69. Chapter 68
TWO WEEKS LATERDolls were in the middle of discussing with Doc about another group of trackers to go out to search for the two missing pups. Doc was at the point of exhaustion from being out every day trying to locate the pair and their abductor, but each time he was on the brink of discovery, Doc faced another obstacle. If it wasn’t another downpour of snow overnight, then it was poor visibility during the daylight hours. Nicole and Doc were constant in their search for their pups, and with every passing hour and minute without them, their wives were beginning to start losing hope that they were ever going to see their babies alive.
Jeremy had been working hard to try over the last couple of days, searching through the School’s video footage from the day the pups had been taken, hoping to see the creature in the middle of abducting the children, and which direction it headed off towards. Armed with a detailed map of the area surrounding the school grounds, Jeremy had just finished working out his calculations as to the likelihood the children could be found. Jumping up from his seat and rushing over and interrupting Dolls and Doc, “From my calculations, it looks like the creature headed towards Tatenhill Farms.” Showing the two Alpha’s a map with numerous colored lines that Jeremy had made, revealing his research.
Meanwhile back at the Earp-Haught household, the mood was strained with Waverly only functioning on autopilot, as she made sure that all the other pups were feed and clothed. Nicole would assist with preparing breakfast before heading out with Doc and begin searching for the rest of the day. After finding little sign of her son and niece, a deflated redhead forced herself to put one foot in front of the other and head home to her fractured family. Nicole remained stoic for the sake of her wife, but just like when Waverly had been taken, it was only when Nicole took a shower, did she let herself cry.
Waverly on the other hand, spent her days looking over Nicolas’ photos, while saddening thoughts rushed through her mind. Thoughts of terrible acts occurring to her son and niece plagued her mind, which would lead her to cry that much more. Since Nicolas’s abduction, the brunette couldn’t bring herself to be separated from her younger babies, resulting in them staying with her during the day, while the older ones headed off to school. Only when Nicole returned at the end of her day of searching, did Waverly find comfort from the vanilla scent the redhead would ooze in her wife’s presence. The moment the redhead walked into the house; Waverly could tell from the look on her wife’s face just how the day of searching had gone.
The brunette would reach out for Nicole’s hand and pull her into her arms, then burying her head into the crook of her tall wife’s neck. Breathing in deeply the vanilla scent and wrapping her arms around Nicole’s middle. The pair find solace in each other’s arms for the next minutes, before being interrupted by little hands pulling at their legs, biding for their time and affection. After the evening meal had been taken care of and all of the pups bathed and read their nightly story, Nicole and Waverly with tears in their eyes would place kisses to the foreheads of their babies, until when they reached Nicolas and Alberto’s room. Since the first night of Nicolas’s abduction, Alberto had taken to wanting to sleep between his parents, being surrounded by their scents and protection. At first, he would stay in his little bed, but sometime during the night, Alberto would climb into his parent’s bed, where he would slot himself in the little gap between his Ma and Mummy.
Just as Nicole was Waverly’s rock, it wasn’t until the redhead headed off towards the shower, was when Nicole finally lowered the hard wall that surrounded her fractured heart. Peeling off her clothes and leaving them in a pile on the floor of the bathroom, Nicole turned on the shower while she waited for the water to reach the right temperature, before stepping in under the hot and steaming water. As the water drops fell over her body, Nicole felt the walls she has erected around her heart, to protect her from having to face a reality that scared her. A world where her son, Nicolas was no longer a part of, a world where she would always feel like part of her was no longer. Before Nicole could let her thoughts race off, she was pulled back into reality by the touch of two hands being placed around her waist and a kiss to the middle of the back of her neck.
With the touch only that could break through to her, now holding her. Nicole leaned forward and pressed her head against the shower tiles and allowed the tears that had been threatening to fall all day, to finally fall down her cheeks. As Nicole sobbed facing the shower wall, Waverly held her tight and whispered, “Baby, I have you. I love you. Let go.”
Hugging her wife from behind and water splashing around their feet, Waverly hummed into Nicole’s back, until she knew that Nicole was ready to turn and face her. With Nicole now looking at her, Waverly reached up and caressed the sides of the redhead’s face. “You’ve been so strong for me and our pups. Now it’s my turn to be your rock. Let me wash you and then we can cuddle in bed until our little visitor arrives.” Placing a tender kiss on Nicole’s lips, the brunette was saying in her own way, “Trust me.”
After finishing their shared shower, the pair helped each other to dress in their nightwear and then into bed. Waverly held to her word, that she would look after Nicole, as she held the taller woman tight against her side. Nicole rested her head on her wife’s chest and ran her hand over the baby belly, to which the pups decided that it would be the best time to reveal their limbs by pressing them against the walls of Waverly’s skin. Both women giggled at the actions of their pups, in amongst such a sad time of their lives. Nicole moved so that she could lift her wife’s top and placed kisses on the baby belly, “I love you and your Ma.”
Just then Alberto appeared in the doorframe, holding onto his Police teddy bear and a sad look upon his little face. Waverly held out her arms towards Alberto and with her hands indicated for him to come over to her. Once he was in his Ma’s arms, the little boy was feeling safe and secure. “Hey, my little buddy. Do you want to feel the babies moving in your Ma’s tummy?” Nicole smiles at her son as she points to Waverly’s now exposed swollen belly.
Nodding his head, Alberto moves so that he can be laying next to his Ma’s belly and holds out his hand to his Mummy to show him where to place it. Laying her son’s hand just above Waverly’s belly button and tapping the skin, Alberto feels the kicking against the skin, which causes him to giggle with glee. “Babies kicking. Do they hurt you Ma?” Looking up at his Ma and waiting for her reply.
“No, it just tickles. But when I was having you and Nicolas, (Waverly takes a deep breath in) you both use to kick me so hard, that one time you knocked off my belly a plate of vegan cookies.” Waverly and Nicole smile as they both remember their first pregnancy.
“I think it might be a good time for all of us to have a cuddle before we go to sleep,” Nicole suggests as she watches Alberto climb into his position between his Ma and Mummy, as he waits for them both to wrap him up in their arms.
Stretching her hand out and laying upon her unborn pups, Nicole would not allow herself to drift off to sleep, even though she was struggling to keep her eyes open. It was only when the redhead could hear Waverly’s soft whimper, that indicated the brunette was asleep. Worry seemed to slide off Nicole’s shoulders as she breathed in her wife’s scent, which had changed to a Lavender smell, providing calmness to the redhead. Before she could fight the urge to close her heavy-laden eyelids, Nicole felt herself drifting off.
NEXT DAYUnlike the last couple of weeks, Wynonna decided that she should at least head into the station and bring Doc some lunch before he was due to head out searching till the light faded for the day. Wynonna stood outside the door to the Black Badge office, with a lump in her throat and a desire to be doing something other than just waiting for news on her own baby girl, Alice. Ever since the moment that the little girl had been taken, Wynonna has been reliving the past couple of years in her head, reliving all the joys of watching Alice grow up and learning to talk, roll over, sit up on her own, standing, saying ‘Mum’ and ‘Dad’ for the first time, all of her milestones. Now Wynonna was wanting to do more, she was longing to hold her daughter again and nothing was going to stop her. All the way over to the station, Wynonna had been going over everything she was going to say to both Dolls and Doc, to let her be apart of the searching. Now she was standing on the threshold of moving forward in her grief and anger at losing Alice.
Luckily for Wynonna, Doc had been told by Dolls that he and Nicole were to have a rest day from searching. It wouldn’t benefit either of them to be exhausted for when they were needed, so Dolls had banned both Doc and Nicole from coming anywhere near the station for a 24-hour period. So, Doc had headed off into his mechanic workshop, hoping that keeping his hands busy, would help him to center his thoughts. Doc was becoming more frustrated at the end of each day, normally as Wynonna so elegantly put it, ‘find a dildo in a nunnery,’ but when it came to his own daughter, he was struggling to find a track of his little girl.
Stepping into the office Wynonna braces herself for Dolls to refuse her assistance and ordering her to head back out the door and head off to the homestead to wait for news. Turning to see as to who was entering the office, Dolls bites his bottom lip with his top lip, pulling it into a flat line, as a sign of saying, ‘Hi.’
“Look before you can say anything, I’m here and I want to go out and have another look at the Tatenhill Farm. We might have missed something. Dolls, please! I need to do this. My baby girl and nephew are out there, with that thing.” Wynonna has moved to stand beside Dolls and has a pleading look on her face.
“Alright, just if Doc asks, tell him that I suggested it.” Dolls place a supportive hand on Wynonna’s leather-clad shoulder before he stands up off his stool to grab his jacket and keys. Leaving a note for Jeremy and Doc, letting them know that they were heading to Tatenhill Farms.
MEANWHILETucked under warm blankets, Alice and Nicolas huddled together holding onto each other not only for warmth but also to give the other reassurance that their parents would be searching for them. For the past couple of weeks, the pair have been forced to watch Mama Olive and Hetty feast on raw human flesh, which was also offered to the little pups along with mugs of milk. As much as they were hungry, Alice and Nicolas couldn’t bring themselves to eat the portions of human flesh that was plated before them daily. Pushing away their plates and replying when asked as to why they were not eating, “The milk fills us up.”
Mama Olive then decided that if they wouldn’t eat the meat raw, then maybe if she cooked it and masked it as food such as a Hamburger, just like she did regularly in her Diner. So, when Hetty presented the pups with a plate of Cheeseburgers, the pups were skeptical at first, but it was only the night before when their hunger pains won out, with them eating food for the first time since being taken.
Hetty always made sure that Mama Olive didn’t transform within the presence of the pups, but there were times when Mama Olive would wander down into the cellar fully transformed in her Wendigo form. Instead of remaining her usual height, Mama Olive had grown at least twice her height, and her hair had grown wilder and darker in color. Her hands and feet had distorted into shrunken bony claws, which when the pups saw her, there was flesh stuck between them. Mama Olive’s mouth was also distorted and where there used to be teeth were now fangs, like that of a wolverine and mostly were dried blood-stained, and her jaw would dislodge and widen enough that she could hold an adult’s thigh in between.
When Mama Olive came down in this form, she would spend her time trying to chase the pups around the secret compartment of the cellar where they were being held. Nicolas would be the first of the two pups to sense Mama Olive approaching their location and remind Alice of the training that their Alpha parents had given them. “Alice, remember to watch her feet. She always points them in the direction, she plans to move. Mummy always said that if you can learn their faults, you can use it to keep you safe.”
“She scares me. But Daddy always said that we must face what scares us, to be brave. If your brave, then I can be brave.” Alice reaches out and takes hold of Nicolas’ hand as they prepare themselves to quickly move out of Mama Olive’s way. For the next hour Mama Olive would make a game out of trying to catch the pups, but each time Nicolas and Alice would either run through her legs or jump out of her clutches just in time. Once she had grown tired and frustrated with them, she would switch off the main light and leave them in the glow of the lamp, which sat on the floor beside the little bed they both shared.
Only when they were left alone did the red- and brunette-haired pups, held onto each other and cried and tried to comfort each other. “Do you think Mummy and Auntie Sheriff Nicole are ever going to find us?” Alice would ask with a quivering voice.
“Mummy Sheriff is going to bite her head off when she gets a hold of her. Uncle Doc is going to do the same with the redhead lady. Alice everything is going to be ok.” Nicolas would say as he held his older cousin in his arm. After seeing his Mummy do this with his Ma, Nicolas knew that it was needed to calm his cousin and help him to keep holding onto his belief that they would be found.