Chapter 6

Sage was at the airport with Hailey. They’d been getting her some clothing that she could take back with her, and they were having a good time. The little girl was like her, nervous at first about the trip, but almost as soon as Rain and Storm joined them, they were having the time of their lives. And spending money had never been so fun for her before.

“I thought that I’d like this dress. Libby has one just like it, but I don’t care for it now.” Sage asked her what she thought was wrong with it. “I don’t know. It’s too tight, which I know I can change, but I don’t like it on me. I’m not as old as they are, can that be it?”

“If you could have anything that you want to wear, what would it be? Nothing that the other little girls have on but something that you want to see if it works on you. And just so you know, I had a top on this morning that was pretty but it felt like it was trying to crawl over me. I had to take it off before I had a panic attack.” They were having fun with just being honest about things. Even when the other two women showed up, they were telling Hailey that her grandparent had entered the hospital and that he was very ill. She asked if she thought he was going to make it.

“No, it doesn’t look good. His only thoughts were that his wife was gone, and he didn’t want to go on without her. I think that happens to a lot of older people nowadays. They don’t have much in the way of family like the Danielsons didn’t, and they just give up when the other one dies. Sad, but it’s true love.” She asked Rain if he’d said anything about her and the little girl. “No. It doesn’t look like he will either.”

Sage didn’t know what that meant, but she figured that he was close to dying, too. Knowing that he’d had a heart attack a few months ago made her think that both of them were on the verge of losing their battles as well. She didn’t know what to think about Hailey and what was going to happen to her.

Getting to the airport in plenty of time, she was thrilled to see that her mom and Stone were talking about something as they came up the runway. They were both seemingly in a great mood and that’s all she thought that she’d ever wanted. As soon as they were close enough for her to get a hug from her mom, Stone told her that they were getting along great and having fun.

“Oh, your husband is such a wonderful person. I’ve spoken to Storm as well. She tells me that the two of you are already wed in the eyes of the law.” Mom leaned closer to her. “She’s sort of scary, too, isn’t she? But I’ve had a wonderful time, and they couldn’t have made me feel any more welcome.”

“I’m glad to hear that. I wanted you to know that I’ve heard from Albert.” Mom stiffened up, telling her that she wanted nothing to do with him. “Good. He asked me where you were, and I, at the time, had no idea where you were at that moment, and I told him that. He said that you owe him for rent as he was tapped out. Again. He has a gambling problem, doesn’t he?”

“Now that I think about it, I’d say that’s a good hard yes. I don’t care for it all that much. I’ll use a roll of nickels when he wants me to go with him until they’re gone, but I don’t bet anything on anything bigger. I have won a few hundred dollars a few times, but I don’t tell him, nor do I share. He doesn’t either if you were going to ask me.” She asked what he spent his money on. “More scratch-offs. The ponies. Most sports games. He’s never any good at the latter, but he still plays. If he’s asking for rent, that means that he didn’t have any of it. We’ll be on the list—no, he’ll be on the list again for not having it. They usually give us thirty days, but here lately, that’s not been working on either.”

“I don’t know him, do I?” She said she’s been with him for nearly twelve years now. “Then no, I don’t know him. He sounds like he’s pissed off a great deal. He told me that if I heard from you, I was supposed to have you call. Something was wrong with your phone. Did you give it to Smokey when she asked for it?”

“I did. Yes. She said that she’d take care that he couldn’t trace me. I don’t know that he’d know enough on how to do that but I’m glad to be done with him.” Mom laughed and hugged her again. “I’m so glad to be here with you. And with your family. I’d like for us to be friends. I think that I’ve burnt the bridges of us being mother and daughter. Who is this lovely little thing with you?”

“This is Hailey. She’s the reason that I’m out here. And that I met Stone. I’m considering her my good luck charm.” Leslie got down on her knees and spoke to the little girl. She was still shy around people and it took a few minutes for her to warm up to her mom. “We’re still waiting on what is to happen to her now that her grandparent is ill.”

“If my daughter is in charge, you can bet that it’ll be done correctly. I don’t know her all that well yet, but I’m sure that she can make things happen when they need to.” Hailey said that she wanted to live with her and Stone. “Well, I don’t know anything about that, but I’m sure they’ll do what is best for you. Sage always did for me when she was a little girl.”

When her mom started tearing up, Stone changed the subject. They talked about what they were going to do for dinner, and since they were already in Columbus, they’d have dinner now. She was glad that she’d only eaten a small salad for lunch when they suggested a steak house. As they were leaving, Hailey held her right hand and her mom the left, she was excited to be able to just be around them all. And hoped that things turned out for all of them.

Mom was giddy to tell her that she could read. She was very quiet about Storm having given her some magic so that she could do it, and was excited to be able to read the menus wherever they went. It was nice to see her mom so happy, and it rubbed off on her.

~*~

Stone kept an eye on the two women. He liked Leslie, all right. There wasn’t much in her mind other than to make up with her daughter and live close to them. Not that she didn’t mind living with them, but she wasn’t going to ask. Neither was Stone. Let the two of them figure that out on their own.

Leslie had broken down in tears on the way back to Ohio. She’d been telling him of the terrible things that she’d done to Sage that had gotten her into trouble. Some of the things weren’t that bad, missing school appointments and not having money for lunches. But there were things that were terrible, too. She’d left her alone as a five-year-old for an entire two weeks so that she could have some fun. But she told him that Sage had done well.

“She’d not missed a day of preschool and did the laundry. What kid do you know does the laundry when they’re just a little bitty thing?” Stone asked her what she’d said about it. “She told me that she needed clean underwear and didn’t know when I’d be back. I should never have left her in the first place.”

“No, you shouldn’t have.” Leslie nodded and looked out the side window, where she could just see the plane’s wing. “She’s doing all right now. Before I became her mate, she was holding down a good job that paid her well and had some friends. She’s been making a lot of them since coming here, too.”

“She was always good at that. Making friends. Mostly to older people, she didn’t know a stranger. It seemed to me like, but she was a good girl. After she left home—I’ll be honest with you and tell you that it took her a while to notice that she was gone—things began to fall apart for me and I sort of lost hope in getting someone to love me again. I know how that sounds. It’s been beating on me since I spoke to her when she called me back. I wasn’t ever a good mother to her, but I want to be a good friend to her now. If you don’t think that it’s too late.”

“It’s never too late for friendship. My family will all tell you when you fuck up. You might want to consider that when you get to our home. Any one of them will take you out if you hurt her too.” She told him how his brother had already told her that. “We all love her to pieces. She’s my all, and I’d die for her.”

Now, they were headed to dinner, and he was glad that he’d invited his parents to come and join them. It was a lot to through at Leslie, but he wanted to get to the point right away that if anyone had a problem with her, they’d never find her body. Old saying? Yes, but he didn’t know any other way to put it than that.

Hailey was getting tired by the time they were ready to leave the nice restaurant. They’d all had a good time and he was surprised to find out that Storm had made it so that Leslie could read. It had been a long time since he’d been around adults who couldn’t read, but her having dyslexia since she’d been born made him realize that teachers now knew how to help someone with that. Leslie might well have been skipped over when she didn’t catch on right away.

Carrying Hailey in his arms, they got into the waiting cars and sat in the seats. He could tell that the two women didn’t know how to act around each other and didn’t care at all when Sage moved to the seat facing him to sit by her mother. They were talking softly when Edwin contacted him.

“Earl passed away about an hour ago.” He said that was a shame, the poor man. “Yes, he’d spoken to his attorney before his wife passed and had the will changed. I don’t know what that means for Hailey, but I’m sure that he’ll have left her something. Probably through Sage, too, if I don’t miss my bet.”

“Are you saying that I should adopt her?” He asked him if he’d already thought that in his heart. “I suppose I have. She’s been a good company for Sage and me when we run out of things to say. She wants to stay with us from now on. Even before we knew that Earl was going to pass.”

“She and Jeffery’s daughters got along well enough, but they’re the same age and girls, so there was a little bit of fighting. Jeffery said that she held her own, but it was too much of a change for her to have sisters around and nothing before.” He asked him if he was going to file the paperwork now. “You’d better be talking to Sage about that. I like her a great deal, but I’m afraid that she’s one of those quiet, crazy women. You know she can go off the handle at a second’s notice.”

“I’m going to tell her that you said that too.” He said if he did, then he’d not tell him when he was going to auctions again. “Christ, that one is tomorrow. I wanted to do with Sage, too.”

“Take your new daughter. It might be good for her to be around more strangers. She seems to come out of her shell the more she’s around you and Sage. How is the mother doing? I hate to say this, but I think that we’re all wondering when and if she drops the other shoe. It wouldn’t hurt me at all to take her out if she so much as breaths the wrong way around either of the women in your life.” He told his brother that he was having a good time with them all. “Good. One thing that I can mark off my list of shit to do.” They both laughed. “I’m going to let you talk to your family, Stone. If you need me, you know all you have to do is reach out. I don’t want anything to happen to any of you now that things are becoming normal around here.”

After closing the connection between him and Edwin, he listened in on the other two’s conversation. Mostly, they talked about the house. There were sprinkles of Albert in there, as well as himself. He was glad to hear Sage say that she loved him, as he loved her so much more than he could count the stars in the heavens. It was wonderful, too. He told himself that they were ready to move some of the other things into their new home that would make it their own. He wished that he’d had a house before now, then negated that. He wouldn’t have this house if he’d done that.

It was nearly totally dark out when they arrived home. He carried Hailey into their home and put her in one of the bedrooms close to their room. Well, it was Sage’s room, but he’d been close by in the event that she needed him. Hailey was nearly asleep when she changed herself into pjs and rolled over to sleep. Stone was still laughing when he made his way down to the bedroom that he’d been using.

The stress of the last week was starting to weigh on him. He’d been fired and found himself a home, a mate, and a daughter. He’d been keeping an eye on Sage in the event that her mother turned out to be some sort of demon. He didn’t really expect her to be a demon, but with this family and their outside families causing trouble, he honestly didn’t know what to expect. He was glad that Leslie had turned out to be all right.

He found Leslie in the kitchen and asked her if she wanted anything. “I would love something to snack on. The time difference is catching up with me. I usually have dinner about now.” He asked her if she wanted something big or small. “Small. Just something to tied me over until breakfast. Do you all eat together?”

“It’s the first time that Hailey has spent the night here, so I don’t know what the plans are. I know that I was supposed to go with my brother to an auction he wants to go to. You can go too if you’d like. It’ll be a nice, fun day for us.” She said she’d never been to an auction before. “They can be a blast if you don’t mind not getting everything that you want. And you should tell yourself that, too. That its all right to not get everything. I usually set myself a budget for the things that I want, and when it goes past that, I’m all right with it, too. Not to say that I sometimes get caught up in the moment and buy something that I didn’t really want, but that’s all right.”

“I’d like to go, but I won’t bid on anything. I don’t have any money anyway. Sage told me that it didn’t matter; she’d make sure that I didn’t have to do without, but I’m betting she didn’t mean me going out and spending a great deal of her money either.” The two of them laughed, and he told her what he’d told Sage. Whatever was his is hers, and hers is for her. “That sort of sounds one-sided. I’m sure you don’t mean that.”

“But I do. I love her very much and now that you’re my mother-in-law, that includes you as well in my family.” She blushed brightly but didn’t say anything more. “There is leftover meatloaf if you’d like some of that. I love cold meatloaf sandwiches very much. With bread and butter pickles on them.”

There was just enough for him to have two thick sandwiches and for Leslie to have one. There were chips to go with it and he noticed that she didn’t eat any of them but did enjoy some carrots instead of chips.

“I know so very little about my daughter. Does she still love Mexican food? Does she douse everything down with hot sauce? She used to do that as a child. I don’t know what her favorite color is or even if she went to college.”

“I don’t know that much about her either. You were told that we’re all wolves, weren’t you?” She told him that she’d been told that several times. “Good, then you’ll know that when we find our other half, our mates, it’s forever. And quick. I fell in love with her before I even knew what she was to me. We were just a couple of people who were looking through a house together, this one, and ended up being mates. I would do anything for her.”

“I would as well if I knew what she needed.” Leslie put the dish that she’d been using on the sink. “I’m a little afraid that Albert is going to show up. He will know where she lives, in Ohio, but maybe not…I couldn’t read then, so I couldn’t tell you if the city was put in the ad announcing that you were off the market. I guess you’re a big deal, aren’t you?”

“I’m just a former kindergarten teacher who just decided that I’d rather be home than going to a job every day. I don’t know that I’ll always feel that way but that’s the way I feel right now. Summer is coming up and I find that I want to go on a long vacation with my little family—that would include you as well and have a blast.” She blushed again. “I’ve been all over this world when it was just starting out. I’d like to see things again that I had some help in making.”

“I don’t have a driver’s license, much less something that will allow me to go on long trips like you’re talking about.” She looked at him again. “You’re a nice man, Stone. I’m so glad that my daughter has someone in her life like you. I want her to be happy.”

“I do as well. And you happy as well.” The two of them started for the stairs, and he heard someone closing a door above them. “That would be Sage, going to check on Hailey again. She’s been a mom for less than a day and already acting like she’s been at it forever.”

“Unlike me.” He said that he’d not meant that. “I know you didn’t. But I know that I was a terrible mother and want to make it up to her if she’ll allow it. If not, then as I said, I’ll be her friend. I think that’s what we’ll end up doing anyway. It’s much too late for me to expect her to call on me for motherly advice.”

Stone didn’t get into the bed that he’d been sleeping in the last couple of nights. He wanted to go on a quick run and then take a nice dip in the pool. As he was sneaking out of the house to do just that, someone cleared their throat. It was Sage.

“I couldn’t sleep. I thought that I’d come down here and mellow out.” He said he’d been thinking of going on a run and then a dip in the pool. “Go ahead and go on your run. I will more than likely go upstairs before you return. Storm was telling me that you and your brothers get together about twice a week to go running. I have to admit, I’m sort of jealous that I can’t do that as well.”

“I don’t know if I can change you or not. We’re still looking into that around our family. My parents weren’t shifters when they first met. In fact, my mom was a wolf and my dad a human.” He told her how they’d met and how his dad had saved the pack when he’d sent his mom back to warn the others that poachers were coming. “It turned out well for them and when we were born, we were the first shifters of wolves ever made. The mother of all the earth, Grace, she keeps tabs on us as well. You’ll have to meet her sometime soon.”

“Of course I will.” He told her he was serious. “If it’s all right with you, I’m still boggled about how much money you have. Let’s just let that settle in for a couple of days before we touch on that again.” He laughed and let his wolf take him.

Stone wanted to hang out with Sage and just talk about things, but he wanted her, too, and thought that if he had this run, like the one he’d had before leaving to get her tonight, he’d be able to stave off his need for her again. As it was now, the pool was getting more use than he’d thought it would with her being around him all the time. He was glad now that the heater hadn’t been turned on, and he could enjoy the quick cold sensations when he needed to.

Not only did he find a couple of the pack out on a run but he was able to join them when they were checking out the properties. They had been hired by Edwin and were being paid good money to keep them all safe. With all the money they had, it would be just like some fool to try and kidnap one of them to get his sorry ass killed. And they would die, too.

The sun was coming up when he went back to the house. Almost thinking that the cold dip would pull him from exhaustion, he did get in and swam laps. After getting out, leaving his towel hanging on one of the many hooks that were there, he dressed himself, just in case someone was awake this time in the morning, and he came in through the back door. The kitchen was alive with laughter, and he thought that it was a sound he could get used to.

Even as tired as he was, he still had pancakes with the women in his family. While Leslie made them, by reading her first ingredients to make something, he thought that they were a little light on the sugar. But he was happy with the results as she was an that made his day that it took so little to bring joy to her face.

After taking a shower, he was ready to meet the day. While he had no idea what was in store for him, he was about as ready as he could be when Edwin asked him to testify at the courthouse in the principal case.

“They don’t need you as a witness as the police were able to apprehend him when he shot at you and Sage, but it might be helpful to his state of mind to tell them what had happened before that. And that you quit. He’s telling everyone that he fired you and that you’d forced his hand in having to shoot at you.” He told him that he’d be glad to do that. “However, the auction is the first thing. I heard from Sage and she and Hailey and her mom were going. This will be a good one for them to get their feet wet in because most of it is box lots.”

Box lots, just junked-up boxes, were things that the auctioneer didn’t find of any value and knew that he’d not make a great deal on. Once, when he’d been looking for some glasses for his home, he’d gotten eleven other boxes when all he’d wanted was the one. He’d sold off most of the things to other collectors of junk and was happy that he’d gotten a nice dozen glass glasses for his condo.

They usually showed up early for these things. About half an hour before the bidding was to begin. Since they were all going in separate cars, he was happy when they arrived first. Hailey and her grandma, he supposed, went to look at the box lots of dolls that were being auctioned off.

“You think she’ll be safe on her own?” Stone laughed and said if she wasn’t they’d learn a great lesson in letting a newbie go by themselves. “She and Hailey have a budget for the things that they want. I’m so glad that you sent them that link so that they could go over some of the things before we got here.”

There weren’t many people there when they arrived. He saw the usual people, ones that had shops that they’d buy junk for. There were also collectables that they’d spend a great deal of money at. He’d never been in any of their shops, but they had to be doing good if they were able to spend as much as it seemed they were buying.

He had to remind himself that he didn’t need anything for his classroom. A few of the parents that were at the auction talked to him about being fired. After explaining what had happened, about the shooting, too, they were applauded by the things that had transpired. It was different than the other man was telling anyone who came to see him.

When the bidding was ready to start, Hailey and Leslie came to join them. He had his eye on a couple of things for the back yard, and he thought that the things that were for swimming, life jackets, and the such would be perfect to have around if the other kids joined them in the pool.

Hailey told him that she was going to see if she could get herself her first doll. It hurt him that she didn’t have anything but he was going to make up for her life up until now. As he started bidding on the box lots, he told Sage to get her the dolls even if she had to pay a hundred bucks a piece for them.

He lost sight of the women for a while. Seeing his brothers and them bragging on the things that they’d gotten, he showed off his glass paperweights he’d gotten for next to nothing in several boxes. Dad was able to find a stand with pipes.

Dad’s passion was to take them apart, clean them up, and resell them for some profit. All his life, he thought that his dad’s natural smell was a mild cherry smell about him. It had been the pipes that he cleaned that made him smell so wonderful. Dad had been doing that since he’d been able to afford to buy his first one.

“I got the dolls.” He asked her how many . “I don’t know if you’re going to be happy with me, but Hailey is over the moon. Not only were there the dolls but there were boxes of clothing too for them. So if you want to be the one to tell her she can’t have three dozen dolls, that’s all on you, Buster. I made her happy, and that’s all I care about.”

“I hurt when she said she’d never had a doll before. Between the two of us, we’ll get her fixed up. There’s doll furniture over here that I can get her. A doll bed with some other things that only a little girl might understand. Even a stroller for one.” She asked him if Hailey could be there when he got them. “I’d love to spend time with the two of you when it’s time for them. I’ve already fallen in love with the little girl.”

“I have as well. The look on her face when she picked up the first doll was like magic. I’ve never wanted to see someone smile as much as I do her.” He nearly lost track of what he was bidding on when he had to wipe at his own eyes. “I’ll see you in a bit. We’re having fun.”

He was able to bid on a few other items. There were some stained glass birds that he liked. At one point in his life, he made glassware for churches and homes. He thought that if he could get the birds for a good price, he could make some nice ornaments for the tree. Speaking of which, there were several of them at this auction.