Fifty Shades Later: An Inevitable Conclusion (Fifty Shades of Neigh Book 3)

by Anna Roberts

  You're applying lipgloss?

  - It's important to look nice. Some of the bank tellers might be blonde and attempt to intimidate me with their looks.

  I thought you wanted to remain anonymous?

  - I do.

  So wouldn't you do better with a ski mask or something? Rather than lipgloss?

  For once the idiot makes a good point. I rummage in the glove box of the Audi - maybe there's a spare mask lying around from Aspen? Dammit - I can't find a thing in here. Does nobody ever valet my cars any more? It's still full of candies from last Halloween and most of them have melted into a kind of sticky goo at the bottom of the glove box. Why do they even call it a glove box anyway? Nobody ever puts gloves in there - just plastic coffee cup lids and screwed up Egg McMuffin wrappers and parking tickets and all kinds of crap they're trying to forget about or can't be bothered to throw away. It's like a metaphor for something deep, but I can't think what.

  Your first marriage springs to mind. Although that wasn't exactly deep.

  - Shut up. It totally was. I loved him in spite of his gross pony obsession.

  I yank at the sticky glove box door in frustration. A gimp-mask tumbles out into my lap. I never thought I'd see the day that one of Bennett's gimp-masks was a welcome sight, but there it is.

  Why the hell does he have a gimp-mask in the car?

  - He finds it soothing. Driving has always been stressful for him, so he used to wear a gimp-mask to help him relax.

  How did he see?

  - This one has eyeholes.

  It has a large quantity of melted candy-corn stuck to it, but I guess I'm going to have to pick that off as best I can. There's no way I have time to clean it up. My poor weave is just going to have to take another one for the team.

  My Inner Goddess is dumber than usual today, I swear. Let me get this straight, she says. Bennett used to drive around Seattle wearing a gimp mask with eyeholes cut out of it?

  - Yes. How is this hard to understand?

  The cops must have loved that.

  - They didn't. They pulled him over and told him to take it off. That's how it came to be in the glove box.

  God, the cops. I hear sirens in the distance. I carefully pull the gimp mask over my hair, put up the hood on my sweatshirt and step out of the car. The bank is before me - a great marble and stone edifice where I used to withdraw money to go shopping. How times have changed now.

  I adjust the gun in the back of my jeans and make for the door.

  Then the world explodes in a mass of screaming, sirens and noise. The next thing I know I'm face down on the floor with a gun pointed at my head and a heavy boot between my shoulder blades, holding me down.

  Shit.

  I reach to unzip the gimp-mask, but a loud voice screams "HANDS ON YOUR HEAD!" and the boot between my shoulders weighs heavier. "You don't understand," I murmur, my voice muffled by the mask (I really should have unzipped that in the car) "My husband has an account here - I only came to withdraw some money."

  Rough hands remove the mask and half of my weave. I'm jerked to my feet and marched to the door. The police sirens wail louder around me. What will happen to me? What will happen to Celestia? Holy crap - it's all gone terribly wrong.

  "Stop," I moan, as I'm handcuffed, and not in a sexy way. "There's been a mistake! Do you know who I'm married to?"

  "Lady, I don't care if you're married to the next King of England," says a security guard. She is tall and African-American - it's a shame, because in different circumstances I think we could be friends, a thought that sends my Inner Goddess into spasms of inappropriate laughter.

  Yeah, you're not weird about minorities at all, are you?

  "Why is this happening?" I wail at the sky. I've never really believed in God, but I figure if anyone knows then he does.

  "You walked into a bank wearing a hood and a mask and carrying a gun," says the security guard. "I think the bigger question is 'What did you expect to happen?'"

  I start to cry as she marches me towards a police car. "I should never have listened to those gay mice from Narnia!"

  "See?" says a familiar voice at my elbow. "This is exactly what I'm talking about, officer. How do you expect me to trust a woman like this to raise our daughter?"

  The guard spins me around to bundle me into the police car, and in that moment I know I'm about to faint, not only because the chapter is ending, but because there in front of me is a van marked INEPT KIDNAPPERS INC. and in front of that - holding my infant daughter in his arms - is Timothy Grope.

  Chapter Eighteen

  Buttplug! The Musical!

  I lie back among the wildflowers in the meadow and sigh. Above me the sky is blue and clear and perfect. I'm on my third vodka-Collins and life is good. Somewhere I hear the squeals of Celestia playing tag with her father - close enough to sound adorable, but not close enough to piss me off.

  Wow, my life is great. I'm the editor of a flourishing publishing company and the only woman to have a baby without getting stretch marks. I have a house in Aspen and a penthouse in the city, and a house outside the city, with panoramic sunset vistas of Puget Sound. So things were a little sticky for a while, but everything worked out great in the end...

  ..."Mrs. Neigh?"

  A harsh voice jolts me back to reality. Oh shit.

  I glance up. "Um...yes?"

  "Are you okay, Mrs. Neigh?" asks the judge, peering down at me.

  "Uh, yeah. Sorry, your honour - I was...um...Twilighting, I guess." I can feel the gazes of everyone in the courtroom boring into my back. Oh crap - everyone is here. Just everyone. Even Crispian - who's back in an orange jumpsuit. There's no way they're going to electronically tag him this time around.

  And I never thought I'd be glad to see Ms. Helena Handbasket again. It's not like she's a good attorney, but perhaps the judge will be swayed by her lipsticked blonde obviousness.

  "Mr. Grope," she says, approaching the witness stand. "I'd just like to clarify a few points, if I may?"

  "Sure," says Timothy Grope, looking directly down at me.

  "Did you have any contact with my client between the dates we've established? Before you saw her leaving the bank on August seventeenth of this year?"

  "No."

  "So that last time you saw Hannana Neigh..." Ms. Handbasket pauses for a moment to prise her tongue from behind her front teeth. "Um...the last time was the evening of the Filthy Rich Plutocrats masqued ball at which..."

  "...objection!" The prosecution counsel stirs.

  "Sustained," says the judge. "Ms. Robinson - if you could try to keep from referencing other criminal cases. And yes, I realise this is difficult when dealing with this family and the whack-a-mole of thoughtless felonies that goes with it..."

  "I understand, your honour. I'm just trying to establish a time frame here."

  "Continue," says the judge, rubbing his temples. "Just try and keep the helicopter mentions to an absolute minimum."

  "Yes, your honour," says Ms. Handbasket, flipping her hair. She turns back to the stand. "You had no contact with Mrs. Neigh between the...night in question and the time you saw my client leaving the bank. Is that correct?"

  "Yes," says Timothy Grope.

  "So," Ms. Handbasket pouts. "When you 'picked up' my client's daughter from the hospital crèche, my client had given you no such permission to do so?"

  "No, but..."

  "Yes or no, Mr. Grope?"

  "No," says Timothy Grope, glaring down at me.

  "So - let me get this straight," she says. "After what...some twenty-eight months had elapsed between the last time you saw my client, you thought she would somehow be okay with you picking up her nineteen month old daughter?"

  "No."

  "No?"

  "No. I didn't think she'd be okay with it at all, but she'd given me no choice. Nineteen plus nine is twenty-eight - I did the math. She didn't reply to my e-mails and my daughter was clearly being raised in an unstable environment."

  There's a mu
rmur in the courtroom behind me. I hear a voice - I think it's Kate's - murmur, "And boom goes the motherfucking dynamite." Timothy Grope's attorney has a very nasty look in his eye. So does the judge.

  Ms. Handbasket raises an eyebrow. "You're alleging that my client's daughter is your daughter?"

  "No," says Timothy Grope. "I'm stating a fact. I have a DNA test to prove it."

  No. No. This is too much. I can't take any more. "He's lying!" I yell, leaping to my feet. "I couldn't have got pregnant - we did it standing up against the desk!"

  "Mrs. Neigh..." says the judge.

  "...and then bending over the desk!" The words are pouring out of me and I can't stop them. "And under the desk, but that was only oral and everyone knows you can't get pregnant from oral unless you swallow!"

  The judge whacks the table with his little hammer thingy. "Mrs. Neigh - control yourself or I will have you removed from this courtroom."

  I start to cry. Kate leans over, tugs my hair and hands me a Kleenex. "Dude, did you even fail Health class?"

  I sob helplessly. Why is this happening to me? It was only one time. Well, three. And a half.

  Ms. Handbasket is still talking. "Your claims that Celestia Neigh was being raised in an unstable environment are all very laudable, Mr. Grope," she says. "But were you or were you not - at the time you allege my client was neglecting her daughter - riding around in a van labelled 'Inept Kidnappers Inc' and sending threatening e-mails?"

  Timothy Grope sighs. "Look, the van is very easy to explain. I'm a member of a community theatre group and we were doing a promotional video for our newest production. When I found out Hanna had a kid my car was in the shop so I had to borrow the van - unfortunately still with the decal on the side."

  The judge peers down at him. "Okay, I'll bite - what was the production?"

  "A musical, your honour. Based on The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo."

  The judge frowns.

  "I know," says Timothy Grope. "But it works a lot better than it sounds. Trust me."

  "Isn't it a little exposition heavy?"

  Timothy Grope shakes his head. "Actually you'd be surprised how the world of Swedish financial journalism lends itself to song and dance numbers, your honour."

  "Never mind that," says the judge. "How do you make a song and dance number of the scene where she..." He trails off and shakes his head like a dog that's just had a bath. "No, never mind. I think I can live without knowing that. Forgive me, Ms. Robinson. Continue."

  Ms. Handbasket produces a sheet of paper. "Mr. Grope - did you, or did you not send my client an e-mail - subject line 'Shall I Compare Thee To A Summer's Eve?'"

  "Yes."

  "In which the text of the e-mail reads 'Fair maiden, dost thou recall that fragrant night when we trysted beneath the twinkling lights of an enchanted woode?'"

  "I did," says Timothy Grope. "She didn't reply."

  Claudia jumps to her feet. “Never mind that! What about the time he kidnapped my daughter?”

  The judge peers over his glasses at her. “Mrs. Neigh,” he says, with quiet, angry patience. “We have been through this. You will have to press formal charges if you want the case dealt with in a court of law.”

  “Fine,” says Claudia. “Consider them pressed.”

  “It doesn’t work that way.”

  “Why not?”

  “Because, you idiot woman,” says the judge. “If you’d simply called the police when it was appropriate to do so we wouldn’t be having this conversation.”

  “And in the meantime you’re just going to let a kidnapper wander off with my grandchild?” shrieks Claudia.

  The judge gives her a long, evil look. “Taking into account the alternative...” he says. “Sit down, Mrs. Neigh. Or I’ll have you removed.”

  Claudia sits down.

  The judge takes up his papers again and turns back to Timothy Grope. "Mr. Grope, is it true that you sent Mrs. Hanna Neigh a further e-mail, this time in all-caps, that simply read RUN RUN RUN JUST AS FAST AS YOU CAN. YOU CAN'T CATCH ME I'M THE GINGERHEAD MAN. Is that correct?"

  Timothy Grope pauses. "In my defence," he says. "I was drunk when I sent that one."

  I gaze up at him, and suddenly it all makes sense. Oh my God - and I thought it was Crispian, because Crispian was the only one who knew about us talking all medieval-like when we were being witty together. But he wasn't, was he? There was that night when I dropped my phone in sweet and sour sauce and I had to call Timothy Grope back on the land-line and he told me to put my phone in rice to get the goop out of it, but I'd only ordered yeung chow and Crispian...oh my God...I remember...

  The judge bangs his little hammer thing. "Mrs. Neigh," he says. "Will you please refrain from narrating in court?"

  I apologise, but his eyes are already elsewhere. He switches his glasses and squints out into the courtroom. "Are you wearing cat ears again?"

  Shit. Casper. He's already been told off for wearing furry stuff in the courtroom. It's 'beneath the dignity of this court' or something. I turn to look and see that he is - he's wearing a pair of ears and a studded black leather collar.

  "They're folf ears, your honour," says Casper.

  "I don't care," says the judge, turning the same shade of red Celestia turns when she knows we're out of juice. "Take them off - this is a court of law, not an amateur production of A Midsummer Night's Dream."

  Casper gets to his feet and glares around the courtroom. "Well," he says, exhaling. "Doesn't that just say it all, ladies and gentlemen?"

  "Sit down, you dumbass," hisses Kate, yanking his sleeve. But Casper's on a roll.

  "...this is exactly the kind of Fursecution that my kind has had to suffer. And from the very lips of the establishment, you'll notice..."

  "...I'll have you charged with Contempt..."

  "...contempt," says Casper, gesturing dramatically with an animal-gloved paw. "Ah, your majesty - you cannot teach me a thing about contempt..."

  "Get out."

  "...I have suffered the slings and arrows..."

  "OUT!"

  A couple of heavy-set bailiffs go after Casper. He yelps and tries to scramble over the back of his chair, tipping it into his mothers' lap and sending her sprawling sideways and the rest of the court tumbling in her wake like dominoes. Kate laughs, Alicia screams and I hear Ms. Handbasket's voice raised above the chaos - "Perhaps I might request a brief recess, your honour?"

  But the judge has already - as Kate might say - totally lost his shit. "GET OUT OF MY FUCKING COURT! ALL OF YOU! OUT!"

  We all blunder out into the corridor. "What the hell is wrong with you?" Claudia yells, yanking Casper's ears. "This is a custody hearing for my grandchild - my only grandchild. And possibly the only halfway normal one I'll ever have. Look how my children turned out – a pervert, an idiot, a lunatic and the one who married a narcissist."

  Casper snorts. "Oh, and whose fault is that, Mother?"

  "Not mine. I expect it was all the crack you huffed in utero."

  "What?"

  “Wait,” I murmur. “Which one married a narcissist?”

  Claudia ignores me and favours Casper with an evil grin. "Yes, Casper - your birth mother was a crack-whore!"

  "Wait..." I gasp. "I thought Crispian's birth mother was a crack-whore...oh my God...does this mean Crispian and Casper are real brothers?"

  Everyone is staring at me. I flush.

  "No, you fucking idiot," says Claudia. "How many times do I have to tell you? Crispian's birth mother was a medical student from Iowa. Pleasant young girl - come to think of it, didn't you meet her?"

  "She did," says Kate. "It was...Oedipal."

  "I can't be expected to remember that night," I wail. "I've blocked it out - it's too traumatic. It was the night that Crispian died..."

  "...and you beat the shit out of his defence counsel and apparently wandered off to knock boots with your boss," adds Claudia, rummaging in her purse for a cigarette.

  At that moment Ms. Handbasket slams into the cor
ridor. "I quit," she says, throwing up her hands and swallowing a burp.

  "You can't!" yells Claudia.

  "I can."

  "I didn't say ‘you can’t’, you cloth-eared girl."

  Ms. Handbasket shakes her head. "I'm sorry - this is too much. How do you expect me to win a custody case when my client is also standing trial for bigamy and armed robbery..."

  "...nobody knew Crispian was alive," says Bennett, putting his arm around me. "And the armed robbery charge is absurd. Hanna wouldn't hurt a fly."

  "I know," says Ms. Handbasket, through clenched teeth. "But the entire defence for that case hinges on her being too stupid to figure out how to rob a bank."

  Kate nods. "Yeah. I'd buy it."

  Ms. Handbasket rubs her breastbone. "Look, I'm living on antacids as it is. Maybe it might be best for you to call it quits and admit that the kid might be better off with her biological father."

  Everyone stares at her. "You're supposed to be defending us!" says Claudia.

  "I know that," says Ms. Handbasket. "And it's true - I am supposed to be defending you. It's one of the planks of our Constitution - the right to a fair trial."

  "Well then. What's the problem?"

  Ms. Handbasket hiccups. "The problem," she says. "Is that you are all terrible people who consistently display complete contempt for the forces of law and order..."

  "Nonsense," says Claudia, lighting up under a NO SMOKING sign.

  "...you seem to think that wealth gives you a free pass to behave exactly as you like," continues Ms. Handbasket. "And I'm damned if I'm going to have anything to do with handing an innocent child into the permanent custody of a pack of amoral, self-centred morons. Goodbye, Mrs. Neigh. I would wish you good luck, but I feel like it would be intellectually dishonest to do so, since I wish you the very worst of luck for the remainder of your selfish, meaningless existence."

  She turns and stalks off down the corridor.

  "Well, she sure told you off," says Kate, into the fuming silence. Claudia slaps her. Unfortunately Kate's not the slapping kind and punches her on the nose.