The Cost of Freedom Is High

Estimated Date of Arrival, But Whose?

I picked up Bella's now limp, passed out body and brought her over to the larger bench outside of the shower.

Once she was dried off, and her undergarments were back on, I quickly dried off and put my jeans back on.

After I had finally granted her release, her body had bucked against my fingers, and her entire body shook as she squirted against my hand.

Instantly she blacked out. her body quickly turning still as fast as it had started to squirm.

Figuring that everyone upstairs would already be fast asleep I carried her up to one of the spare rooms on the first floor. The one that TJ had originally found her in.

I slipped her into the covers, and went back into the front hall closet.

Since we couldn't trust Bella to have any phones around, we all had to keep our phones locked up in the closet.

Each band had their own basket for their cell phones. I pulled ours out and saw that mine was beeping and glowing.

1 Missed Text.

It was from Tino.

Text:
Just thought we'd give you a heads up, we'll be arriving back at the house around 5 am, PTV and ATL will be about 45 minutes to an hour behind us due to traffic.

See you then,
Tino.

Looks like I'd be getting up early.

Once I put my phone back, I locked everything up and made my way back to the room with Bella in it.

I set the alarm for 4:45, and crawled into bed next to Bella.

She groaned in her sleep, and rolled away from me.

I rolled my eyes, she was a piece of work.

It was all worth it though.

"Night." I whispered.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
4:45 am

'Beep, beep, beep'

I reached over to the other side of the bed and shut off the alarm.

Once I was assured that Bella was still in a very deep sleep, I got out of bed and made my way down to the foyer.

Just as I entered the room the door opened and Austin entered the house.

"Welcome back." I cheered.

"Thanks, nice to be back." Austin replied, as he stepped into the house Tino, Phil, Alan, and Aaron walked in behind him.

"Do you want to just wait until later to unpack?" I asked.

"Yeah, we've just backed the bus up into the driveway. We'll get it a bit later today." Phil stated.

We made a bit of small talk, and made our way over to the couches and sat down.

"How has Bella been? It's been awhile since we've actually seen her." Alan asked.

"She's improved with leaps and bounds, however she still has those few quirks about not willing to fully give in. As you know though the plan is to have Michael and DJ move in sometime this week. We originally planned for the end of the week, but now they're just going to make it as soon as they can." I explained.

"How long has she been asleep?" Austin wondered.

"About 6 hours." I replied.

"I'll go grab the phone bucket." Aaron stated.

Aaron came back about a minute later, and passed around the bucket as everyone put their phone in.

"Thanks." They said.

Then he tossed me my phone.

"Michael called and left a text message." Aaron informed me.

"Weird." I stated.

I pulled up his message and saw that he and DJ were available to come over today and get settled in. I asked the guys if that was alright.

"Sounds perfect." Austin replied.

I texted Michael back, letting him know it was fine. I suggested that if he were to actually make it today he should leave as soon as possible so that there was a still a chance of him making it here with DJ before Bella woke up.

He replied instantly, he and DJ would be here in about 4 ½ hours.

"Perfect, they'll be here in about 4 ½ hours." I told everyone.

Bella was in for a surprise when she woke up.

If she was smart, she'd hear us out and still be calm.

I think we all were prepared for the worst though.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

5 Hours Later -

All of OMAM, ATL, PTV, along with myself, Michael and DJ were situated around the table, talking about smaller things.

"So, how was the little bundle of joy?" Alan wondered.

"Much more difficult than we originally had planned." Michael answered.

I think we all understood his pain.

Suddenly out of nowhere we heard Bella call out "James."

Everyone went quiet and I replied "In here."

This was going to go one of two ways, my gut didn't have a great feeling about it.

She made her way down the hall so that she was finally in my line of sight.

Michael and DJ were seated so that she had to actually walk into the room to see them.

Bella did just that, and as soon as she caught the slightest glimpse of them, her body froze.

"No, no, no, no, no, no." She whined, sounding absolutely horrified.

"Bella." I cautioned her, realizing that she was starting to make small steps backwards.

"No!" She cried out.

She took of like a bat out of hell.

"Bella!" I screamed.