Sean: The Sons of Crosby: Vampire Paranormal Romance

by Kathi S. Barton

  I’d appreciate that. I surely would. They talked for a few more minutes, Dad telling him what his plans were for the day and Chase laughing with him. I love you too, son. Very much. I couldn’t be prouder of my boys than if you’d be in the White House. You think one of you might get there sometime?

  Why not? Dad and he shared a laugh, and Chase told him he was going to sleep now. I’ll see you tomorrow, Dad. We’ll have dinner or something. All right?

  Yes. That sounds good.

  Dad said he loved him very much, and they closed the connection. When Dad came back and told him to tell Emerald he loved her too, Chase thought it was the sweetest thing he could have done. Chase closed his eyes and finally let sleep take him under.

  Chapter 7

  Cody and Elliot covered up the last of the plants they’d planted today. There would be nearly full-grown plants by the time they were ready to leave tonight, thanks wholly to the faeries that lived in the greenhouse. It was the reason he rarely, if ever, had to order plants to fill the large nursery he and Cody took care of.

  “Dad, can you tell me what these seeds are?” He loved being called Dad. It gave him such a thrill each time the kid called him that. “It only says seeds on the bag. I think it’s from the queen.”

  One of the thousands of faeries came down and landed on Cody’s hand. He was a great kid. Elliot loved him to pieces. But there were times, even after living with him and Misty, that he was still terrified of someone hitting him. As soon as he shook the faerie free of his hand, Cody burst into tears because he hadn’t meant to harm the little man. It took several of them, at least a hundred faeries, to console him so they could work with him again.

  Cody looked up at him. “I’m sorry.” Elliot got down to his level and asked him what he was sorry for. “For being such a pussy. That’s what my mean dad used to call me. Aunt Emerald said he was the pussy on account he had to hit someone smaller than him to feel like a big man. But I still get scared he’s going to come around the corner and take me.”

  “Cody, he’s not. Not ever. And I’m sure that anyone in your position would feel the same way.” He hugged the little guy, and they got back to the issue at hand. “I don’t know what they might be. But they’re large seeds, aren’t they?”

  “They’re calla lilies, my lords.” Rainy picked up one of the seeds and held it high above her head while she examined it. “Yes, this is a good seed too. Shall grow beautiful flowers that will brighten up any home with scent and beauty. I believe the lady queen has several of these very ones in her own home.”

  “Do you think they’d go well in here?” Elliot stood back and let Cody take over the conversation. He was getting better with speaking first in situations, more so every day. He thought working here was bringing him out of his shell.

  Elliot went to find the other bags of seeds he’d been given to plant for the faeries. There were about fifty bags that were only marked with seeds. Some of them had hand-painted trees on them, so he just assumed they were tree seeds. He would have to try that. He’d not been able to put out any trees for sale because he’d only just opened up last spring. This year they were doing so well; it was the reason he and Cody were in here today, putting more seeds into the ground to have for tomorrow’s business.

  “Master Elliot, I was wondering if it would be all right if we were to grow more of the seeds in the back of the greenhouse. There is plenty of room, and you have no one using it at the moment.” Elliot didn’t bother telling the young faerie, Pink, not to call him Master again. Instead, he asked her what she meant. Laying the tree seeds on his desk, she went right to them. “This would be wonderful to grow. Oh, my yes. These are fruit trees: apple and orange. I’m afraid that when they were bagged up, the person did not think to separate them into different fruits. So you will only know what they are if we tell you. That would be a good thing to put in. I’ve heard customers ask you about trees.”

  There was a tone there, one he thought was telling him he was being remiss in not having them already. Asking her what she needed from him to get started, she told him everything was in the back that would be needed, and she’d get on it right away. Telling her not to forget to mark what the trees would be, she nodded. He had a feeling he’d be asking them again for what he was tagging. They were always so excited to plant something. It mattered little to them what they were putting into the ground.

  Just yesterday, he’d come into the greenhouse with lunch for him and Cody to find several containers of dirt with leaves sticking from the top of them. He didn’t bother trying to figure it out on his own but went to find Cody, who had been there with him since morning.

  “I didn’t ask. One of the blue faeries came to me and asked if they could have some dirt. Since they mostly plant everything, I said you’d not care. You don’t, do you?” He told him he didn’t. “Well, when I went to figure out what they were doing with them, I saw the leaves. I just came back here to work. I’m not going to ask.”

  They laughed about that for the rest of the afternoon. As they were leaving for the day, he was asking Cody if he wanted to get some pizza to take home when he realized the kid was no longer behind him. Turning around, he looked at his son and asked him if he was all right.

  “Dad, you have to come here and look.” He was whispering, so Elliot did the same in telling him he didn’t want to. “Yes, you do. You have to see the leaves they planted. It’s...they’re grown.”

  Moving slowly back toward Cody, he told him in the same low voice that he’d better not be joking with him. Cody shook his head, then pointed to the right. Elliot came around the corner where the leaves had been planted and stared at the containers for several minutes before he turned back to Cody.

  “What are they?” Cody said he didn’t know. “Do you think we should ask someone or just walk away?”

  “If we walk away, there isn’t any telling what they’ll look like tomorrow when we come back. I think you should ask someone.” He took a step back from him and smiled. “I’ll be over here. You know, just in case.”

  Elliot didn’t have any idea what the just in case meant, but he whistled for Pink to come and tell them what they were growing. The thing was, Elliot had a good idea what they were seeing, but it didn’t freak him out any less. Pink landed next to one of the planters and smiled up at him.

  “This is how the queen grows gardeners.” Elliot nodded but didn’t feel any less afraid of what he was seeing. “You can see that they’re pods, can you not, Master Elliot?”

  They were most assuredly pods. Each leaf had curled around what looked to him like a tiny head. The sparkles in the dirt around the leaves, Pink told him, was magic. He wasn’t sure he wanted to pick one up and have a closer look, as Pink had suggested, but he did so anyway. As soon as he pulled the little container to his face, the leaf uncurled, and a tiny little body slipped out, naked.

  His first instinct was to throw it away, as far and as hard as he could. But before his mind got in touch with his hand, the little person stood up, dressed magically, and then had wings sprout out behind him. Elliot was no less willing to toss it away, but then Cody was there, asking to see him.

  Cody was a great deal calmer than he was about the whole thing. As the two of them stood there, all of the dozen or so of the pods had—well, he supposed, birthed. Each of them were bald, and they had the largest wings he’d seen on any of the other faeries. As soon as one of them landed on Cody’s hand, he laughed. Christ, this was the strangest thing he’d ever witnessed in his greenhouse.

  “They’re gardeners.” He told his son that was what Pink had told him. “Look. They have a backpack sort of thing around their waist. What do you suppose is in it?”

  He started to ask if it was more pods, but he giggled instead. Cody looked up at him oddly but didn’t comment. Elliot was freaking the fuck out, and he wasn’t sure he cared who was seeing.

  “They have
all the tools born with them that they will need to do their job.” Pink spoke to the faerie gardener on Cody’s hand in a language that he didn’t know. “He wishes to show you, young Cody. Is that all right with you?”

  “Yes. That’ll be cool.” As the little creature emptied his pack out, Elliot knew it was somehow enhanced so that it could carry much more than it would appear to. “Look how tiny that rake and shovel are.”

  Today there were more leaves planted and growing so that they could work in the greenhouse for him and Cody. Elliot found himself avoiding the area where they were growing for fear of seeing something he just couldn’t handle.

  Gathering up what they’d need to help with planting the trees, Elliot worked with Cody for only an hour, with the faeries doing most of the work. In no time, he had three apple trees, four peaches, and a lot of magnolia trees. He’d found out recently that Brandy, his stepmother, had a love for the magnolia trees. He and Cody were going to drop off a few of them for her on their way home.

  Once they were in his car, heading home, Elliot realized that Cody was very quiet. He didn’t intrude on whatever he was thinking about. Something he’d learned about his son was that he was smart and that he liked to have all his thoughts together before speaking. Elliot supposed that was because his father would have beaten him if he didn’t get to a point sooner rather than later.

  “Dad, I’ve been thinking about this for a while now, and I was wondering if you’d help me go to college.” He didn’t know where he was going with his question, so he didn’t answer just yet. “I want to be able to be able to not just plant seeds but know a lot about them. My dream is to work in the greenhouse with you when I grow up. I love handling the plants and knowing what they are. It was really nice of you and Mom to get me that computer pad so I can look some of them up. But I want to be more than just a person working in a greenhouse. What do you think?”

  “It would require a great deal of math, you know. Scheduling the planting to be ready when they’re going to be needed. You just told me the other day that you thought you’d never use as much math as you were taking.” He told him what Grandda had told him, about how there was nothing you could do that didn’t require you to do math at some point. “He would know. Math is one of my dad’s favorite subjects. He should have taught it, but he wasn’t sure about being around a bunch of humans all the time.”

  “I’ve been working harder on math. It’s not as bad as I thought it would be. I’m thinking I was just lazy about it.” He had been, Elliot thought. His teacher had told them that Cody was much smarter than he let on and that he bored easily. “The teacher asked me if someone had finally spoken to me about my grades. I started to tell her that Aunt Emerald had, but they’re all afraid of her now, so I just said my grandpa had. He did too, but Aunt Emerald said she was going to do something to me that would keep me standing for a year. I thought that if anyone could do that, it would be her.”

  Elliot laughed. Not so much at what he’d said, but how the school was afraid of Emerald. He thought that anyone with half a brain would be afraid of her, but the principal had sent home a note about not wanting to train, her words, any more of the Crosby children because they were all half-breeds.

  He hadn’t been there when Emerald had shown up unannounced. But almost the same day, there was not only a new principal, but also a new janitorial service, and several teachers had been hired. It wasn’t just one person, he’d heard, but an entire staff that had been bullying the kids associated with the Crosbys.

  “Okay. The teacher we spoke to at the open house said you were smart enough to take some college courses online if you wanted to. She did tell us you’d be able to test out of certain classes simply because you’re much more advanced than any of the other kids in the school.” Cody said he didn’t agree with skipping any classes. “Up to you, son. But think about how much faster you’ll be able to get to the goal that you want. Hannah and I only want the best for you. You know that, don’t you?”

  “Yes, I know that too. And I love you guys so much for everything you do for me.” Cody told him what he’d like to do. One thing was to use his own money to buy himself a computer instead of a laptop. “I’ve not been studying that well when I’m at home because I can carry the laptop with me and go anywhere. I’d rather have to sit down and do it without moving.”

  Hannah met them at the door. It was the greatest thing, Elliot thought, to have someone there waiting at home for you. Going into the house, he realized they’d forgotten to pick up dinner, which seemed to be fine with them. They wanted to go and get some Chinese, something he knew they loved more than anything else. Except for him, of course.

  ~*~

  Grayson watched Alex play the game he’d invented for him. It was a game that the hearing impaired could play, as there wasn’t much in the way of talking, but sign language used all the time. It had been fun to make work, especially since he’d been able to put magic in the program that made it seem as if the characters were signing correctly.

  Alex turned to him when another area was opening up for him. “This is wonderful. A very good usage of signing that doesn’t make the person feel like it’s a lesson rather than having fun. I think people will pick this up quickly and get a great deal out of it.” He asked him if he could find any flaws in it. “No. But then I was having so much fun I didn’t think to look for them. Thanks, Grayson. I think I can use this in my classes for teaching adults how to sign.”

  Alex was deaf since birth. But he was the most outgoing, confident person Grayson had ever met with a handicap. He would tell anyone he could that it was because his sister would have beaten his ass had he ever tried to get something out of life without working for it. It took Elliot a while to realize she meant things like food stamps, help with his bills, or anything someone more in need of it might not get because he’d gotten them.

  Not that any of them had trouble with people getting food stamps or any other assistance. He was glad there was something out there for people to use. He knew firsthand what it could be like if you didn’t have a pot to piss in. Grayson had been helping people out since long before this town was anything more than just a bunch of scrub and deer.

  After making sure Alex had all he needed, Grayson went to find his wife. Misty had been working on a big trial for the last several days. What she couldn’t find, Hannah would. She was the best researcher any of them had ever seen. She found whatever she needed on someone, even things he was sure the people didn’t know about.

  Kissing Misty on the forehead while she was on the phone, he sat down in the chair across from her. When she hung up, she smiled at him.

  “How aware are you that there are dangerous places to go swimming?” He asked her what she meant by dangerous. He was, he pointed out to her, dangerous too. “That’s true. What I meant was, there are several places around the world that are posted and even fenced off that people shouldn’t ever be wading in much less swimming.”

  “I know of a couple. I don’t know that I’d consider them dangerous, but tell me which place, and I’ll tell you if I’ve heard of it or not.” She told him. “Honey, even from the name of the place, I wouldn’t go there to swim. I take it one of the people you’re working for has a client that went there.”

  “No. This is for a resort in the Dominican Republic. Someone’s family is suing them for not having any signage to a place called Boiling Lake. These guys, a bunch of buddies, decided that they were immune to things such as signs and warnings. They actually snuck in, which right there should tell a person they knew better than to be there. But they snuck into the lake called Boiling Lake and decided to take a dip. It’s fucking called Boiling Lake—didn’t that give them some clue that it might be hot?”

  “I take it there were deaths.” Misty told him that only one of the nine men made it out alive. “Christ, that must have been a nightmare to retrieve the bodies. How hot are you talking, just ou
t of curiosity?”

  “One hundred and ninety-five degrees. And they weren’t able to retrieve the bodies. The man that wasn’t killed is more than likely wishing he’d never heard of the lake either. He’s lost nearly all his skin, as well as his fingers and toes. My contact person told me he was videoing the entire adventure when his buddies started screaming. He was hurt trying to go in and save them.” Grayson asked what the lawsuit was claiming. “Oh, this is a good one. The families are claiming it should have been the resort’s responsibility to make sure no one could swim in the water called Boiling Lake. And that the resort should have warned their sons to not go there. Here, have a look at the signage I got off an aerial view of the place.”

  Even he could make out the chain-link fence around the area. And it looked to him like there were danger signs every few feet. She also had a picture of the warning in the resort lobby that said that it was off limits to anyone.

  “They’re going to lose, I’m thinking.” Misty nodded and leaned back in her chair. “Something is bothering you. What is it?”

  “I would love to get away for a while.” He said he could do that for her. “I don’t mean a shopping trip, though I know we’ll end up buying things, but just a place to go, hang out around a pool or a lazy creek, and do nothing.”

  “Camping?” She brightened at his suggestion. “I can make that happen too. I’ve actually been thinking about how much fun we’d have going camping. I’m not saying we should invite them, but your dad and brother have been talking about buying a camper for the last several days.”

  “We’ll get one too. And if they want to go, they’ll have their own sleeping place and camping place. Oh, Grayson, that’s a wonderful idea. I can almost feel the nice breeze and the campfire food. Let’s go as soon as this shit here is over.” He told her she’d have to go with him to get a camper. “You go and get us something huge. Something we can keep for a while and have our children go with us on trips. My goodness, I’m so excited now that I could bust.”