Irrevocable Trust (Sasha McCandless Legal Thriller Book 6)

by Melissa F. Miller

  “Honey, I understand you’re all probably in shock right now. It’s a terrible thing, what happened to your mother, but you’re only seventeen, right?” She crossed herself at the mention of his mom.

  Technically, he wouldn’t be seventeen for another five months, but he figured older was better in this situation.

  “That’s right.”

  “How are you going to take care of all your brothers and sisters all by yourself?”

  “We’ll manage.”

  She smiled hesitantly. “But you don’t have to do it by yourself. There are programs—”

  He held up a hand to stop her. Despite himself, he flashed back to his father and recalled the way he squared his shoulders and jutted his chin when he was asserting his authority. Cole adopted the mannerisms that had worked so well for his dad.

  “Listen. We don’t want your help. We’re fine.”

  “You need an adult to take care of you, son.”

  “Our … uh, Uncle Hank is on his way,” Cole said. He figured a partial truth was good enough for Mrs. Stokes.

  “Uncle? What about your father? Is he in the picture?”

  “That’s none of your business, you old snoop.”

  She opened and closed her mouth, like a fish flailing on the bank after it had been landed.

  He closed the door before she could find her voice. Then he engaged the deadbolt and turned to lean against the door. He reached inside his waistband to confirm his mom’s old gun was still there. He’d dug it out of the trunk while the others were still wandering around the house in shock. He hoped he wouldn’t have to use it, but if that old bat showed up with a social worker, he’d do whatever it took to keep his family together.

  You’re just like him. The thought buzzed across his mind like a gnat. He swatted it away. He was nothing like his dad. If anything, he was the opposite: if he resorted to violence, it would be to keep his family together, not to tear it apart.

  He steadied his breathing and looked up. Calla and Hal were sitting cross-legged in the doorway to the kitchen, staring at him. Brianna, Leah, and Mark emerged from the upstairs hallway and peered down over the railing at him.

  For a moment, all six of them were quiet.

  His eyes met Brianna’s.

  She looked back at him for a second before she nodded.

  “Family meeting,” she said.

  They all filed into the dining room and took a seat around the long oak table. It was where they ate, prayed, learned, and played. And where their mother had always convened family meetings.

  Cole’s throat felt tight when he looked at her empty chair, but he pushed thoughts of her out of his mind. Right now, he had to figure out a way to keep them together. That was his job. He could cry later, in the shower—the only truly private space in a house of six people. Now, he had to lead.

  Brianna tapped his arm.

  He turned to face her. Her green eyes were clouded with worry and sadness. She looked way older than fourteen suddenly.

  “They don’t remember,” she whispered.

  “Neither of them?”

  “Neither,” she confirmed.

  They hadn’t been sure whether Calla and Hal had any memories of their previous life—their old names, the compound, their dad. They knew Leah and Mark remembered, but none of them ever talked about it. Now, with their mom gone, he wasn’t sure how much to tell the others. Brianna said she’d find out what the little ones knew. Apparently nothing.

  That was good and bad. Good because it was safer that way, but bad because they wouldn’t be able to understand how much danger they were really in.

  They were at war with their dad. And the government hadn’t yet shown up to protect them.

  Cole wet his lips and tried to think of the best way to explain the situation.

  Brianna beat him to it.

  “Okay, guys,” she said in a no-nonsense voice that sounded just like their mom’s. “Here’s the deal. We only have each other now. It’s just us. And because we don’t have a mom or dad, some people are going to want to take over, try to help us.”

  “Help is good,” Leah said with the wisdom of someone who hasn’t yet celebrated her tenth birthday.

  “Help can be good,” Brianna agreed. “But we don’t want this help.”

  “Why not?” Leah asked.

  Mark exploded. “Because we’ll end up in foster care or an orphanage or something—they’ll try to split us up!”

  “An orphanage? Like in ‘Annie’?” Calla asked.

  “Will Daddy Warbucks be our new dad?” Hal said, bouncing in his seat.

  “Can we get a dog?” Calla added.

  Cole threw Brianna a look. They’d already lost control of the discussion. Now what?

  “No dog, no orphanage, and especially no new dad,” she told them firmly.

  Calla stuck out her lower lip.

  Brianna ignored the pouting and continued, “We have to be a team. And we have to be very careful. Nobody goes outside without me or Cole.”

  “Not even to the backyard?” Leah asked.

  “Is the backyard outside?” Cole said.

  “Yeah.”

  “Then no,” he said, trying to keep his voice even like Brianna’s. There was no point in terrifying them, but they had to understand that this was serious.

  “What about food?” Mark wanted to know.

  “What about it?” he countered.

  “When we run out of food, who’s going to go to the store? And who’s going to cook? And where are we going to get money to pay for it?” Mark’s voice began to tremble as the adult concerns that now faced them started to become real.

  Brianna held up both hands. “Take a deep breath,” she soothed. She waited until he did as she said, then she continued, “Cole and I are going to take care of everything, we promise. We just need you to help. You have to listen to us and do what we say, okay?”

  She swept her gaze around the table. Four heads nodded in unison.

  “Good,” she said.

  Mark, at twelve, wasn’t as easily satisfied as the three youngest. “But what’s the long-term plan? We have a plan, right?”

  Cole nodded. “Of course, we have a plan. Hank is going to help us.”

  “Who’s Hank? Is he our uncle?” Leah wanted to know.

  Cole couldn’t tell her no, not after she’d just heard him tell the busybody next door that he was. “Yep, Uncle Hank is on his way.”

  Brianna gave Mark an encouraging smile. “See? It’s going to be fine.” She turned to the others. “Now, who wants pizza for dinner?”

  CHAPTER SIX

  Jeffrey Bricker’s legs were cramping. And he had to urinate.

  But he couldn’t risk getting up to stretch, let alone relieve himself—not until nightfall, when the other campers were sleeping. The state park he’d chosen was a good fifty miles outside Sunnyvale, but he had to assume that Anna’s body had been found by now and that someone had discovered her real identity. If so, then there would be all-point-bulletins out through the Southeast to be on the lookout for him.

  He distracted himself from his discomfort by recounting how flawlessly he’d executed his plan—and his wife.

  It had been simple, really.

  He knew Anna better than any other human alive. He knew that eventually she’d give in to her longing for a garden. He also knew that the survival tactics he’d introduced her to weren’t ingrained, not really. If they had been, she never would have left the compound and turned on him. So he surmised that, in her weakness, Anna wouldn’t recognize the danger in doing business with someone he knew; he thought she would contact one of the movement’s trusted suppliers of heirloom seeds—and there were only three major companies who supplied most of the patriot groups. He’d been right on both counts.

  He’d planned to call the owners of all three companies. But he’d only had to call the first company on his list. Gary Stevens had fallen all over himself to help. Why wouldn’t he? Jeffrey was the hero of the
American prepper movement. True patriots through the Western Hemisphere were lining up to help him any way they could.

  Stevens was glad to provide Jeffrey with a list of customers who fit his specifications: new customers; female; ordering the largest vault (Anna never could pass up a deal).

  It had then been an easy matter to take the list to the public library in Arizona and start typing the names into the Google search bar. He ran the entire list of names and addresses through Google, even though he knew he’d hit pay dirt with the third name on the alphabetized list.

  Allison Bennett had no Internet footprint. None. She wasn’t on Facebook. She had never commented on a blog post. She’d never been photographed. And according to publicly available records in the Pape County Recorder of Deeds Office, Ms. Bennett had purchased her home in January of 2013.

  Jeffrey was disappointed in how easy she’d made it.

  After crisscrossing the country through a system of stops on the movement’s version of the Underground Railroad, he reached Sunnyvale and scouted out the town.

  He’d spent two nights sleeping in the shed behind the ‘Bennett’ family’s house, watching their movements through the small plastic window by day to get a sense of their routines. At dusk, he crept up to the dusty loft at the top of the shed, ate two energy bars, and then bunked down under an old tarp that had been left there.

  He’d expected to feel some melancholy or longing as he watched his children trot through the backyard, tending the garden and playing tag, but he hadn’t.

  He’d noted with approval that Clay had grown several inches and had become broad-shouldered. Bethany seemed taller, too, and she’d gotten braces. Henry and Clara had lost their baby fat. Lacey looked exactly as he remembered her. So did Michael, but when Jeffrey heard him call across the yard to his sister, he was surprised that his middle son’s voice cracked. Puberty, already?

  He noted the changes in his children clinically, but he felt … nothing. Nothing at all.

  Until, that is, he saw Anna.

  She was hanging laundry out to dry. The spring wind whipped her hair into her eyes and wrapped her long skirt around her ankles.

  She looked older than he remembered—more gray in her hair, more lines on her face—and sadder. But his throat tightened at the sight of her, and, despite her spineless betrayal, he had to fight an urge to go to her and gather her up in his arms.

  But Bricker was a disciplined man, and a patient man, so he stayed in his hiding spot and waited for the time to be right.

  Very early on the morning of his third day hunkering down in the shed loft, Lacey and Henry came banging into the shed to grab fishing poles and tackle boxes. He watched from under the tarp as they hauled out the equipment. Then he waited until all six kids had lugged the equipment through the yard and disappeared down the hill below, Clay in the lead and Bethany bringing up the rear, with Clara up on her shoulders.

  After he could no longer hear their shouts and laughter, he did some jumping jacks and push-ups to get his heart pumping. Then he scanned the shed for potential weapons.

  Axe. Hedge clippers. Shovel.

  He considered and dismissed each in turn. He found what he was looking for on Anna’s potting bench. A small, heavy trowel with a graphite handle. He recognized it as the one she’d used back at their old home. He’d shoved it in his back pocket and pushed open the door.

  He breathed in deeply, filling his lungs with the crisp, morning air. Then he crept through the backyard toward the kitchen door. As he expected, it was unlocked. He slipped inside, shaking his head at Anna’s basic security failures.

  He heard the shower running upstairs, so he poured himself a cup of coffee and sat down at the table to wait for his wife.

  He grinned to himself now, remembering the fear and surprise in her eyes when she’d seen him sitting there. He replayed the scene, relishing each moment. Her screams, her mad dash for the living room, the satisfying thumping sound her face made as it collapsed.

  He wished he’d been able to spend more time with her, afterward. But he’d known he’d had to hurry. Even at their most disorganized, the federal authorities would be swooping in to scoop up his children by nightfall. Ultimately, he planned to free them from their governmental shackles, too. He’d be damned if a corrupt, collapsing government was going to hold his kids hostage indefinitely. But he had a plan to execute in order of priority, and it was time to make his next move.

  He slipped out the back door and melted into the woods behind the house.

  He hiked at a good clip and set up his temporary camp hastily. He didn’t intend to waste much more time in the backwoods of North Carolina. He’d eat and rest. Before the first morning light, he’d break camp and head for the next stop on the Patriot Railroad. Destination: Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  Sasha smiled and nodded at Bertie. Her hand-to-hand combat instructor’s mother was recounting the plot of a movie she’d recently seen, but between the buzz of conversation, the music at full volume, and the traffic rushing by below the balcony, Sasha could hear every third word—if that.

  Daniel and Chris had been hosting their weekly wine tastings for two months, now, and they’d grown from an intimate gathering of close friends to a mad crush of people. Last week’s feature in the City Paper had only increased their popularity.

  Bertie leaned closer and shouted, “You seem distracted. Is everything okay?”

  Sasha sipped the assertive Spanish red that was the star of this week’s party and considered her response. Everything was decidedly not okay.

  Connelly was keeping secrets.

  After vanishing on her for lunch, he’d turned up at the condo reeking of booze just before the party. Then he barely spoke to her on the short walk to Daniel and Chris’s place, lost in his own thoughts.

  She searched through the crowd and spotted him in a tight group gathered in the space between the French doors and the piano in the living room. He didn’t seem to be paying any attention to the conversation around him. He was staring at the wall over the fireplace, his jaw clenched tightly.

  Her chest ached at the sight of him looking so fiercely unhappy. She almost sighed then caught herself. Bertie was waiting for an answer.

  “I’m sorry, Bertie. I’m just a little tired, that’s all.”

  Bertie narrowed her eyes and pursed her lips.

  Before she could pry for details, Sasha flashed her a smile and swooped in to give her a hug.

  “It was so good to see you, but I have to call it a night. I have an early morning meeting.”

  Bertie squeezed Sasha’s shoulders with a surprisingly tight grip.

  Sasha abandoned her wine glass and edged her way through the crowd to Connelly.

  He was nodding absently as a professorial-looking woman, complete with horn rims and bun, explained the plot of some art house film currently playing in Regent Square.

  Sasha touched Connelly’s elbow and he glanced down, his mouth curving into a bow when he saw her.

  “Pardon, Professor Heckman, let me introduce my wife, Sasha. Sasha, Professor Heckman teaches biology at Chatham University.”

  “Sylvie Hickman,” the woman said, giving Sasha a wide smile and a solid handshake.

  “Sasha McCandless … —Connelly,” Sasha said, still tripping over her hyphenated last name a half-year after she’d adopted it. She was glad she’d decided to continue using her maiden name professionally. She’d hate to be so tongue-tied in front of a judge or jury.

  “A pleasure.”

  “I’m sorry to interrupt, but I’m afraid I have to steal my husband before I turn into a pumpkin.”

  The professor laughed easily and gestured with her empty glass. “Of course. I appear to be in need of a refill, anyway.”

  Sasha smiled and grabbed Connelly’s hand, guiding him toward the door with the determination of a border collie herding livestock. She dodged clusters of wine lovers and social butterflies, nodding hellos to familiar fac
es, but didn’t stop until they reached the front of the apartment.

  “Don’t you want to find Daniel and Chris and say our goodbyes?” Connelly asked, as she yanked open the door.

  “They’ll understand. This place is a madhouse tonight.”

  He fell into step beside her as they headed along the short hallway to the stairs.

  “They know how to throw a party. I guess word gets around,” he said.

  “I guess so.”

  “We should have skipped it this week.”

  She glanced over her shoulder at him as they tromped down the cement stairs. “Why?”

  “No reason.”

  “You know something, don’t you? Is it Bricker?” The questions that had been on her lips all day burst out.

  Connelly squeezed her hand tight and cut his eyes toward her, pained and wary. “Not here.”

  They walked in silence the rest of the way home.

  Tension followed them into their lobby, up the stairs, and along the hall to their front door, clinging to them like smoke.

  Once inside, Sasha immediately unbuckled the tiny straps on her heels to free her feet from the their four-inch-high prison.

  She wiggled her bare toes and sighed in exaggerated relief while Connelly headed straight for the kitchen to feed the cat.

  She waited until Java had food and fresh water then she walked around the island and stood directly in front of her husband.

  “So? Do you?” she asked.

  “Do I have information about Bricker?”

  “Yes.”

  He sighed and leaned back against the counter. His gray eyes were guarded. “Maybe. I don’t know.”

  “Come on.”

  “Sasha, I can’t talk about it. I’m sorry.”

  She bit down hard on her lip. Took a slow, deep breath. Waited until the urge to shout passed. Then she said, “Is it bad news?”

  Connelly shook his head sadly.

  “I can’t tell you that. I’ll tell you this, though—I’m not going to let Bricker hurt you. I promise.”