Pain shot through Blair's head as she tried to focus on the alarm clock beside Todd's bed.
Todd's bed.
She ran her hand over the sheets and unwillingly imagined that Todd was beside her. His hair, creeping over his eyes and waiting to be pushed back by her fingers. His scar, a fading reminder of what it was like to be an outcast but find a kindred spirit, was hardly perceptible any longer when she stroked it. The broad curve of his shoulder, the skin growing warmer as she—
"Viki's house," Blair whispered aloud, opening a new burst of pain behind her eyes. "We wouldn't be doing that in Viki's bed even if he were here."
The clock read 4:55. It was too early to do anything to help Starr or Jack, but she couldn't very well keep lying in Todd's bed and thinking of Todd. That was a complication no one needed in the middle of murderous psychopaths, mistaken identity, and bail hearings.
She jumped to her feet; the world spun to protest that she had moved too quickly. She grabbed the dresser to steady herself and nearly knocked over the carafe of orange juice that was sitting in a bucket of ice. Next to it were a muffin, a small plastic bottle, and a note.
Blair— For your headache. Do NOT take the pills without food. Call if you need me. Cord
Her eyes flooded at his thoughtfulness. Cord never stopped reminding the world why his cowboy hat was white and not black. Blair rarely agreed with Tina, but she certainly understood why someone would move heaven and earth to bring Cord back to her life.
By the time she'd washed her face and made the bed (she couldn't leave the bed unmade while she was feeling vulnerable—that had gotten her kicked out of a foster home forty years earlier) the headache had subsided and she felt safe to drive.
She raided Todd's dresser one more time and found nothing that made her look less like she was a twentysomething making the walk of shame on the morning after. She did pick out a shirt and a pair of slacks that would serve Todd better than whatever he was wearing now if he had to attend a bail hearing this morning.
She turned Cord's note over and wrote:
Cord— Thank you for everything. See you soon. Love, Blair
The "love" was just for the hell of it when Tina inevitably saw the note. Besides, Blair would have sworn her undying fealty to anyone who had left her those pills. After the conversation they'd had last night, there was no chance of Cord misunderstanding.
She padded down the hall in her bare feet. Bree's door was open a crack; both Sam and Bree were breathing peacefully, eyes closed, smiles on their faces.
Further down the hall, Hope was sleeping soundly in Liam and Ryder's nursery. "You'll see your Mommy in a few hours. She can't wait," Blair whispered.
There was a creaking noise as if someone had stepped on a loose floorboard. (Since when did Viki allow an imperfection like a loose floorboard?)
Blair braced herself to kill Irene with her bare hands before the psycho got anywhere near the children. "Who's there?" she called softly.
There was no answer but a disgruntled yip from beneath Liam's crib. Tina's dog, Princess David Vickers, turned in a noisy circle and lay down again.
"It was you? Shut up and try to be less of a bitch than your owner," Blair told the dog, which favored her with a withering look. It had obviously heard the bitch joke before.
It was past time for Blair to get out of a crowded house where even the dog disliked her and back to La Boulaie where she could start getting things ready for Jack and Starr.
She texted Mickey Horton to call her as soon as he was awake. She picked out fresh clothes for Starr and Jack. She changed herself out of Todd's underwear and into something appropriate for the mother of teenagers who did not deserve to be locked up. She logged on to the Logan's website and ordered new pajamas for all of the children, to be delivered upon the store's opening, in celebration of her family's return to their own beds. She removed Jack's laptop from the safe to which it had been confined since the MyFace incident and returned it to his desk. He had taken a big step yesterday; he deserved a big reward today.
After an eternity, it was time to return to the jail.
The earliest hours of the morning were the worst. Todd, Starr, and Jack were tired of talking; tired of trying to stay still and pretending to rest; tired of being sore and cold and hungry; and above all, tired of waiting.
In the hopes that if he was very quiet he wouldn't trigger another sniping match between Jack and Starr, Todd sat on the edge of the disreputable bunk bed and fantasized about the sandwich he had refused to eat the last time he'd been here. Had it only been a few days ago?
His stomach, sore and aching, growled loudly.
When a guard arrived bearing a tray of what was probably supposed to be oatmeal, Todd could have kissed him. Jack snapped to attention, too, and gulped down the contents of his bowl before the cell door had been re-locked.
Todd winced. Jack was about to confess to his role in an accidental death and then confess to perjury. He needed his wits about him, and that meant not being distracted by hunger.
Meanwhile, Todd was about eight hours removed from swearing anew to rededicate his life to making up for what he'd done to Jack at birth.
This selfless parenthood thing really sucked, even when it wasn't actually selfless because he would benefit from Jack's statement.
Todd pushed his bowl at Jack. "Eat mine too."
"You sure?" Jack asked, but he was already devouring the sloppy mess with his eyes.
"Yeah," said Todd, and he turned away so he wouldn't have to see any more.
He shuddered when his eyes fell on Nora Buchanan, looking as if she had seen a ghost. She had clearly not spent the last eight years missing him.
She shook her head in distaste as she took in Jack scarfing down the last of Todd's breakfast.
"I remember one of the first times I saw you, Todd," she said. Jack and Starr both jumped; neither one of them had noticed Nora's entrance. "I was getting you and your frat brothers ready for your trial. They were all too nervous to eat. Even Kevin, who knew he hadn't even been in Marty's room that night. But you, you were shoving a sandwich the size of your head into your mouth like you didn't have a care in the world. You didn't care what you'd put Marty through. How does it feel to pass that attitude on to your son?" She gestured to Jack, who had put the second empty bowl down beside the first. "He's about to admit that he murdered a young mother and left her son without the only parent he's known for most of his life, and he doesn't care any more than—"
Nora's rant was punctuated by the spatter of vomit hitting the floor. Todd grabbed Jack by the neck and got his head over the toilet for the second heave.
"Nora, my brother didn't murder anyone. It was an accident!" Starr shrieked from the other cell. "Don't tell me Matthew never made a mistake, because I know that isn't true!"
"Counselor, why are you speaking to my underage client without his attorney present?"
"Mr. Horton!" Nora's obvious discomfort was music to Todd's ears. "I wasn't speaking to Jack, I was speaking to his father. I have a long enough history with Todd to know that he would request an attorney for himself or his son if he wanted to."
"I hope that that history wouldn't cause an unfair bias against the young man." Mickey Horton made the accusation in such a distracted, grandfatherly way that Nora took a step back and lowered her voice before she defended herself. Blair had made a good strategic decision.
"I assure you, I am quite capable…"
Jack whimpered under Todd's hand and Todd tuned out Nora's retreating self-righteous rant to focus on his son. Todd preferred vomit to Nora, anyway.
"Everything up?" Todd whispered. He started to rub his hand in a circle on Jack's back before he saw the bruises and stopped himself. He settled for squeezing Jack's shoulder.
"Think so," Jack muttered. "Sorry."
"What for?" Todd pulled Jack to his feet and sat him back on the bed. "I appreciate you eating that food so I didn't have to. Maybe we can raise your allowance if you become my taste tester going forward."
Jack looked at the floor. Todd pulled the sheet off the top bunk and spread it over the oatmeal so neither one of them would have to see it any more.
"I know you were hungry. I could hear your stomach."
"I wasn't hungry for anything that looks the same going down and coming up. Are you in pain? Did you just eat too fast?"
Jack shrugged. "Sorry," he repeated.
"Did you know that when I met your mother I was working as a janitor at the hospital?" Todd tried.
"Yeah, I knew that."
"So this kind of thing is nothing new for me, all right?"
Jack nodded stiffly, but didn't say anything else until a guard arrived with an armload of clothes. "Your mother and your lawyer are waiting upstairs," he told Jack as he distributed the rest of the clothing to Starr and Todd. Todd was grateful that Blair hadn't insisted on fetching Jack herself. It was better if she didn't see firsthand that his first night with his children in eight years had resulted in Starr shivering herself blue and Jack throwing up on the floor.
A long hour after Jack was escorted away, the guard returned for Starr, who left in a flurry of assurances and blown kisses.
Todd was alone again. He tossed himself onto the hard, stripped top bunk and contemplated the best thing to say to Blair when he saw her again. "Jack has gone almost 12 hours without calling me 'Scarface.' Can't we just celebrate?" "Made out with anyone through the bars of a cell lately? Would you like to?" "Since you brought me these clothes to put on, want to go full circle and take them off?"
"I know Starr got hypothermia on my watch, but you were the one who let her jump in the river in the first place!"
Just as he was starting to find the game surprisingly entertaining, the click of high heels bounced off the hard walls. All at once, Todd jumped from the bed, eager not to wait a second longer to see Blair than he had to.
Seeing Tina instead was more than a small disappointment.
"What are you doing here?" he demanded without preamble.
Tina reached through the bars to pat his shoulder in a way that was probably supposed to be sisterly. "Is that any way to talk to the person who came down here to bail you out?"
"I don't need you to bail me out." At least, he didn't think he did. Blair had all but said she was going to bail him out the night before. She had brought him fresh clothes. She couldn't have gotten angry enough to leave him to rot in the past two hours, could she have? Even Blair was angry, Starr wouldn't leave him here alone.
"Just in case things don't go how you planned," said Tina sweetly. "Big sisters always have to look out for their little brothers."
Tina tapped Todd on his nose. Todd rubbed off her touch.
"Tina?" Todd queried.
"That's my name."
"Are you sure? You're not Dena? Or Gina?"
"Disassociative—"
"Or Lena?"
"—Identity—"
"Or Nina?"
"—Disorder—"
"Or Mina?"
"—Is not something to joke about."
"I came back after eight years to the whole Jess-Tess thing. Maybe everyone got D.I.D. while I was gone."
Tina's cheery demeanor didn't falter. "No, Todd, I'm still me. I'm merely turning over a new leaf."
"How's that working out for you so far?"
Tina glanced over her shoulder to assure herself that they were alone. "It was going fine until you basically demanded that Viki take Blair in last night and manipulated a seven-year-old into sealing the deal."
"I didn't manipulate Sam. I asked him. I instructed him. I coached him. It was all very forthright."
"Not important. What is important was that little Sam wasn't the only one sealing deals, if you know what I mean."
"I don't think I'd be comfortable knowing what you mean."
"Too bad," Tina hissed. "I'm not going to be the only one who's uncomfortable around here. As soon as Blair showed up looking even worse than she usually does, you can bet Cord was going to do whatever it took to make her feel better."
"I don't think sex is what people usually do to make concussions feel better," Todd said, choosing to ignore the fact that in his days as a football star he had used his valiant on-field injuries as a pickup line on multiple occasions.
"I didn't either. I spent the whole night being generous and respectful of Cord's kindness, and not being jealous at all. I didn't confront him about going in and out of her room all night because people do that with concussions, right? Then this morning I went into the nursery to check on Princess David Vickers."
Todd shook his head to clear it. "Back up. Princess What?"
"Princess David Vickers! She's my dog, your children's cousin. You need to learn these things now that you're back."
Todd quickly determined that while there were many things he needed to learn, that was not one of them. "So you were in the dog's nursery."
"It's Liam and Ryder's nursery," said Tina as if Todd was being unreasonably obtuse. "I couldn't find Princess David Vickers and I know she gravitates to the babies—she's very maternal. Blair was in there, and do you know what she was wearing?"
"A red dress with a low neckline?" He was pretty sure it wasn't the right answer, but he liked it anyway. If Blair absolutely had to be dressed, he was partial to red.
"Underwear. Men's underwear. Cord's underwear."
Todd couldn't stop his hands from forming themselves into fists. He had always known that after being gone for eight years, he wouldn't find Blair unattached. He had had plenty of time to remind himself not to make the same mistake he'd made with Professor Torn-heart. He wouldn't hold the relationship against Blair; he'd simply make sure she ended it.
But he hadn't expected her to jump into bed with someone else hours after he'd saved their son's life and she'd stood a breath away from him in the water, running her hands through his hair.
He'd already forgiven her for not noticing or caring when he'd disappeared and been replaced with his evil twin. Somehow, this felt worse. She really didn't care how he felt at all.
"That doesn't mean anything," he justified weakly. He didn't expect Tina to buy it. He didn't buy it.
"Then she slunk out of the house and she left this behind for Cord." She pulled a note out of her pocketbook and tried to hand it to Todd.
"I don't like it when Manning women bring me notes in prison. Last time Irene did that, she tried to kill my family."
Tina rolled her eyes. "Then allow me to read: 'Cord. Thank you for everything. See you soon. Love, Blair.' Love!"
"What do you want me to do about it? She can love whoever she wants. It's a free country. I mean, not for me." He banged his head on the bars, but not too hard. "For the rest of you, it is."
Tina twisted herself around the bars to look Todd in the eye. "Look, I know the revelation that our mother faked her death and abandoned us so she could go around torturing people, including you, is a lot to take. But this is not the time to feel sorry for yourself. This is the time to get out there and fight."
"You want me to punch Cord?" That had a certain appeal.
"Fight for Blair! Remind her how much she loved you! This thing with Cord can't be serious yet. It's only been about a year since that Elijah person died, but a year without a man in Blair time is, like, ten years in real time so she must have been frustrated and desperate, and Cord is very handsome and he likes her, so—"
Todd clapped his hands over his ears. "Please stop."
"Promise me you'll fight for Blair as soon your bail gets paid."
"Order me a pizza and I'll consider it." He didn't know what to feel about Blair, but he knew he was still hungry. "Two pizzas. And wings. And mozzarella sticks. And—"
"I will get you a takeout menu, I will order you anything you want, I will pay your bail, if you get Blair the hell away from my husband."
"Are you and Cord married again?"
"You know what I mean," snapped Tina, and she turned on her heel, leaving him alone.
The scary thing was, Todd did know what she meant. He knew it viscerally.
It wasn't Tina who returned a moment later, but the guard. "All right, Manning, bail is paid. Let's get you out of here."