by KB Winters
He offered Jackson a high five and Jackson returned it before glancing over at Chase. I hadn’t realized it before, having only seen them separately, but together the resemblance was striking. There was no doubt they were brothers. “Matt!” Chase came forward and the two brothers locked in a tight embrace. In that moment, I realized how worried Chase had been for his brother. He hadn’t said anything about it, but I remember Matt saying he had guys following after him.
When the boys backed off from one another, all grins and smiles, Matt reached over and offered me a brief hug. “Thank you, Matt. For everything,” I said in his ear before pulling away.
“You’re very welcome, Melissa.”
“Jackson, honey, this is Matt. He’s Chase’s brother and he’s a friend of ours.”
“I’ve heard a lot about you, little guy. I’ve heard that you’re quite the sailor.”
Jackson beamed at the compliment and reached back for Chase’s hand. “I’m his first mate!”
We all laughed but the mood shifted as the breeze carried the sound away. “Well, Melissa, we can go back to my office unless you’d rather talk here.”
I nodded. “I need to make hotel arrangements. Could I use your phone on the drive?”
“Of course.”
Chase, still holding Jackson’s hand, stepped forward and set his other hand at my elbow. “Do you want me to go get you a new phone and tablet? Then I’ll meet you at the hotel. I can take Jackson with me.”
“Sure. Jackson is that okay? You can go run some errands with Chase?”
“Can we get ice cream?”
Chase chuckled. “Sure thing, buddy. Anything you want.”
Jackson cheered and they headed off toward Chase’s truck which was still there in the lot and had Jackson’s booster seat in the back from our original departure. I watched them go and then returned my gaze to Matt. He led me across the lot and we hopped into his black SUV.
“Here’s my phone,” he said, sliding the device across the center console. “Why a hotel? The house is yours.”
I sighed. “I know. I’m just not ready to go back there…”
“I understand. Sorry, I shouldn’t have pried.”
“You’re fine. I think Jackson and I will stay in a hotel for a few days and then get back to…” I stopped short, having almost said ‘our normal life’ but quickly realized there was no such thing.
“Life?” Matt suggested.
“Something like that.”
Matt fell silent as we pulled out onto the highway and I used my credit card to book online reservations on his phone. When that was done, I dared to peek at my email, and saw the hundreds of messages lined up. I quickly clicked out of all that and handed Matt the phone again. “All set.”
“Good. So, where should we start?”
I gave a hollow laugh. “I have no idea.”
“Well the first thing you need to know is that the FBI investigation is still open. After everything went south with the sting, they obtained warrants to search Henry’s vehicles, homes, and offices. Those searches have all been concluded as far as I know. You might want to send a team of your staff to the house to make sure everything is in place before you arrive. I don’t know the condition it was left in following the search.”
I nodded, adding it to my mile long to do list. “Did they find anything? Do they know what he did?”
“I don’t know. I haven’t got anyone on the inside and now that he’s…gone…I doubt we’ll ever really know. They rarely release the details of these types of investigations to the public. Although, I’m sure they’ll want to speak with you now that you’re back in town and you might be able to wheedle some information from them.”
“Okay. What about the funeral arrangements? Do you know anything?”
“I don’t. Melissa…” Matt paused to draw in a breath. “Henry never changed his will. Even with everything that’s happened in the last month, he didn’t change anything.”
I shook my head. “What does that mean?”
“Everything is yours.”
My eyes went wide. “What?”
Matt nodded and glanced at me from the corner of his eye. “The houses, the money, stocks, bonds, everything.”
I couldn’t process what he was saying. We’d been estranged for so long, I figured he’d changed his will a long time ago to cut me out in the event of his death. “Why didn’t he change it? I mean, I expected money to go to Jackson, his trust and schooling funds, but I didn’t think…”
“I know. I was surprised too. But it looks like he either never got around to it or maybe he didn’t want to admit the marriage was failing to his legal team. Or, maybe not even to himself. From what I know of him, he wasn’t a man well acquainted with failure of any kind.”
I marveled. My mind spun with figures. Most of the wealth management had been left to Henry’s advisor’s and consultants. I knew it was in the billions range, but not anything beyond that. The idea that it was all mine, including his thriving business, was mind boggling.
Even more shocking was the realization that I didn’t want any part of it.
Chapter Fifteen
Melissa
Matt and I wrapped up our conversation back at his office. He recommended a friend of his who could help me get things organized and decide what to do with the now-tarnished business. A couple of hours later—I was waiting downstairs, on the sidewalk in front of the Plaza for Chase and Jackson to swing by and pick me up.
Chase’s blue truck came into view in the congested traffic and I flagged him down when he got close. He pulled into the lot and stopped along the curb. He hopped out and raced around to open the door for me before I could object. As I slid into the passenger seat, Jackson proudly held up his triple scoop chocolate ice cream cone.
“Oh my!” I glanced at Chase as he got back behind the wheel and he gave me a guilty smirk. “Can I have a bite?”
“Of course, silly!” Jackson handed me the cone and I licked at it. It took me a second but I realized Chase was watching me suck the ice cream instead of putting the truck in drive. I rolled my eyes at him playfully before reaching around to hand Jackson his cone back. “You’re impossible,” I teased.
“I was waiting till you got buckled,” he retorted.
I laughed and clicked into my seat.
“Safety first!” Jackson added around a mouthful of his dessert. Chase arched a brow at me.
This was going to be an adventure for sure. I rubbed my belly and started hoping for a girl. I needed one more on my team.
“I made reservations at the Western Skies. Do you know it?”
Chase plugged it into his GPS and we took off. “How did the meeting go?” he asked when we merged onto the highway.
“Overwhelming.” I sighed. “I’ll tell you later.”
Chase nodded and Jackson filled the silence by suggesting a sing along of some of his favorite pirate songs which continued until we got to the hotel.
I’d booked a suite with three rooms, secretly hoping that Chase would decide to stay with us. I knew he wasn’t going anywhere—he was committed to raising our child together—but we also hadn’t had much of a chance to seriously talk about the logistics of how it would all work out.
“Yowzers,” Chase said as we shuffled into the room. The suite was at the top of the high rise hotel and gave breathtaking views of the city below from the floor to ceiling windows.
“Hey! Sweetie, don’t touch anything. Your hands and face…well, everything really…is sticky!”
Chase laughed under his breath as I tried to wrangle Jackson. “I think I’m going to take him off for a bath. Are you going to be here…?”
“I’m going to go drop my stuff at Matt’s and grab a shower. But I can come back over a little later if you wanted to do dinner together.”
I nodded. “I’d like that.”
“All right. Your new phone is on the table out here, okay? My number is programmed in. See ya later, buddy!” he called to J
ackson who was running down the hall towards one of the bedrooms. I waved at him and then tore off after my son. As I corralled him into the bathroom, I heard the front door close and latch.
I stifled the tears as I realized I was on my own again.
After his bath, Jackson wanted to catch up with one of his TV shows—now that we had the option for cartoons in English—and I set him up in one of the bedrooms with his show and a plate of mac and cheese that I ordered up from room service. Chase had texted me to let me know he was hunkered down at Matt’s waiting for traffic to die down a little.
By the time I checked back on Jackson, his show was playing the credits and he was asleep against the pillows I’d propped up behind him. I sneaked into the room and turned off the TV. I cleared his dishes and pulled the blanket up a little higher on his chest before leaving him to sleep. I knew he hadn’t had a good night of sleep on the boat and after three busy travel days, he needed his rest.
I left his room and went back to the sitting room and picked at the magazines and books displayed on the coffee table. Nothing interested me but mindlessly flipping through magazines was better than worrying about the millions of thoughts raging inside my mind.
Towards seven o’clock, there was a knock at the door, and I went to answer it. Chase appeared on the other side of the security peephole, a big grin on his face. I opened the door and he took a step inside. “Room service,” Chase said, holding up two bags of take-out. The spicy smell wafted from the warm bags and I licked my lips. “Sorry I couldn’t get here sooner. There was a pileup on the highway.”
“It’s okay.” I popped up on the balls of my feet to kiss him briefly on the lips. He looked startled and glanced around behind me. “He’s conked out already.”
“Oh,” Chase said, a dark smile taking the place of his playful grin.
I laughed and tugged on his arm to haul him inside the hotel room. “You’re amazing, do you know that?”
“I try.” He chuckled and took the bags to the table by the floor to ceiling windows. “Wow, this place looks even better at night. This view…”
I smiled and helped him unpack the bags. “Yeah. Jackson loves it. He said that we’re as tall as the dinosaurs.”
Chase laughed. “Already over the pirates and right into dinosaurs, huh?”
“You gotta be fast to keep up with that one.”
Chase unpacked the last bag and started opening the white paper cartons. Each one held a new, mouthwatering dish. Thai from the smell of it. “I wasn’t sure what you’d like, but figured anything that didn’t involve eggs, beans, tortillas, or plantains was a safe bet.”
I laughed and nodded. “Smart man.”
We served up two plates and took a seat on the couch. “Did you tell Matt?” I started, figuring it best to get the elephant out of the room.
Chase shook his head. “No. I figured we could do that together. We don’t need to do everything in one day, you know.”
I laughed softly and nodded. “I guess that’s true.”
“Although, there is one more thing I would like to do before the night is over.”
My skin prickled with a flush of heat. I set my plate down in my lap and turned to face him. “Should we stash this in the fridge?”
Chase took my plate and set it on the coffee table before reaching for my hands. “Melissa, I know that this has been a long day…a long month…but there’s something I need to tell you and I don’t want to wait until the perfect, right time. Mostly because it doesn’t seem like that’s even possible with all the things coming up over the next few weeks.”
I nodded, but my eyes flicked back and forth between his, looking for clues as to where the conversation was leading. Had the reality of my life in California finally set in and scared him off? Was this the part where he bowed out and told me that he wanted to see his child but needed to move on to another job?
“I’m happy for you, that you and Jackson are home and you can rest assured that you’re safe. I know you don’t need me hanging around anymore, but, I don’t want to say goodbye. We haven’t formally talked about what the next step is, and this might be the part where I make a giant ass of myself, but…” he pushed off the couch and sank down on one knee in front of me. He held my hands tight but as soon as he released one to dig in his pocket, it flew up to cover my mouth. My vision blurred with tears as he presented me with a small black box. “Now, this might not be as fancy as what you were hoping for, but I saw it today and I knew I had to get it for you.”
He popped the cover to reveal a small, turquoise stone set in a silver band. It matched the necklace he’d given me from the flea market. It was dainty and simple but absolutely beautiful.
“Chase, what does this—what are you saying?”
He smiled up at me. “I wasn’t sure when I’d settle down with someone or whether I’d ever have a family. I’ve always wanted one, but with the life I’ve lived, it wasn’t possible. Until I met you. I only want to do this once. I want one love that I can cherish and keep for my entire life and that’s you, Melissa. I’ve fallen madly in love with you. and I don’t ever want to say goodbye to you or to Jackson.”
I glanced at the ring and then back into his dark eyes. “I don’t want to say goodbye either. I love you too, Chase. More than I ever thought possible.”
“Melissa O’Keefe, will you marry me? I want to build a home and a family for Jackson and for the new little one. Will you do that with me? I promise that I will spend every day for the rest of my life not only protecting you and our family, but I will work to make you happy and give you the kind of life you deserve—the life you’ve spent so many years dreaming about.”
The tears that welled in my eyes broke loose and streaked down my cheeks as I nodded frantically. “Yes, Chase. I can’t imagine anything that would make me happier than to be your wife.”
Chase joined me on the couch and pressed his lips to mine, sealing the promise between us with a kiss I would cherish for the rest of my life.
Epilogue
“Melissa, do you know where Abby’s binky is?”
I laughed to myself and grabbed one from the kitchen counter. I held it up as Chase came into the room, trying to contain our five-month-old daughter in his arms as she wiggled and screamed.
“Oh, thank God!” Chase grabbed it from me and popped it into Abby’s open mouth just as she started a new round of wailing over her new teeth that she was cutting. She fell silent and stopped trying to climb up his chest. “Seriously, these things are magic.”
“You thought your missions were dangerous as a SEAL. How does a teething baby with a missing binky stack up?”
Chase laughed and cradled Abby as she settled down, happily chewing on the soft pacifier. “They didn’t cover that in BUD school, that’s for sure.” He planted a kiss on my lips and looked down at my sink full of dishes. “Where’s Jackson? I thought he was helping with dishes tonight?”
“He went next door. His little girlfriend Gracie just got a new puppy and he’s obsessed.”
Chase chuckled. “Lord save us all…”
“I told him he could go over there until it got dark.”
“All right. Well, I’m gonna try putting this one down again and then maybe you and I can get a little alone time…” he said, waggling his brows at me.
“So we can nap?” I teased.
“Eventually,” he replied, tossing me a wink before turning to leave the kitchen.
I wore a smile as I went back to work cleaning the kitchen. An hour later, Jackson came in from playing with the neighbor girl and her puppy, and Chase and I both took him upstairs to read a story.
“Just one more story,” Jackson protested around a wide mouthed yawn.
Chase chuckled and reached over to ruffle his hair. I promptly smoothed it back into place and kissed his brow. “Tomorrow, sweetheart.”
Chase pushed off the side of the bed and started toward the door. I hung back for another moment and stared down into the face of m
y precious son. “I love you so much, sweetheart.”
“I love you too, Mama.”
I kissed him again and stood up to join Chase at the door. “Goodnight, buddy,” he called softly, not wanting to wake up Abby who was sleeping—finally—in the room next door to Jackson’s.
“Night, Chase. I love you!”
Chase stilled and glanced at me. My heart swelled, realizing it was the first time Jackson had said that to him. “Love you too, bud,” he replied, his voice thick with emotion.
We tiptoed from the room and Chase closed the door without a sound. When I met his eyes there was a glossy sheen coating them. I reached for him and snuggled into his chest. “I love you too.”
He kissed my temple. “You have no idea, baby. No idea.”
“Well, maybe you could show me,” I said, looking up at him, my eyes wide with suggestion.
He grinned. “I can try but it might take a long, long time.”
“All night?”
“It’s very possible.”
I giggled. “That’s fine. Since Abby got here, I’m fueled exclusively by caffeine anyways.”
Chase scooped me up and carried me down the hall to our master suite. He kicked the door closed behind us and took me to bed.
We’d been on a wild ride ever since returning from Manzanilla and life in the cottage on the shore felt almost like a scene from a movie rather than real life. In some ways, the two people who met in a fast food restaurant lobby and set off on a boat, caught in a dangerous game of cat and mouse, were completely different people than who we were now. Who we’d grown into.
I knew that neither of us had expected it to lead us to where we ended up, but all things considered—it had worked out pretty perfectly. After returning to California, I tried to move back into the house I had shared with Henry, but I couldn’t do it. The ghost of Henry would always live there and I needed to start over. Jackson did too. So, after a few months, I sold it and rented out the other properties we’d owned together. I dissolved the real estate business, which was on the verge of collapse anyway after the news of Henry’s bad dealings got loose in the media.