Charles should have known it was nonsense. But he also noticed one person missing. “Where’s your mother?” he asked them. “She gone already?”
“She’s outside with some guy,” Tony responded.
Charles frowned. “What guy?”
“The guy she’s getting her groove back with,” Donald said with a smile. “The guy whose daughter is getting married at the Inn. What’s his name? Michael Somebody or Miller Somebody. Something like that.”
Charles knew better than this. That damn Miller Franklin again? At his house? “They’re out front or out back?” he asked.
“Out front,” Ashley said, and Charles headed in that direction.
Donald smiled and sipped more coffee. “There’s about to be a knockdown drag-out, people,” he said.
But Tony was still thinking about what he had previously said. He leaned toward his younger brother. “The guy she’s getting back her groove with?” he asked. “And Dad knows about him? And he’s still alive? You’re kidding, right?”
Donald and Ashley laughed. “Am I?” Donald asked.
But Tony didn’t find it amusing at all. He knew his father. He knew his father would try to kill that man if he knew he was even thinking about having designs on Jenay. He hurried to the living room window, to see just who this mystery man, a man trying to woo his father’s wife, could be.
Jenay and Miller were standing at Miller’s car in the driveway, as Miller tried desperately to explain himself. “I didn’t mean any disrespect,” he said. “That wasn’t my intention at all, Jenay. I just thought, since I heard you and your husband had this magnificent spread, that it would be worth a try.”
“You could have phoned me at the office,” Jenay responded. “You could have visited me at the Inn. I don’t mix work with my home life.”
“And I appreciate that. But since we used to be relatives, I didn’t think it would matter to you.”
Ordinarily, it would not have mattered to Jenay. But she wasn’t going to take Charles’s concerns lightly. He thought Miller had other ideas in mind. She wasn’t about to feed that beast. “It matters,” she said. Then she decided to go there. “What do you want, Miller?”
“Hey,” Miller said with a smile, holding up his hands, “you know me. All you have to tell me is once and it will never happen again. I don’t want to lose my ex-sis over silliness. And I guess this was silly for me to come here. But the idea of having my daughter’s wedding at such a beautiful estate would have been exciting and seemed worth a try. I thought you’d share in the excitement. I guess I was wrong.”
They heard the front door open and close and both looked in that direction. Charles, still in his bathrobe, began walking down the steps. Miller stood erect. “Uh-oh,” he said. “Here comes your prison guard.”
Jenay looked at him. “He’s my husband,” she said firmly. What in the world had gotten into Miller, she wondered? This snarky, insecure man wasn’t the man he presented himself to be.
“Just joking, Jenay,” Miller said with another smile. “You have really lost your sense of humor, haven’t you?”
Jenay felt odd when he said that, as if he was implying that being with Charles had changed her for the worse. She wanted to tear into him, and correct his assumption, but Charles was upon them. She didn’t want to fan the flames since he already had his doubts about Miller. “Hey, babe,” she said as he made it to their side.
But Charles was looking unblinkingly at Miller. “What’s this about?” he asked him.
Miller was still smiling. Still playing Mister Charming. “Excuse me?” he asked.
“What are you doing here?”
“I came to talk to your wife about my daughter’s wedding. If that’s okay with you.”
“You talk to her at the Inn. Not here. Not ever.”
Miller was surprised by Charles’s bluntness. He decided to go in a different direction. “Okay, okay. That’s not the real reason. The truth is, the real deal, is that I came because I thought I’d get a chance to see my nieces, all right? To see Ashley and Carly.”
Now it was beginning to make sense to Jenay. “Why do you want to see them?” she asked. “You were never interested before.”
“When they needed you,” Charles added.
“I know I dropped the ball after Quincy died,” Miller admitted. “I know my whole family dropped the ball. But we were having our own individual hells. We couldn’t rescue anybody from theirs. And when you and Jenay said hey, you guys would take them, who were we to interfere with that? They loved Jenay. She was the only true mother they ever had. And she had a good husband. We weren’t about to interfere with that. So we didn’t. I didn’t.”
“But you want to interfere now?” Jenay asked.
Miller shook his head. “I want to be an uncle to my nieces. That’s all I want to be. I’m sure they don’t even remember me; they saw so little of me. But I truly want to make amends if I can. If it’s not too late.”
It was, and Jenay and Charles both knew it was, but Ash and Carly were adults now. Young adults, but still of age. It would be their decision.
“We’ll ask if they want to see you,” Charles said. “If they do, we’ll set something up. If they don’t, I expect you to drop this matter and leave them alone. Because if you don’t Miller, that will be one decision you regret. I guarantee it.”
Miller smiled. “It won’t take all that,” he said jokingly. When Jenay nor Charles returned his smile, he nodded. “Okay. Okay. I will abide by those rules. But please tell them I really want to make this happen. I failed my brother his entire life. I want to try to make it right.”
Charles nodded, and then Miller got into his car and began driving off.
Jenay exhaled. “I’d better get to the Inn,” she said, and Charles began walking her to her Mercedes. She could tell he was still perturbed. “You okay?” she asked him.
“I don’t like the idea of that guy coming to our home like this,” Charles said.
“I don’t either,” Jenay responded. “And I told him I don’t like it. I don’t know him like that.”
“And for him to suddenly want a relationship with Ash and Carly? Why? When we decided to adopt them he was the first to say he wasn’t interested. Now he’s interested? I’m not buying it, Jenay.”
“Neither am I.”
Charles looked at her as they stood at her car door. “You thought it was totally innocent at the Inn yesterday,” he said. “What changed?”
“His behavior, that’s what. Although I’m not on board with your suggestion. I still don’t think he has any sexual designs on me like you believe.”
“And I still believe that,” Charles said. “There was a lot more going on in his eyes than all of his talk about how you’re his former sister-in-law and ain’t it great. A lot more.”
“I don’t know,” Jenay said as she opened her car door. “That’s not the vibe I’m getting from him.”
“But you agree whatever vibe you’re getting it’s a bad vibe?” Charles asked.
Jenay nodded her head. “Oh, yeah. This morning, especially yes. Coming to my house like that? Something’s up. He’s up to something.”
Charles was pleased she was taking it more serious now. “Stay clear of that guy until I can run a background on him,” he said.
“I will.”
“And you let somebody else handle his daughter’s reception,” Charles added. “I want you to stay out of it.”
Jenay nodded. “I agree. He may not like it, but tough.”
Charles smiled. He loved when they were on the same page. He kissed her on the lips.
Then she looked at him. “The vote is today,” she said.
A sad look crossed Charles’s big green eyes. “Yeah, I know.”
“If Bobby votes against us, we’re going to lose.” Jenay exhaled. “Maybe if you ask him to vote yes, Charles.”
Anger now flashed across his face. “Why should I have to ask him to do something he should know to do himself?�
�� A hard edge was in his voice. “I’m his father. I raised that boy. What the devil has Cruikshank ever done for him but give him his brother’s job to rub it in my face? He knows what Cruikshank is up to. He knows what that shit is about. If Robert can’t do the right thing for his family, then to hell with him.”
Jenay rubbed his huge arm. She knew how heartbreaking Robert’s decisions had been to Charles. Donald and Robert and Ashley were always the three children that gave Charles fits. But Robert was taking it to an entirely different level. “I’ll meet you at City Hall at eleven,” she said to Charles.
“The vote isn’t until twelve.”
“We’d better get there early just in case they invoke some rule of procedure that allows them to start voting before our side shows up,” Jenay responded.
Charles nodded. “Good idea. Eleven it is. I’ll be there. I wouldn’t put anything pass Cruikshank and his minions.”
They kissed again, Jenay got into the expensive S-class Mercedes Charles had purchased for her, and drove out of their circular driveway.
Although Charles wasn’t going to call Robert and urge him to vote family first, Jenay decided that she was going to. He was her stepson, but she loved him just as much as she loved her biological daughter. And she hated that he allowed a snake like Herb Cruikshank to separate him from his father.
After pressing the phone button that activated her car’s monitor, she pressed the icon of Robert’s face. But his phone went straight to voice mail. As if he knew he would be getting calls like this.
When the phone beeped, she pounced. “Robert, this is Jenay,” she said as she drove through the street intersection a short block from her home. But as soon as she entered the intersection, a big delivery truck blew through the stop sign to her right and headed straight for a broadside collision. Jenay, seeing the sudden danger through her peripheral vision, attempted to speed up and out of the truck’s way. But the truck was speeding so fast that she couldn’t get her car away fast enough.
The truck collided with her, rocking her Mercedes until it was rolling on two wheels. The airbag deployed on impact, and the Mercedes then fell back onto all four wheels. But then, to Jenay’s shock, there was a second hit from a speeding truck on the opposite side of the intersection, and that hit caused the Mercedes to spin around and around, like an out-of-control toy, until it rammed against a pole, and nearly split in half.
CHAPTER EIGHT
Just after Jenay had driven out of the driveway, Charles tightened his bathrobe and began to head back up the steps. But Tony came out of the house, as if he wanted to have a word with Charles before he went back in, and walked up to his father.
Charles watched Tony as he headed toward him. He was always impressed with Tony. He had a keen awareness that always made Charles take note. Even when Tony was a kid, they used to call him Old Man because of that awareness about him, that wisdom within him. He gave Charles fits with his career choices, when he bounced around from school to school to school and career to career to career, including, at one time, Seminary school to become a priest. But he ultimately settled down enough to earn a PhD in Clinical Psychology, and to build a successful private practice and a successful radio therapy show. But what Charles loved most about his next-to-the-oldest son was that he lived his life with such a strong moral code that it often put his father’s own high moral standards to shame.
But there was more to it. Tony, for some reason, worried Charles. It might have had something to do with his looks. It might have had something to do with the way Tony’s thick, wavy black hair piled high on his head and framed his strong, gorgeous face and big, green eyes, making him almost have a feminine beauty about him. Charles was overly protective of his son. He was a strong young man but his heart was fragile, and Charles didn’t want anybody breaking it.
“What was that about?” Tony asked as he met his father halfway on the steps.
“You mean the guy that was here?”
“Yeah,” Tony responded. “Who is he? Donnie and Ash act as if he’s some secret admirer of Ma’s.”
“He’s her ex brother-in-law,” Charles said. “He’s Ash and Carly’s uncle.”
Tony was floored. “Really?”
“They don’t know yet, so don’t tell them,” Charles warned. “We need to know what his intentions are first.”
“So what’s he after?” Tony asked. “A relationship with them?”
“That’s what he claims.”
Tony studied his father. “But you think it’s more to it than that? You think he’s after Jenay?”
“I don’t know what he’s after. But I’m going to find out. And for his sake, he’d better hope it isn’t Jenay.”
Tony smiled. And then he looked at his father again. “The vote is today,” he said.
Charles exhaled. “Don’t remind me,” he responded, and proceeded up the steps.
“Heard from Bobby?” Tony asked, but before Charles could respond, they heard the noise of a crash that sounded so deafening both of them looked down the street. Then a second sound, equally deafening, and they suddenly realized it was the sound of a car. Of a car crashing nearby.
They looked at each other. “Jenay,” Charles said with horror in his voice, as if he just knew she was involved, and both men took off running.
Donald and Ashley, who heard the crash sound from inside the home, came running out. When they saw their father and brother running across the lawn toward the street, they took off running too.
But nobody was a match for Charles. He was outrunning even Tony as they ran out onto the street. They could see the wreckage from where they were and what they saw caused Charles’s knees to buckle. There was a wrecked car in the road, and it was Jenay’s Mercedes, and it was a total loss!
Tony did the sign of the cross across his chest when he saw the wreckage, and then he hurried up to his father. But Charles was able to regain his ability to move, and he took off again, running even faster, and it took all Tony had to keep up with his father. Both were praying, especially Charles, who was praying out loud. “Lord, please let her be okay,” he prayed. “Lord, please let her be okay. Lord, please. Lord, please. Lord, please!”
Tony’s prayer was inward. He wasn’t begging the Lord because he knew that wasn’t coming from a place of faith, but of desperation. He prayed in faith that Jenay would not only be okay, but would walk away from this hellish scene without a scratch.
It didn’t look good the closer they got to the wreckage. A couple cars had already stopped at the scene, with two guys at the car’s door pulling on it, trying to pry it open. Police and fire rescue sirens could suddenly be heard in the distance.
When Charles and Tony arrived at the car, and Charles could see Jenay trapped in the front seat of the car, it became all about getting her out of there. What if that car blew? He forgot about the horror of the scene and went into saving his wife mode. The two good Samaritans moved aside and Charles took over. He was bigger than both of them, and his biceps made clear he was stronger too, so they quickly stepped aside.
Donald and Ashley made it up to the wreckage with tears in their eyes. “Mommy!” Ashley was crying, and Donald, crying too, was holding her back. “Mommy!”
Tony, however, remained still, praying silently. He never ceased from praying.
And Charles placed his feet on the side of the car, at least the front part since the back part was completely mangled and nearly separated from the front, and pulled on that handle and pulled on it. With maniac’s strength he pulled. When he saw Jenay began moving, as if she was suddenly thrust out of her shock, she began pushing on the door herself, panicking. She knew the car could blow too. And within seconds of her assist, Charles was not only able to sling the jammed door open, but he slung it halfway off its hinges.
To everybody’s shock, Jenay was not only alive and well, but was able to get out of the car on her own power. Charles grabbed her immediately as she did, and began moving her away from the wreckage, but Donald a
nd Ashley were overjoyed to see her stand upright. They ran to her.
“I’m okay,” Jenay insisted. “I’m okay!”
She looked at the wreckage when they and the good Samaritans were well out of danger. Then she looked at Charles. His eyes were so intense and so wide open that they looked like glass. And she suddenly realized that he was more in shock than she was, and she was in total shock.
She pulled him, and Donald and Ashley, and Tony too, into her arms. They all had one question, one very obvious question: where in the world were the other vehicles that were involved in the crash? She knew it was two delivery trucks, because she saw both coming for her. Where were they? It was a question she especially wanted answered. But now was not the time.
The shower water in the bathroom was running strong when Carly finally woke up in bed. She could see the outline of Trevor’s fine body through the shower stall’s frosted glass door, and felt flushed just remembering how hard he did her last night. But then a sadness came over her too, because she knew he wasn’t just showering. He was showering because he had to hit the road, to leave her, once again.
She got out of bed, put her bathrobe over her naked body, and began picking up all of their discarded clothing. Last night, after he carried her upstairs, they went at it again, and he took off and threw aside every stitch of clothing they had on. Now the clothes littered her bedroom.
But as she sat Trevor’s pants on the chair, his wallet fell out with a hard thump. Dang, she thought with a smile. That’s heavy!
But when she picked it up, she couldn’t resist. Did he have a picture of her in his wallet? Several pictures?
But as she looked through his billfold, she didn’t see any pictures of anybody. Not her, not anybody. It didn’t make her feel reassured. Big Daddy always told her that if she wanted to know how a man felt about her, see if he had a picture of her in his wallet, not just on his phone. It made no sense to Carly, in this age of technology, but she always trusted every word Big Daddy told her. But Trevor, apparently, didn’t get that memo.
Big Daddy Sinatra: Papa Don't Play Page 5
