Chapter 3

“What’s going on?” Tricia asked suspiciously when she saw the two of us come down the stairs.

“I’ll tell you later,” I promised with a smile. “Everything’s fine. You worry too much.”

She looked like she wanted to say something else, but I took the pause to roll off, looking for a drink, dragging her along. Patty had taken over the job of bartender and poured me a soda. I hadn’t had a chance to talk to her much this evening and I felt bad about that. “You outdid yourself on the cake, Mamma. Thanks,” I told her. It had been a huge cake in the shape of Cap’s shield.

She smiled and thanked me. “I was glad to do it,” she said. “I noticed that you made sure there was food at this party.” She chuckled about that a little.

“Yeah. It seemed like a better idea than trying to get everyone here fed before the party.”

Tricia was still looking at me suspiciously over the exchange with her father, but chimed in. “What happened at the last party?” she asked, wondering why the food had caused so much comment.

I told her the story briefly, but with this much distance, there was none of the emotion I’d had at the time.

“Your summer really sucked,” she said sympathetically.

I shrugged. “In some ways, it was possibly the worst summer ever. In other ways, it was the start of some of the happiest moments imaginable. Just like that rumor eventually led me to you. It started out pretty rough for me, but now, I think that it led me to a place where I’m happy.”

Patty smiled at us and there was only a trace of sadness in her face at the loss of what could have been. I took her hand and pulled her down to kiss her cheek. “Mamma, can you help me with the last of my Christmas shopping?”

“Me? Sure, I guess. What do you need?”

“Booze. Lotsa booze,” I said flatly. “I need eight bottles. Four of the best liquor out there.” I looked around to see if we’d be overheard before telling her why. “I want one for Dan, one for Dad, one for Mark and one for Carl. Carl’s especially important. I can’t get him something meant for years to come. A bottle of something he can use for toasts over the next few months is something I thought he’d appreciate.”

She nodded. “I can get that,” she assured me. “What about the other four?”

“Champagne,” I said. “Four good sized bottles of the best.”

“And who are these for?”

“Two female doctors who are responsible for keeping me alive and the third is for here for New Years Eve. The last one is for Charmaine. She and Mark are the people who made my shield.”

She nodded. “Not going out for the evening?” she asked lightly.

“I’m not precisely in dancing shape,” I pointed out dryly.

“I suppose not. What are your plans for that night?”

I shrugged. “Mom’ll be home, so that means Lilly will be too. Hanna and Emma will both still be out of town, but I thought about having Gina and Tricia come spend some time and invite Lana, Beck, Tabby and Collie and watch movies unless they have other plans.”

“I think they’ll like that,” Patty said with a smile.

After that, we mingled some more, Tricia acting as my pilot so I could give my arm a rest. I took her out to the kitchen to poke around for something to eat since the pizzas were long since gone.

While we were out there, I heard the front door close and knew that Tricia’s dad had made good his escape. We found Emma and Hanna talking to Mom and I went to join them. They were getting to know each other a little better and I took that as a good sign.

The five of us chatted for a while before Tricia frowned. “Do you know where Dad went?” she asked Emma.

“I’m not sure,” she admitted. “He was here a little while ago.”

“He left,” I supplied, taking her hand.

“He what?” she asked, looking at me like there had better be more of an explanation than that.

“He and I talked upstairs. He told me that you’d asked him to let you stay overnight sometimes. He asked me a lot of questions about Emma and how things worked between us and then he made me promise to keep you on top of your homework. He might have been a little less concerned, knowing that I’m not medically cleared to do anything that strenuous. So he said that he’d slip out when I had you distracted and you could stay here tonight.”

The four of them gaped at me like I’d just spoken in Chinese. “Really?” Tricia said finally, her eyes lighting up.

“Yup. He’s not sure that he likes how much you stand up to him now, but I pointed out that it means you’ll have no problem standing up to me when need be.”

“If you wouldn’t come apart on me, I’d hug you so hard right now!” she said.

“I’ll take a kiss and a gentle hug,” I offered. She grinned and put her arms around me awkwardly before leaning back to kiss me.

“But I don’t have a nightgown or anything,” she said sheepishly, making Emma laugh.

“Don’t worry about it, Sweetie,” she said, putting her arms around the younger girl. “We’ll take care of you.”

She blushed, but nodded. We filtered through the room, talking to everyone, but the crowd was starting to thin out.

I got a chance to talk to Hector again before his parents made him say goodbye and he promised he wouldn’t blame himself for what happened any more. His mother looked grateful and I smiled and said goodnight to them. Gina had driven her own car here and was sticking around to clean up after the party, but there was honestly not a lot to do. Tabby and Collie had been helping at keeping everything tidied all night.

I’d stopped to talk to them a few times through the night, but now I wanted to ask them about New Years.

“Hey,” I said, rolling into the kitchen on my own for the moment. “What are you guys up to for New Years?” I asked lightly.

“Nothing in particular,” Collie said with a shrug.

“Same,” Tabby answered.

“Yeah. I’m in the same boat. I was thinking of doing something casual here. You want to come? Nothing too crazy. Just movies, games and some company.”

They looked at each other and Collie shrugged again. “We don’t want to intrude,” she said awkwardly. “You’ll have your girls here.”

“Emma and Hanna will both still be out of town. I’m planning on having Tricia and Gina over and inviting Lana and Beck too. You’re not intruding. You’re invited. I meant what I said about this being your home. I want you to be here more. Mom’s home and Lilly’s here. You’re welcome here even if you get your mail somewhere else.”

They smiled at that and they exchanged that same look again before nodding and coming to hug me gently. I managed to talk Lana and Beck into the same deal with no trouble. They both got along with Tricia and Gina and they were glad to have something to do. Gina was just as thrilled to be invited. I told her to ask her parents and she scoffed.

“They’d say yes to you,” she said with a laugh. “After what you’ve done to protect me from Vance and everything else you’ve done in general, they’d give you anything you asked for. After talking to Hector, my mother could kiss you.”

“Still, ask them. Better to keep them informed than assume they approve.”

She shrugged and promised that she’d ask and let me know. By this point, we’d wound down the party. Mom and I were banished to the table to talk while everyone else cleaned up.

“How’re you holding together?” she asked gently.

“With stitches,” I said with a smile, making her laugh a little. “Kidding aside, I’m doing okay. I’ve got incredible girls that support me and I’ll have a couple of weeks of calm through Christmas to get all the breakers reset in my head,” I told her. “I’m really glad you’re home. Besides the obvious reason, Emma’s flying home on the 20th and the house would have felt pretty empty for the days leading up to Christmas.”

“You would have had Lilly and your father here,” she said certainly.

“Not so much. When I went into the hospital, she went to his place to stay to be closer to him.”

“I know,” she said, glancing toward the kitchen.

“You can’t blame her. We were both in the hospital. There was no firm date for when you were getting released and I stood a good chance of being released to a funeral home. He’s the only family she had. Lana and Beck came and stayed with Emma and I’m very grateful to them for that.”

She nodded. “So Donald wasn’t staying here at all then?” she asked.

“No. He put some clothes in my old room and a few things in Lilly’s bathroom, but that was just for appearances. He came to look in on us, but Lilly was spending all day with Patty anyway. There were days I didn’t even see her.”

“Sounds like you were mostly getting by on your own,” she said, looking sad about that.

“I had a lot of help,” I told her. “Groceries, meals, getting around to appointments and just the simple things like checking to make sure we were doing alright.”

“Are you still looking into moving out?” she asked.

“I don’t think that’s necessary now. We’re all in a vastly different place than we were before Halloween. I’m in a much better place with Lana and Beck and like I told you before, I actually invited Tabby and Collie to join us for Christmas. I want them to feel like this is home even if they don’t live here any more. You and I are dealing with each other much better. You’re accepting of Emma, Hanna, Tricia and Gina and that’s important to me. It means a lot.”

She smiled and took my hand. “I understand you had a chance to mend fences with Tricia’s father,” she said lightly. “That’s not a small accomplishment.”

I nodded. “Well, most boyfriends tell their girlfriend’s father they’d take a bullet for their girl. Not many have to prove it,” I pointed out with a shrug. “The silver lining is that Tricia now has permission to stay the night when there’s nothing going on the next day. That’s something we’ve both wanted for a while now and ironically, I can’t do a damn thing about it for a few more weeks.”

She patted my hand and smiled. “I’m sure Dr. Spencer and Dr. Forester will let you know when it’s all clear for you to start having sex again. Just give it time.”

I nodded. “I know,” I said lightly. “I’m not impatient, really. It’s just sort of funny that he gives his permission NOW.” I chuckled a little.

We watched the rest of the cleanup and then the girls came to say goodnight. Lana, Beck, Collie, Tabby and Gina all gave me gentle hugs and kisses before they left. Gina looked like she wanted to stay, but the deal had been for her test results to come back negative first. The girls all hugged each other and then we were free to lock the doors and go to bed.

Lilly went up to bed without hanging around much, but Mom wanted to spend some time with the four of us, getting to know Hanna and reconnecting with Tricia. She was amazed at the change in her and told her so.

“Matt and Emma helped me a lot. Dad doesn’t like it so much because I’ll argue with him when I think I’m right. He hates that,” she giggled a little.

She smiled thinly and nodded. “Parents sometimes have trouble listening when their kids are trying to tell them something important. It sounds like you’re managing okay though.”

“Yeah, he means well, but he thinks he needs to protect me from everything out there and really, I just need him to step back sometimes,” she said happily. She was really completely changed from the girl I’d known two months ago.

We finally went downstairs to bed and I was undressed by three very gentle sets of hands even though I was completely capable of doing it myself. Okay, I was MOSTLY capable at best.

Hanna and Emma both stripped down without hesitation and guided me onto the bed, propping my cane where I could get to it if I needed to get up in the middle of the night.

Tricia bit her lip and then started undressing slowly before joining us. Emma and Hanna kissed me deeply, then kissed Tricia gently and went over to the other bed to let us cuddle together. They had no intentions of just going to sleep though and started kissing each other heatedly while we watched.

Tricia was fascinated as they touched and kissed with increasing passion. They’d been too long without an outlet for their frustrations. Worry and circumstance had submerged their need, but it was still there.