Demanding His Brother's Heirs

by Michelle Celmer

  Yes, Jeremy had had his problems, but it was difficult trying to imagine him being that cold and heartless.

  “She was devastated. And of course she came running to me, the ‘good’ twin.”

  “What did you do?”

  “She didn’t want to have it, but she was afraid to tell her parents, so I did the only thing I could. I went to my father. He took care of it. At that point, cleaning up Jeremy’s messes was a regular thing.”

  “How old was she?”

  “Fifteen. My brother was eighteen. At the time, the age of consent was sixteen. He could have gone to prison. Honestly, it might have done him some good. But every time he got into trouble, someone would bail him out. I know it was the drugs making him act that way, and though he did try to get clean numerous times, he always relapsed.”

  “I feel that if I had known, I could have done something.”

  “He wasn’t always like that. I mean, he was definitely the type to push the limits. Some of the things we got away with as kids...” Jason laughed and shook his head. “Sometimes at school we would go into the bathroom and exchange clothes so people would think I was him and he was me, and then we would go to each other’s classes. We were so identical most people couldn’t tell us apart, and the ones who could thought it was hilarious. It’s how Jeremy managed to pass physics. That and me doing all of his homework.”

  “So you were kind of a bad kid, too,” she said.

  “I’ll admit I let him talk me into some crazy things. I took the SATs for him so he wouldn’t have to cope with my father’s wrath, and he got into a good school, then flunked in the second semester. Looking back, I know I wasn’t doing him any favors. But I drew the line at the drugs. Not that he didn’t try to talk me into doing them with him. But my health being what it was, I couldn’t take the risk. It caused a huge rift between us.”

  “That was his shortcoming, not yours.”

  “I know.”

  Maybe the only reason she’d met Jeremy was so that he could lead her to Jason. She’d never been the kind to believe in fate, but maybe in this one instance it was just meant to be. Lying here in bed with Jason, the twins between them cooing and kicking their little legs, it felt as if they were a family. Did that mean she was finally getting everything she had ever wanted? Or was it just another illusion?

  God, she hoped not. She wanted to let herself believe it was real this time. That finally, after a lot of searching, she had found her destiny. The question was how did Jason feel?

  His phone rang and he rolled onto his back to grab it from the bedside table. He checked the display and answered, “Hey, Lewis, what’s up?”

  Holly could hear the rumble of Lewis’s voice through the phone, but not what he was saying. Jason’s smile dissolved and he sat up in bed, asking Lewis, “When?”

  She could see instantly from the look on Jason’s face that something was wrong and her heart stalled in her chest. Common sense told her that it had something to do with Miranda’s pregnancy, but she hoped she was wrong.

  “What can I do?” he asked Lewis.

  There was another pause, then Jason said, “Let me know.”

  He hung up and Holly said, “What is it? What’s wrong?”

  “Miranda lost the baby.”

  Thirteen

  “No,” Holly said, looking crestfallen. “When?”

  “He said she started to spot in the middle of the night, so they went straight to the hospital, but it was already too late.”

  Holly’s bottom lip started to quiver. “She must be devastated.”

  “I asked if there was anything we could do, but Lewis said they just need a few days alone to grieve.”

  A big fat tear spilled over her lid and rolled down her cheek. Jason’s reached up and brushed it away.

  “I can’t even imagine what she’s going through,” Holly said. “They’ve tried so hard and she wanted this so badly. It’s not fair.”

  “No, it isn’t,” he agreed. “But maybe it was better that it happened now than three months from now.”

  “For someone like Miranda, who has been hoping for this practically her whole life, there is no better time. Should we send flowers so they know we’re thinking of them?”

  “They know. I think we should respect their privacy. They’ll tell us when they’re ready to talk about it.”

  “But I want to do something.”

  “All we can do now is be there for them when they need us.”

  Having no children of his own or even the ability to have any, it was difficult for Jason to put himself in his friends’ place, but he did feel awful for them. He knew how important it was, especially to Miranda.

  “I’m going to dress and get the boys ready, just in case,” Holly said, picking up one twin in each arm, which actually didn’t look as complicated as he would have imagined. “Let me know if you hear anything.”

  “I will. I promise. And, Holly?”

  She turned back to him.

  “Last night was...” He couldn’t even find the words. “Wow.”

  He managed to coax a smile from her. “Yeah, it was.”

  He showered and dressed and headed down to the kitchen for coffee. Faye must have heard them stirring because a steaming hot cup of his favorite decaffeinated dark roast was waiting for him beside the Wall Street Journal on the kitchen table.

  “Good morning,” she said as he walked in the room. She left out her usual, “How did you sleep?”

  “What would you like for breakfast?” she asked instead.

  “Just coffee for now.”

  Normally she would have lectured him on the fundamental benefits of a balanced breakfast, but this time she said nothing at all.

  “Everything all right?” he asked her.

  “Of course.”

  He told her about Miranda’s miscarriage and she clucked sympathetically. “That poor woman.”

  “Lewis said that she’s devastated.”

  “God works in mysterious ways.”

  Jason didn’t buy into that. No one controlled his destiny but him. “Then God is cruel and unkind.”

  “Things happen for a reason,” she said.

  That was the sort of thing people liked to tell themselves so they didn’t have to face the fact that life was random, and bad things happened to good people. There were no guarantees.

  Instead of taking the paper and coffee into his office the way he normally would have, he sat at the kitchen table. Faye was much more somber than usual. Ordinarily by now she would be talking his ear off about one thing or another.

  “Everything okay?” he asked again while she busied herself wiping down granite countertops that were already clean.

  “Yes.”

  She only gave him one-word answers when she was upset about something. “How about we save some time and rather than me trying to drag it out of you, you just come right out and tell me what’s up?” Though he had a feeling he already knew.

  She draped the dishrag over the edge of the sink, and then turned to him. “Are you going to do right by her?”

  Do right by her? “You make it sound like I’m a kid who knocked up his high school girlfriend. That was Jeremy’s thing, not mine. Are you forgetting that I’m not even physically capable of knocking someone up?”

  Faye flashed him that stern and exasperated look he knew so well. “I just don’t want to see her hurt. Anyone with eyes can see that she’s in love with you.”

  “I think you’re mistaking sex for love.”

  “Or are you mistaking love for sex?”

  “She flat out told me that she didn’t want to bury another husband. I think that speaks for itself, don’t you?”

  “Women say all sorts of things when they’re protecting their heart
.”

  “Holly is a straight shooter and honest to a fault. I’ve never known her to hold back when something is on her mind.”

  Faye shrugged her narrow shoulders. “If you say so.”

  He sighed. Why did she have to make this so complicated? “Is there a particular reason you think that Holly and I shouldn’t be together?”

  “On the contrary. I think you two couldn’t be more perfect for each other. You’ve been alone for too long.”

  “I do date.”

  “Tell me the name of the last woman you dated,” she said.

  Was it Marla or Marsha? Martha maybe? It definitely had started with an M.

  He frowned. All right, she’d made her point.

  “I won’t be around forever, you know. It breaks my heart to think of you being alone,” Faye said.

  It was true that she and George had been in his life longer than anyone. Longer than his parents even. The idea of them not being around was hard to fathom. Despite what he’d told Holly, they were more than just employees. Aside from Holly and the twins, they were the only family he had. Would ever have. He would never have a wife or child of his own. But with his nephews and Holly to look after he would never be truly alone. It was possible Faye would outlive him, as well.

  “I just want you to be careful,” Faye told him.

  “You don’t have to worry,” he assured her. “We both know what we’re getting into. Everything will work out.”

  * * *

  It was five days before Holly was able to go see Miranda, and only because Lewis asked her to. Assuming the presence of the twins might be upsetting, Holly left the boys home with Jason, who surprised her by offering to sit with them instead of Faye, who had errands to run in town.

  “I’ve never seen her like this,” Lewis told Holly when she got there. “All she does is sleep. She refuses to eat and I have to practically force fluids down her throat. She hasn’t been out of bed since we got home from the hospital, and alternates between sleeping, crying and staring at the wall. I’m afraid to leave her alone for fear that she might hurt herself. And when I’m not here I have the housekeeper checking on her every fifteen minutes. I don’t know what to do for her.”

  “It’s not even been a week. Maybe it will just take time.” Miranda was the most positive, upbeat person Holly had ever met. She would snap out of it.

  “I thought maybe if you talked to her, woman to woman, she might bounce back. She refuses to talk to me.”

  “I’ll do my best,” she told Lewis, but even after how he’d described Miranda’s condition, Holly wasn’t prepared for what she saw when she stepped into their bedroom. Though it was the middle of the afternoon and the sun was shining, the shades were drawn. The room was dark and smelled stale and sour. Miranda lay under the covers facing the wall.

  “Hey there, you awake?” Holly said softly and got no response. She could tell, as she drew nearer to the bed, that Miranda hadn’t bathed in a while. Holly walked to the window to get some fresh air in the room, but as she reached for the blinds, Miranda said in a hollow voice, “Don’t.”

  “Some fresh air would do you good.”

  “I want to sleep.”

  “How about a shower?”

  “Go away.”

  “Lewis thought you might like to talk.”

  “I don’t. Just leave.”

  She was starting to see why Lewis was so worried. But who was she to tell Miranda how to grieve? Hating to leave her friend alone, she walked to the chair across the room and sat down, thinking that her presence might be a comfort. Miranda didn’t move or make a sound the entire hour Holly sat there.

  She came the next day, and was happy to hear that Miranda had taken a few bites of the food from the tray the housekeeper had brought in, but Holly’s welcome wasn’t any less chilly this time. But she stayed, just so Miranda knew that she cared. When she arrived the following day, Miranda still hadn’t showered and the smell in the room was getting unbearable. After another chilly greeting and several minutes at her post in the chair, Holly could no longer stand it.

  She got up, walked over to the window and snapped the shades open.

  “Hey,” Miranda protested from the bed, her voice sounding stronger.

  “If you can’t be bothered to shower, I’m going to have to have some fresh air. It stinks to high heaven in here. After another day or two I’m going to have to hose you down with Lysol.”

  Holly opened the window, letting in an intoxicating rush of clean lake air. When she turned around, her friend was sitting up in bed. It was the first time Holly had actually seen her face since the miscarriage, and it was heartbreaking. Miranda looked a million years old.

  “If you don’t like the smell, then leave. I don’t want you here anyway.”

  “If you don’t like it, get up off your ass and throw me out.”

  Miranda shot Holly a look that was pure resentment, and then flopped back down and pulled the covers over her head.

  It went on like that for a week. Then one day, as Holly was in her usual chair reading, she heard a quiet voice say, “It’s my fault.”

  Holly put her book down and walked over to the bed and sat on the edge of the mattress. “Miranda, it’s not your fault.”

  Miranda sat up, her beautiful long hair greasy and matted into dreadlocks. “The first day or two when we found out, I was so excited, but then I started to get this sinking feeling, like something horrible was going to happen. I couldn’t shake it. I was terrified that I would feel that way through my entire pregnancy.”

  “That doesn’t mean it was your fault.”

  Tears welled in her eyes. “That’s not the worst part. After it happened, I was almost relieved.”

  “Oh, Miranda.” Holly hugged her and Miranda actually hugged back. The foul stench of body odor burned Holly’s eyes but that didn’t stop her. “Considering all that you went through, of course you would be scared. I’m no expert, but I went through a pregnancy wrought with complications. I can barely remember a time when I wasn’t at least a little frightened.”

  “Lewis doesn’t understand. He has a kid from a previous relationship, so it just isn’t as important to him.”

  “And he’s a man. They don’t understand.” Holly held Miranda at arm’s length. “But you have to snap out of this. Why don’t you take a shower and I’ll put some clean sheets on the bed for you? I promise you’ll feel so much better.”

  “I really smell that bad?”

  “You really do,” Holly said, coaxing the hint of a smile from her friend.

  When she left that day, Miranda was still in pajamas, but she had showered and eaten lunch, and was sitting up in bed watching a rerun of the new season of The Real Housewives of New Jersey, one of her favorite shows. It had taken more than an hour and a whole lot of painful tugging but Holly had managed to get most of the snarls from her hair. On her way out to the car Holly ran into Lewis, who had just gotten home from work. When she told him the progress they’d made he hugged her.

  “I don’t know what I would have done without you,” he said. “I don’t know how I’ll ever repay you.”

  “I’m here because I want to be. You don’t owe me anything.”

  When she got home Faye was fixing dinner and Jason was just putting the boys down for their afternoon nap. They were down to two naps a day now, and had been sleeping through the night. Which meant Holly should have been getting a lot more sleep, but lately Jason had been keeping her up late.

  Faye never brought up the strange banging she’d heard, and if she’d said anything to Jason he never mentioned it. Either way Jason seemed to have no qualms about being openly affectionate in front of Faye. And though Holly was curious as to what Faye thought about the situation, she never asked.

  Once Holly and Jason had tucked the boy
s into their cribs, they went up to his room for their own “nap.” Since their first time together it was as if they couldn’t get enough of each other, and she had never felt sexier or more desirable in her life. Unlike the men who had come before him, Jason seemed to know instinctively what she liked, and making sure she was satisfied was his top priority.

  She was barely halfway up the stairs to his bedroom and already she was wet with anticipation. She told him about her progress with Miranda and he seemed happy to hear it.

  “I’m sorry that I’ve been spending so much time over there. I feel like I’m neglecting you and the twins.”

  “It’s not a problem,” he said, tugging his shirt over his head as they reached the top step.

  “I think it’s actually good for the twins. The last thing I want is for them to grow up feeling cheated. They need a male presence in their life.”

  “Happy to do it,” he said, unfastening the buttons on her shirt and tugging it down her arms. “Have I mentioned how sexy you are?”

  She grinned. “About fifty times a day.”

  He undid her bra and cupped her breasts in his warm palms, pinching the tips lightly, driving her crazy before they even finished undressing. She laid back on the bed, and Jason crawled up the mattress looking like a prowling wolf as he settled between her thighs. If she had worried their first few times were beginner’s luck, she needn’t have. Every time she thought it couldn’t get better, it did.

  Fourteen

  Over the next few weeks Holly and Jason fell into a comfortable routine. She spent every night in his room, usually waking to find that he’d brought the boys into bed. He spent most days in his office, and she began to get out more, meeting people and making new friends. She’d even begun to spend some of the money that was piling up in her bank account. Holly still visited Miranda several times a week, but gradually, as the summer wore on, Miranda began to recover. She started to see a therapist, and Holly was finally able to coax her out of the house, even if it was only to hang out on the beach or have lunch in town.

  “How are things with you and Jason,” Miranda asked her one blazing afternoon in August when they sat in the shade in Miranda’s backyard, the boys playing in their playpen. They were both sitting up on their own and starting to scoot. Holly knew it was only a matter of time before they were crawling and pulling themselves up on furniture.