “We all lead our own lives, but we come together because we’re a family. That’s what we do, guys. We move in and out of each other’s lives, coming together before heading off to take on our own particular sphere.

  “You five are too busy to be hovering around me every second of the day, and I wouldn’t ask it of you.” She pursed her lips. “Nearly four years ago, in this very room, Kurt told me how it is. He said that the five of you were too busy to deal with a girlfriend of your own, but that together, as a unit, you could satisfy one.

  “That’s how we’ve been and how we’ll always be. That’s what I want. I don’t want it to change. Do you hear me?”

  “You’re recuperating, dammit,” Sawyer argued. “You need us.”

  “Yeah, but I’m not an invalid. I don’t need the five of you around. If it bothers you so much, take it in turns.” She waved her arm in the air dismissively. “I don’t mind what you do. Make a damn rotation. Just…” She licked her lips, her anger coming to an abrupt halt. “Don’t make me feel any worse than I already do. You being here makes things feel different. I already know things are, I don’t need the reminder with the way you treat me.”

  Sawyer blinked and Andrei’s brow creased into deep frown lines she’d swear hadn’t been there before. At her back, Kurt approached. He squeezed her shoulder after he placed a mug of chamomile on the coaster in front of her.

  He dipped down and kissed the crown of her head. “I understand.”

  She peered up at him. “You do?”

  “I do,” he confirmed. “You’re overwhelmed and we’re making it worse by acting out of character.” He shot the others a look. “We’ll figure it out among ourselves, but… Sascha, you’re going to have to deal with the fact we want to be with you. Even if it breaks our usual MO. We want to be with you. Not out of guilt or whatever you might think, but because we weren’t there for you when you needed us the most, and I know I’m not just speaking for myself here,
sweetheart, but that kills me.

  “It kills me that another man was there for you, caring for Tin, and holding things together for you, while we were just going on with our regular business. While we were completely unaware that our entire world had just crashed.” He swallowed thickly. “I, for one, don’t think I’ll ever get over that.”

  She sighed. Maybe another woman would be angry, but how could she be?

  It was circumstance.

  That was all.

  She swallowed, feeling the need to admit something to them both. “I could have gone and dragged Sawyer from the study. I knew he was working, but I also know that even if you are, and I want you, you’ll stop everything.” She pursed her lips. “I wanted it just to be me and Tin that day.”

  Sawyer scowled. “What the hell for? It was a shitty day. Why would you want to go shopping in that kind of weather?”

  “Because…” She winced. “I wanted to have another burger from McDonald’s and I wanted to get your Christmas gift.”

  For a second, the three of them were quiet, then Kurt, his voice somber, murmured, “I’m not sure whether to laugh or cry.”

  She blew out a breath as she peered down at her lap. Tugging at a loose bit of thread on her sweater, she whispered, “You always get mad at me if I eat junk food. And I like to treat Tin with it too. I know it’s stupid, but it’s just…” She shrugged. “It’s something my mom did with me. Every now and then, I’d have a Happy Meal. I wanted to continue that tradition without you guilt-tripping me about MSG and processed meat.”

  Sawyer shook his head. “Lass.”

  The phrase was enough to make her brow pucker. “What?”

  He shook his head again, then he scraped back the chair and headed out of the kitchen. Eyes widening as he left, she whispered his name but he either didn’t hear her or ignored her.

  She let him go, and the others didn’t stop him either.

  Kurt’s sigh was heartfelt. “I don’t know if you intended to make him feel better, Liebchen, but you might have just made things worse.”

  “Huh?” she asked, staring at him blankly. “I-I just told you that I was the one who willfully went out without Sawyer. I went alone even though I knew it was really cold out. Why would he feel worse about that?”