Chapter 18

Her golden curls were covered by a little straw sunhat with a band of daisies around its brim as Sidney carried Becky’s sleeping form towards the big dark vehicles waiting a stone’s throw from the bottom of the stairs of the jet. It was the middle of the night, just as it had been when they’d left the city. Cody followed closely behind, keeping her head down. Her hair, freshly dyed midnight black, was pulled into a pony tail and mostly hidden beneath one of Sidney’s baseball caps. Just one more concession they’d had to make to the FBI in order to make their return to Pittsburgh feasible. That and the order of a ten foot high metal security gate for his property that was already in a gated community and the hiring of a professional security team, two of whose members would be driving the vehicles idling on the tarmac.

Cody looked up into the serious gaze of a very tall, very burly man with a dark complexion and acne scarred face. He smiled, showing a row of perfectly white teeth. His unexpectedly warm smile made her flinch.

“We’re going to take very good care of you ma’am,” he nodded. Cody knew her eyes were wide but she nodded back and then stepped into the back seat of the SUV and slid across the wide leather bench. Sidney went to hand Becka to this stranger. Cody made a sound of distress and reached for her niece. The big guy might have been hired help but that didn’t mean she trusted him.

With an understanding but tired smile, Sidney handed Becky to her but as soon as he sat down Becky climbed across the seat and back onto his lap. Cody didn’t take umbrage. If she had a choice it’s where she would be too.

“Home,” Sidney reached over to give her hand a squeeze. The word should have conjured images of safety, security, warmth and peace. Right now, in the middle of the night surrounded by men in dark clothes with bulges that let everyone know they were armed. She might have felt secure, for the moment at least, but with that there was none of the warm fuzzy feelings that the word should have created. “It’ll be alright,” Sidney added, giving her hand another squeeze and sending an encouraging look her direction.

Cody nodded and tried her best to smile but all of the warnings that the real FBI agents had given them before they had left still had her stomach in knots. There were serious men who were seriously hunting them to seriously kill them and big muscle heads with guns was no guarantee of their safety, not if someone really wanted them dead. It was kind of a lot to take in.

“You’re crazy,” she breathed, not for the first time. Sid’s smile grew.

“For you,” he replied with a wide, toothy grin. His eyes crinkled and he laughed when she made a face at him and stuck out her tongue.

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He paused at the foot of the stairs, listening to the sound of voices above them. At that moment he wished he wasn’t carrying Becky in his arms. He heard Cody’s sharp intake of breath behind him, knew her pulse would be racing just like his was. He wanted to call out to the big man with the gun standing outside the front door he’d just closed. He wondered if that would scare off the intruders, if they’d run outside and get gunned down in his driveway.

That would certainly make for an interesting story for the morning Gazette, he thought as he took another step up. He was glad the stairs weren’t old, that they didn’t creak and that he’d had a carpet runner put on them to stifle the sound of his shoes on the hardwood.

There was a light on, he could tell as he reached half way. ‘Fuckers’, he thought grimly, ‘I wonder if they’ve eaten the food in my fridge too?’ He turned and handed Becky silently to Dakota. The little golden haired angle stirred in her sleep and then tucked her head under Cody’s chin and stuck her thumb in her mouth.

“Stay here,” he whispered and then turned and headed slowly up the stairs, trying to stay as silent as he could.

“About fucking time you got home, mon ami.” Sid stopped, his foot hovering above the top stair. A grin broke out across his face.

“Jesus Max, you scared the shit out of me,” he laughed, exhaling the breath he had been holding as he saw Max’s head appear above the back of the couch wearing a grin that could only be described as one the Joker in Batman would wear right before doing something unspeakable.

“Someone had to be here when you got back. Welcome home Cap!” his friend exclaimed as he climbed over the back of the couch, right before another head sheepishly popped over the back of the couch as she readjusted her glasses and made an unsuccessful swipe at fixing her bobbed dark hair which had the look of having had fingers run through it, at the very least.

“Making yourself at home, I see,” Sidney pitched his voice low as Max thumped him on the back in welcome.

“Well what was I supposed to do? Sit and watch movies by myself?” Max asked, looking crushed by the very thought. Sid found himself grinning. It was good to know some things never changed. “Besides, your new nanny, très jolie, non?” His smile erased, Sid groaned. Had it been Flower waiting up for their arrival, this wouldn’t have happened.

“Maaaxxx,” he moaned but couldn’t complete his complaint as a pair of blue eyes fluttered open and looked up at him.

“Teddy?” Becky asked and then yawned wide. 

“Right here,” Cody appeared beside him to take the bright blue bear out from under his arm. “Let me,” she continued with a bemused glance towards Max. “Which way is her room?”

“We set up her room down the hall,” Max replied brightly, as if he hadn’t just been caught shagging the babysitter. “Vero painted some really cool Winnie the Pooh stuff on the walls I put up the border. Flower just hung the mobile,” he added, with his best butter wouldn’t melt smile on his face. “You must be Dakota. Creature’s been telling us all about you.”

“Creature?” Cody raised an eyebrow as Sid leaned in to press a good night kiss to Becky’s round, warm cheek.

“I’ll explain later,” Sid sighed watching her turn to head down the hall.

“I’ll help,” the nanny that Nathalie had hired, having gotten herself straightened out suddenly appeared at Cody’s side. He felt himself stiffen, waiting for Cody to curtly dismiss the woman who had to be around their own age but with a roll of her eyes in his direction she nodded and both women disappeared around the corner.

“Je ne résiste jamais à une grosse belle derrière,” Max shrugged and Sid grinned back at him. It was nearly impossible to stay mad at Max.

“It’s good to be back,” he sighed, following Max to the couch and letting himself fall into it. He closed his eyes for a long moment to allow the familiar scents and sensations of home begin to ease the tension that had manifested itself in a slow, dull throb at the back of his head.

“So, CIA, FBI, what’s next, a tank on the front lawn firing shots at curious puck bunnies?” This was the reason Max was one of his best friends, Sid thought as a smile crept across his lips. No matter what was happening, Max somehow managed to find a way to lighten the mood. A vision of a tank that shot pucks like a slap shot from the point filled his imagination.

Not that he’d ever really partaken in the line up of puck bunnies in the way that say Jordan and Max had but Sid shook his head. “No more puck-fucks. Not for me,” he sighed and then leaned forward and dropped his head into his hands so he could rub his temples. His head was really beginning to ache.

“She must be really something, this mob moll of yours,” Max prompted. Sid raised his head enough to look over at his friend to see if he was making fun of him and he could tell by his raised eyebrow that Max was, kind of, but there was concern in his friend’s blue eyes too.

“She is,” Sid replied quietly but firmly. “She really is.” 

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She’d never had a room like this. She was sure that Becky had never had a room like this. Dakota made a mental note to thank anyone and everyone that had obviously put in time and energy to make a room as welcoming and as gorgeous as this one was. As soon as she turned on the overhead light, she felt like she was standing in the middle of the hundred acre wood, including what seemed like real tree branches fanning out over the small bed like a protective canopy with hidden fairy lights blinking on and off like fireflies.

“Wow,” she whispered looking around at the various murals that covered each of the walls containing the familiar characters from the stories, Kanga and Roo, Owl, Tigger and of course Pooh with his jar of honey. “Someone did a lot of work.”

“The guys mostly did the tree and the lights and filling in but Veronique...that’s Marc Andre’s girlfriend, she did most of this.” Cody didn’t turn to face the young woman who was hovering anxiously in the doorway behind her, mostly because she couldn’t help but sort of enjoy the nervous energy coming off of her. It was kind of cruel but she wanted the girl to squirm, just a little. “Ummm I’m Mel and I am soooo sorry about what happened, you know...before.”

Dakota put Becky gently down on the small bed and started to peel the old fashioned patchwork quilt down around her as her niece grumbled and turned over onto her side, her teddy clutched tightly to her chest. Once she had her under the quilt, she bent over her, tugged off the sun hat and pressed a kiss to her forehead.

“From what I’ve been told,” she replied quietly, “Max can be quite...,” Dakota hunted for a long moment about the right word, tried to remember how Sidney had described his incorrigible friend.

“I think the word you’re looking for is irresistible,” Mel sighed and Cody turned to find the woman smiling though her face had turned a deep shade of rose.

“Mmmm, not sure that’s what I was going for, but I’ll take your word for it,” Cody chuckled as she lead the woman out of the room and turned out the light. “I’m not going to make you promise it will never happen again,” she continued once the door was closed part way behind them, “but the only reason I haven’t bounced you down the stairs on your head is that Sid’s boss recommended you for this position and...well, we don’t have a lot of people that we can trust right now,” she added, searching the woman’s face for a long, silent moment. She had a pleasant face, open and honest looking with bright eyes and an infectious smile. “I guess what I’m asking is, can you keep the...Max thing separate from looking after my niece? Nothing can distract you and I mean nothing,” she added seriously.

The woman, Mel, nodded and after a moment, so did Cody. ‘Not that I trust her’, she told herself as she indicated that she’d follow the woman down the hall, ‘but I think I’ll fall down dead if I don’t sleep soon,’ she thought as they both rounded the corner to find the boys deep in conversation.

“So you’re not ready to play?” Max was asking and Sid was shaking his head. Cody felt her chest tighten. She knew he wanted to, that he would rather not be giving that answer, but she also knew that he’d been seeing white spots dancing in front of his eyes for the best part of the last day.

“Not yet,” she answered for him. He shot her a grateful look as she slid onto the arm of the couch and reached for his hand. “You just need a little more time, dontcha babe?” she added quietly.

“Yeah, maybe in a week. I’ll see the doc tomorrow and I guess I’ll know better then.” She watched him send a more confident smile to his friend. “But first and fucking foremost I need to sleep and you need to take the baby sitter home,” he added and then winced but this time, she could tell by the smile that quickly followed that he wasn’t in pain. “I mean her home Max, her home.” Max feigned a shot direct to the heart and collapsed back on the couch and played dead. “Never mind, I don’t want to know. Do what you want,” Sid grumbled but smiled at his friend. The woman, Mel, turned crimson. “Just have her back here before practice tomorrow.” 

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“I’m sorry about Max,” Sidney sighed as he stepped out of his jeans and left them on the floor beside the bed. Cody let her gaze roam lazily up his thickly muscled legs to his bare, smooth skinned torso. It was a nice view, even if she knew she was far too tired to do anything about it.

“From what you’ve told me about him, I’m not sure I would have expected anything less,” she mused as he turned out his bedside light and slid beneath the quilt, tucking his body in next to hers’.

“He can be pretty...persuasive,” she heard the smile in his voice as he slid his arm over her waist and tucked his knees in behind hers’, “but if Nathalie says she’s great...”

“We’ll give her a chance,” she finished his thought and heard his relieved sigh right before he pressed his lips to her shoulder. “Glad to be home?” she asked as the warmth of his body and the heavy comforter began to lull her to sleep.

“Ask me again tomorrow,” he yawned. Cody closed her eyes and nestled herself down into the warm clean sheets. The house was quiet and dark. The only noise was the slow, even sounds of Sidney breathing.

“Everything will be okay, right?” she asked in a whisper as she laced her fingers in his and pulled his hand up beneath her chin.

“I sure as hell hope so,” he answered, pressing his lips to the back of her neck. “We’ll start figuring things out in the morning,” he added like a promise in a voice that trailed off into a long yawn and then she felt his hold on her tighten as he too nestled himself further into the sheets. “Guards outside. Go to sleep. Worry...tomorrow,” he mumbled and then she heard his breathing slow and deepen as his body relaxed heavily against her own. Taking a deep breath Cody closed her eyes again and matched her breathing to his, emptied her mind and let sleep take her too.

Chapter 17

He’d woken with a pounding behind his left eye, the feeling that someone or something was trying to drive a railway spike through his head. It hadn’t been this bad since that first morning after the Tampa game, after he’d woken up for the second time with a throbbing head and churning gut. He wasn’t nauseous now, but he would be if he got up, if he tried to eat.

She seemed to sense it, or saw him wince when she opened the curtains. Either way, the curtains were quickly and tightly drawn and when Cody came back from the bathroom wrapped in a gauzy white robe she had two Advil and a glass of water which he took gratefully. She took the glass back and then reached with her other hand to run her fingers briefly through his hair.

“Stay in bed today?” she asked in a whisper. He was about to argue, say he’d be fine in a few minutes, but the door swung open and Becky burst in, already in her swimsuit, her pail clutched tightly in her chubby little fist.

“Sidwheee come make castle?” she asked, beaming up at him. He winced and his stomach rolled threateningly. The little girl’s enormous blue eyes searched his face and she frowned. “Sidwhee sick?” she turned and looked up at her Aunt who reached down and ran her fingers through Becky’s curls.

“That’s right. So that means we have to be very, very quiet,” Cody explained, “and it also means that Sidney won’t be able to help with the sand castles today.” Becky didn’t try to hide her disappointment as her little shoulders drooped and her bottom lip trembled, but she nodded anyway and turned to leave the room. Sidney watched Cody guiding Becky away and sighed. The guilt made his stomach churn but for the first time it wasn’t about Flower and Jordy and Max and the boys. Now it was about a little girl who, unlike his teammates, couldn’t be expected to understand that a jackass had hit him in the head, on purpose, and there were just going to be days like this.

He hadn’t had a headache like this for weeks, maybe months, Sidney thought as he closed his eyes and pulled the comforter back up to his chin. He’d actually started to believe that he was better, or at least well on the way to recovery. A few more days of surf and sand and Dakota’s body moving rhythmically beneath his and he’d be able to return to the Pens locker room and the team.

He could already hear his doctor ‘tsking’ away about how he’d overdone it last night. Just the thought of how many times he’d brought her shuddering in his arms made Sid smile, but that made his head hurt worse.

Turning onto his stomach Sid buried his face in the pillow and cursed loud and long. It hurt his head but letting it out made him feel better, for a moment or two anyway. Now that she’d admitted it, now that he felt in the way she’d curled up against him and allowed him to hold her as she slept, he’d wanted to spend the day proving in every little way that he could think of how much he loved her. Now he was stuck in the dark, with a jackhammer in his head, hating his life.

‘Tension just makes it worse’, the doctor had warned him and with that warning in his head, Sidney rolled onto his back, closed his eyes and tried to think of nothing at all. The only problem was he couldn’t shut his brain off, as much as he wanted to, and he couldn’t seem to ignore the voice in the back of his head that was telling him he was fucking up.

Not just by staying in bed and not just by disappointing Becky either.  That voice that wouldn’t shut the fuck up was telling him that he was making a mistake and that this was a dream world and it didn’t matter how he felt now because once they were back in the Burgh it would all be different.

Sidney rolled onto his side and stared at the closed curtains. He wanted to tell the voice to shut up, that it was wrong, but the pounding in his head that told him that he was human and broken also reminded him that he’d never made a relationship work, not when he was playing hockey and he wanted to play hockey again, very much.

_______________________________________________________________________

She watched her like a hawk, like a protective mother bear, looking for a single nuance, any momentary change in expression that would hint that Becky’s seemingly happy go lucky exterior was in any way masking symptoms that would need to be dealt with. The more she watched from her towel on the beach, having not so much as flipped a single page in her book, the more Cody was beginning to think that her niece was as resilient as Sidney seemed to think that she was.

She didn’t cry when one of the other kids took her pail, she did put a handful of sand down the back of his shorts and then ran away laughing. She didn’t shy away from any of the guards when the big men were forced to coral her when her hunt for seashells took her too far from their comfort zone. She giggled when they picked her up under their arm like a sack of flour. There was no sign of the rocking that Cody had seen on the trip to Pittsburgh. No night terrors. No wet sheets. She seemed....perfectly normal.

“If you look hard enough you might start seeing things that aren’t there.” Cody looked up to find Sidney standing over her, towel draped casually over his round shoulder, a Pittsburgh Pirates baseball cap pulled down low over his sunglasses. “She’s fine Codes, and if she’s not...we’ll deal with it as it comes.” Cody shrugged and returned her attention to the where Becky was skipping along the very edge of the water, shrieking whenever the water swept up and over her toes.

“We huh?” Cody moved over to make room for him as he knelt on the sand beside her.

“You’re not gonna start that again,” he sighed and though she couldn’t see his eyes, she imagined him rolling them behind the dark lenses of his Ray-Bans.

“I just can’t imagine you having time with all your...superstarness,” she teased, reaching over with her foot to push against his. That earned her the briefest shadow of a smile.

“If it’ll make you feel any better,” he said quietly, his hand sliding over hers’, “we can take her to the best doctors in Pittsburgh and if they’re not good enough....”

“I’m sure they are, will be,” she insisted, quickly catching on that he wasn’t in a kidding kind of mood. She glanced sideways at him but he was staring straight ahead. Not at the girls playing in the sand, just...ahead. “Still no better?” she asked, pitching her voice low.

“It’s better...ish,” he mumbled, wincing as one of the girls let out a high pitched squeal as a bucket of water was dumped over her head.

“You don’t have to be out here,” she told him as he withdrew his hand and pulled his knees up to his chest, wrapping his arms around them. The sight of all those muscles working was enough to make her catch her breath. The way his jaw worked as he clenched his teeth...that made her worry.

“I’m fine, okay?” he snapped, an irritated tone in his voice that made it very clear he didn’t want to talk about it. Cody flinched and then climbed to her feet.

“Good, I’m glad,” she mumbled and sent a sideways glance his direction. “Is there anything that I can...do?” she asked, reaching over to brush her fingers along his thigh.

“No, fuck...no one can do anything,” he snarled, continuing to stare straight ahead, his jaw clenched, anger written in every tensed muscle in his body. Cody let her fingers fall away from his leg and onto the beach towel.

He had every right to be cantankerous, she told herself, considering the obvious strength of the symptoms of his head injury that currently had him staring broodily at the water. Not that they’d every really discussed the topic. She knew. Everyone in Canada and any hockey fan in the States knew about the subsequent hits that had laid the greatest player in the game low.

“We could talk about it, about what you’re feeling?” she suggested, almost under her breath.

“Don’t wanna talk,” he snarled back, teeth clenched, snarling like some kind of crazed wolf. It hurt, stung. After everything that had happened in the last few hours, it felt hard to believe that he would shut her out like that. One look at the tense way he was holding his jaw told her that there was no use arguing the point.

Even so, she decided as she got up, walked down the beach and crept up behind Becky, she didn’t have to like his tone and she didn’t have to keep him company while he sulked.

“Gotcha!” she laughed as she grabbed her niece and swung her up in the air. Becky let out an ear piercing screech and part of Cody felt bad about that, but part of her didn’t. 

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“You knew this might happen,” the doctor’s voice on the other end of the line was firm but gentle. Sid mused that he thought he was probably using his bed side manner, soothing but honest.

“Yeah, good days and bad,” Sid replied with a sigh, sitting back on the bed, letting himself sink into the pillows and closing his eyes.

“It would be helpful to be able to run some tests, do a CAT scan,” the doc continued and Sid nodded mutely. He’d been a lab rat so long he never protested when someone wanted to poke holes in him or send radioactive isotopes coursing through his body. “I’m fairly certain nothing’s changed,” the doctor continued and Sid didn’t need to hear the rest to know what he’d say.

“Yeah, I know, better to be safe than sorry,” he mumbled, letting his head loll forward.

“It happens infrequently but brain bleed do occure...,” the doc began but Sidney ignored the doctor’s worst case scenario. His head hurt, yeah, like hell, but that wasn’t the worst of it.

“What were the other symptoms I was supposed to let you know about?” Sidney asked quietly, rubbing at the tightness in the back of his neck.

“Other symptoms? Like nausea, vomiting,” the doctor began but paused when Sid let rip a frustrated growl.

“No! I mean...y’know, the mental stuff.” He was doing his best not to snap at the doctor the way he had at Cody. That was why she and Becky were eating with the Consular and his wife and he was sitting alone in their room. Not that he blamed her for avoiding him. It had to be confusing to be his whole world one minute and tossed aside like a toy that had lost its lustre the next. Not to mention her wanting to shield Becky from the angry wolf.

“Are you having problems remembering things?” the doctor asked in a way that made Sidney picturing the older man in his white coat pulling out a checklist and licking the end of his pencil, ready to start ticking boxes.

“No, not like that like...moods or whatever,” Sidney curled his free hand into a fist and slammed it into a pillow.

“Anxiety, depression, restlessness,” the doctor began naming off the symptoms, “mood swings, intolerance to stress, emotional incontinence....”

“Yeah, that stuff,” Sid’s eyes popped open as he recognized the way he was feeling, “Didn’t you say it was like being bi-polar or something?” he muttered, trying to explain it. The doctor made a sound, one of those thinking sounds and Sid did his best to show a little bit of patience while he waited for the answer.

“Maybe if I understood the context,” the doc finally prompted him. This was the part where Sid was glad he wasn’t sitting in a doctor’s office with the older man looking at him over his bifocals. He squirmed enough without having someone actually watching him do it.

“It has to do with a woman,” he began with a sigh.

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Becky had wanted to sleep over with one of the Consular’s daughters. It had taken every last ounce of faith that Cody had to send her across the courtyard in her pyjamas, her bear tucked under her arm. She watched her go until the Consular’s wife, one of those Betty Draper types in a twinset with pearls and heels, waved and shut the door.

“She’ll be fine.” Cody shut her eyes and leaned back into Sidney’s now familiar arms. He had a bottle of wine in one hand. “Let’s go for a walk,” he suggested.

“Sure that’s good for your head,” she replied, maybe a little bitterly. He’d have been better at the small talk at dinner and his absence had been noted.

“It is better now and I’m sorry for being an ass earlier,” he said, kissing her temple and managing to sound truly remorseful. She was glad he didn’t say ‘if he’d been an ass’. It saved her from having to correct him.

“Don’t we need glasses?” she asked, looking down at where his free hand was stroking along her arm.

“I won’t tell if you don’t.” His chuckle was masculine and throaty but there was a certain edge to it that set off alarm bells in her head.

“I’ll just get something to put on over this,” she said, looking down at the light sundress she was wearing. It had been the kind of warm that makes your skin moist but now there was a wind coming off the ocean that was sending goose-bumps up her arms.

“Here,” he whispered, sliding a dark hoodie from under his arm and handing it to her. Cody unfolded it and smiled. It was one of his, a black and gold Penguins hoodie. It would fit like another dress, but it would be warm. With a shrug she pulled it on and zipped it up to her chin. The sleeves hung over her hands but that was okay. She didn’t really want to hold hands with him right that moment anyway.

He didn’t seem to notice, or at least he didn’t remark on her crossing her arms in front of her chest as they started down the path to the beach walking side by side. The only sound was the ebb and flow of the waves licking the beach. She’d thought it was a comforting sound before. Tonight it was a lonesome sound.

She kicked off the ballet flats she was wearing as they hit the sand, considered carrying them and then left them on the edge of the walk way. She could feel, even if she couldn’t see the agent following near behind them. If they weren’t going to let anyone kidnap them, she supposed they weren’t going to let anyone steal her cheap flats either.

“So, bad headache today?” she asked as she dug her toes into the sand. The sensation of the still warm sand underfoot made her think of that night they’d snuck out of their hotel room. She wanted to be able to smile at the memory of what they had done together out on the sand. She still couldn’t.

“Yeah.” His monosyllabic answer made her tense. She glanced sideways at him. He was looking down, at his feet.

“We have to go back soon, don’t we?” Cody asked as they walked. He didn’t reply. It was answer enough. “Are you worried about playing? Or about us?” she asked quietly, trying to read his expression. Sometimes he was easy to read, like when he smiled, or when he looked at her the way he had this morning when she’d woken up in his arms. Now though, as he stared out over the black inky darkness, she had no idea what he was thinking, except that it wasn’t about her, or not specifically.

“Maybe a little of both,” he admitted quietly before finally stopping and turning to look at her. “I am worried about going back,” he paused and then sighed, finally reaching for her hand. This time she let him take it. He ran his thumb along her knuckles. “When you said you didn’t think that I’d have time for you...I want to make sure that I do. I...I don’t know if I’m good at this. I mean...I want to be but I’m afraid I won’t be.”

“Are you...is this the ‘it’s not you it’s me’ speech?” she asked, her heart racing, pulse jumping.

“What?” he looked startled, flushed. He stared at her, unblinking for a long moment and then, finally, shook his head. “No. Fuck...no. No...I mean...I’m just saying that if, when we get back, if I turn into an asshole...it’s not you.”

“See it is the ‘it’s not you it’s me’ speech,” she muttered, staring down at their joined hands.

“I said when we get back. I want you to come back to Pittsburgh with me and I don’t mean back to your place and my place but...I want you to come back with me. Dakota...I want you, both of you to move in with me.”