14. Mason
14
MASON
P eople like to say the funeral service was beautiful. I heard it enough times as people came up, shaking my hand, kissing Sam’s cheek, hugging my kids. But I hated hearing that phrase. It wasn’t true. The funeral sucked. My dad was not supposed to go out that way. It was bullshit and wrong and a tragedy. He should’ve died in his sleep, from old age, needing a handheld urinal to piss. He should’ve been surrounded by his grandkids.
Or fuck, I didn’t know. Just longer. He had more years in him.
Why the fuck couldn’t he have brought us in earlier? We would’ve helped. We would’ve done fucking anything to stop this. He was a Kade. Anyone messing with him messed with us. Fuck the business side of it.
He was one of us.
No one fucked with us.
But it had happened and we’d had one week to process.
One. Week.
That ended when people began arriving for the funeral, because it quickly became a who’s who. CEOs of global companies arrived in droves, celebrity athletes came for me, Olympic medal winners showed up to support Samantha. Channing’s sister and her entire crew arrived. Nate’s sister showed up, along with my stalker and another girl Heather pulled in for a tight hug. Quincey’s half brother traveled down with his family. I was hoping to talk him into taking the giant tortoise back with him.
Then there were the board members. Their families. Shareholders. Any investor and wannabe investor. Fallen Crest’s town council. The mayor. Roussou’s mayor. The chief of police.
The church couldn’t hold any more, so we had to get security. Of course, that was around the time pictures started hitting the internet, and I knew the press would soon show up. A few cameras had been there from the beginning, but by the time the service actually started, the cameras doubled.
Once again, the casket was closed. The minister said his piece. Music played. There were a couple solos and at the end, we took our places at the casket to carry it out. Logan and I were in the front. Nate and Channing behind us, and Matteo and Max were next. Two of our cousins were last. We all wore matching white boutonnieres. Sam had been crying when she helped pin mine to my jacket.
I hated every fucking second of the day.
I cursed every step we took to carry my dad’s casket outside. When it lowered into the ground, I wanted to light it on fire. Fuck throwing in the dirt. Sure, it was symbolic. I knew there was a respect and a sacredness about it, our last goodbye and returning him to the ground. It was the cycle of life.
I loathed everything that happened today.
Fuck my dad for deciding to go out this way. Fuck him. Fuck the Bennetts. But also, fuck that sadness in him, because a part of him wanted out. He wanted to join Analise.
Also, fuck how much I was going to miss him.
We had food and beverages afterward for people at my dad’s place. We’d never sold it, though we’d talked about it enough times. He and Analise would move out. Then they’d move back in. There was a revolving door on that house. I wanted to sell the place, but someone always changed their mind at the last minute. Today it was a good place to host the after-party. I’m sure there was a better, more appropriate word, but that’s what it was. An after-fucking party for putting a dead guy in the ground.
The mayor came around again. The board members. Most of them wanted to know what was happening with the company and when the next meeting would be. All the faces started to blur together. I escaped to my dad’s back office, and Jesus, as soon as I stepped inside, I felt his ghost.
“Took you long enough,” Logan said from the corner. He was slumped in a chair in the shadows.
I grunted and moved to the desk. “What are you doing in here?”
“Same as you. Hiding from all the ass-kissers.”
“We’re leaving our wives out there?”
Logan laughed, the sound bitter, and he raised a bottle of bourbon for a swig. “They’ll be fine. They all move in a herd anyway, and Sam’s hung over. No one’s going to mess with her when she’s hung over.” He shuddered. “Plus, Channing’s sister is out there. She’s protecting everyone in our group.”
His sister was even more antisocial than me. Her entire group could form a literal wall to protect the kids. They’d step in if Sam or Taylor needed anything.
Logan took another swig, and the liquid swished in the bottle. “Nate and Channing are out there.”
I went over to the chair beside him, taking the bourbon and drinking too. “Matteo?”
Logan grinned, darkly, snatching the bottle again. “I’m pretty sure he took someone to the pool house. Doubt we’ll see him until tomorrow.”
I raised my eyebrows. “Who?”
He shrugged. “Don’t know. Just saw the back of her hair.” He changed the subject. “What’d Sam say about last night? Maddy’s avoiding everyone today.”
“Yeah.” I sighed, reaching for the bourbon. “We’ll deal with that tomorrow, but I told Sam about it this morning. She wasn’t happy, and she was pissed that Maddy didn’t listen to Max. I’m fairly certain she’s going to rope Heather in with a plan for how to destroy that kid’s life—the one who disrespected Maddy. If they don’t, we will.”
“I’ll drink to that.” He held his hand out for the bottle.
I handed it over. “You already are.”
“Yeah.”
“Your base is still in Boston. What are you going to do?”
He raised his eyebrows. “What do you mean?”
“I’m going into the office tomorrow, to start looking at the accounts.”
He shook his head, his mouth tipping up.
“What?”
“Just use the kid. He’ll get you into everything. He’s a computer-hacking genius.”
I scowled. “He’s not a kid anymore. And no.” He was talking about my stalker.
He laughed. “You were his idol growing up. He’s one of my clients. I’ve gotten to know him. He’s not that bad.” He winced, adding, “Anymore.”
Zeke Allen. From the little I knew about him, he’d started out as a douchebag and a bully. That had changed to being just a douchebag, and somehow he’d ended up as what? A good guy? I didn’t buy it. I’d been told he kept pictures of me in his locker in high school. I’d dealt with stalkers. Women and men. They were dangerous. It was bad enough that he had access to my family. I would not bring him into this business with my dad.
I wanted nothing to do with the guy.
“I’m just saying. He’s a resource we could use. He’d help you out in a heartbeat.”
“No.”
He sighed, finishing the bourbon. “Fine. Did Moreaux corner you yet?”
He was one of the board members, the pushiest one of them. “At the church and when we were leaving the cemetery. He tried again in the kitchen too.”
“Fuck that guy. We’re burying our dad today.”
I agreed with him, but I also knew narcissistic assholes tended to only think about themselves. I hadn’t been expecting hugs and cookies from the guy. “I’ll start going through everything.” It was worth repeating.
Logan frowned at me. “On a Sunday?”
I nodded, eyeing the empty bottle.
Logan laughed and pulled out his phone.
“What are you doing?”
“Texting Nate to bring us another bottle.”
“Good thinking. And yes, I’m going in on a Sunday. No one should be there. His office was cleaned on Thursday.”
Logan didn’t say anything for a minute. “Mom’s not here.”
My gut tightened. We had called her and she did what she did. It became about her.
“Good riddance.”
Logan’s gaze sharpened on me. “You don’t care that she’s not here?”
“You do? She loathed Dad, and she barely remembers she has sons, much less grandchildren. Good fucking riddance to her. We have bigger things to deal with besides wondering where our fucking mother is.”
I’d stopped caring long ago. Helen had been decent enough when she was married to James, but she chose to hide in a wine bottle. There’d been a couple stints in rehab, but nothing stuck. The last time she left one of the treatment centers, she’d gone to an all-day brunch and woke up the next morning with some young stud boyfriend. She hadn’t looked back since. “She’s probably on some yacht with who the fuck knows.”
Logan snorted.
Maddy was the only one who remembered her with fondness. Nash and Nolan were too uncomfortable around her. They didn’t have good memories with her. It was ridiculous. Anyway, they had four sets of grandparents, or they once did. Helen was a lost cause. James and Analise had passed now. The last two worth anything were Malinda and David, who were fucking godsends.
Logan must’ve been on the same wavelength because he scowled. “Where the fuck is Garrett? That fucker’s not been around for ages.”
I had to grit my teeth. “He’s another lost cause.”
Sam’s biological father had tried coming around for a few years, but it wasn’t long after Maddy was born when that began to fade. He and his wife moved to Europe. The estrangement was on their end, not Sam’s. She reached out. It was never reciprocated. She didn’t talk about it much, but I knew it bothered her. There was no relationship with her two half-siblings.
I knew that killed her.
“When was the last time he was even around?”
I frowned. “Fucking forever.”
He grunted.
The door opened, and Logan burst out, “Took you goddamn long enough.”
Nate entered with a grin. I half expected him to have brought a slew of guys with him, but he nudged the door shut before heading our way. He handed Logan the bourbon and sank down in a nearby chair with a beer in hand. “What are you dipshits doing in here? You’re hiding from everyone.”
Logan glowered as he opened the bottle. “We are not. We’re commiserating.”
He didn’t respond to Logan, though, instead giving me a slight nod. “What were you talking about?”
“About how Sam’s bio dad is a fucking piece of shit,” Logan said.
Nate’s eyebrows shot up. “Say it like you mean it. Say it from the chest.”
Logan frowned, but he didn’t seem to care enough to decipher that Nate was messing with him. “How was cuddling with Harold last night? Do tortoises get wood?”
I stifled a laugh.
Nate scowled. “Thanks for all the help with deterring my wife from luring that turtle into our bedroom. Heard all about the audience who thought it was hilarious. Quincey was laughing about it this morning.”
Logan shared a look with me before he smirked. “Not my wife, not my problem.”
Nate growled.
Logan snickered before gesturing to me. “We’re talking about our piece-of-shit parents who are also piece-of-shit grandparents. James and Analise are the exception—” He winced, paling. “ Were the exception. Helen’s pathetic, and Brickshire’s been a ghost. Does Maddy even remember him?”
I shook my head. “I honestly don’t know. I think he’s been in contact with Sam over the last five years, but it’s been sporadic and nothing substantial. He sent her a postcard once.”
“A postcard?” Nate shook his head. “I forgot those things exist.”
Samantha’s half sister had been six the last time she saw her. There’d been another kid, but I couldn’t remember his name. I’d questioned Sam one time about it, asking if it bothered her that Garrett was absent from our life. She’d shrugged. “ He doesn’t have the excuse this time of not knowing about me .” She hadn’t wanted to talk about it anymore and rolled over, taking the blanket with her. I’d considered asking my private investigator to look into him, but when I brought it up a few days later, Sam shook her head. Her shoulders tensed and her jaw got tight. “ You will not. It’s his decision not to be in my life. I chase no one. If this is how he’s chosen to be as my father, I don’t want him in our kids’s life as a grandparent. They’ve got two sets who love them tenfold what he might’ve. Let’s focus on the ones who are here .”
We’d dropped it after that, but I knew Sam kept tabs on her little sister somehow.
“That’s sad,” Nate remarked.
I tilted my head to the side. “It’s life. We have blessings in other ways.”
“Yeah. Focus on the silver-lining shit.” Logan took another swig, thrusting his free hand in the air. He coughed a few times before rasping out, “Let’s go fuck ’em up. What’s his number? I want to find out where he is. We got a whole list by now, Mase. It’s like we never left.”
I raised my eyebrows at him. “We never left? You move here in the last day and I didn’t catch when that happened?”
He glowered. “You know what I mean.”
I did. I was a little salty about it. Now that I was here, now that we were going to war, I wanted my brother by my side. I took the bottle away from him, capping it and putting it on the floor on my other side. “He’s in Europe, and no, we’re not.”
“Hey,” Logan protested
I glared at him. “You’ve had enough. You can’t keep getting drunk and leaving your wife to deal with Sammy. That kid is a handful, and she’s pregnant.”
He rolled his eyes. “I got drunk one night. Tonight’s the second. Don’t insinuate I’m a selfish husband.” He scowled at me.
We were glaring at each other as Nate laughed, missing the actual anger bristling between us. “I still think it’s fucking hilarious that you named your son Sammy,” he said. “And even more hilarious that Taylor was okay with it. You basically named your kid after your sister-in-law.”
I grinned, remembering when he delivered the news. Sam had been horrified.
Logan laughed too, the tension easing. “It started as a joke, but we were so sad after losing our girl that we wanted to take our time naming him. Then Taylor’s dad had a heart attack and well, time took off. The little guy just became Sammy.”
Nate was still laughing, shaking his head. “And his nickname is Sam. That’s the funniest part of it.”
Logan snickered, and then closed his eyes, going still.
Nate lost his grin, casting me an inquisitive look.
This was dark Logan.
We were in Fallen Crest. We’d lost our dad. He remembered how shitty some of the other grandparents were, and he’d been reminded about his daughter.
Logan and Taylor were shattered when they lost her.
Two years later, Sammy came along, and it was as if he’d gotten his soul, plus his older sister’s soul as well. His personality burst out of him, and sometimes, they could only contain him enough to keep him safe. He was a lot .
He’d been staying with Malinda and David this last week. Taylor had been able to sleep, which she said every day she was thankful about. That usually came up around the time she was readying herself for when they’d come to the house.
The front door would burst open and Sammy would tear into the house. “Mommy!”
It was the same entrance every morning. No walking. No skipping. No jogging. A full-on sprint. He’d barrel right at her.
He’d grasp her hips for a quick hug, and then he was off, looking for his next victim. Thank God his cousins all doted on him, as that kid was nuts. I was his godparent. I should’ve been nicer about him, but nope. The kid was nuts. Funny, but nuts.
I loved catching his arrivals whenever I could. Malinda didn’t understand why I asked her to alert me when they were on the way over, but I never wanted to miss the moment Sammy entered the household.
I couldn’t wait to see what he was like as he got older. Logan was fucked.
The door burst open again. It was Channing this time. He gave us all a look, jerking his chin. “Stop hiding. Kids are crying, and your wives need time off. Let’s go.” He didn’t wait around, striding off.
There was a momentary pause before Nate began laughing.
Logan exhaled, grinning slightly. “What the fuck was that?”
Nate stood up, grinning at the two of us. “I feel like we got caught sneaking booze by our dad. I’m suddenly fourteen again.”
Logan looked down at his lap. “I feel like I just got caught watching porn, and not the good kind. The raunchy shit.”
“Dude,” I said.
Nate went for the door. “I don’t even want to understand where that came from. I’m out.”
“That’s because your daughters are angels,” I called. “They do nothing wrong, and they want to save animals and the planet.”
Nate tipped his head back before he disappeared into the hallway. “Not Lilac. She’s focused on gymnastics already. I think she’s going to be an athlete. See you out there.”
Logan tilted his head to the side. “Can’t she be both?” He looked my way for the answer.
“Fuck if I know. They’re not my daughters.”
His scowl was immediate. “You’re supposed to know everything.” He walked around me, bent down, and picked up the bourbon.
I whisked it out of his hands. “I know enough to know that if you keep drinking this shit, you’ll be sleeping instead of going on a little mission I want to take tonight.”
“Mission?” he asked.
I ignored him, leaving.
“Mason!” he called after me. “What mission?”
“Stop fucking drinking and you’ll find out,” I tossed over my shoulder.
“ You’ve been drinking.”
I didn’t enjoy getting buzzed or drunk, and he knew that.
When I got to the main floor, I heard someone screaming at the top of their lungs. “IF YOU DON’T PUT THAT SNAKE DOWN RIGHT NOW, I’M GOING TO brING OUT MY PYTHON. SNAKES SHOULD NOT BE AROUND LITTLE KIDS.”
For fuck’s sakes. Who brought snakes to this house?
I made an amendment to our mission tonight. First order of business was finding all the snakes and getting them the fuck out of my house.
Someone else screamed, “IT’S GOING FOR HAROLD!”