Chapter 5 (Mother): On My Feet

                                        

                                              
Copyright © 2025 by GroveltoHEA
Research was my specialty. There wasn't anything I couldn't find if I dug deep enough, no system yet I couldn't hack into. So my research session with Autumn was extremely helpful, and as soon as I got back home, I organized my notes and cross indexed them. I would have started to memorize them, but Butcher walked into what I liked to think of as my Fortress of Solitude.
"My office."
Shit. This was it. I followed him into his office, hoping this wouldn't take too long so I could get back to memorizing the shoulds and shouldn'ts for not scaring Glory and helping her to feel comfortable with me. I already had some ideas in my head.
"You interrupted time with my wife and daughter yesterday," Butcher said once the door was closed. "Seems like I should get something for that."
"I know," was the only answer you could give to that chilling statement, and as he walked toward me, I held up a hand. "I'd like you to keep it below the neck so I don't get bruises where Glory can see them. She's had enough bruises and violence for the last three years, so I don't want her to see more and scare her."
Butcher was about to punch me in the stomach, so I braced myself...for the hit that never came. He stood in front of me, hands fisted at his sides, and it seemed pretty fitting that lightning chose to strike at that moment pretty damn close to his window. I felt like I'd been struck by lightning when I realized he wasn't going to hit me.
"Fuck this," he muttered.
"Go ahead," I offered, holding my arms out to my sides.
For a minute, I thought he would, but then his fist dropped and those dead eyes were on me. "Get out." 
I wasn't sure if he was disgusted with me or with himself. With Butcher, when you were invited to leave, you left without wasting time, but I needed to know something.
"I'm worried Glory will never trust a man again," I admitted. "What would you have done if you couldn't get Raine to trust you?"
"Lived my life, same as always," he said right away.
Disappointed, I turned for the door, and just as I was about to walk through it, he stopped me. 
"But it would have been empty," he said, and I know it cost him to say that, and the next part cost even more. "Told you to give her a blanket. But I should have said don't ever walk away from her."
 "I won't," I assured him, and then, knowing he wanted me to leave, I left.
I added that piece of advice to the others and nodded in satisfaction when I looked over the long list I had of things I should and shouldn't do with Glory. After I'd finished memorizing them, Big was calling me.
"Samantha was thinking that it might help Glory to be around normal people. Not sure how the hell we're considered normal, but my mother-in-law likes you. Wanted to know if you could come to dinner --"
"I'll be there."
"Can I finish, brother? She wanted to know if you could come to dinner tonight. Six o'clock. Hamburgers and brats on the grill and all the good shit that goes with them. We're eating outside because Samantha thinks it'll provide a more relaxed atmosphere."
"I'll be there," I repeated. "And, Big, I've been thinking when Glory's ready to be on her own, we should offer her the option of  living at the apartments. No place safer."
"Got one coming up at the beginning of next month. Third floor. I'll hold it for her."
She could move in with me. 
"She may want her own house," I said, in which case I'd have to set her up with security. Patrols. Tanks. Helicopters. F-35s doing fly overs. Marines. Whatever it took to make her feel safe.
"I think she might feel safer in the apartment. Her in-laws have been raising a stink about their missing son, hired private investigators, have police detectives on it," Big told me, as if I didn't already know. "They're trying frantically to find her, too. They already talked to our lawyers and the judge who handled the divorce. In the meantime, Samantha and Tabitha have been going over the 온라인카지노게임 repeatedly with Glory."
"Their son's not missing," I said grimly. "We all know exactly where he is." Here piggy, piggy. "Besides, I have them chasing shadows. Lots of leads to run down that'll keep them busy for quite a while."
Big laughed. 
"But if they keep it up one more day, I have some other things of theirs that are going to go missing."
"I'm sure you have it all planned out. By the way, you did good not talking geek last night. Keep it up. See you at six," he said before ending the call. "
I shook my head in amusement at his friendly advice. When I was in college, I'd met a girl as quiet and as shy as I was. We had the same classes and over time, we became friends, neither one of us interested in anything more. We'd found a kinship in our social awkwardness, only able to speak freely when it came to our coding classes, and then we could talk for hours.
"You know, Conall," she'd said one day after she'd just spent half an hour explaining in great detail a glitch she'd run into with her code, "it's nice to be able to talk with you like this. My sisters don't understand what I'm talking about when I get into the weeds, and they even made a rule for me -- Rule number seven: non-geeks don't want to hear the details of programming."
Years later, I could relate. My brothers would roll their eyes and walk away when I was explaining the algorithms I'd used to unearth some long-buried information -- all they cared about was the bottom line: had I found the information they needed for handling a situation? I'd tried to keep rule number seven in the back of my head, but since computers were pretty much my life, I didn't have much else to talk about. 
Until I saw Glory's picture. Suddenly, computers weren't the most interesting thing in my life. For the first time ever, I looked up from my screens and wanted a girlfriend. A wife. A family. I just needed not to blow it with her.
At six on the dot, I was standing on the Stellan's doorstep, bag in hand. Tonight's offering...I could only hope she liked it and didn't think I was an idiot.
"Hello, Conall!" Tabitha said as she opened the door. "Come on in."
Glory was once again on the couch, resting before dinner since she still had a ways to go to regain her strength.
"Hi, Glory," I said and she nodded shyly. Keeping Autumn's advice in mind, I walked to her slowly and carefully extended the bag with the handles over my open palm. No holding things in my fist.
"What is this?" she asked, taking the bag carefully from my hand.
"Something I hope you'll like."
Reaching into the bag, she pulled out several little outfits for her bear. Since it was a boy bear, I'd found several outfits for him: a leather jacket with a bandanna for his head; a plaid shirt with overalls and a straw hat; and a Batman costume.
"These are adorable," she said. "Thank you."
I'd thought she might enjoy something whimsical, something that took her way back to her childhood and happier times.
Soon after I arrived, we went outside to eat dinner, and once again, Glory looked down at her plate, quietly eating, while the rest of us talked about our days. When we were having dessert, an alert on my phone vibrated, so I checked it discreetly. Keeping my face neutral, I looked over at my brother.
"Hey, Big," I said. "Meant to ask you earlier. You know last month when your bike was making that weird noise, like a wrench was caught in the engine? Mine's making it now, too. Could you come take a look at it?"
I was already on my feet.
"Sure. Excuse us," Big said to everyone, following after me. "You should put some party music on, keep things lively while I'm not here to be entertaining."
He nodded at Rick, who seemed to understand immediately, and the music was playing loudly before we turned the corner of the house.
When we got to the front yard, there were Glory's former in-laws, just getting out of their car.