When they got back to La Boulie, they found the kids sound asleep together in a blanket fort in the entertainment room. Blair took one look at them and pulled out her cellphone, walking back into the hallway and talking in hushed tones.

Todd followed her and heard her calling in Sam and Jack sick the next day to school. Her voice was suitably weary and spoke of middle of the night vomiting in a tone so spot on Todd almost believed it himself.

"I guess I'm still the kind who spoils her kids," she said when she hung up. "We're doing thumb-prints for security tomorrow anyway. Why not just… spend the day getting ready? That will help us get in even faster."

"You've got a plan," Todd commented.

They went back in to make sure the kids were comfortable and leave a note telling them they had the next day off before heading up to their room. "If we can get everything going in the next couple of weeks… we'll be set. We'll get the rest of the furniture in, we'll move over the things we want to move, buy the things we need to buy and then we can go up to the cabin for our long weekend the weekend before Thanksgiving. The way I see it, we drop the kids off at school Thursday morning, head up, come back Monday night, pick up the kids and move into our new place."

"Right before Thanksgiving, huh?"

"Mm-hmm," Blair began stripping off her clothes as soon as they entered their bedroom. "I just want us all to be there… originally I figured we'd start the New Year there…"

"We will," Todd agreed, pulling back the covers once they were both undressed. "We'll just get there a little early."

"It all sounds impossibly normal, doesn't it?" Blair yawned. "That's the only thing that worries me."

"How's that?" Todd pulled her close to him feeling his eyes droop as well.

"We don't do normal."

"Not the way most people define it," he agreed. "We'll just have to decide what's normal for us. This is new for all of us, we'll figure it out."

"I like that…"

Todd came to the next morning as he realized he was getting poked in the forehead. As his senses began to take in what was going on he recognized that he was in bed, he recognized the soft lavender smell that Blair infused with their sheets, he recognized the feel of her body pressed against his back and he recognized that whatever was poking him wasn't any sort of actual weapon.

"Grampa Todd… I'm awake…" Hope's voice said softly. She seemed to recognize that he was getting there himself.

Todd peeled his eyes open to squint as his grand-daughter. The bedroom was still dark, which suggested it was still very early in the morning. Hope held a flashlight that looked like a glow stick in the hand that also clutched her stuffed gryphon close to her body.

"I see you're awake," Todd's voice was rough with sleep. "Do you need to go potty?"

"I already went."

Todd frowned in the dark. Was that why she was waking him up? Was there an accident that needed dealing with? "Where?"

Hope sighed. "I went potty in the potty… Grampa Todd, I'm awake."

Blair murmured softly in her sleep and snuggled close against his back. Todd really didn't want to leave her soft warm presence when it was still dark out.

"You want to get in bed and snuggle with me and Gramma Blair?"

"I'm hungry," Hope said petulantly.

"Oh," Todd pushed himself into a sitting position as a yawn nearly split his head open. He looked at the clock, blinking when he read 5:45am on it. "It's pretty early, Peanut."

"Grampa Todd…" Hope's voice was threatening to verge into whine territory.

"All right, all right, come on." Todd pulled a shirt over his head and found some socks to put on his feet before ushering Hope out into the hallway.

It took a good ten minutes for Todd to convince Hope to accept Lucky Charms for breakfast instead of her desired eggs and bacon. Todd hadn't made eggs in years and he had no idea where any of the pans were to make bacon. He was clearly woefully underprepared for his role as a doting grampa in the wee hours of the morning.

Hope finally did settle down enough to eat her breakfast, if a little messily, and it was about a quarter after six when Starr wandered into the kitchen to see her daughter attempting to feed her gryphon yellow star-shaped marshmallows while her father blinked grumpily from his seat in the breakfast nook.

Starr did her best not to laugh but it was very difficult and her success wasn't exactly complete.

"5:45, Starr," Todd groused, frowning at his cup of coffee which wasn't close to being as good as anything Blair made for him.

"Where's Mom?"

"Sleeping. Like a normal human does at this time of the morning."

"You used to be an early riser."

"I appreciate lazy mornings a lot more than I used to," Todd pointed out. Sleep was still not exactly a friend of his but it was a lot more complicated than it used to be. There were fears in the dark that didn't used to be there and they were fears he couldn't voice to his daughter. "I appreciate a lot of things a lot more than I used to. I don't remember early mornings like this with you."

"I had a nanny," Starr reminded him. "A fleet of them it seemed."

"Oh yeah…" his mind was still foggy if he had forgotten that. He caressed the top of Hope's white-blonde head affectionately. "Is your Mom up yet?"

Starr shrugged. "Not that I'm aware of. Jack managed to pry his eyes open long enough to see that he had the day off of school. Sam's watching cartoons. He doesn't believe in wasting a free morning with something like sleep."

"I'm going to go curl up with your Mom again, then," Todd got up and pitched the rest of his crappy coffee in the sink. "We had a late night."

"I bet," Starr smirked.

"Knock that crap off, Shorty," Todd tossed over his shoulder. "I'll remember comments like that when you decide to bring a new piece of cannon fodder home."

The sly yet hopeful look on Starr's face rang an alarm bell but Todd set it aside for the moment as he went back up to the bedroom. He entered just as Blair was coming out of the bathroom, tying her robe around her.

"I was just coming down to look for you."

Todd shook his head as he shucked off his shirt and socks. He reached over to Blair as he crossed the room and jerked the tie of her robe undone, peeling it off her shoulders. "Bed," he grumbled. He turned the covers down again and then crawled in, fluffing the pillows as he did.

"Are you feeling okay?"

"Come here," Todd patted the space next to him. "It's barely after six and you called the boys in sick today so we could have a lazy morning. Is it so wrong if I want to cuddle with my woman?"

Blair smiled, glancing towards the window to note that the mornings were much darker now and offered a good excuse to stay in bed a little longer. She slipped in beside him, sighing as he pulled her close. She had never had so much time with Todd that she could feel comfortable refusing a little more, especially now that he was so freely demonstrative with his affection. "Not enough sleep last night? Used to be it didn't matter how little you got… you were always fine."

"My relationship with sleep is a bit more complicated than it used to be," Todd murmured, closing his eyes.

"How so?"

"I fight going to sleep and I fight waking up… even when I'm with you, I don't like to fall asleep. When I do… I don't want to wake up?"

"Why not?"

"I don't want all of this to be a dream," he whispered. "I don't want to fall asleep and miss out on being with you and the kids and I don't want to wake up and find I've dreamt the whole thing up. I don't know if I could take that…"

The quiver in his voice gripped her soul. She let her fingers drift over the arm that was draped over her. "This isn't a dream, Todd. This is real."

"I think that's what Dream You would say."

"I think Dream Me would say something like 'The goldfish are jumping through the fire escape.'"

"What?"

"Dreams don't make all that much sense, Todd," she reminded him. "They're bizarre. For as much as we might get something that seems like it could be real, someone will say something or do something or something truly bizarre and nonsensical will take place. You're safe…" she kissed him softly. "You're out of that horrible place and you did that. You're home. It's okay."

"I'm not completely certain of that," he whispered.

"I'll remind you, then." Blair reached up with one hand, sliding her fingers into his hair to massage his scalp. "But for now, lover, relax and get some sleep."

His eyes drifted close but his lips curved into a soft smile. "I like the new nickname."

"Well, it's what you are, isn't it?"

"I'm trying to come up with a pet name for you but you didn't much like 'sugar.'"

"No, I didn't."

"Why not?"

"Doesn't suit me."

"You can be sweet."

"Doesn't suit me," Blair persisted, her fingers moving from his scalp to his neck.

"Maybe not," his voice was almost a purr. "But calling you 'Hell-bitch' seems a bit rude."

Blair laughed, loudly in fact. Todd peeled his eyes open and smiled broadly. She brushed the tip of his nose with hers. "Yes, that is a bit rude. Maybe just in bed… when I'm on top…"

"Ride me like a hell-bitch?" Todd asked playfully before Blair's neck massage encouraged him to close his eyes again. "I'll keep that in mind."

Blair eased up on the massage and shifted to lightly scratching her nails against his skin as she saw Todd drift closer to sleep. He didn't sleep well and she knew that but it was also something that she was used to. Todd had never been the most restful sleeper. He was not a man who slept the sleep of the righteous but for the bulk of their relationship he hadn't seemed to need as much sleep.

It was easy to see, however, that he did need it and he had commented on more than one occasion that he never slept so well as he did when he was with her. It was something she had mentioned frequently as well. It was easy for Blair to curl up with him and offer him the same solace he offered her. Hopefully, given time, it would help.

But she also knew better than that. She could hold him all night, every night, but she couldn't erase those eight years.

It was something she'd need to talk to him about.

Jack was an absolute nuisance to the tech guy who came to take thumb-prints. He peppered him with questions about how the system worked and what the failsafes were and how soon response time was implemented if the worst happened. Jack's imaginative mind, coupled with an encyclopedic knowledge of spy and horror movies, exhausted the man's knowledge by spouting off various scenarios at rapid speed.

Blair watched her eldest son keenly. Her own desire for an absolute high tech security system was based on the invasions they had suffered through at La Boulie… some with almost fatal consequences. It seemed, however, that Jack had filed them all away and wanted to be as certain of their security as possible, too.

It was just another thing that reminded her how alike she and Jack really were.

Todd complained about getting his prints taken in a jovial manner. Only Todd could remark about how he usually got printed when arrested and make it funny. Sam's eyes were wide as he listened to Todd amp up his rap sheet to make him sound like a super villain.

When Sam began to counter Todd's antics with descriptions on how Spider-Man, Iron Man or Thor might defeat him, Blair ushered the tech guy away.

Jack followed, his eyes sharp.

Blair made arrangements to meet the tech at the new place shortly. As he packed up his stuff, she turned to Jack. "Think you can motivate our crew in their to pack up some things and come over?"

"Really?"

"It'll take some time to get the prints implemented into the system but I want to test everyone today so we know it's all ready to go and secure."

Jack's expression softened somewhat. "I want us all to be safe, too. We've had too many people just… walking in. We've had too many close calls."

"I agree," Blair reached forward and smoothed her son's hair. "So while I oversee the set up, you get the rest of our unruly bunch to help with some of the move. I'll even order in dinner and we can all eat at the new place tonight."

"Awesome!"

"Get to it."

The security set up went very smoothly. Blair had chosen the best for a reason. And once everyone had arrived and had tested their thumbprints to get the elevator moving and open the door to either the main house or Starr's apartment, they also got a quick run through of all the things the system monitored.

As the tech droned on, Todd felt himself comparing the security to the place that Irene had him stowed away. The biggest difference was that Blair's fortress had tons of windows and light as opposed to being isolated in a swamp somewhere with no windows and no natural lighting at all.

Blair didn't trust other people to take care of her on a good day and it was clear that the years he was gone hadn't done anything to dispel those fears. She kept a baseball bat in the bathroom, a stiletto knife in her vanity and Todd had found mace and pepper spray hidden in the bedroom as well.

Blair didn't feel safe in what was her home and she clearly wanted to be.

Todd wanted that, too, He wanted it for all of them so he didn't object to Blair's obviously high grade security.

Besides, this place was nothing like Irene's compound. Even talking about the features didn't send him back to that place. Blair was too ingrained in the entire place to send his mind back to white walls, white clothes, metal chairs designed to send electrical currents through every part of your body. For all that Blair loved a contemporary look, white walls were clearly not something she wanted, either. Every part of their new home had color in it.

Color and warmth and love and care… he smiled to himself. He could feel safe here, too.

He supposed it was ironic that two people that so many considered dangerous themselves would be so concerned about feeling safe and protected.

But what did anyone else in Llanview really know? Even the ones who loved them the most didn't seem to understand what they had created together… what they had beat the odds to build in their family and their businesses and their life, tattered thought it was at times.

"Hey," Blair's voice interrupted his thoughts. He focused on her standing in front of him, looking at him quizzically. "Where were you just now?"

"Right here."

She tilted her head, questioningly. "Really?"

"Really. Just here… with you and the kids," he leaned forward and dropped a kiss on her forehead.

A touch of color pinked Blair's cheeks since Todd had kissed her with the security tech standing there. "He's going to wait until the food gets delivered so we can have a walk through of that…"

Todd nodded. "Pretty high tech place, babe."

She shrugged. "I was married to this guy who loved to play with technology and gadgets and stuff. He was pretty good at it."

Todd smirked. "You want a private fireworks show over downtown?"

Blair grinned at the memory. "Actually, I've got a better idea for fireworks."

The tech cleared his throat hesitantly.

Todd flipped a lock of Blair's hair up with his finger. "I think we're making our guy uncomfortable."

"We make everyone uncomfortable."

As she stood there smiling, her green eyes twinkling with all kinds of devilry, Todd felt a sense of triumph. This was his Blair, she didn't care who didn't like how she did things, she only cared that she got done what she wanted done.

He wasn't the only one who had needed to come home.