Then she hung up on him. He wanted to throw his phone across the room, but sadly it was one of those that were connected to the wall and had cords running everywhere. Why his brother had a landline was beyond him. Josh was having to look up every phone number he wanted in the giant Rolodex beside the heavy assed thing.
Sitting down at his desk again, he ran his fingers through his hair and looked around. There wasn’t a thing out of place. None of his passwords or account numbers had been disturbed either. Yet all his money was gone, his safe had been standing wide open, and the money and jewelry he’d found all over the house were missing. Who would have done such a thing and thought he’d not press charges?
He couldn’t, he knew that. Not only could he not press charges on the missing things, but he couldn’t have the police involved at all. They’d want to know where the children were, where the will was that had put him in charge of them and their money. Just yesterday morning, he’d been told that someone from the welfare office was going to be at this house on Friday to talk to the girls, and to see if Lucy, the oldest, had any comments on how things were going with the care of her sisters.
“That bitch has done this. I know it.” Getting up to look again for something that would tell him where his things were, he kicked the newspaper across the room. The name Jackson was in bold letters across one of the pages and had him bending over to pick the paper up.
Reading it over three times, he decided he didn’t know who the hell it was. There wasn’t any mention of this Lucille person having any sisters. The man she was marrying had a name he’d never heard before. Tossing the paper aside, he went to figure out if there was a calendar in the kitchen that told him the entire household was on vacation.
“They’d better be. If they’ve left me, that is going to be the wrong move on their part.” He didn’t have any idea what sort of restrictions he could put on them if they were gone on a planned vacation. But he’d been talking to himself for so long now he figured if it came out of his mouth, it had to be right. He was smiling when he entered the kitchen again.
The woman sitting there at the table was no one he knew. Josh hoped she was some sort of replacement for his staff and asked her if she was there to cook for him. Instead of answering him, she continued to sip her tea and munch on what looked to him like giant biscuits. He reached for one of them.
“Touch that, and I’ll remove your hand from the elbow down. Sit your ass down and keep your fucking mouth shut.” He didn’t feel like he had a choice in the matter and sat down. Once there, he thought about getting up, and the person glared at him. “I’ve been looking over some of your handy work, Josh. You’re not going to get away with this.”
“Oh yeah? What might you think you’ve been looking over?” She looked at him oddly, and he realized how stupid he sounded. “Tell me what you think I should be worried about with you. You’re not supposed to be here, and that’s breaking and entering.”
She laid a set of keys on the table. They looked like the ones his brother had in his pocket all the time when he’d been alive. “Where did you get those? Do you have any idea how long I’ve been searching for the keys to his car?”
“I don’t know. Why don’t you enlighten me?” He didn’t care for her tone but asked her again about the keys. “I have a better question for you, Josh. Why don’t you tell me where the girls are? Do you ever go and check on them? I’m to understand you’ve dropped them off at the mall twice now. Where are you supposed to pick them up this time? The county welfare office is supposed to be here soon, aren’t they?”
“What is it you think you know? And what I’ve done with those girls is really none of anyone’s business. My brother told me to keep an eye on them, and I’m doing that.” The woman told him he wasn’t. “I am too. They’re having a good time hanging out at the mall. Just like you said.”
“I never said they were at the mall, moron. I simply pointed out that is where you dropped them off. Both times you had to have the household inspected by the county. I don’t think you’re going to have an easy time finding them this time. They’ve been gone for nearly eight months now. Wouldn’t you say?” He didn’t have any idea when it was he’d dropped them off at the mall. He did know he’d not had to hit Lucy when they’d gotten there this time. “About that. Did you know you cracked her jaw? That as of right now, she’s going to have to have a brace put on the bone you hit. Not very uncle-like of you, if you ask me.”
“I didn’t ask you shit. Why are you here? To ask me questions you already know the answer to?” Now he got why the woman on the phone was pissy with him. This woman asking questions she had the answers for was annoying. But then that was what the banker was getting paid for. “I want you out of my house right now.”
“It’s not your house. I’ve found the will, and you weren’t even mentioned in it. Much less told to take the money earmarked for their children. Did you check your balance today?” She smiled. “I guess you did. It was fun, really, taking it out of your accounts and putting it into one that the three girls of Mr. and Mrs. Jackson can use. I wanted to personally thank you for not spending any of it. However, you should be gathering up the very little you came with and get out before I have to rough you up. The house and its contents, they don’t belong to you.”
“I haven’t the slightest idea where you’re getting your information, but I have the will in my office.” She said it was his brother’s office. “No. It used to be, but now it’s mine. As is the care of his children and their money. I think it’s about time you left here. Before I call the police.”
“You won’t do that. Calling the police could cause you all sorts of trouble, now couldn’t it? They’d ask you questions about where the children are or even why you are trying to sell off the place when it’s not even in your name. You thought there would be something for you in this, and came here fully aware that you were to stay away from the family and not to bother the girls ever again.” She was dead right about everything. Instead of letting on that he was afraid of what she knew, Josh stood up and went to the back door. “Good for you. Leaving now while there’s still time before the family arrives.”
“I’m not leaving here. You are.” She just smiled at him. “I haven’t any idea why you think I’m joking, but this is my house, and I demand that you get out, right fucking now. I don’t have time for this shit.”
“Of course, you don’t. You have little girls to find. Money to chase down. Things like that can wear a man down, I’m told.” She stood up, and Josh realized how incredibly tall the woman was. When her face turned deadly, the only way he could have described how she stared at him, Josh swallowed twice before she spoke. “If I have to return here to move your ass out of here before the girls are ready to claim this home as their own, you’re going to be farting from your ears, because your ass will be so curled up inside of you.”
Then she just disappeared. Josh staggered to the table and sat down, nearly missing the chair twice before he realized they were all pushed under the table as if no one had been sitting there. When he looked around, he noticed there wasn’t a teacup out of place or a single crumb on the table. Josh told himself over and over that it had been a bad dream. A terribly bad dream.
Sitting there for several more minutes, he was able to convince himself it had been just a bad dream for him. He had dozed off, and that was why it had seemed so real. Getting up then, feeling a lot like his old self, he looked for keys to any of the several cars in the garage to drive and find the girls. He had to find them. Tomorrow was going to be a big day, and they had to be there, or he’d be in trouble.
When he finally located keys, they were to his old beat-up POS, a junker he’d stolen and driven here when he’d gotten word that his brother and his wife were dead. He hated to be seen in such a piece of shit. However, he needed to get going. He figured the car was worth less than his worst pair of shoes, which was zip. And that was the r
eason no one had asked him where it had come from.
Getting the thing started enough to be put into gear, Josh was moving down toward the mall an hour later. There was going to have to be a better plan than the one he’d been relying on. Dropping them off at the mall had been a nice place for him, but then he’d have to search for hours trying to locate them when he needed them. Josh decided he was going to have them stay at the mall. Girls liked the mall, didn’t they? It shouldn’t be any sort of hardship for them to hang out there until he needed them again.
“Stupid children. Don’t they have any idea how much work they’re causing me? It’s doubtful they even care.” He was sure the youngest wouldn’t. She was mouthy, and he couldn’t stand to be around her, questioning every move he made. “I’ll gag her as soon as I find her.”
He thought about the oldest one. Josh had an idea she was older than the other two by a few years but was not sure how old she was. Remembering her tall slim body, he thought her to be about seventeen. No older than that, however. If she was, he was sure his brother would have mentioned it in his will that whatever her name was, she could take care of the kids instead of the staff.
“Which is really stupid. They’d be sucking them dry more than I am.” But they’d have a house to live in, he thought. Not to mention food and warm clothing. “Then they should have prepared better after their parents were killed. That’s what I’m going to tell them when I see them. That they had plenty of time between their mom and dad dying and me getting here to be ready to be homeless.”
He was laughing so hard at his own joke that he nearly missed pulling into the mall. Josh sat there, staring at the place he’d dropped the girls off for a full ten minutes. Construction was going on everywhere. It was no longer a mall. In fact, there was a sign out front that proclaimed it to be the site for the new high school.
“What the hell?” He pulled forward enough that he could see there were construction workers all over the beams. The walls to it were mostly up, and he noticed there were no windows on the lower few feet of the place. “Who the hell said they could tear down the mall?”
Not that he ever went there. He couldn’t remember the last time he’d shopped at any of the stores that used to be in the place. Trying to remember if he’d seen anything in the newspaper about all this shit, he was startled into screaming a little when someone knocked on his window.
“I have a truck coming in behind you.” He didn’t understand what the person wanted him to do, so he leaned over to roll down the window. “I need for you to move. You’re holding up the trucks behind you, buddy. Just park someplace else.”
He moved to what used to be the parking lot of the mall. The trucks, monster things, were lined up behind him three deep. Watching them go to the site, he marveled at how the people on the ground unloaded each of the beds of the trucks with heavy equipment he’d always wanted to learn how to drive.
He supposed all young boys wanted to be able to drive big equipment. Josh had been just like that, wanting to be a trucker or some other glamorous job that involved driving something huge like that. But he’d been a bum. At least until his brother died and he took over his estate.
~*~
Lucy wandered around the house, not really seeing much. Her mind was on what had happened tonight. She was a married woman with two sisters she was caring for, as well as an absent husband. Though the absent husband part was her own doing. She had asked him for time and he, sweetly, gave it to her.
“Whatcha doing?” Lucy looked at her sister and wondered when she’d gotten so grown up. “Lucy? Did you hear me? What are you doing in here?”
“Just looking around. What are you doing?” The shrug was so typically Cybill. “The cook asked me what we wanted for dinner, and I told her we’ve not decided. I don’t want to keep him waiting too long. Are you hungry?”
“Not really. I mean, I want to eat, but not here. I don’t know. It feels as if we should be celebrating or something. Don’t you think? With Ian. He’s my brother now.” Lucy said she knew that. “He’s a nice man. I really like him. I know you don’t, but it’s going to be—”
“I never said I didn’t like him, Cybill. I just don’t know him. You have to admit, it’s only been a few days since we met him. I mean, in that little bit of time, I’ve had my arm hurt, we’re no longer living in a van, Jilly has been operated on, we’re in this mammoth of a house. And this one is the hardest to believe—I’m married. I think with all this going on, at the same time, we can at least be conscious of the fact that I’m a little stressed out.” Cybill told her how sorry she was. “I don’t want you to think you can’t voice how you feel. But I do want you to think about how I’m feeling, all right?”
“Yes. I guess I can be sort of pushy. But I have to tell you, Lucy, this is the safest I’ve felt in a long time. I know you do as well.” Lucy told her sister she did feel safe here. “Good. How about this? We can pick up something to eat—get a bunch of those little boxes of Chinese food—and take it in to eat with Jilly. You call Ian and see if he wants to join us. It’ll be our first meal as a family. Whatcha think?”
“I’ll ask, but don’t get your hopes up too much. He’s a busy man, and does work.”
She realized she knew he made computers and such, but nothing much more than that. Picking up her new cell phone, she pushed the preset she was sure was his. As soon as Demi answered, she told her she was sorry.
“Don’t be. I should have said I was answering Ian’s phone. He’s doing a job for me at the moment.” Lucy told her what Cybill wanted to do. “What a wonderful idea. You tell your sister he’ll be there with bells on. I’ll order for you, so you have enough food, and have it delivered to you. Do you have a car to get there?”
“I’m to understand Ian left us a car to use.” Demi told her she’d send a car to take them to the hospital. “I don’t want to put you out. We can drive.”
“You’re not putting me out at all. We’re in for the night after Ian leaves here. Being nearly ready to pop, it’s tiring to be up past nine in the evening. I’m secretly hoping the baby comes sooner rather than later. I’m tired of being hugely pregnant and unable to stay awake once I sit for any longer than ten seconds.” They both laughed. “I’ll do this because I want to make up for having your new hubby here instead of where you are. I know you’re taking things slowly, but he should at least sleep there. Just in case that uncle of yours comes around. By the way, did I mention that Meadow spoke to him today? It was a hoot for her. I’ll tell you about it tomorrow.”
“All right. But why would she want to speak to him at all?” Demi told her what was said to him and how he thought it had been a dream. “So, you’ve taken his money?”
“No. I took you and your sisters’ money from him and gave it back to you. It’s being funneled through a couple of banks now. You’ll be notified when you have to go down and sign the paperwork for you to use it. I didn’t assume you were sharing with Ian. I thought that was good of me.” Again, they both laughed. “You’ll need to sign off on paperwork when you get to the bank anyway. Ian signed the house over to you. Before you get all upset over that, you should know we’re doing it like this, so the courts will notice you have a home. Also, your uncle. I want him to be so confused when he gets here.”
“Confused people tend to be mean ones, don’t you think?” Demi told her they were also stupid. “I think Josh has been stupid most of his life. But if this works, I’m indebted to you.”
“Nah. We’re related now. If we don’t stick together, then things go wrong. In this family, things tend to go wrong at the beginning, but they’re easily fixed. You’re a great addition to this family. With the girls, it’s going to be nice having someone to talk to.”
Ian came by and picked them up just as she was hanging up the phone from talking to Demi. His car wasn’t really big enough for the three of them, and he said he’d have to look for a new on
e. That his brother worked at a car dealership, and he’d get a nice discount from him.
“I don’t know why I said that. None of us have ever asked for the discount. It’s for family. As big as our families are getting, that could be a bad thing for his place.” Lucy asked him what he’d do with this car. “I was going to talk to you about that. I thought that once Jilly starts driving, she’d use it to take herself and Cybill to class. If it’s all right with you.”
“That’s what I was thinking too. She’s going to need something, and I’d rather she had a newer car that she can rely on rather than a beater that needs to be repaired all the time.” Lucy looked at her sister in the back seat when she laughed. “You don’t think she’d like this car?”
“She’d love it. I think it’s funny that you think she’s going to want to take me anywhere. I don’t know if you noticed this or not, but Jilly likes boys, and having her little sister around isn’t going to be a good thing.” Ian laughed, and Lucy frowned. “It’s all right, Lucy. I don’t mind riding the bus. I’m actually looking forward to going back to school. It’s been a long time, and I only hope I can catch up to where the rest of the class is now.”
“I never thought about you being behind.” Ian told her there were all kinds of classes she could catch up with online. “I might have to look into that. Cybill has already figured out what she wants in her room. I hope it’s all right that I’ve ordered it.”
Lucy was still nervous about things like ordering and having money. It had only been about thirteen months since their parents had died, and most of that time had been spent by them living on the streets.
Jilly was sitting in a chair when they arrived. Her color was good, Lucy thought. She also told them she didn’t have a headache anymore, and that she had slept like a log. Lucy asked if the doctor had told her what had happened.
Ian: McCray Bruin Bear Shifter Romance Page 4
