Chapter 26

Saturday started out with a large-scale breakfast next door. Lana and Beck came to fetch us before we really wanted to face the day, but we reluctantly got out of bed and started to get dressed without bothering to kick them out. They were friendly to Hanna and to Zoe whom they’d only met a couple of times. I was pleased that things were getting back to normal and soon we were climbing the stairs and headed next door.

Patty greeted us with a smile and gave me a hug and a kiss on the lips before sending us all to the table while she directed Lilly around the kitchen. When everyone was served and we were all eating, Patty smiled and looked at my new girls. “So, Hanna, are you enjoying having a Master?” she said, picking out the collar.

Hanna looked up and I could tell she was uncomfortable at being singled out with everyone there. “Uh, yes,” she said, unsure of herself.

“Don’t worry, dear,” Patty said kindly. “I don’t bite.”

“That’s a filthy fucking lie,” I blurted before I could stop myself. FUCK, my mouth!

She looked at me in shock and then she threw her head back and laughed. Beck, Lana and Lilly joined a moment later and Dan was right with them. I joined them a second later and my look told the girls that we were okay.

“I think we should explain,” I said when we had calmed down. “During the summer, Lana and Beck wore collars of their own.”

She nodded in understanding. She was the only one under collar. Her name had come up but this was her first introduction to the family at large.

“I want to hear more about how you know she bites, Matt,” Zoe said with an arched eyebrow.

Emma laughed again. I’d told her the whole story and that included Patty.

“Because I bit him,” Patty said evenly, taking a sip of her coffee.

Zoe obviously wanted to press, but she was torn since she was a guest here.

Dan rescued her from the choice. “I presume you’re all familiar with Matt’s frightening skill in the bedroom,” he said. “After weeks of cleaning up and carrying the girls to the showers after he devastated them with whatever he does behind closed doors, poor Patty was starting to climb the walls so I asked Matt to take her and rattle her teeth like he was doing nightly with the girls. Lord knows the two of them were no match for him.”

Zoe gaped at him dumbstruck and Hanna wasn’t much more composed.

I burst out laughing. “‘Rattle her teeth’? I don’t remember you putting it quite like that,” I reminded him.

He shrugged blandly. “I’m married to Patty and I spent enough time listening to the screaming coming from your room all summer to be well past the point of delicate.”

“You seriously let him and your wife...” Zoe trailed off, shocked.

He nodded. “Believe it or not, he was reluctant for the same reasons you have in your head, no doubt. I have medical issues which prevent me from performing. I asked Matt to surrogate since I know that he and Patty love each other, but not romantically.”

“And you two were okay sharing with your mother?” she asked Lana and Beck.

“We were already sharing him with each other,” Beck said. “It wasn’t a big deal. Well, it was to HER, but neither of them told us much about what happened that night and I don’t think she’s been back since.”

“No, there’s been too much going on for me to intrude on his new life,” Patty said primly, continuing to eat.

“I can’t WAIT to tell my sister about you now,” Hanna laughed. “She’s been rampaging through men since she figured out how boys and girls fit together. I’d pay good money to see her meet her match.”

Zoe gaped at her. “You’d share him with your sister?” she asked, surprised.

“Not so much share as inflict him on her. She might have to give up her school. I have no doubt that he’d do things to her that make her hips not work right afterwards.”

“Not a fan of hers?” I asked, interested in the relationship.

She shrugged. “You know how choosy about men I am?” she asked. “She’s the exact opposite. Her standards are just as high, but she takes the exact opposite approach.”

“She’ll take them for a test drive and then return them to the lot when they don’t have all the features she wants?” I clarified getting a nod from her.

“Exactly. Putting the two of you in a room together with a jar of lube and a video camera would be like a bomb going off. I personally put my money on you breaking her like a Happy Meal toy over and over again until she’s ruined for other men forever.”

“Don’t put that on the table,” Patty warned her. “He’ll do it. He’ll eat your Happy Meal too, when he’s done breaking the toy.”

“If he can make her whimper for mercy where I can hear it, I’ll buy him a steak dinner,” she promised.

That got more laughter from around the table. Zoe was still shocked by the news I’d been with Patty, but she seemed calmed some by the fact that we were all still close and normal.

The rest of breakfast passed normally and when we were done, I got my shield and Emma, Hanna and I went off to my Kung Fu class with kisses from Zoe.

Emma sat and watched the class again, interested in what we were doing and taking some interest in the overall feel of the class.

After the main class, Sifu had me bring my shield to him to examine. He put it on and nodded. “Very light,” he said. “Different from what I’m used to. Do you know what it is made from?” he asked.

“Air-frame aluminum and the colors are powder coat, not paint,” I said.

He nodded and hefted the shield. “If it’s sturdy enough, it should make a magnificent shield. I take it that you want to use it like Captain Rogers would and not so much like history says it was used?”

“Ideally. I’d like to go into the charity event and use it like it deserves,” I said.

“Of course,” he replied. We were joined a short time later by an older man with a shaved head. “Ah yes.” Sifu said, pleased. “Albert North, please meet Matthew Russell. He is the young man I told you about and this is his shield,” he said, passing the shield to the other man.

Mr. North shook Sifu’s hand and then mine before putting on the shield. “It’s light,” he commented. “Not steel. Aluminum?” When I nodded, stepped back and hefted it, taking a couple of experimental swipes with it and tested how easily it moved around. “Yeah, it moves like it’s made of air. That’ll mean it’s slightly more likely to turn when you block something.” He demonstrated what he meant by pulling on the shield top to show how it would pivot.

They gave me the shield back and asked me to throw it at some targets Sifu used for weapons training. My first attempt was a little shakier than I’d like, but Mr. North said it was good. He corrected my throw and had me try again a few times. I was getting better, but felt like I needed more practice.

We worked for another hour and when we were done, I thanked them both and bowed to them both since I was still in my Gi and belt.

When I’d changed, Emma had a bit of a laugh at my expense. “Not nearly as impressive as your first outing,” she critiqued on the way back to the car.

“Well, that was a fluke,” I reminded her. “I want to be able to do it reliably.”

“I know and it’s so adorable. Chris Evans is going to be playing on being in great shape and you’re going for skill. I think you should let Hanna take charge of your workout. She’ll turn you into a machine.”

“That’s a perfect idea. I don’t spend enough time with her,” I commented.

She grinned and then we switched to lesser topics on the way to the hospital. I stopped in the gift shop and stocked up on sweets for her and Emma could tell I was nervous. “It’s okay,” she assured me. “You’ll be fine.”

“I know. I just don’t want to damage her progress. She might not be fine if I hit one of her triggers.”

We approached the ward and I told the nurse I was here to see Charlotte Russell. I passed her the bag of treats for her and she nodded. “Good to see you on that side of the glass, Mr. Russell,” she said with a smile. She’d been the duty nurse when I was here before. I guess polite patients were outside the norm.

I gave Emma’s hand a squeeze and she took a seat while I went to the visitor’s room and waited for her to come to see me.

When she came in, it was almost like seeing her on a lazy Sunday afternoon. She had her hair tied back and her sweats made her look like it was just a casual day. We picked up the phones and she smiled at me. I felt the tension lift from my shoulders and I smiled back at her.

“Hi,” I said and I realized I was glad to see her. I hadn’t really SEEN her since mid-September. She’d taken the breakup nearly as hard as I had and seeing us torn apart had torn her apart.

“Hi, Matt,” she said gently. “How’re you doing?” We were both tentative now.

“I’m managing okay,” I said softly. “There’ve been rough spots and smooth the past couple of weeks. We all miss you around the house.”

She nodded. “I miss all of you too,” she said. “But after what happened, I guess this is the best place for me,” her face clouded over and she looked down.

“We don’t have to talk about that night just yet if you’re not ready,” I said. “If this is where you need to be though, I’ll come see you every day, if you want. I know what it’s like to be in that chair too. Sometimes you just need a break to get a handle on things. I’d have been here to see you sooner, but Dr. Spencer thought you might not be ready to see me until now.”

She nodded. “I’d like for you to come and see me,” she said with a smile. “Maybe not every day though. You have a lot on your plate right now. Dr. Spencer says she’s still seeing you on Wednesdays. Seeing you after you’re done with her and sometime on the weekends would be nice.”

“I’ll be here,” I promised. “Would you like to see Lilly too?”

“Is she here with you today?” she asked, telling me everything I needed to know.

“Not today,” I said, “but I’ll talk to Dr. Spencer about adding her to your visitor list as soon as I can. I wanted to wait for that in case my visit upset you.”

She nodded. “I DO want to talk about that night, Matt. I’m so sorry I hit you. I was so angry when you wouldn’t do what I wanted. I just couldn’t control myself.” She looked like she was upset and I wanted to head that off as fast as possible.

“I don’t think you owe me an apology for that,” I said to her. “I didn’t do anything to stop that confrontation from happening and I said some things that made it worse. I owe you an apology for that. I hope you can forgive me.”

She nodded and there was tears in her eyes. “I hope you can forgive me,” she said in return, her voice thick with emotion.

“I already have,” I told her. “As soon as it happened.” Okay, that wasn’t precisely true. I’d been angry about it, but I’d realized quickly that I’d greased the wheels of that night and I needed to own that responsibility.

That made her beam like I’d given her the world. “Thank you, Matt!” she said, sniffling. She took a moment to get hold of herself and asked how things were at home.

“Things are ... better,” I told her. “Not perfect, but getting better. I told you there’ve been rough spots. Things between me and Lana and Beck got much worse for a while, but they’re better now.”

“What happened?” she wanted to know.

She didn’t seem upset or distraught, so I told her about Halloween and played the video for her, showing her my phone through the glass. I told her that the girls had arranged for them to come after me, but told her that those boys got the girls into drugs and I found out later that they’d been too high to really understand what they were asking for.

“I wouldn’t have been as angry about it for my own sake, but I was with people when they came for me and they were going to rape those girls just for being with me.”

“You should have killed those boys,” she said, angered by what I’d told her.

I nodded. “That’s been suggested. I may get another chance. They’re being offered a plea deal for what they did in the video.”

“Do it. They ruined things between you and the girls and they’re going to get away with it.”

“It’s worse than that, but I’ll spare you all the details. I threw up when I found out. Let’s just say that I feel no guilt about what happened to them or what might happen in the future. Not like I did with Miranda. These two and Marlene have proved there’s nothing in them to redeem.”

“Good,” she said and I could see my mother starting to find daylight. “Now, let’s talk about something more pleasant. How are things with you and Emma? I assume my explosion didn’t ruin things there?”

“No, we’re still good. I took her and her roommate and Tricia Saunders to the costume party that night. The four of us are still dating and we added one more so it’s almost like it was in the summer, just with different people.”

She nodded about that. “I assumed you were dating them when I heard you’d bought four tickets that it wasn’t just as friends.”

“It WAS mostly though. Tricia and I spoke for the first time that morning. Everyone treated her like she was invisible before. I had Emma and Zoe help her with a make-over and taught her about doing her hair and make-up and generally teaching her all the stuff she normally would have learned from her mother. Zoe is Emma’s roommate,” I explained, seeing her look confused by the new name. “She’s Pre-law. We’re doing okay and we even had breakfast next door this morning. Tricia’s father still thinks there’s some truth to the rumor at the start of the year, so I don’t get to spend a lot of time with her, but that’s the only wrinkle.”

She nodded. “I’m glad that you’re doing okay,” she said, sounding sincere. “How is Lilly handling things?”

“She’s doing okay. She’s spending a lot of time with Patty and Dan. She misses you. Donald checks on us every day and we had him put some clothes in my old room in case Family Services get wise to the fact that we’re two kids essentially living alone.”