Chapter 36
"Did you enjoy your birthday," Marianne questions before moaning? "It's your birthday but I get the present. A little lower please."
"Aye, it was a good birthday," Bog chuckles before heeding his wife's request, his hands skillfully kneading the knotted flesh and her contented sigh rings in his ears as he moves lower on her back. "Ye're carrying my offspring, so the least I can do is give ye a massage to ease yer burdens."
"Such a romantic," she murmurs sleepily. "I know Chief Jack and Griselda used the kids as a reason but you didn't have to take that promotion if you didn't feel ready for it."
"I know," he comments before kissing the back of her neck. "I didn't take it because of their arguments, even if they are very good reasons, but I was thinking it over quite a lot when he offered it. I was planning on talking to you tonight about it but Chief Jack was one step ahead of me."
"Mam," BB chirps, crawling over her body pillow to peer into her face.
Marianne giggles as he lightly pats her arm, giving into his demands she sits up and leans against her husband. The toddler skillfully maneuvers around her stomach to nurse.
"Is it okay for him to nurse while ye're getting closer to the due date," Bog questions, one hand rubbing her stomach and the other rubbing BB's back?
"I'm only five months," she reminds him. "Yes, it is okay. Even though they keep an eye on me like a high-risk pregnancy, Dr Willa says I don't show any signs of being one and so long as there aren't any complications then BB can nurse as much as he wants. But we think he might take after you because he isn't taking as much milk from me as before and he wants more baby food then the formula during the day. He might just wean himself off between now and the birth."
"Why did Mam mention that she was adding another charge to the lawsuit she is filing? She didn't say what it was," he comments.
"I didn't mention it during lunch because I thought you would rather hear it alone and Griselda agreed. I've been noticing that if I'm in the kitchen with BB while Griselda and Laurel are cooking that he gets spooked if the fire sparks and I mentioned it to Dr Boyd today. He asked his nurse to bring in a candle and he lit it using a match," Marianne sighs, moving her head into Bog's throat. "BB cried and screamed the second that match was struck. We had to take him out of that room because he wouldn't settle down. Dr Boyd was surprised at his level of panic considering he wasn't even injured during the fire but wants us to keep an eye on him."
"My poor wee lad," Bog murmurs. "They had better not have scarred him for life. What about his clinginess to ye and I?"
"Dr Boyd said that is normal one-year-old behavior and your mother agreed but we should also keep an eye that he doesn't keep panicking when he can't see or hear us. It's hard enough on Griselda as it is when I have to go into the office on the same days you work and I really hope it isn't another trauma induced behavior. I might forget the lawsuit and kill them myself," she mutters.
"Careful, tough girl, ye shouldn't say such things to me," he warns playfully. "I'm a cop, remember? Anything happens to them and I might have to investigate ye."
"So...I shouldn't tell you that your mother said the same thing," she quips back, helping BB to maneuver to the other side. "Seriously though, I agree with her logic about the lawsuit. Since the law's punishment doesn't seem to get through their thick skulls about the wrong they committed then maybe being forced to face the consequences from the ones that suffered from their actions might work. Catherine said that Mr Demetri's office is flooded with lawsuit cases from the victims of the party after that last attempt to get off light."
"Mam isn't exactly a fan of lawsuits but after what they tried, she just got fed up with them," he remarks, then uses his fingers to count off. "Let's see, they tried to sue ye, me, Mam, Donald, Rory, Stella, Daniel, Derrick, the police department, Aunt Plum, Judge Carson, and of all the stupidity, Da. Oh, I almost forgot, they also tried to sue each other."
"Sam's remark earlier is so true. After all the fines and lawsuits, not one of them is going to have even a penny to their name. Good thing that Rory's dad had a prenuptial with that arranged marriage agreement and Tabitha didn't get anything that belongs to him or he would be in a lot of trouble right now. Even with the split from the sale of their house when he bought the townhouse, it still isn't enough to save her," Marianne mentions. "At least the lawsuits aren't directed toward Daniel and Derrick, because even though they are getting some bad feedback, it means those that were affected aren't holding a grudge against them."
"It helped that they cooperated with the courts and that it was discovered that they didn't profit off of the blackmail even though they were the ones that collected it. Mam's right, they are good boys and we just need to encourage them to keep trying to stay that way. It looks like Alex and Stella are doing as much as they can to do that. If ye didn't know any better then ye would think that they were their own sons. Yeah, I know," Bog chuckles to his wife's snickers. "Rory's prediction on our wedding day turned out right."
"I'm glad for the both of them and I'm very glad we invited them," Marianne remarks. "Stella opened up quite a lot during the party and she made several plans with a few of the other women. She said that even though the court-ordered therapy was embarrassing, it is really helpful and she now realizes all the damage she let Tabitha do. From the supposed affair to the added stress while Stacy was having treatment and then no support when she died to Zachery's disregard to his own parents, all influenced some way by Tabitha. Truthfully, I'm not surprised by Tabitha's pettiness or that her entire reason for ruining her friend's marriage was because she was jealous that they married for love and though she kept bringing up the supposed drunken affair, Stella kept being faithful to her husband even after the divorce."
"Alex said that he regrets that he didn't talk to Stella as much as he says he should have during the marriage and then letting his emotions shut her down after the divorce that he didn't bother to find out why she had an affair," he comments. "He said that at the time he thought it was because of Stacy's death and he was more hurt than angry that she confided her pain to another man instead of her own husband. Corvin had a long talk with both Alex and Rory before they left and it seemed to work. Let's make sure that we don't let anything get in the way of the two of us, not even our children."
"Agreed. Not only would your mother lecture us until our ears fall off," she starts, chuckling with him at that. "But I also saw Sam and Thomas cringe when they saw Corvin talking to them. From what I saw of him during the gathering, a talk from Corvin isn't a good thing, is it?"
"Absolutely not, no matter how helpful," Bog confirms as she burps the satisfied BB. "He takes after his mother. Aunt Elinor was a terror and there has been plenty of remarks that if women were allowed into the army during her day that she could have won a war hands down. It's no wonder that all four of her sons stayed in the armed forces and all of them are drill sergeants. They get straight to the point and don't care if they're too blunt. Most of the Saxton cousins are the same way."
"I've noticed," she snickers, remembering that last several months around Sam. "Poor Thomas, he's going to have his hands full with those twins."
After giving BB a goodnight kiss, Marianne maneuvers him to allow Bog to place him into his crib. Laying back to down to curl around the body pillow, she listens to her husband's smooth voice as he tells the toddler his bedtime story.
"Goodnight, Briste. Mom loves you, so have a peaceful sleep," she murmurs to the blue eyes peeking through the crib bars.
"Mam, Da," BB coos back as Bog gives him a goodnight kiss.
"Goodnight, my wee lad. Da loves ye, so have sweet dreams," Bog softly remarks, turning off the lamp by the crib. "I hope we aren't going to have any trouble with getting him to sleep when we move into our house."
"I told Dr Boyd about our plan once we moved in and he suggested that in light of BB's trauma from the fire that we slowly introduce him to his own room. Keeping him with us or with Griselda for a little while until he registers that his new home is safe and then start having him sleep in his own room every few days until he wants to sleep in his room," Marianne mentions, sitting back up once BB is fully asleep. "He said normally he wouldn't encourage parents to let the child set the rules but he found it much more comforting for children who have suffered a trauma to know that they are able to be in control of seemingly small things that worry them."
"That might be for the best," Bog agrees, heading the dresser.
Grabbing the two bottles of skin lotion off of the dresser, Bog heads back to the bed and hands the one to his wife. Slipping off his bed clothing, he submits to her treatment as she rubs the lotion on the healed skin of his left side.
"These healed really nicely," Marianne remarks, barely able to feel the scarred skin.
"The doctor is impressed at its healing. I told him that the married life agrees so well with me," Bog chuckles. "Though in a way, ye cared for me as yer husband long before we said our vows."
"The same way that you cared for me as your wife," she remarks, slipping off her nightgown. "Of all that has happened, I find that I can't regret a thing because if I did then that would be the same as regretting meeting you."
"I feel the same," he murmurs, rubbing the lotion from the other bottle onto her skin. "I love ye so much, Marianne."
"I love you just as much, Bog," Marianne softly comments, receiving his kiss before laughing at the sharp kick against his hand on her stomach. "Goodnight, Bonnie and Bella. Mom loves you, so have a peaceful sleep."
"Goodnight, my wee lasses. Da loves ye, so have sweet dreams," Bog recites with his head close to his unborn girls. "How are we going to decide which of our pretty girls get Bonnie or Bella?"
"We'll just know, like I did with BB," she insists as he continues rubbing the lotion on. "I knew his name from the time I found out he was a boy but I was unsure about it until he was born and then I knew it fit him perfectly. At least, thanks to the videotape, I now know where I heard that full name from. Did you hear what Plum said about the renewed research on Love Potion?"
"About what she found out from the subjects that were tested before research was stopped," he questions? "I did and it does explain why Chipperton wanted to keep the drug. I also heard her say that she was going to ask each of the party's victims to give her an interview with them since the DA can't give her the stolen drug back and it was never tested before the theft. She sounds positive that they nearly have the flaw fixed with just ye and me as evidence. Ye naming our son, Briste Bron, and me calling ye, tough girl, were just us remembering small parts of that night. Even without the audio available, the camera did catch most of our conversation and proved that."
"That's what Plum said. She also said that is something more then what previous drug batches showed and it is a positive sign that this batch has a lesser...," Marianne pauses. "What did she call that? She used a really technical term...Well anyway, it basically means we should get our memories back quicker than those tested with the previous batches and those tested with the last one got full memory on average of three years later."
"Nice to know that I'll remember the first time I met ye. My tough girl, my warrior queen, my tempting wee feisty fairy, my wife, my Marianne, my true badge of valor," Bog purrs, kissing her with each name.
"Badge of valor," she questions with a smirk? "Am I one of your scars?"
"I told ye that Grandda called his scars his badges of valor but he and Da both said that their truest and best badge of valor is their wife. Every man's wife is the reflection of him and shows his true worth because every woman's husband is the reflection of her and shows her true worth. We are one bone and one flesh, like we said in our vows," Bog murmurs softly, helping put her nightgown back on and to lay down. "They did tell me that there are times that doesn't ring true because the two never became one. But ye and I are one and ye are my true badge of valor."
"True badge of valor," Marianne repeats slowly, watching him redress in his nightclothes before turning off the bedside lamp. "A symbol of someone's great courage in the face of danger or battle. Life is the greatest battle we ever face and so I am the symbol that you are a great man that faces life with great courage. I like that. Then that would make you my true badge of valor, wouldn't it?"
"Aye, because ye are a great woman, a fighter through and through," he murmurs, wrapping his arms around her and spooning against her. "We are meant for each other and we honor each other through this life and the next."
"What's so funny," she asks sleepily, hearing his muffled laughter?
"All of this started because of yer powerful right hook and I wouldn't have it any other way," Bog answers. "I love ye and I'm proud to be yer badge of valor, Mrs Macgallrigh."
"I'm proud to be your badge of valor, Mr Mcgallrigh, and I love you."