Tucking Sarah and Sammy in the large duvet, Emma quietly slipped off the bed to stand beside the window of the unfamiliar room.

They were not to pass this night in their house, emergency services would be checking it out for any major damages in the structure of the house, water system, gas, electric wires and so on. She had been informed that a short circuit in a wire inside the bathroom had initiated this mess.

Savanah had been apologizing and sobbing, feeling guilty over the whole thing. But Emma made her understand that it was an accident, it was no one's fault. Then Savanah started blaming her bad-luck and Emma didn't know anymore how she could sooth the old woman's guilty conscience. So when Savanah insisted her to stay the night in her house with the kids. Emma couldn't deny, for it would have definitely make the woman feel even more pathetic if she did. And anyways, it was the only option left in her hands, considering it had already been so late at night. If not about herself she had to think about two small children who were still so much scared and shaken up because of the whole chaos and were looking extremely exhausted to their bones.

Emma was feeling the same too.

Sighing, she rested her throbbing head against the well polished wooden frame of the window.

She was suddenly feeling so numb... so cold. The forbidden gate opened up in her mind and those haunted memories from the past were let out from their detention. The reason was something she never imagined she would have to face again in her brand new life.

Brandan.

The moment she saw him she witnessed her wounds getting poked cruelly with a pin in a continuous motion and she amusedly realized that those wounds, those she thought were healed after so many years--were still very much existing, hidden behind thick and unbreakable walls created over the years.

She trembled slightly, recalling the way his arms surrounded around her, hugging her so tight to himself--to that taut, muscular body.

Emma shook her head furiously, trying to shake off those kinds of thoughts about that sexy body of that impossibly evil man who once possessed her heart.

The doorbell rang loudly making Emma wince.

Who was it so late at night?

It rang again. Clearly, someone was out of their mind.

She glanced back at the children warily, they were going to wake up if this kept on. Therefore, to put a stop to it she sprinted up to the front door although she stopped dead with her hand on the door knob. Savanah didn't have late night visitors, she was a lonely old woman who would chew out anyone's brain who dared to intrude her beauty sleep.

Then another though descended on Emma. The possibility of a certain person at the other side of the door made her mind almost go into a frenzied state.

She had noticed how Brandan stood immobilized at the sight of Sammy calling her 'mommy'. In the speed of a comet she had scurried off with her children then, long before he could recover from the shock.

The doorbell rang again, now constantly multiple times. Emma winced when the unexpected comforting touch of Savanah's hand on her shoulder, making her snap out of the reverie of the situation.

Nodding assuringly at Emma, Savanah yelled, "Can't an old woman sleep in peace!"

Emma watched Savanah making her way to the door, not opening the chains she just unlocked the door and looked outside from the small crack in a way that the person at the other side couldn't see Emma standing just behind her.

"What are you indecent young man doing at such a late hour of night trying to perv into an elderly citizen's abode ?" Savanah asked with annoyance.

"Sorry, ma'am, I apologize for disturbing you at such an hour but can I please talk to Emma ?"

Brandan!! Emma had her breath caught in her lungs all the while praying for Savanah not to let him in and looked like her prayers were answered too.

Savanah's voice was cold as ice as she answered. "Listen, young man, whoever you are. Emma and her children had a really tough evening. Do you expect me to wake them up in the middle of night to hang out with an insomniac like you. I know it was you who saved them but seriously where's that precious common sense of yours?"

There was silence for a long moment and when Brandan spoke he seemed really desperate. "Please mam, I really need to talk to her."

He was on the verge of begging and Emma had her heart stuck in her throat. This didn't seem like Brandan at all. What did he want from her? She thought she had relieved the man by removing her presence from his life.

"I forbid you to do so tonight." Savanah snapped.

The door was slammed shut upon his face as a grumbling Savanah turned to face Emma who exhaled carefully her stuck breath. Her heart dropping down to it's rightful place from her constricted throat.

Emma looked at her gratefully. "Thanks for not allowing him in Savanah."

Savanah just waved her hand brushing it away. "Not a problem, dear." She added while walking away, "Just make sure to solve whatever it is going on between you and the insomniac before it makes you and your children's lives miserable. After all complicated things get even more complicated with time if we left them just like that out in the open."

That was indeed quite a wise thing coming out of the usually drunk, cranky oldy's mouth.

With a gentle pat on her shoulder Savanah left towards her room.

Emma still stood there in front of the door for a long time staring at the wooden obstacle which had just stopped him from reaching her. But the question was - for how long?

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For what seemed like an eternity, Brandan stood there glaring at the closed door so intensely almost mentally blasting the object in question to blast into smithereens but at last he blinked and backed away. As much as he wanted to say the otherwise, he himself knew that the old woman was indeed right. It was really a tough evening for Emma's children.

Emma's children. That sounded so...

Brandan didn't know what to name the mixture emotions that burst throughout him. Standing at the front porch of Savanah's house he raked a hand through his already disheveled hair making it pathetically messier than before like he had ran through a hurricane. Not that he just found out that Emma was alive but he was also greeted with the sudden news of her being a mother of two, and all that was revealed to him in a matter of an hour.

He found himself making his way towards his own house absentmindedly. Almost robotically he dialed the number of his private investigator and as if a man hypnotized he barked orders with a threat to give him the information he wanted before the night would come to an end.

While he had his sweet suspicions, he knew he still had to make sure he wasn't too late in finding her.

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