Penny's POV

I woke up at dawn as usual - at least in the summer. In winter I was awake long before.

I lay there for a moment, staring at the ceiling as I thought about what I could do today to get the kids to trust me a little more. We wouldn't get anywhere like this and sooner rather than later the police would be at the door to pick them up and probably send them from one orphanage and psychologist to the next.

Sighing, I got up because I couldn't think of anything and disappeared into the bathroom. After a quick wash, I threw on my jogging suit and wanted to go downstairs. Since Sam was in the house, I could probably go about my morning routine with a clear conscience and pick up a few rolls from Dilys in town. As starving as the children were, they would certainly be happy with a hearty breakfast.

I took a quick look into the guest room and was shocked when I only saw the girl lying in bed. The boy was nowhere to be seen. I immediately ran downstairs and checked the front door. It was still locked. The back door too. Where could he be?

Sam. I had to wake him up! He had to help me look out for him!

I ran into the living room and immediately froze. A smile jumped on my face when I saw Sam stretched out on the couch with the little boy clinging to his arm, who, wrapped up in a blanket, was still playing a tug of war with Sam over his blanket.

I laughed quietly to myself as I watched the two of them pull the blanket back and forth in their sleep before I quietly slipped away for a jog.

When I returned, the house was still quiet. A quick look into the living room told me that Sam had lost the battle for the blanket. I smiled to myself as I went into the kitchen and started preparing breakfast.

I set the table as quietly as possible and made coffee. I was making milk for the children's cocoa again when I was startled by a dull bang.

I immediately stormed into the living room, only to see Sam straightening up between the couch and the living room table. The boy was still sleeping soundly, wrapped tightly in both blankets.

Our eyes met as Sam picked himself up and I could tell he wasn't nearly as amused by the situation as I was.

He quietly crept into the bathroom while I went back into the kitchen and left the door ajar so the noise I made wouldn't wake the kids.

It took less than a quarter of an hour for Sam to join me and once again run his hands through his now neatly styled hair.

"Slept well?" I asked him teasingly and handed him a cup of coffee. He looked like he could really need it.

"Not really," he simply mumbled, taking a sip after leaning against the fridge.

"Wow, you're a real morning person. Even worse than you are at work," I teased him with a grin and shooed him a meter to the side so I could get juice from the fridge. I stopped when I saw that yesterday's bag was gone. That's odd.

"Your couch isn't really comfortable and the other half of the night I had to fight for my blanket or freeze," he just mumbled and took another sip of coffee.

"If you want to stay here another night, we'll swap," I stated as I turned to the pantry to get a new bag of juice out of there.

"I'm certainly not going to sleep in your bed!" Sam stated, downright horrified, and I looked up at him in confusion before putting the juice on the table to finish the cocoa on the stove.

"Why not?"

"Because it's yours. It's not appropriate for me to let you sleep on the couch and even less to share a bed with you. Not if I haven't been invited," he stammered embarrassedly and ran a hand through his neck.

"I just invited you to take my bed," I replied teasingly and Sam sighed in annoyance.

"You know what I meant, right?" he objected annoyed and I just smiled before pouring the cocoa into a thermos to keep it warm. There was still no word or sight from the children. "The boy asked me tonight what I did because I was not sharing the bed with you. Apparently they think that we both..."

"They're not the only ones, as you know," I replied with a smile. "What did you say to him?"

"That we're not together. He asked me if I wanted to cuddle you, kiss you or have babies with you," he told me with a sheepish smile and that made me pretty embarrassed too. Did our interaction with each other really make such an impression that even a child would think of something like that?

"Oh, wow. He's a lot of imagination. He's only 5 or 6 years old at most," I said in amazement when, to my astonishment, Sam helped himself to my cupboards, which were still open, and began to look for flour, eggs and milk.

"But pretty clever!" he replied to me in his mind as he began to pour everything into a bowl.

"Are you telling me that he hit the mark with his questions?" I asked him with a grin as I stepped next to him to see what he was up to, just as he started stirring everything with a whisk. But now he froze and looked at me.

"What?" he interjected, confused, before what I was trying to imply seemed to sink in. "I...well, he..." he stammered, quickly looking back at the bowl in front of him, but he didn't move further but just turned bright red. I couldn't help myself and laughed at his reaction. "Very funny, Pen!" he then mumbled, pretending to be offended, but obviously decided that he wanted to move on. "At least I got it out of him that his name is Niclas and her name is Julie. Their mother was on her way from Bristol to ask her sister to look after the children while she went to the hospital. She must have had an accident with the car and unlike the children didn't come out anymore."

"How terrible," I gasped, remembering something I'd seen on the news last week on a quiet night at the station. I was just surfing through TV out of boredom and didn't really attach much importance to it. Such accidents always shocked and depressed me too much, which is why I didn't watch much news. We had enough strange things in Pontypandy and even more to do with preserving and protecting the ideal world of this city."Wait, I saw something on the news last week. But there was never any mention of children being there", I then stated and picked up my cell phone, which was still hanging on the charger at the end of the kitchen, like every night.

"They probably ran away before the emergency services arrived," Sam interjected with a shrug, getting a pan out of the cupboard before turning on the stove.

"Probably," I muttered thoughtfully as I sat down and searched the Internet for the report until I finally found the video and played it. Without having to look, I felt Sam turn around and look over my shoulder. My heart rate immediately increased a little, but I forced myself to calm down by focusing on the video.

>On the night of Saturday to Sunday, a tragic accident occurred on the country road just behind Newtown, towards the coast. The police assume that the woman had to avoid a deer or something as it crossed the street and the car skidded. The car rolled over several times. An old woman who passed by that evening and did not have a cell phone immediately drove to the nearest telephone to call 911. The emergency services arrived at the scene when the engine compartment of the vehicle was already fully engulfed in flames, followed by an explosion that probably killed the woman before the emergency services could do anything. Since the car, license plates and the woman herself were burned beyond recognition, investigators are still in the dark about her identity. We ask anyone who has information about the accident or who has a missing relative in their mid-20s to contact the Newtown Police Department immediately.<

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The girl woke up and stretched, yawning, before registering that her brother was gone. She immediately jumped up and crept downstairs. She heard the two adults talking in the kitchen, but not her brother. He couldn't be there. Nevertheless, she picked up something in the conversation between the two that aroused her interest and she peered through the ajar door to eavesdrop on them.

Penny had her phone in her hand and Sam was standing next to her, leaning on the back of her chair with his hands as he looked over her shoulder at her phone. She didn't really understand a word of what was said in the video, but even better when the two adults started talking to each other again.

"Penny, we should report this to get clarity. Just for the sake of the children," Sam interjected again and Penny put the cell phone on the table as she turned to Sam.

"Malcolm knows. I'll send him this information. Let's see what he can find out," she replied and picked up her cell phone again to quickly type on it.

"You know that's not the right way," Sam sighed and went back to the stove.

"Are you starting that again?" Penny muttered offended as she also went to the stove to lean on it next to him and fold her arms over her chest.

"Not again. Still! We have to report this, Penny!" Sam interjected seriously.

"They are completely neglected, half-starved and have lost their mother. They will be lost in a orphanage. They are better off here!" Penny stated stubbornly and Sam took a deep breath.

"What is it really, Pen? Why are you going against the rules like that? You're never like that," Sam then said gently and turned to her.

"It's never about homeless orphans either. Regulations are there for rescue operations. Humanity for extreme cases," she replied to him seriously. "If you have any doubts, I won't stop you, Sam," she then said quietly and lowered her eyes to hide her emerging disappointment. The girl looked up at Sam anxiously, waiting to see what he would do next. Would he go and betray her?

"I have no doubt that what you're doing is right. I just doubt that there won't be any consequences if the office finds out. Do you really want to lose your job?" Sam just objected and looked at her intently. Now it was Penny who sighed.

"They can't fire me that easily for something like that."

"But suspend until an investigation is completed and that can take weeks, not to mention what you will have to listen to during interrogations while they try to portray you as biased or even incompetent because you reacted so emotionally."

"How do you know all this so clearly?"

"I attended a special course in Cardiff where the psychological stress on firefighters and its consequences was discussed."

"What are you doing?" the boy asked quietly as he approached his sister, who immediately jumped.

"Don't scare me like that!" she whined at him.

"You were eavesdropping. You're not allowed to do that!"

"Nicki's right, Julie!" Sam now objected with a smile, without thinking, who had become aware of her thanks to the children's voices and was now standing in the open door.

"And you snitched. That's not allowed! No wonder he wants to get rid of us!" the girl snapped at her brother, who immediately flinched and was close to tears.

"Nobody wants to get rid of you, Julie!" Penny interjected and put a hand on the girl's shoulder.

"He just said it. So you can keep your job," she stated, pointing at Sam, but Penny only smiled mildly as she crouched down to speak to the girl at eye level.

"I don't give a damn about a job if it means for you having to live with strangers somewhere," she simply replied and Sam gasped, barely audible.

"No matter where we go, they will all be strangers to us because we don't know anyone. You're a stranger to us too!" the girl said, still offended, crossing her arms over her chest.

"But one I like!" Nicki interjected hesitantly and looked up at Sam."Sam too!" Sam smiled at his confession and put a hand on his back to lead him into the kitchen. It was certainly better to distract the children from the topic with breakfast until they found a solution. "I want to stay with you!" Nicki then stated when he had sat down and Julie also sat down next to her brother to the table and just rolled her eyes at how naive her brother was.

"Oh, uhm, Nicki, it's not that easy. We would have to adopt you or look after you as a foster family and that's not as easy as you might think," Penny tried to explain, embarrassed. The boy's desire to have them both as foster parents warmed her heart, but thinking about it when they weren't even a couple made the matter more than unpleasant.

"Why not?" Julie asked skeptically. She completely misinterpreted Penny's embarrassment and thought she didn't want them both after all and was just lying to keep them quiet.

"First of all, the authorities want you to come into a family, a couple, and Sam and I are not together nor do we live together," Penny explained to her embarrassedly, while Sam preferred to devote himself to the pan with the pencakes.

"For real? Then why is he here?" Nicki interjected, perplexed, biting into a slice of toast.

"Because I want to help Penny take care of you!" Sam came back with a plate of pencakes and placed it in the middle of the table, only for the children to immediately dig into it.

"That's what other mums and dads do too. They look after children together!" Nicki's mouth was full and it was difficult to understand, but it was enough for Sam and Penny to give each other a sheepish smile.

"After their own, Nicki. They don't want children from other mums and dads!" Julie replied, annoyed.

"There are many couples who can't have children of their own, but still want to give children like you a home and love, Julie!" Penny corrected Julie gently.

"You too?" Nicki interjected curiously, looking at her expectantly as he stuffed the last piece of pencake into his mouth.

Penny was about to explain to him again that neither of them offered a basis for offering children a good home when Sam beat her to it: "We would be more than just proud and happy if you could stay with us, but to sort things out for your future, we need to know more about your past," he said with a smile and Penny looked up at him in surprise. Did he really just say 'we'? "How about you tell us what you know over breakfast so we can sort everything out for real?"

To be continued...