by Kim Law
“I’m not selling,” Dani abruptly announced. She’d been the loudest objector two years before, too. Though now that he thought about it, Gabe and his brother had never really stated how they’d felt about the idea. Dani had been adamant, so it hadn’t gone to a vote.
“But I have to do something,” Gabe told her.
“Then I’ll give you the money.” Gloria spoke up, and everyone turned to her in shock. She typically remained quiet during family meetings, but at that moment she stood from her seat, temper rising, and pointed a finger at Gabe. “I’ve been around this family longer than that child has been alive, and I’ve seen what that woman you were married to is like. How she demeans and crushes Jenna’s spirit. No.” She shook her head, her anger continuing to build. “She’s not getting her claws into that child again. I won’t allow it. I’ll give you the money.”
“Gloria,” Gabe’s dad said. Concern masked his face. “That’s your money.”
“And this is my family.” She looked at Gabe. “I have retirement money I’ve never dipped into. I’ll give it to you. Every penny of it.”
“You can’t do that,” Gabe started. But that could be the answer to the problem. As a loan, of course.
But this was coming from the very woman Gabe had recently thought might be more like his mother than not.
“I can give it to whomever I want,” Gloria informed him. She went to a lower cabinet and whipped out a purse, then she dug out a checkbook and looked up. “How much?”
“Wait a minute.” Nick spoke up from the table. “We have something else on our side.”
“What’s that?” asked Cord.
“Reality,” Nick stressed. “There are things she’s done over the years—”
“Things we’d all testify to in court,” Nate added. His tone was harsh.
“Things that would paint her in a very unattractive light,” finished Jaden.
Gabe watched as a glimmer of hope began to shine from his brother and sister at the table, while at the same time, he heard it coming through from the rest of his siblings through the phone. Could they really fight Michelle on this? Because the idea of giving up a piece of them, of their livelihood, to her rated right up there as one of the most abhorrent things Gabe could imagine.
But he hadn’t thought he had a choice.
“She’s always been very careful out in public,” he warned. “The whole town was shocked to find out I’d come home having filed for divorce.”
“Then we’ll share some secrets,” Cord replied. “We’re not about to let her paint our next chapter for us.”
“Agreed.” Dani gave Gabe a tight smile from across the table, pride flashing through her eyes as she stared at him, and he couldn’t help but concur with what he saw. They’d come a hell of a long way in the past two years. They were truly learning how to be a family again. “We’ve worked too hard to be where we are,” she added. “There’s no need to stop fighting for us now.”
Everyone began tossing out ideas then, of things they remembered over the years and who could testify about which of them. Gloria even brought up a key piece of evidence they could use against her. Phone records. If Michelle intended to get on the stand claiming she’d tried to get visitation for months, then all Gabe’s attorneys would have to do was provide his phone records showing there had been no calls.
“That’s terrific,” Gabe told her, and wanted to kick himself for not thinking about it.
“We just need to catch her in her lies,” Jaden added from the phone. “Expose irrefutable misinformation, and she’ll lose her cool. That’s what people like her do.”
As his five siblings continued talking, Gabe’s dad reached over and put a hand over the back of Gabe’s. “Are you sure about this, son?” he asked softly. “The safer bet would be the money. We don’t want to lose Jenna.”
Gabe looked into his dad’s eyes then, and he saw the man he’d grown up with. The one who’d been known for rolling over and letting their mother walk all over him. And he thought about how very much like his father he was. But at the same time, he wasn’t like his father. Because he refused to provide that same example for his daughter. He wanted to win, both for himself and for Jenna. And he wouldn’t go down without a fight. He never should have considered any other option to begin with.
“I’m sure, Dad.” He didn’t know exactly where the conviction came from, but with his family support around him, Gabe knew that he could do this for his daughter. For his family.
And he would do it for Gloria, too. The woman was nothing at all like his mother.
They all put their heads together, and before the night was over, he had his lawyer on the phone and a plan in the works. Ben called in reinforcements, adding to Gabe’s legal team, and a course of action was outlined. By the time they walked into that courtroom in a few weeks, Gabe’s ex-wife wouldn’t know what hit her.
Chapter Twenty-Five
Warm sand sifted through Erica’s toes as she dug her feet into the Santa Monica sand and stared out at the horizon. She and Bree had been on the road for three weeks now, and though they’d had a blast hitting all corners of the country, over the last few days she’d found herself more than ready to head home.
Only, the home she kept picturing wasn’t Silver Creek. She missed Birch Bay.
Lowering her gaze, she propped her chin on her knees and let her eyes linger on the maroon color of her toenails. She and Bree had splurged on several spa treatments in San Diego the previous day, before heading up the coast. And though views along the drive had been breathtaking, she’d been unable to focus on any of it due to the fact that Gabe should have been in court the day before finalizing his divorce. Unless he’d changed his mind, of course. She hadn’t spoken to anyone from Birch Bay since she’d driven out of there that Friday night, so she rightly didn’t know where things stood.
“I brought you a slushie,” Bree said.
A blue drink appeared at eye level, and after taking the cup from her sister, Erica looked up. Her sister had turned herself into a bleached blonde the day before. Add to that the maxi dress swirling around her legs and the headband and John Denver sunglasses, and Bree would fit in nicely had it been several decades earlier.
“Do you ever run out of energy?” Erica asked as her sister didn’t merely sit on the ground beside her but bounced down into place.
“Rarely.” Bree slurped her drink. “So where should we head next?”
“I have no idea.”
Bree lifted her cell phone and held it out in front of her. She took a couple of selfies before lowering her hand and looking over at Erica. “Are we just taking one more week, or do you want to go longer?”
Erica considered telling her sister that she was ready to cut the trip short right then and there, but at the same time, she had no idea what she’d do once they finished traveling. Therefore, she kept her mouth shut. Instead, she dug into the straw bag she’d picked up from a shop on the boardwalk earlier in the day and pulled out her own phone. But not for selfies.
“No more than one week,” she finally answered. She turned on her cell, having had it off since the previous weekend, and watched as it booted up. “I have no idea how you live like this all the time,” she muttered as she waited. “How is it all fun and adventure to you? How do you not need permanence?”
“I need permanence,” Bree argued. “Or I will someday.”
Erica glanced at her. “Do you really believe that?”
“Absolutely. And I might even settle in Montana when that day happens.”
“And I’ll believe that when I see it.” The phone was up, and Erica ignored her sister and loaded Facebook. She’d taken to only turning her cell on once a week since she’d headed out of town. She hadn’t wanted to think about the fact that Gabe wasn’t calling her, and she’d certainly not wanted to break down and be the one to call him. She’d gotten out of the way for one reason only, and that’s because it had been the right thing to do. Calling him would have negated t
hat.
“Anything good happening back home?” Bree asked as she pulled two hot dogs out of her cross-body purse and passed one over to Erica.
“A wedding.” Erica turned the screen so Bree could see pictures of the Bird nuptials, then together, the two of them poked fun at everything they saw. It was childish and immature, but at the same time, it was also fun.
When Bree brought up Instagram and started posting on there, Erica shut down her own social media to check her e-mail. She may not have talked to anyone from Birch Bay since leaving, but she had been sending postcards to Maggie and Arsula. And last weekend she’d e-mailed them. The football team had made it past the first postseason game, and while seeking out the scores, Erica had found a picture of Cord standing on the sidelines during that game. She’d been unable to resist sending that photo to Maggie and taunting her new friend with all his manly Wilde hotness.
She smiled now as she saw a return message from Mags.
I was there. OMG . . . HOT!!! But the man disappeared before I could make my way down to him. I must get better at this stalking thing.
Maggie didn’t say anything about Gabe in the e-mail because Erica had never mentioned to her friend that she’d fallen for the man. But at this point, she’d grown desperate to hear something about him. Even if it was that he and Michelle had gotten back together.
She scrolled through the rest of her e-mails, passing over the majority of them, but paused on one that had come in the middle of the week. “Hmmm.”
Bree looked up from her keypad. “Hmmm what?” she said around a bite of hot dog.
“I have an e-mail from Gabe’s sister.”
Opening it, Erica went weepy at the picture that immediately displayed. “Dani had her baby.”
She and Bree admired the pink-bowed newborn for several seconds before Erica pulled the phone back and read through the rest of the message. There was an update on Haley and Jenna, a recipe Dani had gotten from Gloria that she suspected Erica might like, and she found out that Dani and Ben had won a Halloween costume contest only hours before she’d gone into labor.
“Sounds like everyone is doing well,” she said as she closed the e-mail.
“Any mention of Gabe?”
Erica shook her head. Over the first few days of their trip, she’d filled her sister in on what had happened with Gabe, and then they hadn’t talked about him since. That hadn’t kept her from missing him, though.
“Any missed messages from him?” Bree prodded hopefully.
Erica glanced at the icon for text messages. “Nope.”
But then, she hadn’t called or texted him, either.
Regardless of the silence—and her lack of knowing anything that had gone on in his life over the past few weeks—she found that she wasn’t ready to give up on him quite yet. Not if he was divorced, anyway. And maybe he wasn’t finished with her?
“I just wish I knew if he went through with it,” she mumbled. “His court date was supposed to be this week.”
Her sister dropped back to the sand then and stared up at the sky, and sensing something wasn’t right with the situation, Erica looked over at her. “What?” she asked when Bree didn’t meet her eyes.
Bree grimaced in response, and Erica’s radar went on alert.
“What?” she asked again.
“It’s just that”—Bree swallowed—“I could probably find that out for you. If you want me to.”
Erica went still. “And how could you do that?”
Bree still didn’t look at her. “I could ask Cord.”
“Cord Wilde?” Erica turned in the sand until she directly faced her sister. “You’re in touch with Cord? Since when?”
“Since I got his number when I met him.” Bree closed her eyes and muttered, “We’ve been texting.”
As Bree’s words set in, Erica’s eyes narrowed. She jabbed her finger into her sister’s side until Bree opened her eyes, and when their gazes finally met, Erica said, “You and Cord have been texting for two months?”
“Nothing is going on, E. So stop mothering me.”
“I’m not mothering. I’m just”—she sighed before finishing—“I’m not. I swear.” But she knew that she was. “Okay, fine,” she protested when Bree simply stared at her. “I am, but I can’t help it. It’s who I am, okay? Cut me some slack.”
“You cut me some slack. Whatever man I might be talking to has nothing to do with you.”
“But Cord isn’t the man for you.”
“And how do you know that?”
“Because he’s ten years older, Bree. And because he’s probably slept with twenty-five times as many people as you have.”
“You don’t know how many people I’ve slept with.”
“I know I don’t. But I do know that you’re still just a kid compared to him.” She eyed her baby sister as she remained lying in the sand, her hair splayed out around her head. Honestly, Erica had been doing really good trying not to butt in to Bree’s life over the last few weeks. But she hadn’t known she’d been texting with Cord!
But since she had been, did that mean she’d heard something about Gabe that she hadn’t shared?
“Just be careful, will you?” Erica grumbled. She smacked sand off her capris. “Don’t do anything you shouldn’t. I wouldn’t want to see you hurt.”
Bree rolled her eyes at the words. “We’ve not done anything. I haven’t even seen him since the cookout. We just text once in a while.”
“Good. Keep it that way.”
“I’m not a kid, you know.” Bree might have pulled her statement off better if she hadn’t made a face and stuck out her tongue, but after her bit of rebellion, she went to work texting, so Erica left her alone.
Erica held her breath as messages flew back and forth, and after what seemed like a good fifteen minutes, Bree finally sat up.
“Well?”
Her sister nodded. “Judge ordered it yesterday. And, E . . .” Bree paused, her eyes wide and round. “Michelle signed away her parental rights.”
“What? People can do that?”
“Apparently so.” She held up her phone. “Cord says she tried to blackmail Gabe—custody or a payout—and they all came together to make her life a living hell instead. They brought in the cavalry, prepared to prove her unfit, but she bailed. She didn’t want the bad publicity.”
Gabe was free.
And Jenna could finally be happy.
Erica stared down at her phone again, her heart hammering as she fought with herself on whether to send him a message or not. But what should she say? Congratulations on the dissolution of your marriage? Would he send her a message now that it was over?
In the end, she brought up last night’s high school football scores, instead. Then she let out a whoosh of air at what she saw. She turned to Bree. “They’re going to the state championship.”
“The football team?”
Erica nodded.
“Which team?”
When they’d checked the scores from the games the weekend before, they’d discovered that both Birch Bay and Silver Creek had won in the first round. Winning their respective games this week meant they would be down to only one opponent—each other—since round three would determine the champions.
Erica smiled. “Both of them. And they’re playing at Silver Creek.”
A broad grin broke out on her sister’s face, and she immediately hopped to her feet. “Then that’s where we’re heading next. We’re going to Silver Creek.”
Erica agreed. “We’re going to Silver Creek.”
Chapter Twenty-Six
The stands were completely packed when Erica and Bree showed up for the Montana High School State Football Championship, but Erica didn’t worry about finding a seat. If it came down to standing or sitting, she’d stand—right in front of the stands, with the visiting team’s coach.
She giggled to herself at the thought. She’d been running on high since the weekend before, anxious to get back to Montana. She’d neither c
alled Gabe to let him know she’d be there tonight, nor informed anyone other than their parents that she and Bree even planned to be in the area. She’d merely wanted to show up and see if she couldn’t be the center of attention again, but this time because she planned to cause a spectacle that would hopefully change her life—and not because one would happen to her.
Only, before she and Bree had made it all the way back to their home state, they’d made two more stops on their road trip, this time in Colorado and Wyoming. They’d hiked in Estes Park before going white-water rafting in Wind River Canyon. The views had been spectacular with each, and for a Montana girl who’d grown up with some of the most beautiful scenery in the world, she’d determined that she could have spent a week riding the water between those rock walls. It had thrilled her to find an outdoor activity that she actually loved, and she couldn’t wait to try to drag Gabe and Jenna off to do it with her.
“There he is,” Bree announced in a hushed tone. As if anyone could hear them in the pregame crowd. Bree pointed, and Erica followed her gaze to the front of the stands. Only to see that her sister had pointed out Cord.
“That is not the brother I’m here to see.”
“But it’s the brother I’m after.”
Infectious laughter spilled from Bree, and all Erica could do was shake her head. Bree would be Bree, no matter what. And Erica would not be telling her sister that it was quite possible Maggie had made the trek to Silver Creek as well, and that she would also have her sights set on the man. As would potentially every single woman in the stands. Some things her sister would have to learn on her own.
“There’s Mom and Dad.” Erica motioned to their parents sitting about two-thirds of the way up the stands. Seth’s two boys sat with them, and between the four of them, there seemed to be enough blankets packed in to cover everyone in the stands. She waved when they saw her, but she didn’t pause in her pursuit to find the right seat. She’d see her family later that weekend, anyway. Annalise would be in for the weekend, and Erica and Bree had promised to stick around for a rare family dinner.
