Chapter 23

Ed opened the door to the extra bedroom where Flynn had slept last night. He was surpised she hadn't gone running back to Mustang's arms. When he looked at the bed, he quickly knew why she had chosen to stay here. All three children were in the bed with her and clinging to her. Quinn lay on her chest while their sons were tucked one on each side of her. She held the boys against her while her face was buried in their daughters blond hair. She was keeping them close even in her sleep.

"Flynn? Flynn, honey, wake up," he whispered, touching her leg. His hand quickly recoiled when she jumped violently. They were both afraid she was going to wake the children. He assisted her by removing Quinn from her chest and holding her while she unhinged herself from their sons. He laid their daughter back in the bed where their mother had been sleeping.

"What is it, Ed?" she inquired with irritation, rubbing her sore eyes.

"I need to talk to you," he said, grabbing her and pulling her along behind him.

"Edward, slow down, I'm about to fall," she warned him as she stumbled on the staircase and had to grab the bannister to regain her balance. Terror bloomed in her heart when he whirled around to look at her with the most vicious expression of hatred on his face. She cried out when he jerked her forward, catching her in his arms instead of letting her tumble down the stairs. "Stop it, Edward, you're scaring me."

Without a word, Ed shoved her away, causing her to fall on her rear end on the step behind her, then he callously continued walking down the stairs. Flynn assumed he wanted her to follow him so she picked herself up did so. She wasn't going to argue with him in the house with their sleeping children anyway. She followed him out of the back door to the far end of the pool. Apparently, he was planning on having an argument he didn't want the kids to hear either.

"How could you do this? How could you?" he yelled, grabbing her by the arms and shaking her.

Flynn was beginning to wonder if he had experienced a psychotic break during the night because he appeared to be completely deranged. He had never laid a hand on her in anger, and she was terrified of him at this moment.

"All those years I stood by you! All those years I had to deal with your crap! I have one weak moment – one Flynn! And you make me lose everything because of it. How dare you take everything away from me again!" he bellowed at the top of his lungs pulling back his fist. Just as he was about to let it go, a hand caught his wrist.

"It wasn't her fault you lost everything, Ed. Definitely not the first time and certainly not now!" Roy yelled, his light complexion turning a bright pink as his anger grew.

"You bastard! You just couldn't wait to step in and get your hands on her!" the irate blond yelled, lunging toward Roy.

"I never went after her, Ed!" he bellowed back, dodging the furious man and throwing him to the ground.

"Well, you damn sure didn't fight too hard against it either!" Ed shot back.

"Why should I?" Roy demanded, shoving him back down when he tried to stand up. "Your past blew up in your face finally, and she got hurt in the fallout. Were you honest, Ed? Did you tell her the whole truth of the matter?"

Flynn stared at Ed, noticing the silent warning he shot Mustang. She looked at Roy who was shaking his head. She was clueless as to what was occurring here. There was some kind of unspoken communication going on between the men, and she felt lost and confused, almost afraid to know what it was about.

"Roy, if you say anything else, I will kill you," Ed threatened, jumping to his feet.

"She deserves to know! The biggest secret is out, and she's divorcing you! What the hell else have you got to lose?" the black haired man demanded, his fist poised and ready for Ed if he made a move toward him. "Do you think you can guilt her into not leaving you because of your one moment of weakness?" he remarked, his voice dripping with disdain as he looked at Ed. He had hoped for Flynn's sake the secret would never be revealed but now that it had, he had held his peace long enough. "I never should have agreed to keep your secret, and it was unfair of you to ask."

"What's going on here? What secret?" Flynn inquired, glancing back and forth between them.

"It wasn't a one night stand," Edward said, jumping back when Roy and Flynn turned their heads quickly in his direction. Neither one of them expected him to be the one to tell the truth apparently. "I had a three year affair with Winry. I didn't end it until you were pregnant with Keegan."

Flynn felt as if she had been hit in the chest with a sledgehammer. She dropped to her knees and fell over on her hands. She was audibly gasping for breath as both men rushed toward her.

"Don't touch me!" she screamed so voluminously and harshly it stopped both of them in their tracks. "Both of you are such assholes!" Flynn unsteadily stood to her feet, swaying back and forth as if she'd had too much to drink. "I want both of you to stay the hell away from me."

Flynn ran toward the house as fury swelled within her. She locked the back door behind her after she slammed it. After running upstairs to their bedroom, she opened the window. Fueled by adrenaline from unbridled wrath, she pulled out a drawer from Ed's dresser to dump the contents out of the window.

"Hey! What the hell are you doing?" Ed yelled from below when his clothes rained down on him.

"What does it look like dumbass? You're moving out!" she screeched, throwing the drawer down as well and aiming at him. She smiled maliciously when his yell rang out as he barely sidestepped the wooden missile and it crashed onto the cement to splinter into small pieces. She returned to dumping his clothes out of the window by the drawer full. When they were emptied, she attacked his clothes in the closet. They were sent hurtling out the window an armload at the time, complete with hangers.

"Where am I supposed to stay?" Ed exclaimed looking helplessly at his clothes scattered all over the cement. Some items had landed in the pool and were floating around.

"I don't care! It's not my problem anymore!" she shot back. "Stay with your buddy, Mustang, there!"

"What? Me? How am I suddenly in trouble?" Roy yelled.

"Because you just are!" Flynn dropped down on the bed, flopping onto her back. She could hear Ed's maniacal laughter echoing across their backyard – no doubt he was laughing at Mustang's expense for being grouped in with him for guilt by association. She tried to figure out exactly what Roy could have done differently. How would he have told her something like that? She would have thought he was lying just to break her and Ed up. It had been Edward's place to be honest and come clean about his affair not Roy's. Roy had been forced to carry the burden of the knowledge by no fault of his own. He had hidden the painful secret not to protect Ed, but to protect her. But at this moment she wanted to be angry with both of them because it just felt like the right thing to do.

Flynn did not hear from either one of them until the next day when they both showed up on the front doorstep early in the morning looking like sad, dejected stray dogs. They had obviously worked out their issues with each other by physical means because they looked like hell all beaten and bruised. Men are funny creatures sometimes how they deal with things. She allowed them both in and went to make coffee. She sat a bottle of whiskey on the table because they could all use a special coffee this morning.

"Drinking at six in the morning?" Ed asked, raising his eyebrow at her.

"Call it Irish coffee and shut up," she snapped, pouring a generous amount in her cup.

"Irish you would shut up," Roy muttered under his breath as he poured the whiskey into his coffee. He chuckled at his own joke and took a big sip while the other two people stared.

"Has he already been drinking?" Flynn asked, sitting down in the chair at the end of the table between them.

"Nope. And that's what makes it so sad," Ed muttered, hiding his face in his cup as he drained half of the black spiked liquid. "I'm wondering if I gave him one too many punches to the head. I don't think he slept at all last night either."

Flynn got up to grab the coffee pot to refill their cups. The whisky bottle was passed around again as well. They sat at the table in silence until the alcohol began to take effect.

"What now, gentlemen? What the hell do we do with this really messed up situation we've gotten ourselves into?" Flynn asked, skipping the coffee this time and going straight for the whiskey.

"Hell if I know," Ed answered, slurring his words together. "Any ideas, Mr. President? You've always been a great leader. Tell us what to do."

"She can stay married to you and keep your family together. But she can also be free to come see me anytime she wants to as well. What do you think?" he inquired, swinging his unfocused gaze between the two. The solution had been given without hesitation and with complete confidence in its really had hit him too hard in the head. Is this what he stayed awake thinking about all last night?

"You're kidding right?" Flynn stared at Roy as if he had lost his mind.

"That might not be such a bad idea. That way everyone gets what they want, and we're all happy," Ed mumbled, leaning his cheek on his hand.

"You're both crazy!" she cried out, grabbing the whiskey and drinking what was left straight from the bottle.

"How is it that we're both drunker than you?" Roy asked, swaying unsteadily in his chair. He attempted to stand up only to plop back down in his chair heavily.

"Because I'm Irish remember? I know how to handle my liquor." She tossed her dark red hair back over her shoulder as her gaze shifted from one loaded man to the other. Ed appeared as if he were about to go to sleep, and Roy had leaned forward with his forehead resting on the table. Pathetic.

"Oh, yes, my little leprechaun! I remember now!" Roy exclaimed abruptly, lifting his head up from the table. How his pickled brain could remember one of the many insults he used to hurl at her about her height from so many years ago was anyone's guess.

"Go stick a rainbow up your ass, Roy," Flynn growled, drinking the rest of the coffee from her cup.

Both men laughed hysterically.

"So seriously, Ed, what do you think?" Roy asked, returning to the subject of his preposterous idea.

"I think it's a great idea!" he agreed, waving his coffee cup around. Good thing it was empty.

"Does anyone care to ask me what I think since I'd be the shared property?" Flynn stared straight ahead as both of them gaped at her. Obviously it really had not occurred to them to ask her how she felt about the cockamamie idea. She acted completely sober, taking a moment to think before she answered. After inhaling a deep breath, she calmly responded, "I think both of you should leave and go sleep it off. We'll talk about this when you're sober. If you do not leave now, I have some very sharp butcher knives that will help me cut off the main source of what has led us to our predicament today. Do I make myself clear?"

"Yes, ma'am!" they yelled in unison before saluting her and moving out the door as quickly as possible.

Morons.