Shaking my head, I said my goodbye’s and went back to join my family in the hospital room behind me. Just as I was opening the door, Cole called my name. “Just so you know, you call him Baby Jack.”
“Yeah, so?”
“His initials are still BJ,” he got out through the laughter that was now coming out of him.
I could feel my eye twitching as the poor kid’s fate hit me. Of all of the initials in the world, we had the bad luck to get fucking BJ.
“Yeah, that’s true,” I shrugged. “But, I’m both of their favorites now.”
Closing the door on his whining, I walked in and saw Sabine holding Jack while he slept.
This was all mine and I was going to do everything and anything to keep them safe.
Two days later…
Walking past the secretary and winking at her, I opened the door and went straight into the office, not bothering to knock or wait for permission. The man behind the desk went pale as he looked up from the paperwork spread out over his desk. I’d decided to get a few more debts called in yesterday so I had no doubt the piece of shit was feeling like his world was about to come crashing down. Good, now he knew how I felt when he took Sabine and almost killed her and our son in the car accident.
“Ah, Mr. d’Arvor. I would shake your hand, but I don’t want to. I only do that to people I respect,” I informed him as I sat down on the chair in front of his desk, making myself comfortable.
“What do you want?” He whispered, more than likely hoping that the four businessmen that I’d seen waiting to be shown in wouldn’t hear the predicashit that he was now in.
I wasn’t going to help him out on that, so I spoke louder. “Who told you to take Sabine?” His eyes darted around the office as he tried to think of a lie, but I was five steps ahead of him. “I already know it was an American who offered you a large sum of money. I also know what you intended to do with her and my son,” I leaned forward holding his eyes with my own. “And this pisses me off. Thankfully, Henri told us all of it before he was handed over to the authorities.”
Standing up, I started to walk around, taking in the no doubt priceless artefacts placed ostentatiously around his office. Walking over to one, I put my hand behind it and pushed, grinning as it shattered on the floor and he jumped up behind his desk.
“You can’t do that,” he started to protest, but he was shit out of luck.
“I can and I have,” I said as I walked over to the next one. “Now, as you’ll be aware,” I raised my voice even louder, “debts amounting to twenty-million Euros have already been called in. Failure to meet the payments will result in all of your assets being frozen.” Turning to face him, I watched as he wiped his sweaty face with his hanky.
“Okay, Mr. Townsend. We can discuss this,” he waved his arms and gestured to the seat that I’d been sitting in. “Please sit down. After all,” he gave a weak smile, “we’re family.”
Walking slowly over to him, I stood over him and corrected his misguided thoughts that he was in any way shape or form a member of my family. “No, you piece of shit. We’re not family. I come from a good family and quite frankly, it wouldn’t surprise me to find out that Sabine wasn’t even yours.” The look on his face as I said that made the pieces all fall into place. “Holy shit, she’s not yours!”
His audible gulp as he sat down heavily in the chair made me grin. “Her mother had a lover,” he started to explain.
“Oh, no, no!” I held up my hand as I sat down. “You mistake my delight for wanting to know details. I’m not interested in your story, during which you’ll probably make yourself out to be the injured party. I’m just relieved that my wife and son don’t share DNA with you.” This information changed everything. “Now, who contacted you?”
The sweat was literally pouring off him now. “I don’t know his name, but I have his number.” Nodding, I pointed at a piece of paper beside his hand. Once he’d written it down, I snatched it from him and started back toward the door. “Wait,” he called out to my back. “What about the other…stuff?” He said the last word as a whisper; one last valiant attempt to retain some dignity from the men outside.
As I opened the door, I turned back to face him and laid it all out, making sure that the men in question heard every single word.
“In five-minutes every last one of your debts will be called in. All of the financial records from your business will be published online as well as your personal ones. As you know,” I grinned, “that will show the public how much money you have skimmed off of your clients since the very beginning. It will also show the large amount of debt that you’re in after this man’s investment, “ I pointed over to the businessman who was rumored to have mob ties and whom had invested fourty-five million Euros via the vat of monkey shit that now looked an odd shade of green as he stared at me in horror, “tanked. What’s left now? Nine-million isn’t it?” His eyes darted to the man as he stood up and started talking rapidly into his phone. “Uh oh, that doesn’t sound good.” I gave him a false look of sympathy as I prepared for the final nail in his coffin. “And that money doesn’t exist now either after you used it to finance yet another bad decision of yours, as well as the payments for your mistresses.” I’d been informed on my way to the offices that the man in the waiting room who’d been screwed by the fuck face was actually the second cousin of Sabine’s mother as well as having ties to the Mob, so he was now toast. “Anyway, must go. I have a wife and son to get back to.”
Turning around, I passed my card to the man and offered up my help. “I have all of the records, so if you need them, don’t hesitate to contact me.”
Walking out, I started making plans for mine, Sabine’s and Jack’s futures. The door was shut on this bullshit now, and I could take my snake program addicted beauty home. Tomorrow, we were going to the registry office to register Jack’s birth and then we could fly back.
Sabine
Brett filled me in on everything that had gone down with my dad, well the man that I’d thought was my father. It was strange because I’d never actually felt a link to him, and now I knew why. We’d also told my brothers and sister and they were going to carry out DNA tests to see if they were in the same glorious situation as I was. Unbeknown to me, not one of them liked him, so his downfall had been received with relief and glee.
We’d registered Jack and he now held a British birth certificate and passport. I felt that it was important to make him dual nationality and for him to embrace his American roots, so once we’d settled back into life we’d be filing for that too. My son was a special boy.
Sitting back as he slept in a bassinet beside me, I looked over the Townsend’s ranch and listened to the birds chirping around me. It really was hedonistic here.
“Whatcha thinking about, baby?” Brett’s deep voice asked from behind me, making me jump slightly.
“Don’t you think it’s almost unbelievable that the car accident was as bad as it was, yet I walked away without any major injuries and Jack wasn’t affected at all?” It sounded strange to ask that and to even be thinking it, but the car had been shown on the news the following day and really no one should have walked away from it, let alone a pregnant woman.
“I’m not gonna question it, honey,” he muttered as he sat down beside me. “I’m just going to thank Jesus every day that you did.”
“I know why it happened,” Tom walked up onto the porch, appearing from nowhere.
“You nosy bastard,” Brett snapped as I looked behind Tom for the woman that he dragged with him everywhere, Layla’s friend Sonya. The poor girl had been forced to come back to the ranch when Layla had been ordered to, and he rarely left her side.
Shrugging, he showed not one ounce of remorse as he leaned back against the railing of the porch. “It’s because Jesus is English.”
If there had been any wind and tumbleweeds, they would have rolled past us as the silence dragged on as we sat watching him.
“Where the fuck did you hear that
?” Brett asked hesitantly. I could understand that because I’d never heard this, yet he looked so serious as he said it that I wondered if maybe I’d missed something.
“He watched a Knights Tale,” Cole explained as he also appeared out of nowhere.
Looking around me, I checked for portals or something because they were like freaking ninjas. You never saw them approach and they never made a noise as they did it. Given the two men in question were Cole and Tom, this had to be down to something supernatural. This line of thought I blamed on a science fiction series that I’d watched this morning because Snakes in the City hadn’t been on. Never again, it had scared the shit out of me.
Deciding that it would be safest for the conversation on that subject to end there, Brett turned his focus onto a subject that he knew would make Tom leave.
“Where’s your shadow?” He asked him.
Shrugging, he scuffed the floor with the tip of his boot. “She’s not talking to me.”
“Because you asked her what the fuck was wrong with her cat, jackass!” Cole burst out laughing.
Standing up straight, he argued his case. “The thing has no legs! What the fuck was I meant to think?”
“It’s the type of breed, you dick head,” Cole shot back. “And it has legs, they’re just short because it’s a Munchkin.” I recognized the name as a breed of cat that definitely had very short legs and made a mental note to go to Layla’s. This I had to see.
“You didn’t know that until Ebru told you the story, you mean bitch. And they’re not just short, it looks like he goes straight from body to fuckin feet!”
Walking down the steps, Cole waited until he got to the bottom before he replied. “I’m not the one hoping to get into her kitty, though. I hear Truman’s has a special on lotion and tissues. You might wanna stock up,” he advised, before turning and running across the grass toward his own home.
Watching Tom take off after him, I thought of how lucky I was to get the normal one in the family as my husband and the father of my children. Yeah, children. I’d decided that I wanted another one, regardless of how adamant I’d been that Jack would be an only child as I was giving birth. It’s funny how quickly the memories of the pain fade. Now, I wanted at least four.
Little did I know that my husband had already decided that we’d have six, and that he was going to do everything that he could to make sure that that happened.
Brett
“What’s the update on that phone number?” I asked Coleman. He’d called on his way over here saying that he had information, so we were meeting in the barn while the ladies discussed babies, legless cats and whatever other shit that they decided on.
“We have an address,” he looked nervously at me as he told me.
“What’s the fucking issue?”
“It’s…” he shoved his hands into his hair and made a growling noise. “The property the number was registered to is the one right next door to you in Houston.”
Looking at him in shock, I let that sink in.
“But,” I swallowed thickly, “That property’s been empty for over a year. The owner died and her family is disputing the will because they can’t accept that she left it to the cat and dog sanctuary.”
Nodding throughout my rambled explanation, Coleman looked at me grimly. “That’s just it, there’s no active line into the house.”
What. The. Fuck?
Epilogue
Sabine
T hree years later…
Mon Dieu, I must have been crazy marrying this idiot.
I’d been to go and pick up nappies, or diapers, I had no idea what to call things anymore. I’d lived in America for so long that I couldn’t remember if I was saying the British, French or Amercian version of things. So, I’d gone to get diapers and had come back to not only my kids running around naked, but my husband almost naked too.
“We have a shituation,” he yelled as he ran past me. It was his back that distracted me from my naked hellions.
“Is that…” I started to ask as he ran outside and started rubbing his back on the grass. Slowly following after him, I kept an eye on the two spawns of Satan who were splashing in their kiddies pool as their dad continued to whine and rub himself across the yard.
“It’s all Slumdog Millionaire,” he whined as he ground down into the grass, referencing the scene in the movie where the poor kid gets covered in crap.
I waited for him to finish and would have asked him for an explanation if, underneath all of the grass and mud and God knows what else on his back, there weren’t paler swirls and circles showing through his tanned skin.
Picking up the hose, he turned it on full blast, pressed the special button on the nozzle that made it come out like a tsunami and reached over his shoulder to aim the water at his back.
As all of the crap was washed off his body, the patterns became clearer and I saw tiny smeared hand prints too.
Things were starting to add up as he turned off the hose and stormed over to me.
“Your kids,” he sneered, “took a shit, and then drew fucking…” he broke off, his mouth opening and closing as he thought of the right wording. “Fucking cave paintings on my back!” He finished on a yell.
“Why did you let them do that?” I mean, who in their right minds would let their children do that to them?
“I didn’t let them,” he snapped. “I fell asleep and woke up to it.”
I didn’t get to reply as Gramps walked up, calling out to the kids as he passed them. As always, if their Gampy was around they were right by his side and they almost fell out of the little pool in their hurry to get to him.
“Hey, what happened to your back?” He asked as he walked up holding their hands. I winced thinking of what was on those hands as they hadn’t been washed properly after their art session. That pool was going to have to be burned too.
Turning to look at his back in the reflection on the window, he must have been able to see the patterns because he spun around and glared at me and then he did something that absolutely threw me. That in itself was a big achievement given the family that I’d married into. But, he hissed, actually hissed like a cat at the kids and then stormed inside the house.
“You might want to wash your hands,” I advised a confused looking Hurst and then proceeded to fill him in on what had happened.
Five minutes later, I sat back and watched as he cleaned the kids down with a long brush attachment for the hose that was normally used on cars, but that we kept on the ranch for situations just like this. Townsend kids got up to all sorts and for some reason most of what they got up to involved shit.
It just wasn’t normal.
Later that night…
Sitting back as Brett took a mouthful of his Corona and listened to his family talk about the latest drama to hit the town, I looked down at the plain water in my hand and then looked over at my son and his little sister running after their cousins.
He hadn’t noticed that I wasn’t drinking yet, but he would when the next time I got up to get him a new beer, I handed him his empty bottle with the positive pregnancy test in it.
Looking back at him as he took my hand, breaking me out of my plans, I gave him a grin as he leaned down to give me a kiss.
“Gross,” I laughed. “You just kissed my teeth!”
Grinning back at me, he kissed my nose and then pulled me into his side. “I’m always happy to kiss any part of you.”
Then he ruined my plans by putting his hand on my hip, right on the stick that was poking out of my pocket. Pulling out the hard object, he lifted it up and looked at it in confusion.
“What the fuck is that?”
Admittedly it was a bit mangled, but surely even he could put two and two together?
“Surprise!” I whispered warily. I didn’t want to draw attention to the situation because he wasn’t actually looking pleased by the news.
“What do you mean?” he asked me, getting even more confused. “What the fuck is this?”
Sighing, I took it out of his hand and turned it so that he could see what was left of the screen. “Ant?”
Looking down at it, I saw that that really was the only word that you could see now, but surely he could still tell what it was?
Losing my patience, I jumped up and stood in front of him with my hands on my hips. “I’m pregnant, you stupid dick! That’s what it says – preg-nant,” I turned the screen toward him and moved my finger under it as I said the word slowly, breaking it into syllables. It really didn’t say that, but the fact that he didn’t recognize anything about the pregnancy stick pissed me off.
“What the hell happened to it? Oh Jesus,” he looked around me in the direction of the kids. “Please don’t tell me that they chewed on it!”
Throwing it at him, I walked into the house yelling, “No, Simba did just before she ran up and licked your lips before we left.”
There was a clatter as something hit the floor and I heard him running up behind me. “I told you she smelt funky! You said it was her new food,” he cried as he ran to the toilet. He didn’t manage to close the door before he threw up and I felt my own stomach turning as the loud sound of him being sick carried across the house.
Doing my best to tune it out, I filled up my glass and walked back outside to the group of family who were now sitting silently. My daughter, Tabitha, walked on her chubby legs up the stairs catching all of our attentions.
She was the cutest little girl normally, but at that precise moment, her beautiful blonde curls were in a Mohawk, fixed in position by something brown.
Please let it be mud, please let it be mud…
“What have you done?” Cole whispered in horror, just as his two sons joined Tabby on the porch, their hair sticking out in all directions with the same brown substance.
The smell that followed them answered our worries. And FYI – it wasn’t mud.
“I’ll get the shit shovel,” Hurst murmured as he walked around the shitty tots, keeping a big distance between himself and them, and then walked off to get the brush that he’d used earlier that day.
Providence Series Books 5-7 Page 19