She screamed for him to come back to her, threatening him with all kinds of bodily harm if he didn’t. Christ, the moron was going to be in so much trouble when she got out of here. She was going to tell the others about her encounter with him. Clayton would have to be dealt with too. She’d see to—
“Tina, I said to shut up and sit the fuck down.” The two women didn’t scare her when they put their hands on their guns. She told them what North had said to her. “I don’t give a shit if he told you he was going to have a fucking baby. If you don’t sit down right now and shut up, I’m going to have to hurt you. You don’t want that, Tina. Just calm the fuck down before I have to—”
Slashing out with both hands to ward them off her, she hit one of the guards in the face. When the guard went down, Tina was just reaching for her gun when something hit her from behind, and she rattled around like she’d stuck her finger in a light socket.
Not even when she fell was she able to tell them that she was going to get them for this. Her entire body felt horrible. Tina was also sure that she’d pissed herself. People were going to pay for this. Especially North. There was no way that anything the fucker had told her was the truth. She’d get him to admit that as soon as she was out of this fucking hell hole.
The two guards dragged her back to her cell by her shoulders. Then not only was she tossed up on her bed, but she was left there in soaking pants with one of her shoes missing. Tina would have taken them to task, but she still was aching too much to move, much less talk.
While she laid there, her mind worked out what she had to do next. Getting in touch with Wesley had to be a priority. She needed to know how much if any of what North had told her was true. It had better all be a lie, Tina thought. Every single word of it.
Tina had wanted to live in the big house since she’d been married to her husband. But it wasn’t to be, not with Clayton being older than her husband. Even when Eita had gotten pregnant first, she knew that Eita was just making sure that she was the first of it all. After Holly had the bastard, they’d all hurried to get pregnant by any means possible, and kept the babies. Tina had despised being pregnant and vowed never to do it again. Not for any amount of money.
“We’ll see about shit.” She could finally move and sat up on the side of her bed. A set of sheets were on the floor to her cell, as well as a jumpsuit. How she was supposed to shower now was beyond her. They’d only let them shower every other day in here. Something else that she wanted to take care of.
It took her over an hour to be able to stand up with no help. Then another hour to get washed up and dressed. After having to strip her bed of all the nastiness they’d put her through, Tina had to figure out how to make her bed again. Christ, would this nightmare ever end? As she was putting the blanket over the messy sheets, she was told to back to the back of her cell.
“Beau Tina Wilson Wilkerson?” She nodded at the man standing there with a different guard. “You are being recorded, so there is nothing for you to sign. Come to the cell and received the paperwork that has just arrived for you.”
She took it and went to the back of her cell when told. They didn’t fuck around once you were on this side of the doors. Tina had learned that the hard way. Looking at the papers in her hand, the words didn’t make sense. Tina asked what this was about.
“Your divorce decree. The judge granted it without any of the standard wait time because of the crimes against you. You cannot keep your last name, either. You’re just Beau Tina Wilson from now on.”
She was still reeling from this bullshit when they brought her the dinner tray. Who the fuck did Wesley think he was? He wasn’t going to divorce her. No way, no fucking how. She wasn’t going to sign shit for this. And she was going to be a Wilkerson until the day she died. Mother fucker.
“Mother fucker.”
She screamed it until the male guards came back with the hose to spray her down if she didn’t shut the fuck up. There wasn’t any way that she was going to be a Wilson again. Nor was she going to be divorced. Mother fucking Wesley was going to pay for this shit.
Chapter 11
Mars walked around the first floor with a sense of awe. Clayton was with them as they did the tour. To keep himself from making a fool of himself over the house and contents, he thought about what North had told him last night. This thing with the aunts seemed to be getting deeper and deeper every day. Mars realized that he’d missed something when he saw both Abby and Clayton staring at him.
“I’m so sorry. I was thinking of all the things that will need to be done with the house before we can move in.” There was a great deal to be done. Just getting some of the drapes out of the rooms would add enough light that he would be able to see his hand in front of his face. “It’s very dark in this house, isn’t it? Did anyone ever want to open a window, or even throw back a curtain to watch it snow?”
“I don’t think that anyone ever thought about it, to be honest with you, Mars. The house has been just like it sits now since my father was a little boy, I’m sure. I think that the drapes were never opened because they were afraid of someone being able to see what we were doing inside when the house was first built. After that, it just stuck. I never thought about changing things because it was comforting, I suppose. And Eita never wanted it changed because it reminded her so much of my father. I never realized how much she worshiped him until recently.” Mars thought that he’d gut the house of not just the drapes, but of every stick of furniture in the place before he moved in. “The furniture is so old that I’m doubting even an antique dealer would want it. I know next to nothing about the value of it in the event you didn’t get that. The wallpaper is original, and I believe that the floors are all hardwood. But like the windows, they’ve never been shown off either.”
To prove his point, Clayton bent and pulled one of the hallway’s long rugs up from the floor. The wood was beautiful beneath it, and several hundred shades lighter as well. He said that he’d take that all up and have it redone.
“I was thinking that too. Sand it down to the original wood then have it all stained to match. I know that there are several chemicals that would do it faster, but they aren’t very good for the environment.” Abby did the same thing to the wall, moving an old painting and seeing that the wood there, a knotty looking wood, had suffered the same fate. It was bleached out under the painting as it had been under the rug. “You’d think with no sunlight that this wouldn’t have happened.”
The kitchen was the only room that seemed to have been updated in the last couple of decades. Even saying that it was still old and worn out. With all their millions, Mars would have thought that the house would be more up to date than it was.
“I’m looking at this house like I’ve never seen it before. Some of these rooms I don’t think I’ve been in since I was a small boy. My goodness, how did we let it go so long like this? I mean, it’s clean.” Abby said that was about all that was going for it. “Yes, I can see that as well. Some of the rugs that are in my office are badly frayed too. I used to think that rather than allow anyone in my domain to repair it, I’d just shove a piece of furniture on it. I think that my father had the same idea. Goodness gracious. This needs a whole overhaul.”
“It’s nothing that can’t be fixed, I think, if Abby thinks that she could live here. It’s a nice house. At least the foundation seems to be nice.” Clayton assured him that it was. “It’ll be up to her. I think it will take a little while to have it brought up to this century, but it might be worth it. Mom used to tell me that she never got to slide down these banisters. She said that she was terrified of getting splinters or something like that.”
There were all kinds of nicks and gouges in the oak banister throughout the house. Not only that, but there were cracked windows under the heavy drapes. Abby went to one of the large dark velvet curtains and yanked it right off its rod. The entire room was aglow in morning light and dust b
unnies.
“I just knew that there was going to be an old fainting couch in here.” Abby looked at him. “I want to live here, if for no other reason than to bring life back to this old girl. The first thing I’d like to have fixed up is the kitchen. We can live here with the million year old shit, but we gotta eat. Are you up for the challenge, Mars?”
“Yes. Yes, I believe that I am.” He looked at Clayton, who, like he’d said, was seeing the rooms for the first time. “What is there from here that you’d like to have, Uncle Clayton? Anything that you wish to keep is yours. But the rest, if Abby doesn’t want it, is going to the auction block. Not only would I like to have something from this decade to sit on, but I don’t think that there is enough room in any of the rooms for much in the way of people. There is too much of everything here.”
“What would you do with the paintings here? There are quite a few of them.” Mars asked him if they were family paintings. “Only in the sense that they’ve been in the family for a very long time. I believe that there are a few of them that are quite valuable. They’ll need to be cleaned if you use them. The one over the fireplace in my office is of my father. If nothing else comes to me to take, that one is one that I’d like to have.”
“It’s yours. The rest we’ll take care of as we go. All right?” Uncle Clayton smiled at him. “Do you have any idea if the fireplaces work? I mean, that’s not the only way to heat this sucker, is it?”
“No, but I don’t know that it’s any more up to date than the rest of the place. There is a furnace in the lower level of the house that needs to be tended night and day to keep this place warm. Also, you’ll see that all the bedrooms have a fireplace. That’s what we use to keep us warm in the winter months. And electric blankets. What I would do is have an air-conditioning system put in on each floor, or you’ll be as roasting as we were during the summer months. I believe that is why families took off from here in the summer. The house was too ungodly hot for them to suffer through.” He and Clayton headed to the library, which had a solarium off from it, while Abby was making calls. “You’ll love this room, Mars. It was always my favorite place to go where no one would bother me. Your mom…. My goodness, Holly loved this room too. She so loved to read.”
“She was forever with a book at home. Never a reader, but always books. She never kept them either. Mom said that books were made to share and to be read. That’s why there were never more than a dozen of them around. Mom would read them then share them with her patients if they expressed a desire to read something.” Clayton said that sounded just like her. “I have a picture of her somewhere that I’ll show you. We took a trip once. We visited all the Carnegie libraries around. A lot of them have been converted to homes. Very few of them lend out books anymore. But we had a good time.”
“I just bet the two of you did.” When Abby caught up with them, she kissed him on the mouth before turning to Uncle Clayton. “Well, my dear, what is it you’ve discovered? If there was ever a cat eating grin, you have it down pat.”
“We’ll live here. It’s nice having money to spend when you want something, isn’t it?” Both he and Uncle Clayton agreed with her. “There is a crew coming in tomorrow to start on the kitchen. While they’re going to update it as well as modernize it, they’re also going to be putting in wiring. I turned on the light in the office to use some paper on the desk when the entire lamp exploded. Also, one of the bedrooms will be worked on at the same time. I told them that I didn’t know the dimensions of the room, but if it’s anything like the rest of the house, it’s huge.”
“I’d like to pay for the renovations.” Abby just smiled at Clayton. “It’s the least I could do after leaving you with all this to take care of. It should have been in better shape for me. With you guys, you’re almost starting fresh. I’d feel better if you’d allow it.”
“I’d feel better if we could come to another arrangement.” Abby looked up at him as if to ask for permission for something, and he only had to nod at her. “I’d like for you to be here with the others every holiday. Christmas, birthdays, and anything else we can have a party for. I’d also like your input on a few things too. Such as the furniture and the other items that I’m sure that we’re going to be selling off.”
“I can do that. I would gladly do that.” He asked her about the crews that she hired. “I mean, I don’t know a lot about construction, just watching things that go on around town and the like. But there are a great many of them that will rip you off as soon as your back is turned.”
“I don’t plan on turning my back on any of them. Each company that I hired today will have a single room to work on. Once they have finished that, completely and to our specifications, then they might get a contract from us to do the other rooms. It’s sort of a competition, you might say. There will be three bedrooms done at the same time that the kitchen is being stripped down to the wood. I want the best, and if I have to fire a few idiots along the way to get the best…. Well, I can do that too.”
They were still laughing when the first foreman showed up to take a look at the room he was going to have a crew working on. He and Abby went to the second floor to see what room they were going to set them up on. Clayton was making calls too, and they left him to it.
Mars was surprised by how small the bedrooms were. There were plenty of them, but they all would only hold a bed and maybe a couple of dressers. Even the closets seemed to be made with smallness in mind. Looking through the six bedrooms on each side, Mars came to a decision.
“I want there to be three bedrooms on each side of the hall. You take the middle two to be worked on.” The man looked as if he was going to protest. “Do it or don’t, I don’t care. I want two rooms made into a single larger one. With that in mind, they need to have closets that are larger than they are now, and new wiring throughout the upper floors.”
“How many bathrooms are up here?” The contractor, James Wimples, followed them as Abby counted. “Two? That has to be taken care of as well. I want at least a shower stall and a toilet in each of the rooms. That shouldn’t be too hard with the walls taken out, should it?”
“Ma’am, what you’re wanting is a total revamping of this house. I was under the impression that this was going to be a simple remodel. This will take a great deal more than just a few men. The fact that you’re wanting new bathrooms is great, but it’ll have to be done with the other rooms, to keep from having to tear out walls again and again.” Mr. Wimples went to the wall and pulled one of the boards away from it. “This here is slat work. It’s going to have to be pulled out, then the plaster taken out before we can add some insulation to make these rooms more soundproof. It’s what I’d do. And instead of putting just a stall in each of the rooms, I’d put in a half bath, if that’s all you’re wanting. Then a full bath at the end of each hallway. But if I was staying around here for a couple of days, I’d want my own johnny to use and shower space. Put yourself in a whole bathroom with a shower, tub, and even a johnny, and people will be thrilled that you took the time to do that.”
“What else would you do?” They followed him around the little room, where he showed them where the windows were old, and the wind was coming in all around them. The way the glass was so old that it was no longer safe to have it stuck in a room a child might wander into. After two hours, not only did they have a better idea of what they needed in the rooms, but they had also hired James, as he asked them to call him, for the entire place.
“No one sent out another person to check out what they’d be doing.” James told him that he didn’t know if he was big enough to do a job this large. Mars smiled at him. “You hire as many people as you think you’ll need and get them going, and we’ll make sure that by the time this house is complete, if you stick with us, you’ll be bigger than you probably want to be.”
After they figured out what else needed to be done, and there was a great deal of it to be dealt with, they sat down to figure
out what was going to be needed, and what was to be gotten rid of when they started tearing out the walls.
“You have a lot of wood up there that can be repurposed for other things. Like we can cut it down for the walls in the bathrooms. There is some marble around the fireplaces that we’re taking out that we can have cleaned then use them as the counters in the new bathrooms.” Mars said that he loved those ideas. “Okay. Good. The carpets will have to be taken out, then the floors sanded down. After that, we can have them just stained. They’re old enough that it’s doubtful they’re going to shrink. Your idea about putting an air unit on each floor is a good one. You’ll need a few fans in the rooms to keep the air going, but other than that, you’ve got a good foundation here.”
It was just after four in the afternoon when James left. He said that he’d have some of the crew coming by in the morning to take care of moving the furniture and such. Abby asked him if he knew a reliable auction house, and he said his daddy had one. He’d have him call.
“That was informative.” Abby sat down on one of the many chairs that were in the room where Clayton was. “What is this room called, anyway?”
“The parlor, I believe.” He laughed. “I don’t think it was used very much by Eita. She was more into staying up in her room when she was here. Which really wasn’t that often. I guess the police have given you the okay to go ahead and have the room redone, right?”
“Yes. They got all that they needed. They also found a list of people they think will close a lot of cases too. Missing people and where she had taken care of them.” Clayton nodded but didn’t say anything more. “On a lighter note, I think that this will be moving along nicely. And James said his dad would give us a call tomorrow about the furniture.”
“While I was on the phone, I took a look around. Other than the paintings, there isn’t anything that I want here. Nothing at all.” Abby just squeezed his hand, and Mars told Clayton that was all right. “Also, I’ve spoken to my brothers, and we’ll be paying for some of the renovations. Holly should have gotten a share of what Father left us, and that is what we’re going to do with it. If you don’t mind.”
Marsden (Wilkerson Dynasty Book 1) Page 15
