Saffron threw a near by pine cone, with accurate aim at Graves' back, though not hard enough to do anything. Jon clamped down the portal at Graves' words and he and his brother leaned up against the wall of the house. "No body's going to listen to me any more, are they?" Iris asked. "Not any more Iris." Saffron replied. "Fine, be that way." Iris replied. Lily Rose stuffed her sister behind her and some of the others. She loved her sister,but Iris was just...creepy. Totally her dad's fault... Saffron heard Calin's comment and glanced toward him, before getting to his feet. "Well, your mother, is on her way home now...MY job, was to check and see if the house had burned down yet...You know how she is about those books..." "Mum's coming home?!" Cearea choked. "Calm down, Cee, we don't know if she's going to have a fit or not..." Calin said. "Have a fit about what?" Came Lex's voice. Saffron smirked faintly. Her timing had improved... He lost the smirk quickly. "Saffron, what the HELL is going on here? And WHAT are you doing here?" She asked, looking at Graves. Having four teenagers hadn't changed Lex much, except to make her one of the most protective mothers around. And formidable. Calin some times wondered, who the voice of authority was...His dad even caved to his mother at times... "Hey mum...it's not exactly what it seems to be..." Calin jumped the gate, catching up to her. "Oh really?" Lex asked, looking at her son. Then her gaze drifted past hm to take in the large amount of kids standing by the house. Calin stepped closer and spoke softly with his mother a moment, Lex looked at him with a raised eyebrow and a look of shock for a moment, before giving a soft laugh. "Which ones?" She asked after a moment. "All those who claim this woman as your mother, please raise your hand." Calin called over his shoulder. Lex watched as the hands came up. "Okay, I'll introduce as best as I can..." Calin said, dragging his mother over to the fence. He started first at one end, starting with Cayden and Gaberiel. "Okay, well these guys ARE yours and dad's just from their world...this is Cayden and Gaberiel. They say they have a sister..." "We do." Gaberiel said with a nod. Lex blinked, there was a very striking reseblemence between both boys and Faal... "And this is Elora...but in her world, her father's Nate..." Calin glanced at the tiny girl who looked a lot like Cearea, but then Lex could see MacDonnell traits in her too. Elora nodded shyly. Travis gave her a nudge and Marcas slipped up behind her. "And then that seems to be a trait in some of the other worlds..." Calin said. "Because," He paused, then pointed. "Jamie, Garrett and Gavin over there, their dads are all Nate... I'm assuming you have sisters?" The three guys nodded. Lex looked at the three and shook her head wtih a faint smile. "Then we get back to you and da." Calin said, "Because Callum there...happens to be yours and da's in his world..." "Callum?" Lex looked over at the boy with surprise. Callum simply nodded and Calin sighed. He was going to have to have a talk with Callum at some point. "And so are both Aidens here..." Calin said, pointing to the youngest boy. Lex looked toward him, with surprise as well, before her gaze was drawn to the girl beside the younger Aiden. Calin glanced at his sister, Cearea, who was chewing on her lip, as she watched her mother a moment, before Cearea spoke up, moving over beside Gaberielle. "And this Gaberielle, but her real father happens to be-" "Abadon...yus, I know..." Lex said softly. She sighed, biting back the impluse to say I'm sorry. Gabrielle gave a soft wary smile. "I've never met him.. except in my dreams sometimes. Ellander is the one who raised me. He's my father." she said in her soft voice. "He's been trying to find a way to stop Abadon from even the dream contact... the Courts are afraid of his influence over the Daughter's heir..."she offered a shy sad smile. "Krel... OUR Krell that is.." she said, smiling softly at the young man between her and Cearea. "We know he'll be my Guardian when I take your place, so he's been helping father in the search. He was supposed to meet me.. when he was late, we thought to meet up with him on his way.... instead... we found ourselves here.... with a different Krell..." Sorcha raised an eyebrow, a soft smirk on her face. Well... that would explain the 'something' she sensed between Krell and her sister... if things held between worlds on his role, then perhaps... Graves snoreted softly. "Hey kid..." he said to Lex with a smirk. "Sorry about the mess... kids had a party and invited some.. 'unsavory types'. We took care of it." he said, indictaing the few zombie corpses in sight. Raelin bounced to her feet as Graves sat up to look at Lex, and ran over to her mother. "Mumma! Guess what?! Iris says I'm going to grow WINGS!! Isn't that great!?! I can't wait!!" Lex took a moment address everything and looked over at Graves as Raelin reached her. "Well the kids should know we don't allow parties in this house, but it seems one or two of them, seem to have forgot, doesn't it... ? Saffron, what are you doing?" She asked her brother, seeing him. Saffron opened his eyes and looked at her, before shrugging and getting to his feet, dusting his jeans off. Lex looked back at Raelin, touching her for a moment. "That's lovely dear, your father will have a fit..." She said, before turning her attention back to Gaberielle. She glanced at their Krell, who was supposed to be her squire, but Estehl seemed to have made him Faal's squire...amung other things. She wasn't sure rather to blame Estehl, or Puk for Krell's adventures... But if in Gaberielle's world, Krell was her guardian, it would prove Faal's notion about the boy in this one... She looked back at Gaberielle. "What about...your mother... Because there...are ways to stop the dream connection...there's a couple ways actually...some more extreme then others..." She said softly. Gabrielle gave her head a gentle shake. "They've managed to severe his connection to her shortly after I was born... It almost killed her at the time, but she made it through. Father said if it hadn't been for me, she might not have fought so hard. But so far every attempt with me has failed..." Graves jumped to his feet. "Excellent.. so.. Lex is here. She can babysit while we hunt down the bad guys and kick some ass. Have the folks at the office figure out how to get the brats back where they belong." Raelin looked like she was about to bounce back his way and he stabbed a finger in her direction. "You... Annoying One... stay put." Raelin laughed and looked to Caleb, as if sizing him up as a replacement. Sorcha caught her look and snorted softly. "Mom... we serioulsy need to ban Uncle Gil from influencing her any further..." Lex frowned slightly at what Gaberielle said, about not being able to break the connection with her. "I suppose it would because of the blood tie..." She said softly, thoughtfully, before turning her in Graves' direction. "Hold up." she said with a calm tone. "We might want to estiblish WHO the bad guy is first." She said, shaking her head and giving Saffron a look. It seemed Saffron had been inching his way toward leaving. "You can stay put too." She took her cellphone from her messanger bag. "But I do believe I should call your father." She said to Calin, catching a hold of Raelin's back shirt collar as she inched her way toward Caleb. Graves saw the girls attention diverted and smirked. "Aww... come on Lex... let the kid go. Caleb's my son.. let her hang out with him. Or isn't my kid good enough for yours? Hell.. they're cousins after all." he added then cracked up laughing again. "Fuck.. that is just so...fuck.." "I am so glad you find that funny..." Saffron said, turning to give Graves a look. "I mean, one doesn't exactly picture YOU as a father..." He pointed with such a tone. Lex raised an eyebrow. Saffron had been oddly snappy lately... "Do I get an explanation for that comment?" She asked. "Well it seems, mum," Calin said patiently, "That in Caleb and Gavin's world, and Rachael's, that Saffron is a girl...yeah." Calin told her. Lex's eyebrow went even higher and she looked back at Saffron, who'd crossed his arms over his chest with a dark look. "And then Iris started making some comments she shouldn't have..." Nicky said from his spot, Bastin shoved him. "What comments?" Lex looked back at some of the others. Iris popped from around Lily Rose and spoke before Lily Rose could restrain her sister. "He's in love with him." She pointed from Saffron to Graves. It took Lily Rose and Tristan to tackle Iris... Graves managed to stop himself form looking at Saffron at Iris's comment. "Don't forget the whole Guardian thing, brat." he muttered. "Look, Lex... we'll deal with finding who's behind this, alright? You deal with... them." he added and waved a hand at the kids. He saw the looks he was getting from the older ones and sighed. "IF you guys can keep your asses out of the way... we'll consider letting you help." Lex was giving her brother a look, before glancing at Graves. "I like how you assume to I can watch ALL of these kids..." She said with a dry tone, "If you excuse me, I'm calling the office." She said. "And dad..." Calin put in. "And Faal, yus." Lex agreed, dailing his office extinsion first to see if he was there. Graves just raised an eyebrow and looked at Saffron . "What? It's not like they'r in fucking diapers! How much watching are they going to need?" Sorcha snorted softly as Raelin managed to slip past their mother and make her way to Caleb. Yeah.. that kid was going to be a problem. A faerie with a fascination for dangerous men. Dad was going to freak... Uncle Gil was going to laugh his ass off.. so was Uncle Estehl...   ** Faal held up a hand as Nate came around the partion at the same time as he picked up the phone. They had it set up so that only calls from certain people automatically got through without having to go through the main desk. Nate raised an eyebrow as he plopped donw in the nearest chair and put his boots on Faal's desk. Scowling at the boots, Faal bit back his comment and turned his attention to the phone call. "Hello?" Lex gave her brother and Graves a look as the phone was answered. "Hello Faal. We have a problem at the house...I think you should come home...and you might want to bring mum..and dad...and hell, bring all the parents there..." She said with a sigh, looking at all the faces. Faal was on his feet and slamming Nates boots out of the way as he did. "We'll be right there." he said, knowing form past experience to save the questions for later. Troublke at the house met the kids... and the fact that she wanted ALL the parents... "Nathaniel... we need to get all the parents out to my house NOW." he said simply as he checked his gun and grabbed his jacket on the way out the door, Nate right one his heels. "Aww shite.. what have th' litle devils done now?" Faal snorted. "Well find out in a minute. I'll get everyone fomr the apartments.. you spread the word down here. We'll meet in reception and i'll open a rift." ** Saffron looked at Graves and snorted. "All those kids are the product of people working for Chaos Inc or close too, reguardless the world...in other words...ALOT of trouble..." He replied. Graves smirked and shrugged. "Yeah well... you guys are a pain in the ass... shouldn't suprise me the kids follow that. Especailly MacDonnel's.. fuck...look at them all.." he said and nodded towards the kids. "Fucking rabbit!" Saffron snorted. "Yeah, he should die of shock when he gets here." He said, "Actually considering I believe some of those kids were with Lex...Faal should die of shock..." He added as an after thought. "Not amusing guys." Lex said from her spot, putting her cellphone up. She turned back to the massive amount kids. "Well, I'm not sure if the kitchen's big enough to accommadate everyone...I guess we can wait out here..." "ACTUALLY." Iris said from under Lily Rose's hand. "It's going to rain..." Lex and Saffron both turned their eyes up to the sky, no one had noticed the clouds had gathered in rather quickly and were a rather dark grey. "I wondered where the sun had gone." Nicky said from his spot. Bastin, Calin and Mike did their best to bite back the laughs... Sorcha looked up and sighed then grabbed Dante by the shirt collar. "Come on, unc... inside." she said and her and Calin began herding the younger ones back inside. Graves frowned up at the sky, thinking just what he'd done lately to deserve this kind of 'attention' from Her. As he felt the chill of Saffron getting closer he tried to shove Iris' predictions and comments out of his mind. They'd made their choices years ago, long before Saffron had gotten married and had kids. It was a bit late for going back now. Even so, he swore he could feel the tattoo he'd gotten after he'd heard Saffron had gotten married. The few times they'd worked together or been around each other since, fate had conspired in such a way that his arm had always been covered. And once again, he was wearing a jacket and rain was on the way... at least the Lady was on his side in that. Be a bit embarrassing to explain why he had a black winged angel of death bearing Safron's face tattooed on his body, now wouldn't it? It only took about five minutes for the word to spread through the offices and another couple for everyone to meet up. Less then ten minutes after Faal had hung up the phone, he'd opened the rift into the back yard to find it empty save for  the two men and a couple decaying zombie corpses at the far end. "They're inside." Saffron told them when they came through the rift. He was sitting on the rail of the back porch, rather waiting for the rain...or watching for more zombies. "And just so you know...in case of heart attack, I've got EMS on speed dial." He added, managing a wicked smirk. Lex opened the kitchen door, "Everyone who hasn't already been here, needs to come into the library." She told the rest of the parents. "And be prepared for something a shock.." She added. She heard Saffron snort softly. The rest of the parents headed into the house and toward the library. Lex looked back at Saffron and realized Graves was still out there too. She snorted softly. "Try not to get to wet, Saffron." She said, before heading after the others. Saffron snorted softly, glancing back at the door as it closed, before leaning against a post on the porch rail. He finally turned his eyes on Graves, when he was sure they were completely alone. *** Lex came in the library behind the other parents, and could understand their stunned expression. "Yeah...this is the trouble I was talking about. Calin...you want to explain it to them?" Calin snorted, giving his mother an amused expression. "Appearently there's some bad guy out there, who's yanked all these guys..." "And girls!" Sora put in. "And girls, through worm holes or something from their own worlds..." Calin said. Faal found himself looking at a kid that could've passed for Sorcha's twin when she was younger. He looked up in surprise and found another.. and another. Nate was cursing softly and being smacked in the arm by Larkin over his language, although she looked just as likely to swear herself. Kay was the one who managed to speak intelligently first. "Worm holes... not a time shift like earlier? A portal gone wrong?" "No. Well we're not sure..." Calin said. "Nicky had a theory it was similar to the whole thing Tiger used to do, but...really, come on...Gavin, Jamie, Garette, and Elora...in their worlds, their parents are Lexine and Nate." Calin said. "Um..." Came one of the kids. Calin turned to see Cayden looking at Chaos. "Problem?" Calin asked. "Sorta...we're not allowed to be around Lady Chaos..." Cayden said. "Why?" Lex asked. "Because our father hates her...although the feeling is mutual...I mean she did try to kill dad." Gaberiel said, glancing at Cayden who nodded after a moment. Calin snorted and glanced at first at Lex who was trying to hold back a smirk, then he glanced at his father and Chaos, biting back his own smirk. "In their world, those two, Cayden and Gaberiel have Lexine and Faal as parents..." "Yeah, and those are our cousins." Cayden pointed at Mariah and Chase. "They're parents are Nate and Larkin...but Nate and Faal don't work for Chaos Inc...as a matter of fact... none of us have any contact with any one at Chaos Inc..." Calin snorted, and shook his head, then continued. "Then there's Callum and those guys over there. Callum being like Cayden and Gaberiel. But I believe Rachael is...Saffron and..." "Eire's." Rachael said. "Right... and Jack and Johnny..." Calin glanced at them. "Nate and Larkin's.." Jack said. "And Thayer's the son of Threni and Mike MacDonnell." "Well actually," The boy named Travis cut in. "My da's Mike MacDonnell, only my mum's Larkin." He said. "Oh yeah... and Brina there...That's Eire's daughter in her world, but she was raised by Eire and Xander...and actually, the boy with Brina, Xander, is your little brother..." Calin added. "And this is Gaberielle and Aiden." Cearea cut in from beside those two, along with Krell. "Did I miss anyone?" Calin asked. Then noticed Caleb by the window. "Oh yeah..and Caleb's parents are Saffron and Graves..." "Yeah.. you forgot me.." Tamara said, pushing her way from between a couple of her 'brothers'. She looked to Nate where he stood with Larkin. "Hi da." she said softly and heard a startled squeak from where Sylvie suddenly leaned against Xander. "Oh my god... Tamara?" she asked softly. "Nate... it's ..." Nate swallowed hard, his eyes burning. His mind had been stumbling over the fact that in other worlds, his brother was alive and he was looking at a couple of his kids right now... until the slim, freckle faced copper blonde had stepped forward. And suddenly he was looking at the daughter he'd lost almost thirty years ago. Except she looked closer to twenty.. if that... "Hey babygirl..." he managed to say softly. "Oh, sorry about that." Calin said to Tamara, before moving back and letting the parents take care of this. He flopped down in a chair by the window, although his gaze drifted back to Callum. He and his sisters knew about the baby that their mother had lost before they'd adopted Calin. They knew it was supposed to be a boy and that their parents had christiened him Callum. But Calin had never really thought...and yet here he was... They were about the same age...Callum maybe only a few months younger then Calin... "Anyway." Calin said from his spot, lounging in the chair, one leg over an arm and looking back at the adults. "As I said, some evil dude has dragged all these guys here. And according to Iris, we have to hurry up and get them back to their worlds. Maybe before dinner, but Iris didn't specify." Several of the younger kids snickered at that comment. Calin was in his prince mode at the moment, which usually annoyed his younger sisters to no end. And greatly annoyed Caspin, who thought he was the more important fae prince... this appearently amused their great uncle Gillorn to no end...and Gillorn tended to favor Calin anyway... Most of the parents seemed to be a bit in shock as they tried to take in the fact that they were looking at their children from other worlds.. and with other spouses. Eire was eyeing Brina warily, trying to wrap his head around the comment about him and Xander raising her... not to mention him and Saffron having a kid. That was just wrong.. not as wrong as Saffron and Graves having one, but still.... "So...do we have any idea who the bad guy might be and how they're accomplishing this?" Kay asked. "Because I have no clue how to reverse this... I don't know anyone with the ability to travel across dimensions outside of our own... except perhaps Tiger...." " No...We don't have an idea, sadly." Calin said. "It wasn't long after they arrived that the zombies showed up...followed by Graves and Saffron." He said, drapping an arm over his head and tapping his foot in the air, his leg still over the arm. Cearea looked like she was ready to throw him out of that chair. "As for some one who could help..." Calin went to shrug, when a thought came to him. "Wait! What about that guy you know, mum?" He turned his head slightly to look at Lex. "What guy?" Lex asked. "You know, the one that's got a brother we don't like..." Calin said. Lex snorted, then it occured to her. "Oh! You mean Justice..." She looked at her son, who nodded. "Well...yus, I suppose Justice would know something about it..." She said after a moment of thought. "Oooo! Ooo! I wanna go to the white court!" Nicky said. Regan reached over and snatched her son's shirt collar, pulling him back. "The only people who can get into the white court are people who have leave." Some one said. "Which is Lex, Faal, Saffron-" "Who's busy..." "Chaos and Rue..." Regan was saying, though Iris cut in there. Faal sighed. "Calin. Sit up and behave before I turn your sister loose on you." he said, earning a smirk from Cearea. He eyed his youngest daughter where she'd perched on the arm of a chair next to Caleb. He sighed and rubbed his forehead with a thumb. At least he was closer to her age and would be gone back to his own world very soon. And as the cousin issue had already been brought up, it would be hands off. If he had his way, she wouldn't be dating for a very long time. He had the distinct impression she was going to be far more of a handful then the other girls. Calin sighed deeply and shifted, sitting up properly in the chair and gave Cearea a look. She simply stuck her tongue out at him in return. He was momentarily distracted by what ever was happening outside and he heard Iris snicker faintly. "Well I suppose I could go see if Justice is around..." Lex said thoughtfully, before looking at Faal. Faal gave a half shrug. He really had no clue what to do. He had never heard of anything like this and he wasn't sure how to even react to it, let alone fix it. Lex was the one who knew every book and file in the archives off by heart and could rattle of case referrences with an ease that rivalled Sylvie's... if there was anything even remotely close to this or that might concievably help, they were the ones who stood a chance of finding it. "If you think he's the one for this, by all means. Tell me what you need from me and it's yours... as always." he added with a soft smirk. "Well, not always appearently." Came a comment from either Iris, Raiden or possibly Niell... Lex ignored it and considered for a moment. "I'll pop over to the white court and see what Justice has to say on this, maybe even Rue's father." Lex said. "In the mean time...maybe there's a clue to all this in the way these guys ended up here...start interrigating." She said, heading for the door to the hall and enough room to open a rift to the white court. Saffron gave a soft whimper at hearing him, leaning back against the tree, and pulled Graves toward him, one hand slidding into his hair as he kissed him passionately, ignoring the rain as it got harder. Faal raised an eyebrow as he looked over the children. "In this world..." he said, letting his voice trail off and he sighed and looked at Kay. Kay rolled her eyes. "Damn it Dominic.. not the sad eyes... you are fine with children.. you've proven it." she said, waving a hand at them. "Stop trying to stick this one someone else.. your wife told YOU to start questioning." Faal just smirked and gave a snort before considering how to do just that. "Well who arrived here first?" Larkin asked the kids. "Well that would be Caleb and Gavin." Calin said, pointing. "Yer Nate an' Lex's," Eire said looking at Gavin who nodded, then Eire looked at Caleb. "An...yer Saffron an'...Graves..." he said slowly. "Yeah..." Caleb answered. "Well...it does make sense..." Regan said. "I mean...think about it...Death Elemental...Necromancer...makes real good fuckin' sense..." "ANYWAY..." Larkin interrupted her big sister, looking back at Gavin and Caleb. "What were the two of you doing before you ended up here?" Gavin and Caleb looked at each other. Gavin leaned over toward Caleb and the two confered for a moment. "We WERE hanging out in the graveyard..." Gavin said. "Don't ask..." Caleb put in. "We were kinda...ambushed by well, you know those zombies laying outside. Some of those guys...Well we ducked into a mausoleum, turned from closing the door and walked right out of an alley way not far from here..." Caleb finished. "Ran into those guys..." He nodded to Mike, Nick and Bastian. Faal looked them over considering that. "Who was next...?" "Brina, Travis, Elora and Marcas..." Sora said, nodding to the four in question. "Any zombies involved in yer 'trip' here?" Nate asked as he managed to tear his eyes away from Tamara. "Ah hell.. let's just check here... how many of ye didnae have any zombies involved?"                                      * * * As the parents were all filing inside the house, Graves had moved to tree with the old fashioned wooden seated swing hanging from the largest branch. He was standing there, leaning back against the rough bark with his eyes closed, completely aware of every move Saffron made. He'd never gotten over him. He'd tried, but the kid had effected him way too deep. One night. One night and he'd been haunted by it for ... goddess.. how long had it been... fifteen.. sixteen years? Longer? yeah... the boys looked about sixteen... it had to be seventeen or eighteen years ago now... And he still felt the same. He focused on keeping his breathing even and not looking at him. It had been a mistake on his part to walk away... he'd been a bit too hung up on whole guy/guy issue at the time. And Saffron had a girl in his life that he was crazy for... It had seemed like the right thing at the time... But what if the creepy kid was right? Was it possible that Saffron felt the same.... all these years, his marriage and kids... Saffron watched Graves for a long moment, before sighing and hopping off the railing. A light sprinkling of rain began falling, but Saffron didn't pay attention to it. He approached the large tree, his hands in his jean pockets. "How long are we going to go with out talking..." He asked Graves softly, watching him. Graves smirked and sighed as he opened his eyes and looked at him. "I don't know, kid. Figured it was just the way you wanted it..." he said simply. "The creepy little brat could be wrong you know... lots of kids here.. her radar could be fucked up by all of this..." "The way I wanted it?" Saffron echoed softly in a questioning tone, before sighing and leaning his back against the tree. "I don't think its gone the way I wanted it..." He said softly, looking back toward the house and away from Graves. Graves snorted and turned to look him, leaning on his side, one arm over his head. This was the first time they'd allowed themselves to be alone together since that night... The few times they'd been this close they'd had others around. The last time had been during a job almost a decade before.. he had a photo of the two of them he'd had scanned down that he kept in his wallet. How pathetic was that? "Kid.... Saffron. " he said, then corrected himself.. afterall... he was hardly a kid anymore. "You have a gorgeous wife and great kids. You've got a life most people would envy.. aside from the monster hunting part..." he said with a smirk. "And you finally grew your hair back out... the preppy look was not you, man." Saffron felt that old pleasent shiver run through him, and realized he'd missed feeling it. He gave a slight smirk at Graves words, still watching the house. He spoke with a soft tone, "Neither was my marriage to Alandra...Only ended up staying because of the kids..." He shifted slightly and finally looked over at Graves. Neither had really changed much, least they didn't look their age..."I believe there's an old saying, 'Death should stay in Death's company...'." Graves snorted softly and looked up as the sound of rain drop started to hit the leaves harder above them. "Damn ... the creepy kid was right..." he said softly then pushed away from the tree to face Saffron straight on. "What are ya saying, Saffron?" he asked simply, then reached out to run his thumb along the other mans jaw. "Are you saying that you've spent all this time wishing you were with me instead?" Saffron gave a soft groan, closing his eyes a moment at Graves touch, the rain slowly getting heavier above them, slowly starting to hit them more and more. And he finally opened his eyes, looking at Graves. "How much more simply can I say yes?" Graves gave a soft moan and slid the palm of his hand over Saffrons cheek. "Babe...." he said, giving in to tempation and dropping both hands to slide around his waist. "Please..." he said softly, not even sure what he was saying it for. Was he asking for it to be real or for him to be sure... he knew the answer to both was yes... He leaned closer, his eyes closing as he breathed in that familar scent that made his heart ache with wanting. "I never stopped wanting you, Saffron...." he said simply. "If you're serious about this... then just kiss me." Saffron gave a soft whimper at hearing him, leaning back against the tree, and pulled Graves toward him, one hand slidding into his hair as he kissed him passionately, ignoring the rain as it got harder. Graves wrapped his arms around him tighter and kissed him back hungrily. He could swear it was even better than it had been that night. The rain had picked up, and despite the tree above them filtering the drops, they were both thoroughly soaked... and neither seemed to care. Graves just let go like he had back then and opened himself to the moment, feeling as if no time had passed at all. Saffron gave a contented sigh behind the kiss, slipping his arms around Graves neck, kissing him back just as hungrily. He'd been an absolute fool to have walked away the next morning. And he'd regretted that decision alot since. Alandra had known, thanks to her aunt Arcanina, the same woman who'd practically raised Saffron in Hell. Arcanina had told her, before their wedding, that Saffron was better off with some one else, and had already met that some one before. Alandra had confronted Saffron about it, she'd been mad, but stubborn enough to marry him anyway. And Saffron had only stayed for his sons. Graves broke the kiss with a sigh, resting his forehead against Saffrons. "I've never stopped wanting you, Saffron... I'm sorry I let you go. I should've chased after you... I was stupid." he said simply. He sighed again and slipped one hand up to cup his face, his thumb brushing rain drops off his cheek. "Fuck, Saff... would've been better if you'd decided this years ago... your boys are going to take this even harder now, you know..."        ...Tbc....