Epilogue
Graham
One month later…
I felt like a zombie as I walked toward the bed and collapsed face first onto the sheets. Hell, it shouldn’t be this hard. It was tougher than boot camp. Army Ranger Training. Special Ops missions. Stopping World War Three in NoKo.
How the fuck do women do this?
My lids were closed and I was near sleep when I felt a hand on my shoulder and Lee’s lips on my neck. “Go away,” I grumbled. “We have to be up in four hours to take Ella to her soccer game. Touch me again, I might just punch you.”
Lee let out a frustrated breath. “Are you ever going to be there again?” His tongue moved down along my back. “I’m in pain here, baby. Rubbing one out in the shower isn’t doing it for me any longer. I need you. You’ve been home a month. You forgave me weeks ago. Are we ever going to fuck again?”
“I’m too exhausted,” I groaned, even though the touches and kisses stirred a little life into the beast. “I need sleep. Next time they scream you get up. Don’t you dare pretend to sleep through it again.”
“But Olivia won’t settle down for me. She only likes you, Graham.”
“Bullshit, you just can’t handle both of them at once. You’re going to have to learn to. Me being home full-time with you isn’t happening. I’ll get a call. Out I’ll go. The world’s still a fucking mess.”
I was asleep and snoring before his finger teasing my hole got enough blood in my rod to keep me awake.
One of the babies screaming—I couldn’t tell which—dragged me from sleep and I jumped up in bed. The room was filled with morning light and Lee’s spot was empty.
I checked my phone. Oh crap. It was thirty minutes until out the door for Ella’s game. I hopped in the shower, skipped the shave I needed, yanked on my clothes, and hotfooted it into the kitchen.
It was the rally point for my family before we headed out anywhere. The smell of coffee made my nostrils happy, and as I turned the hall into the kitchen my lids shot wide.
Ella dressed in her uniform, ready to go.
Breakfast plates with half-eaten meals beside near-empty bottles of formula. Good, Lee had fed the girls.
Diaper bags packed. Coffee thermoses filled for two. And a brown bag with something that smelled good in it, hopefully for me. Both babies wrapped in swaddling and locked in their car seats.
Well, I hadn’t expected this. Lee was always a disaster managing all three girls. He must really be horny to pull this one out of the hat: nothing for Graham left to do and family ready to go.
“Don’t look so surprised. It’s insulting,” Lee jeered, touching my lips with his in our PG-13 marital kiss in front of Ella.
“Not surprised. Knew you had it in you and were only being lazy. Glad to have you working as a team now.”
Ella laughed as her dad pouted. God, I wanted to kiss that delectable mouth of his the way I longed to. A few hours’ sleep and I was rejuvenated everywhere.
“Can we go now?” Ella inquired demandingly.
“Yes,” I said slowly, shaking my head with my face close to hers. “Though why you’re eager I can’t figure out. We’re bringing your dad to the game. Remember?”
She rolled her eyes and made a dramatic slap on her forehead, and we both laughed as Leland’s pout grew bigger.
“Are you both done picking on Dad?” he asked, shoving the straps of the diaper bags one over each shoulder. “You get the babies. I’ll get the car.”
“Sounds like a plan to me, babe.” I cooed down at my daughters then grabbed the handles on the car seats. “Ella, get my breakfast and our coffees.”
She sprang from her barstool and took a moment collecting our items from the counter. As she trailed behind me toward the front door, she said, “You have to promise me, Poppy, you won’t let Dad do anything to embarrass me like he does at practice.”
I stifled a chuckle. “No guarantees, but I’ll do my best.”
Two hours later, we were in the bleachers, and doing my best hadn’t achieved a damn thing. Lee was being Leland, and I was pretty sure we both were going to get blasted by Ella first thing outta there.
But Lee did look sexy hot when he was flustered and angry. I wasn’t sure why, but it was in his worst spoiled-Leland moments he was his most endearing to me.
Though it proved another truism for me that probably should not have left me charmed—or aroused—to see him in all his lionlike outrage because Ella got unfairly punished—and she had by what I saw, by that yellow card in the ref’s hand.
And there was Leland, as if the world turned differently for him and his daughters, never having learned what I’d learned before exiting kindergarten.
Life wasn’t fair. It was better to learn that when you were young. It didn’t work out well when people didn’t learn it until adulthood.
Evidence of that: Lee, red-faced, angry, and shouting.
“Dial it down, babe,” I warned. “You’re making a fool of yourself.”
Lee’s incensed tiger eyes locked on mine. “Don’t tell me you’re not pissed. This is wrong. Is everything in this country rigged nowadays? Elections. Getting into the right schools. Even this.”
He shook his head and his mouth pursed in Lee’s outraged expression that was ridiculous and adorable.
“Sit. Close your mouth. Now.”
He dropped down heavily beside me, but in another two seconds he was back on his feet shouting and bouncing around like he was going to storm the object of his frustration.
From behind me grumbled, “Damn it, can’t you do something about your friend? He’s ruining it for everyone.”
I glanced over my shoulder to note the infuriated stare trained on us. The man was right, but one fast glance also told me he was an asshole. Fancy suit. Prick demeanor. Here for the day because he felt he had to be and not because he wanted to.
“Sorry,” I said blandly. “Cut him some slack. He’s been under a lot of stress lately. I think he’s just getting it out here.”
“I’ve not been under stress,” Lee managed to shoot at me while continuing with his tirade addressed elsewhere. He froze like an angry lion, pointed, and stared. “Don’t you do it. I won’t be responsible for what happens if you do.”
The man behind us stood up. “If he makes one step off these bleachers, I’m putting an end to this myself. He’s behaving like a hotheaded idiot. Put a muzzle on him. Or I’ll do it for you.”
Oh no, he didn’t.
I was about to deal with Mr. Goes Home and Beats his Wife when Lee whirled on me. “Did you see what the ref just did? To me? He red carded me. What the heck does it mean when the ref raises a card at a spectator?”
“It means you won’t be able to see the rest of the game,” our annoying intruder piped in. “You’ve got to get your ass out of here. And when this game is done, I’m making sure you’re banned permanently. Tell your wife it’s your own fault she’s got to park her butt on the field each week to see your kid’s game.”
Lee cocked a brow and made a sloppy gesture at me. “He’s the wife.”
“Very funny, Leland. Don’t play into his bullshit.”
“Well, we never reached an official agreement on that,” Lee pointed out. “You’re the better parent. I’m pretty sure that makes you the wife. Maybe we should ask our friend sitting behind us?”
“Stop it. Haven’t you annoyed enough people today? Crap, I can’t take you anywhere.”
“I’m not trying to annoy you, Graham. Just having your back here.”
Back here. Lee was incorrigible when he thought he was on a roll—not.
“Oh great. Fucking great. No wonder.” The man’s eyes filled with disdain. “And now you’re going to fight with each other and ruin the game even more than he already has. Why don’t you people take it elsewhere?”
You people?
That did it.
I turned enough in my seat to lock my icy gray stare on him. “Do you want to explain the no wonder and you people comments to me?”
We warred with our eyes and I wasn’t sure which way this would go.
“Graham. It’s all right. And believe me, that guy ain’t worth it.”
My gaze didn’t shift from the piss war I was having with Mr. Soon to be in Pain. “It’s not all right, Lee. I served my country. I’m not going to take shit in California from No-Nuts at a soccer game.”
“We’re surrounded by kids, babe.”
Good point. Time to let this go.
“Babe,” the prick mimicked, kicking up my anger.
I rose to my full six feet four and turned to face my target. To say he was visibly intimidated by my physique and how I towered over him even a step lower would be an understatement.
“You have a problem?” I asked. “You want to go somewhere to settle it like men?”
A second or two of hushed silence all around us.
Then the unthinkable happened: the prick stood up.
Not the way I hoped this would go.
Maybe the guy was wrong in the head.
“You don’t want to do this, friend,” Lee warned as he shot to his feet on my right flank. “Graham’s not been getting a lot of sleep and it makes him a little quick to react, so I suggest you sit down and we all just go back to enjoying the game.”
The man’s jaw gaped as he shook his head, his glare shifting back and forth between Lee and me.
“Jesus Christ. Not only do you people marry now, you procreate in numbers. No wonder the world is so fucked up.”
Damn it.
I’d forgotten the front pouch because Emily had been sleeping so well.
No wonder the jerk wasn’t afraid of what I’d do.
You people a second time, and procreate in numbers—no, not letting that go.
“Lee, take Emily.”
“No. I don’t want you mixing it up with this asshole and I can’t hold both babies at once. You know that.”
“Not so brave now, are you?” Our nemesis sneered at me then turned to Lee. “Don’t let him pussy out of this. He threw down. Take the kid and let him settle this like a man. Or are you afraid your wife can’t take me?”
Lee was seeing red after that. I don’t know what would have happened next. My cell phone rang. I pulled it from my pocket and checked my caller ID.
Shit.
“I’ve got to take this call, Lee,” I informed, rapidly shrugging out of my BabyBjorn and handing off Emily to him.
“That’s it, run off,” the man jeered. “Can’t miss a call from your hairdresser.”
I paused and lifted my shirt so he could see the Glock strapped to my hip. “Not my hairdresser. The FBI. And me leaving right now doesn’t change anything. I can find you, no problem, any time I want. This ain’t over.”
I hurried down the field sideline and was out of earshot of the stands before Lee fell in beside me. “You don’t work for the FBI, baby.”
“I know, but we’re not allowed to say the TDA, and fuck, that jerk wouldn’t know what the acronym meant anyway.”
“Crap,” Lee grumbled. “We can’t even enjoy Ella’s soccer game without the agency calling you. I’m not ready for you to leave again yet.”
I leaned over and kissed him. “You just don’t want to have to try to take care of all three girls by yourself. You’ll figure it out and I’ve got to go return this call. Behave yourself. No more arguing with the ref, and ignore the idiot.”
“Can’t argue with the idiot, Graham. Remember, I got tossed from the game.”
“It doesn’t matter. Game’s almost done. Go to the car, load up the twins, and wait for me.”
I watched him head for the parking lot and grabbed my phone, tapped on the missed call from Jena, and listened to it ring.
“Are you serious?” Her voice boomed into my ear without preamble.
“Yep, serious.”
“You’re resigning from your contract. Again?”
I turned so I could watch Lee struggling to figure out how to get one baby into a car seat without making the other one angry.
“No help for it. I’m needed at home, Jena.”
“For how long?”
Damn it, Lee’d jiggled Olivia so much she was screaming. “As long as it takes for me to get my family squared away and things shipshape at home.”
She let out an aggravated growl. “Family leave. Six months. But I won’t accept your resignation. There are too many hotspots in the world for us to lose you.”
Six months. I debated it.
“Thanks, Jena. We’ll touch base again in six months.” I hung up while she was still arguing with me.
I was halfway to the parking lot when Ella closed in on me. “That was a totally wrong call, wasn’t it, Poppy?”
“You fought through it well and finished the game like a champ.”
She arched a brow. “How do you know? You weren’t in the bleachers. You left when Dad got ejected from the parent area.”
I struggled not to laugh. “I watched the end from right over there.”
Her head tilted as she smiled up at me. “Can I go with my friends for pizza? Mrs. Talbet said she’d bring me home.”
Ah, Talbet, the overdressed desperate housewife. I didn’t like her, but that did get us down one girl for the afternoon. And Lee had looked sexy all flustered and angry.
“If I say yes, you’ve got to promise to behave yourself and be home no later than six.”
She nodded vigorously. “Thanks, Poppy. I will.”
I watched her race back onto the field to her circle of friends, then headed to Lee and the car. He’d gotten the twins into the back seat. They were crying, but that would stop once the car started moving.
As I climbed into the driver’s seat, he jutted his chin toward Ella. “What’s that all about?”
“Pizza this afternoon with her friends. Mrs. Talbet’s bringing her home.”
Lee grimaced as I backed out of our parking spot. “I can’t stand her. Why’d you say yes?”
“We raised Ella well. We need to trust that.” As I stopped at the parking lot exit, I grinned at him. “Besides, that leaves us only the twins and they’re going to be asleep by the time we reach home. Sleeping babies. Tween from the house. You thinking what I’m thinking?”
He moaned in pure agony. “I hope we’re thinking the same thing.”
“Yep. It’s time for you to finish apologizing to me in bed.”
Leland smirked all the way to our house and it didn’t bother me. I was ready to be completely his husband again.
The End