Ben was sitting in his favorite chair in his living room with his laptop nearby, in case he wanted to browse the engineering boards for new puzzles. He had a steaming mug of herbal tea resting on the table beside him. He’d discovered he enjoyed the beverage while in Singapore. Tina and Lucy were doting on him while his children played on the floor before him. Christopher was having a play date at Ashley’s.
Just another Sunday morning in Ashburn Court. He’d been following this pattern for weeks and was beginning to feel restless.
General Davis’ commando team had fulfilled their promise almost two months ago to get him from the hospital to the airport and on a jet flying home with no fuss. There hadn’t been any sign of another hit team from the Russians since their last group had been wiped out so quickly.
His fever spiked when they landed, and he’d spent a week in Hannah’s hospital after emergency exploratory surgery with their guest surgeon, Mishka Shyamalan. She’d repaired a torn suture in his small intestine, and he underwent another course of antibiotics to deal with the infection.
When he was finally cleared to go home, he had weeks of recovery ahead of him, and now he was finally beginning to feel like himself again. He’d even been allowed to do a low-impact, low-stress workout. He knew he had a long road ahead to return to his previous strength levels. That didn’t discourage him, though, as he’d done it before, and he knew he could do it again.
He’d had multiple visits from each of his loved ones and spent much of that time in cuddle mode. Initially, he was forbidden to do anything more strenuous. Making love fell into that category, but cuddling in bed and kissing were allowed. Being naked was also allowed if the mood called for it, and not surprisingly, most often, it did. He was assured that no one felt neglected, and Ben calmed their fears about his health.
During the initial weeks of his recovery, he’d had a surprise visit from Jahal Mannan, who’d heard of his close call and took it upon herself to personally hand-deliver the ring she’d made for him. Tina and Lucy met her at the door, as Ben was still bedridden at the time.
Unfortunately, while she was a master jewelry designer, she sucked at being secretive as her eyes found the ring on Tina’s hand and searched for the one on Lucy’s before realizing she was being watched by two women far too intuitive for their own good.
The surprise was ruined.
While Lucy shed tears of joy on Ben’s shoulder and was extra cuddly with him for weeks, Ben was more than a little annoyed at being robbed of being the one to present it to her. It took many kisses from her to dull that disappointment.
As he was restricted to his home for recovery, there hadn’t been much for Liliya to do, but she did walk with him around the block once he could manage it. She told him she was taking online courses in photography as a new hobby. She said it was teaching her how to see the world with fresh eyes, not just from an assassin’s perspective.
Evelyn’s wounds healed, and her eyes had no permanent damage. When he looked closely into her lovely blue eyes to see for himself, her face warmed up considerably.
That’s when he saw the scar.
A thin white line ran across both cheeks and bisected her nose.
Just… like… him.
Something moved in his chest, and he’d wrapped his arms around the woman, holding her close as he dealt with his emotional upheaval. The idea that he’d almost lost her was knocking him off balance. She’d frozen momentarily, then she’d held him equally tight.
She’d been smiling more since that day as they finally managed to get back to work in his basement for lengthening amounts of time as he recuperated. She’d been very diligent in ensuring he kept to the schedule and didn’t push himself too hard.
Hector’s team completed the tear-down of Rochelle’s home and prepared the site for the new construction. While Ben had been spending time on the designs for the new homes with Dan Bishop, he put the project on hold as he wasn’t ready to work on it. Additionally, Chanel hadn’t informed him when Beth’s home would be released. Hector told Ben that his team would be prepared to start again in spring.
Ben and Evelyn returned to the battery project, but his mind told him it was a dead end. They set up a second test in his basement with the bulletproof shielding. This time they removed the plastic wrap from the lithium cells. The result was a battery with no better performance than any others.
Having proven this, Ben had Evelyn run a background check on the designer. She discovered, at the time of his death, that the man had been drowning in debt and needed the funding the project would get from being renewed by the Department of Energy. Instead, he was killed by his own experiment.
Ben asked Evelyn to notify the Department of Energy that they’d have to look elsewhere for a battery solution.
The effort wasn’t a complete waste as it triggered some ideas for Ben. He managed to create three small innovations; a new kind of pressure switch with incredible durability and a projected lifecycle of millions of trips before failure, a new temperature sensor that could be used in high G or impact environments, and finally, a miniature sound suppression technology that required no external power source. These could be used in humble ways to improve life, but none were splashy or particularly noticeable. Ben just smiled about that as he added the small prototypes to the trophy cabinets in his office. Evelyn was thrilled to see her name on the small description cards under the title Assistant.
The General was pleased with the return on his investment, as his development teams immediately found uses for these inventions, so that was a bonus.
When he was finally capable of walking around and could last more than a few hours before his body forced him back to bed, Rain threw an engagement party for Karen, Jayden, Penny, and Frank.
The entire neighborhood attended and had a wonderful time. Ben called in all his food truck friends to cater the event, and Hector was DJ for the dance party. The foreman said it was the least he could do for his favorite employee of their new business venture.
Karen and Penny covered Ben’s face with kisses for the approval of their mates and the beautiful diamonds in their spectacular rings. Ben noticed the ring’s bands were embedded with tiny diamonds which he hadn’t supplied. He believed this was Jahal’s way of apologizing to him for the slip up with Lucy’s surprise. He didn’t tell his daughters that. He just praised their rings and watched their eyes glow with joy.
While incapacitated, he’d managed to get the Klein Group to complete the selection process for Berlin, Paris, London, and New York. He arranged for them to fly in the Sky Shepherd premiere jet once more but learned that Robin had unfortunately moved on.
Ben let Louis know that Ed would be his proxy in terms of Engineering approval. The younger man was very pleased to hear that.
Speaking of Ed, he’d come to visit Ben with Grace and his daughters in tow. They spent a wonderful afternoon watching the girls and Christopher playing in the tower, and Ed enjoyed playing with Sam and Gretchen. Christopher and the triplets were exhausted afterward and barely managed to eat during the lovely dinner Tina and Lucy hosted.
Just a week ago, Chanel met with Shelly and gave her the bad news that one of the victims they’d found in the excavated cellar was her missing sister, Patty. That evening, Trish brought Shelly over for an evening of cuddling with Ben, and he told her he’d decided to build a contemplation garden over the spot once the new home was built. It brought the woman to tears once more, but she loved the idea as Patty loved nature and would have treasured this.
When the doorbell rang, it jarred Ben from his reflections, and he slid forward in his chair to answer it, but Tina popped to her feet and pressed a hand against his chest to make him stay as Lucy stood and rushed to the door.
Ben gave Tina a stern look. “I’m capable of answering a door, you know.”
She gave him a sweet smile. “Sunday is Pamper Ben Day.”
He slid back but grabbed Tina under her arms to pull her with him, stretching her out over his body. She squeaked in surprise, then found her lips being caressed by his. The squeak turned into a moan, then another squeak as he pulled back to look into her eyes. “You’re making every day Pamper Ben Day! Too much pampering!”
Catherine was grinning at them from the doorway, with Chanel smiling at her elbow. Lucy helped Tina to stand, and Ben got to his feet. Before Lucy could get away, he grabbed her for a quick kiss that left her flustered and squirming.
“I’ll deal with you two naughty ladies later,” he whispered to them, and their excited smiles flashed at him.
Ben walked over to hug and kiss Cat when she tilted her face up to him. Chanel settled for a hug.
“Time for a change,” Tina said as she carried Sam from the room, but the boy got kisses from the two ladies, as did Gretchen in Lucy’s arms.
“Would you like to take a seat?” Ben asked, and they nodded and followed him back into the living room. They sat side by side on the sofa as Ben settled back into his chair. “I’m beginning to feel trapped in this chair.”
“Really?” Cat said with a skeptical look.
Ben shrugged. “A little stir crazy, then. I think I’d go mad if it wasn’t for my walks around the court.”
“We were just checking in to see how you’re doing and to let you know everything is on track for opening the first Shepherd Foundation Headquarters in January. The renovations and construction on the buildings downtown are ahead of schedule, and I’ve been given assurances they’ll be done this month.”
“That’s great news. I assume Trish is pretty excited about the opening?” Ben asked.
“She’s ready. It will be great to say we actually have one of the Foundations open. We’re planning to get the rest of them open next summer if all goes well,” Cat said with a smile.
He looked to Chanel. “Any more thoughts on that position I offered to you?”
Chanel nodded. “The company I arranged to handle security in the interim is doing a good job. I really want to finish this case for Shelly.” Her expression became frustrated. “Grace has tied a number of people to the purchase of the home, but we have no evidence of them actually visiting the house. Not even that weasel Marion Spencer. When I questioned him, do you know what he did? He laughed at me. He said I had no evidence he was ever there. He also said he’d never see the inside of a prison cell because of his dialysis. The bastard dismissed me with a fuck off.”
Ben frowned. “That must have been very frustrating.”