Adjournment (The Fate Series) (42 page)

“People will come looking for us, you know… they’ll realize we’re missing.” Molly starts to struggle against Dean.

“Not if they’re already here,” he says putting her down once we’re all inside the yard.

Chase and Simon put us down next to her. The three of us stand here slack-jawed in awe as Lexi, Jacob, Tyler, Josh, and Mea are swimming in the half-below, half-above ground stone pool.

A long arched pergola rounded in the center stretches across the entire back of the house, with small stone dividing walls sectioning off different sitting areas. Under the center of the pergola is a sunken outdoor stone bar that seats seven in the dry area, and I’m not sure how many at the side that’s shared with the pool. To the left of the bar, a chef is working in a stone and stainless steel kitchen that is attached to the indoor kitchen and also sits lower than the pool. To the right of the bar are the steps to get from where we are standing down to the bar and lounge area. .

“You have dry seating in the middle of your pool!” Molly shrieks, running down the stone steps that lead to a round sitting area in the middle of their enormous pool. “Is this a fire glass pit?” she screams out in excitement.

I haven’t been here is a long time but… wow.

“You three actually know what you’re doing,” I breathe, walking around the pool to take it all in.

“Of course we know what we’re doing. What do we look like a bunch of idiots?” Chase shouts offended.

Raising an eyebrow at him, he holds his hands up in defeat.

“I call you idiots all the time and you never get upset,” I hear Grams yell.

I squint and shake my head at Chase.

“What was I supposed to do… leave an old woman behind to fend for herself?” He throws his arms out.

Morgan smacks his head when she walks past him to look around for Grams.

“I’m relaxing over here watching this very handsome young man make me barbeque pizza,” she hums from her hiding spot.

By young she means early sixties.

“What no spiral water slide?” I tease.

“I told you! No one ever listens to me!” Dean shouts. He walks down to the seating area where Molly is and turns on the fire pit.

“Well, do you like it?” Simon grins knocking his elbow against mine.

I love it, and I’m going to start hanging out here instead of our house. Wait, what am I saying? Whatever this is, is done tomorrow.

“It’s a little ostentatious for my taste.” I give an unimpressed look.

It’s beautiful and so not Judith.

“So, will you stay?” Simon smiles, holding out his hand.

Giving a heavy sigh I take his hand.

“Well, you’ve taken my friends and Grams hostage… I guess I’m left with no choice.”

He really did leave me with no choice.

“See, I told you taking the old woman was a good idea.” Chase gives an ‘I told you so’ grin.

“Sidney, I’m really happy we got to meet like this.” Mea beams as we walk over to the bar.

Here it comes.

“Why do I get the feeling you’re about to ask me to do something that I’m probably not going to want to do.” I wrinkle my face at her.

“Because I’ve mastered this look from your sisters?” Her smile widens.

“Out with it,” I deadpan.

“Well, as you know, people don’t know that we are married… and we need you all… you all meaning Lexi, Jacob, and you to sign NDAs.” She cringes.

“Oh… is that all? I thought you were going to ask me to actually do something for you. Like cover a murder or something.” I laugh, hopping into a chair.

Her face goes serious for a second and then she smiles. “So you don’t mind?”

“Well, I don’t mind. Deception is my middle name…” I give a small dance in my seat.

“Amen to that!” Chase interrupts me.

Sending him a dirty look, I continue, “But Lexi is terrible at keeping secrets… however, if you wave lawsuit in front of her she might be able to keep her trap shut,” I snicker.

Lexi sends me an evil look before turning to Mea and smiling. “I can keep it shut, it’s not like you’re going to be onset. Out of sight, out of mind right.” She nods.

“Yeah—that’s the thing. I do go to set…” She cringes again.

Lexi’s face falls. “I don’t understand… what do you do on set?” She stares at her.

“Oh, well, that’s easy, I’m his assistant.” She leans back into him cupping his jaw with her hand.

You’ve got to be kidding me.

“And do you often take your assistants to Fourth of July parties?” I glare at him.

“Well yes… I guess… why?” he gives me a confused look.

“Just wondering.” I shrug.

The chef brings the pizzas over and lays them down on the bar in front of us.

“Gram’s? Pizza!” Morgan shouts over to her.

“No thanks, Lovey… we’ll eat over here,” she sings back.

Choking down a gag, Morgan looks at me.

“We?” I cover my mouth to laugh.

With a slight shudder, Dean tries to change the subject.

“So are we breaking into girls vs. guys… Chandler’s vs. McAllisters…” He smiles cracking his fingers.

“There’s more guys than girls… so that’s out…” Molly sighs, taking a bite.

“But we only need a few, you guys are terrible, and Sidney hasn’t played in years,” Chase brags.

“Hey!” Morgan shouts and slaps him in the head.

“Sid, if you don’t want to play, it’s okay… I know how it’s not your thing anymore.” Molly frowns at me.

“And pass up the opportunity to shoot them? I don’t think so. I am so in!” I clap, rubbing my hands together.

“Did you even bring your gun?” Morgan says into her drink.

“I have stuff, don’t worry.” I manage to hold back my overly joyous smile.

I’ve been waiting for tomorrow.

“Well, I say we call it a night. We have to be on the road for seven am…” Josh stretches as he stands up.

Who decided it would be a good idea to wake up early and shoot each other with paint?

“Agreed,” we all say at the same time.

“Would you ladies like us to walk you home?” Dean smiles as he kisses Molly’s hand.

“Nope… See you tomorrow,” she smirks, yanking her hand back.

“And so it begins,” Simon muses from behind us.

I take my lip between my teeth to hold in laughter as I continue to walk away.

He has no idea.

Who knew cake in bed could be so good?

Molly’s fingers work like crazy to text Dean as we walk up the steps to our rooms. No doubt telling him to sneak up the back steps… traitor.

“I’ll see you both in the morning,” she says turning off her screen and walking quickly to her room.

“No meeting? No strategies on how we should take them out?” Morgan smiles at her.

“Umm—I’m really tired actually. We can go over it all tomorrow. Besides Dad is going to want to have one of his
meetings
in the morning, so why do it twice… right?” She practically trips over herself as she walks backwards to her room.

“Good point… okay, well, goodnight,” Morgan says, shaking her head as Molly slams the door on us.

“What a tramp.” She rolls her eyes at me.

“Honestly though… like we wouldn’t figure that out.” I sigh. 

“Want to wait at the back steps to scare the crap out of him?” She perks up.

While that does sound entertaining, I’m exhausted.

“Nah… we can just save it for the morning when he leaves to do the walk of shame.” I give a menacing laugh.

“That’s even better!” She hugs me before walking to her room.

Closing my door behind me, I look around at the dimly lit room and walk into the bathroom to wash my face. I notice a familiar white t-shirt resting on my towel rack, and I touch it to see if it’s dry.

What Simon doesn’t know won’t hurt him.

Yanking it off, I strip down then pull his shirt over my head and inhale.

I need a cedar closet.

After washing my face and brushing my teeth I lay down gathering the shirt in my hand to breathe him in.

I’m sure he won’t miss this one shirt… 

My eyes close as I continue to get high off his sweet scent but spring open when I hear a familiar tapping against my door.

Ummm…

Smoothing the shirt back down I place my hands over my chest and try to relax.

This looks so unnatural…

I need to roll over…

Or maybe on my side…

No, now it looks like I’m a centerfold…

Just act normal, pretend you’re sleeping.

The door slowly creaks open letting a small amount of light in with it, and I close my eyes to give off the illusion. But now I can’t see anything which makes it even worse. Then the door shuts and I don’t hear anything else.

Is that it? Did he think I was sleeping and left?

Stupid Sidney! Way to go!

Opening my eyes I look up at Simon who is smirking on the side, his side, of my bed.

“Faker.” He shakes his head at me.

Busted.

Ignoring him, I roll over onto my side and pull the blankets up to my shoulder. “Couldn’t sleep?” I ask.

This sort of thing used to happen when we were kids… on one specific day in fact.

“Didn’t want to,” he says, turning his back to me and placing something down on the nightstand, his nightstand.

“We aren’t kids anymore, I think this might be classified as inappropriate,” I point out.

His shoulders begin to move with heavy jerks from his laughter. “It was inappropriate as kids, too.” He turns, and now I see he’s brought food with him.

“I don’t think so, you were young and, well…” I look down at the comforter, my mind wanders back to when we were kids, and he would tap against my door.

“Sidney?” he whispered into the dark room.

Flicking on my light I held up the milk I just snuck downstairs to get, and he walked in with cookies.

“Is she crying again?” I asked pulling back the covers on his side.

“Yeah… could I sleep here?” He glanced around nervously like I would actually kick him out.

“I have the milk if you have the cookies.” I smiled as he got in and began to divide the cookies between us.

“I don’t want to grow up… I don’t want to cry every night from missing someone.” I watched his face fall as he thought it over.

Me either…

“Cake?” He gestures to the dish, pulling me out of a memory I had long forgotten about.

Reaching over I flip the blanket back for him.

“Well it isn’t cookies and milk but it will do.” I reach out for the dish, he pulls it back as he gets in. I watch as he moves his way over to me holding the plate in perfect balance as to not drop even a crumb from it.

“You know the entire time I was eating this I thought it might be missing something,” he says running his index finger through the frosting.

“Really?” I raise an eyebrow at him. “And what could it possibly be missing?”

I sit here frozen, my eyes wide, and my heart thrashing in my chest as he moves his frosting coated finger toward my mouth to brush it across my bottom lip.

“You,” he states, leaning in.

I almost forget to breathe as he pulls me toward him. Running his tongue across my lip, he hums.

“Yes, that’s it. That’s exactly what it was missing.” He smiles against my mouth.

For the love of God, just put me out of my misery.

Swallowing the knot in my throat, I look into this eyes, and it’s Simon… my Simon.

Before I have a chance to change my mind, I lean in, pressing my lips against him, slowly parting my lips in a silent invitation. His tongue intertwining with mine sends me into a whole new state of want. The taste of him and the peanut butter blending together shatters the last of my control to pieces, and I don’t even care. It’s intoxicating and freeing. I never even realized I’ve spent most of my life missing him. Lacing my fingers through the back of his hair, I want to pull him in but there’s something holding me back.

Breaking away from him I stay close, my eyes held shut.

“Wait…” My words come out with heavy pants. “I thought you said not yet?”

I feel his lips quirk up before he begins to speak.

“I just wanted to make sure you were mine… and only mine,” he says before lightly kissing my jaw.

With a satisfied breath, I close my eyes.

Silly man, I’ve always been his.

Taking the plate from him, I slide my leg over his thighs to place the dish on the side table. I straighten myself over him, my eyes following my hands as I slowly run the tips of my fingers over his shoulders and down his arms. Feeling every muscle move, contract, relax. The love struck teenager in me wants to smother him with kisses, but the woman I am now needs to savor this, to take mental notes of every second so it won’t be forgotten tomorrow when we go back to being just us. Simon and Sidney, two people that were once, as I like to think, in love. Tonight we can be them.

Sex changes things but not if you never see the person again. 

A shiver races through me as the tips of his fingers lightly brush under the hem of the shirt. My eyes roll back in my head from the feeling.

“This looks familiar, I was wondering where it went,” he whispers against my blazing skin.