Chapter Twenty-Seven
Beck
“Baby, wake up.”
“Hmmm.” My eyes were heavy as I felt lips lightly trail down my neck.
“Come on, beautiful, time to wake up.”
“I don’t want to.” Rolling over, I buried my face in the pillow. I pulled the blanket over my head and hid.
“I know, baby, but we have that meeting with Matlock in an hour. You need to get a shower and eat something.”
Shooting out of bed, I looked at the clock. “Why do I always oversleep with you?”
Chuckling, he said, “Because we kept each other awake until the early hours in the morning.”
Trying to get up from the bed, Micah pulled me back.
“What are you doing? I have to shower and get downstairs.”
“Give me that mouth first.”
Heat coursed through my body at his demand.
I leaned back and pressed my lips to his. His hand cupped the back of my head, holding me in place to deepen the kiss.
“We have to get ready,” I murmured against his lips.
When he finally released me, I jumped from the bed, rushing into the bathroom.
“Shit.”
“What’s the matter?” he asked, popping his head through the doorway.
“I have nothing to put on. All I have is what I wore yesterday once I changed after the funeral.”
I was trying to stay calm. There wasn’t enough time to run home, shower, change, and run back. There was no way I would feel comfortable seeing everyone downstairs in yesterday’s clothes.
“Baby, I had Rachel grab you some stuff from the house.”
I finally noticed the bag he was holding out to me.
“Love you,” I declared, grabbing the bag and turning on the shower.
“That’s what you said last night, right before you let your father sucker punch me.”
I turned to Blade, embarrassed.
“I’m sorry about that. He just seemed like he needed to do it, and he missed out on so much.”
I stood there waiting for him to accept my apology.
“I know baby, it’s ok. Get in the shower and get ready, then we’ll get a bite before the meeting.”
“I don’t know if I can eat anything. My nerves have my stomach doing backflips.”
I threw my hair up on top of my head to cut down my shower time. I got in, washed up, and got out. Micah was still standing there, leaning against the bathroom sink.
“What are you doing?” I asked.
He just stood there, staring at me.
“Enjoying the view.” He smiled, and I felt my cheeks blaze.
I hoped I never got used to the way he made me feel. He leaned over and kissed me thoroughly before walking out of the bathroom.
“Hurry up, Becca.”
Once we got downstairs, my father sat at a table eating breakfast.
I walked over, kissing his cheek. “Morning Dad.”
It felt strange, but right at the same time.
“Morning, baby girl. You sleep ok?” he asked, glaring at Micah.
“Don’t ask questions you don’t want to know the answers to Sheriff,” Micah cautioned.
“Stop it, you two.”
I slapped Micah’s chest with the back of my hand.
“Morning, sweetheart.” King leaned over and kissed my cheek.
I heard Micah growl.
“Really? He’s my uncle,” I admonished, shoving him with my shoulder.
“Don’t care. You’re my girl,” Micah whined, leaning over and grabbing the back of my neck to kiss the side of my head.
“Matlock here yet?”
“Yea, he’s in church getting everything ready,” King answered.
The front door opened, and a prospect walked in, followed by my mother, her husband, and Michael.
I jumped up and ran over to hug Michael.
“What are you doing here?”
“I wanted to come check on you and make sure you were ok after everything yesterday,” Michael said, watching the men sitting at the table.
“I’m fine, don’t worry.”
I heard King whisper to Micah. “How come he gets to hug her?”
Micah looked over at me and shrugged. “He’s gay. It’s like she’s hugging Rach.”
“No shit?” King asked, his eyebrows disappearing into his hairline. “He’s a big motherfucker.”
“No shit,” Micah replied.
Michael threw his head back and laughed.
Matlock chose at that moment to step into the room and call us all into church. He was dressed in a suit, his cut nowhere in sight.
King, Micah, my dad, and I walked toward the double doors when my mother started her shit.
“Why is Declan coming in? My mother didn’t know him.”
“Actually, Connie, I’ve known Willow for the last five years. However, my daughter asked me to come to the meeting with her,” my dad asserted.
“Why?” My mother glared at me.
“Because she wants me there. Despite your interference, she wants me in her life.”
My dad glared back at my mother, and I wondered if I’d made a mistake asking these two to be in the same room together.
“Connie, love, let’s not make a big thing out of it.”
Chris, my stepfather, had always had a way of tempering my mother. I’m glad he was here with her today.
We entered church, and everyone took a seat. My father sat on one side of me and Micah was on the other.
“Don’t get used to that seat, fucker. It’s mine,” King chided, and Matlock just grinned.
“Let’s get started. I have allowed both the sheriff and Mr. Sawyer to be present at the request of Conifer Sawyer and Rebecca Washington.”
“It’s Connie,” my mother snarled.
“I beg your pardon, Connie,” Matlock apologized. “As I was saying, we are here to execute the last will and testament of Willow Washington. She had some considerable assets.”
He shuffled through his paperwork and began, “Mr. Kingston O’Rourke, Mrs. Washington left you the property the clubhouse sits on, as well as the surrounding fifty acres. It is yours free and clear, along with an account that contained the money you have paid over the last five years with interest.”
I looked over at King, and he hung his head.
Grams loved him, and he knew it now, without a doubt.
“She didn’t have to do that,” he said.
“No, she didn’t,” Matlock agreed, “But she wanted you to have it. She loved having us here and wanted to make sure we never had to worry.”
Matlock grinned at Micah as he continued.
“To Micah Spade, she leaves her granddaughter.”
I threw my head back and laughed out loud. That was Grams. She knew how to get her point across. Micah just shook his head, grinning.
“Nicely played, old woman.” He reached over and took my hand. “Best inheritance ever.”
He lifted my hand to his lips and kissed me. Grams made sure I would know Micah was alive, even if he didn’t tell me.
“Can we get on with this, please?”
My mother, ladies and gentlemen, always a pleasure.
“To Mrs. Conifer,” Matlock held his hand up, stopping my mother from objecting, “I have a note here to use your full name. To Mrs. Conifer Washington Sawyer, I leave the home she lives in as well as one hundred thousand dollars.”
Jumping to her feet, my mother screamed, “WHAT? We own our home. She can’t leave us something that belongs to us.”
“Connie, love, we didn’t own our home. Your mother did,” Chris admitted quietly, looking up at his wife.
“What are you talking about?” My mother scrutinized her husband.
“We had some lean times, and I didn’t want you to worry, so I spoke to your mom. She paid off the house by buying it from me.”
“I knew she hated me,” my mother whined, collapsing into her chair.
Matlock continued, “To my granddaughter, Rebecca Lynn Washington, I leave my house and the bulk of my estate in the amount of 3.2 million dollars.”
My mouth fell open at the end of Matlock’s statement.
“ARE YOU SHITTING ME?” My mother launched herself out of her chair again. “She left her everything? Where the fuck did my mother get that kind of money?”
My mother turned to glare at me.
“I should have aborted you like I told him I did.”
My father moved so fast he had her by the throat and against the wall before anyone realized he had moved.
“You fucking bitch. You will not speak to my daughter that way.”
She was clawing at my father’s hands, as her face turned red.
I ran over to him, placing my hands on his arm.
“Please let her go. She isn’t worth it.”
My father looked at me as I pleaded with him to let her go. He dropped his hand from her throat, and she coughed, gasping to take in air.
“Get her the fuck out of here,” he barked at her husband.
Chris immediately jumped up and took her elbow, leading her from the room.
I put my arms around my father and asked him if he was ok as he held me tight.
“I should ask you that, baby girl.”
“Eh, I’m used to her. Though that’s the worst I’ve ever seen her act. She has a point, though. Where did Grams get all that money?”
“Stocks,” King announced.
“George,” Micah said at the same time.
“What?” I asked.
“Stocks, a club brother. He’s a wiz at the stock market. Stocks handles the club’s investments. Remember George Kaplen? From school? Turns out he wasn’t too mean to have friends, he was just socially awkward. But a fuckin’ genius with the stock market.”
“George? Wow! He never got better. He was always just unfriendly,” I said, remembering the little boy who I had tried to be friends with, I really did.
Micah laughed. “Yea, he still isn’t the friendliest, but he’s a brother in the club.”
“He handled Willow’s investments as well,” King stated.
“She never said a word to me,” I mumbled.
Micah walked over, pulling me from my father’s grasp.
“Looks like I got me a sugar mama.” He laughed as he kissed my hair.
My father growled.
“Oh relax, old man, I’ve got my own money. We all do.”
I took a deep breath.
The first I felt like I’d been able to take in weeks.
“Well, that’s over with. Maybe now things can get back to normal. It’s been a crazy few weeks. I need to go over to the house and start going through Grams’ things. I need to decide what I’m going to do next.”
Micah looked down at me. “What do you mean, next?”
“Well, I need to decide what to do with the house. I need to decide how long I’ll be here.”
He turned me so I was facing him with his hands on my shoulders.
“Baby, it’s already decided.”
Tilting my head in confusion, I waited for him to continue.
“You’re staying here. We’re gonna live in that big house and fill it with babies.”
“What?” I whispered. “You want me to stay?”
“Of course I want you to fucking stay. I told you I was never letting you go again. Did you think I was lying?”
I dipped my head to look at the ground, and Micah bent down, lifting my chin with his finger.
“Baby? I promised you I would never lie to you again. I love you.”
“He’s right, baby girl. You’re staying right here. We’ll talk about Blade living there with you later,” my father added, pulling me away and tucking me into his side.
Micah stood tall, facing my dad. “No discussion needed. She’s mine. She’s always been mine.”
Pushing me behind him, my dad countered, “Seems to me you neglected to make that claim. Twice,” holding two fingers up.
“I’m making that claim now, here in church, in front of my president.”
I searched the room for King. He stood by the door, a finger over his lips, and motioned me to him. Ducking away, I slipped through the double doors quietly.
“Let them hash it out. You and I have plans,” he said, taking my hand and leading me out the front door.
“We do?”
“Yup, and it’s gonna piss them both off. You game?”
Looking back at the clubhouse briefly, I turned and smiled at King.
“Absolutely.”
He handed me a helmet and climbed on his bike. Holding out his hand so I could slide on behind him, he torqued up the throttle. Just as we took off through the gate, my father and my man came running out to the parking lot.
I threw my head back and laughed at the look on their faces.
King and I rode all around town and before I knew it, we were pulling up at The Ice Cream Shoppe.
Yes, that was the name.
We climbed off the bike, and he took my hand, dragging me through the front door.
“What are we doing here?” I asked, following him up to the counter.
“I’m taking my niece out for her first ice cream.”
“I’m twenty-five.” I chuckled. “I’ve had ice cream before.”
“Hey, work with me here. This is a rite of passage for an uncle. It’s not my fault it took two goddamn decades,” he grumbled, looking up at the menu hung on the wall.
I gasped, and King peered down at me.
“You’re a big softie, aren’t you? The big, bad, scary King really has a heart of gold,” I concluded, my hand on my chest for emphasis.
He pulled me to his side and kissed my head.
“Only with you, sweetheart, and don’t breathe a word of it. I have a rep to protect,” he said with a wink.
We sat together in the shop eating ice cream and talked about the club, my childhood with Micah, and my mother. He told me stories about him and my dad when they were growing up. He told me about my grandparents and what they were like.
Heading back to the clubhouse a few hours later, we found two very irate men waiting for us.
I scrambled off the bike and heard my father and Micah yelling.
“Did you just kidnap my daughter?”
“You took my girl on your bike?”
“You are both assholes. No, I did not kidnap your daughter. She got on the bike willingly,” King told my dad. Then to Micah he declared, “And no to you, too. I took my niece to get her first ice cream.”
“She’s twenty-five!” my dad announced.
“She’s had ice cream before,” Micah yelled.
“Shut the fuck up, both of you.” King dragged me back toward the clubhouse, and I laughed the whole way.
This was what had been missing. Not just Micah, but my dad and my uncle. I had a family. I loved Grams with everything in me, but for so long I was alone, because I couldn’t come back here and deal with the memories.
Now I was ready to live. Ready to make new memories. I would no longer just go through the motions. I never actually made it to the acceptance part of grief. I no longer had to accept Micah being dead. I had, however, accepted that every decision in life happened for a reason.
Losing Micah allowed me to leave Diamond Creek. That allowed him to come back here looking for me, which ultimately made him choose to let me go. Letting me go allowed him to meet the Silver Shadows. Suggesting Nebraska as the location of the new chapter allowed me to find him again.
Losing Grams brought my mother back to Diamond Creek. Which led to the sheriff discovering that he was my dad.
I could even contribute Grant’s attack on me, being the catalyst for Micah getting his head out of his ass and admitting we were meant to be together.
As Jeff Goldblum said in one of my favorite movies, ‘ Life finds a way’ .