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Ben was still a good hour away when the blustering rain turned to icy, blowing snow instead.
“Aw… Bloody bollocks.”
Flicking on the wipers, he squinted out into the night, slowing down a little more as visibility dropped even further. The headlights were, quite uselessly, only illuminating the driving flurries of white snow and hardly reaching the road itself. Ben sighed, slamming one palm against the wheel in frustration. The trip was already not the shortest, he was already running late from a cock-up at Brighton CID that morning, and now he was going to be even later.
There was nothing for it, though, but to keep on and make sure he didn’t wind up nose-first in a ditch somewhere instead of just a bit late. He spent the rest of the drive trying to ignore the impatient little voice insisting it wasn’t that bad, he could speed up just a little, and maybe they’d still be up by the time he got there—
A gust of wind rocked the car and Ben’s stomach lurched, his heart rate picking up as he felt the vehicle begin sliding smoothly sideways and forward. The ice was so slick, the tyres had no purchase whatsoever— but a moment later, they gripped the road again and he had control of the car once more.
Ben slowed down.
Unfortunately, the weather didn’t let up in the slightest and even with the motorway nearly deserted, the rest of the trip took at least twice as long as it normally should have. By the time he finally turned the last corner and parked up in the drive, midnight had come and gone and he was exhausted and achy from being tense behind the wheel for hours on end.
He unfolded himself from the driver’s seat with a groan and hurried up the front walk in the dark, the wind pelting him with little stinging pellets of ice and wet, half-frozen snow. Unlocking the front door, he slipped inside and heaved a heartfelt sigh as he finally shut the bitter night and its howling wind out behind the thick wooden door.
The light in the entryway had been left on for him, but the rest of the house was dark, quiet; the air heavy with a soft, familiar, comforting warmth. Ben tugged his shoes and jacket off and, already yawning, padded upstairs in sock feet and made his way down the hall to the bedroom in the dark. John and Sarah were, as he’d known they would be, already fast asleep. They barely stirred when he crawled into bed, slowly and carefully easing under the warm covers and curling up behind John.
Sarah mumbled something unintelligible and rolled over, flinging an arm over him and John both without waking up, and Ben smiled into the darkness, snuggling in closer with a deep, contented sigh to bury his face in the nape of John’s neck. For all that it had been a miserable bastard of a drive to get here…
It was still more than worth it, to finally be home.