Chapter Eleven
Sadie
Two Weeks Later
It’s Friday, finally. I am ready for the weekend so I can sit at home and do nothing.
The last two weeks have been peaceful, but work has been crazy.
We launched a new version of our in-home virtual assistant on Wednesday.
Yesterday we spent all day in meetings, but today should be pretty easygoing.
The only problem is that I woke up with a raging migraine.
I have the blanket pulled over my face so that the guys can get ready for work, so that the light doesn’t cause my brain to explode.
They’re being as quiet as possible because the slightest noise makes pain shoot through my head.
I’m trying my best to avoid getting sick because it will just make my headache worse.
“Hey,” Mason says softly, pulling the blanket away. “The light is off.”
“My head hurts so bad,” I groan.
“I know, baby. Take this,” he says as he puts my medicine in my hand. I put the pill in my mouth, and he hands me my bottle of water to wash it down with. “Todd is working from home today, so he’s just going to come hang out here.”
“Okay,” I whisper. “Tell him to come tell me when he’s here so he doesn’t scare me.”
“Okay. If your head gets any worse, have Todd take you to the doctor and call us. Okay?” Mason says before gently kissing my forehead.
“Get some rest, Little Demon,” Dean says quietly. He and Lance kiss me gently before leaving me to rest. I hear the front door shut around the time that the dizziness that my medication creates hits me. I slip into medication-induced dreams.
“Sadie,” I hear Todd call out to me. There’s a sense of urgency in his voice that makes my eyes fly open. “Fuck. There you are.”
“What’s wrong?” I mumble and run my hands down my face.
“I’ve been trying to wake you for hours. You were scaring me,” he says as he sits beside me. “How do you feel?”
“Better than this morning,” I say with a sigh. “What time is it?”
“A little after two,” he says. “You should get up and eat lunch.”
“Yeah, I haven’t eaten since dinner last night,” I say as I slowly sit up. I get out of bed and stretch before Todd, and I walk out of the room. The light still hurts my eyes a bit, but it’s not nearly as bad as earlier when I first got up.
“Sit, and I’ll make you something,” Todd says. I nod and pull myself up to sit on the counter.
“Why do you care so much?” I ask after a few minutes of silence. Todd sets the spatula down and turns to face me.
“Why do I care?” he asks, and I nod. “I don’t know if you know this, but you are my friend. Friends generally take care of each other when they need it with no expectation of anything in return.”
“Yeah, but you’ve spent your entire day here yet again while I just… slept,” I say.
“Call me crazy, but I like taking care of my friend so she doesn’t pass out in the kitchen only to be found hours later,” he says.
“So it is for me, not a favor to them?” I ask.
“Of course, Sadie. All of this is for you,” he says. “Where is this coming from?”
“I don’t know. Sometimes I just feel like you all only put up with me because the guys would flip shit if you didn’t,” I shrug.
“Doll, if I didn’t want to help you, I wouldn’t be here.”
“Don’t you get bored?” I ask.
“Not really. I just do some work and go in and check on you every now and again,” he says as he plates my food and hands it to me. He puts food on a plate for himself and leans against the kitchen island to eat.
“Hey, hey,” Leo calls out from the living room.
“We’re in here,” I reply.
“Hey, man,” Todd says. “What are you doing here?”
“Dean said Sadie wasn’t feeling well, and I had to drive this direction anyway, so I just wanted to see how things were,” he answers.
“Well, that’s sweet of you,” I smile. “I’m good. Migraine is mostly gone. How are you?”
“I’m okay,” he says with a kind smile.
“How’s work been?” I ask as I eat.
“Oh… It’s going,” he chuckles. Leo is an electrician and has a house up the road that he is working on, so he stops in occasionally. “We should be wrapped up in the next week or so.”
“That’s good,” I say as I get off the counter and take Todd’s empty plate from him. Once I get it loaded into the dishwasher, we go to the living room. Todd packs up his work stuff and turns to face me.
“Are you good? I need to go pick Stacy up. Her car is in Billy’s shop,” he says. “I don’t want to leave if you’re taking more medicine.”
“No, I’m okay,” I say. “It’s basically gone now.”
“Okay. Stacy and I will be back later on tonight when the guys are home. The guys are going to force you into a game night,” he says as he hugs me.
“They always pick games I suck at,” I laugh. “I’ll be a good sport and join game night.”
“Atta girl,” he nods. “Okay. Just call me if you need me. Lance called earlier and said they would be home around six or so.”
“Okay. Drive safe,” I say before he steps out of the house and shuts the door behind him.
“Six? Don’t they usually get home sooner than that?” Leo asks as he slips his phone into his jeans pocket.
“Yeah. They must have had something come up,” I say. “You know you can sit, Leo.”
“I’m going to leave here in just a few minutes,” he says. “Who’s coming for game night?”
“No idea,” I shrug. “Last time it was everyone.”
“Yeah, that was fun,” he laughs. A knock at the door pulls my attention.
“Todd probably left something,” I say as I get off the couch. “And it was only fun because you won.”
“Yeah,” he says. “I do like winning.”
“Why did you knock?” I start to say when I open the door. I gasp and take a step back when it’s not Todd who takes a quick step into the house before I can shut the door. “You need to leave, Paul.”
I am still backing away from him. Nothing good will come from him being here. He shouldn’t even have my address. I try to swallow the lump in my throat as anxiety starts to pool inside me.
“Ah!” Paul says happily. “You’ve met my cousin, Leo. Small world, isn’t it, Bunny?”
“Fuck,” I mutter when I take another step back, and Leo grabs my waist and stops me.
I don’t even need to ask to understand that Leo has been playing me since high school.
I’ve got to hand it to him, though. He played that role pretty fucking well to pretend not to be a two-faced little fucker.
I can’t imagine the guys will take well to this.
Something in the way Paul is grinning at me tells me that I won’t be around to find out what their reaction is.
I pull away and attempt to run for the back door. I can easily cross over the creek to get onto the neighbor’s property. I get as far as the doorway to the kitchen before one of them grabs me by the hair and pulls me to a stop.
“Stop it!” I scream. I try to pry the hand out of my hair, but an arm snakes around my waist and pulls me against their body.
“I’ve missed you, Bunny,” Paul says. “We have so much time to make up for.”
“Please don’t, Paul,” I say as tears flood my cheeks. He has his hand on my neck and presses in on the side. I am almost immediately woozy.
“Don’t worry. I’ll be gentle,” he says as everything goes dark and my body slumps.