Thinking about the little twit, Merriam had missed a great deal going on around her in the courtroom. There was a large screen in front of her seat so that she couldn’t see anything or anyone that was directly in her line of vision. She could see the jurors, all thirteen of their nasty fat faces staring at her all the time, but not the judge or anyone that might be seated in the big chair next to him. Her attorney, some court appointed little prick that she couldn’t fire, was seated next to her.
“What are they doing here? Why is there this monstrosity in front of me? How can I see who is talking over there?” He told her to keep her voice down. “I will not. I want to know what sort of stupidity this is. Tell me, or find someone that can answer me if you can’t get your shit together enough to do that.”
That was when she heard a voice on the other side of the screen. Cocking her head so that she could hear it better, making sure that she was correct—though how, she thought, could she be wrong on something like this?—she knew that her husband was over there, and he was saying the most monstrous things about her.
“Roger Addington, you shut your trap right now. I will not have you airing our private matters to anyone that comes around. Did you hear me? I said to shut up.” He didn’t answer her, which startled her. He never didn’t answer her. “Roger? What are you doing here, anyway? I don’t remember you clearing it with me to come here today. You’ll leave right now and then come to see me later. Or better yet, you’ll get me out of this situation that you’ve put me in, and I might allow you to visit that bastard daughter of Raven’s. She still has it, doesn’t she? I’m going to take care of that as well when you—are you listening to me, Roger?”
“We’re all listening to you, Janet. Everyone in here can hear you screeching at the top of your lungs about shit that doesn’t concern you.” In as hard a voice as she could muster, she told him that she was his wife, Merriam Addington. “No. You were never my wife. You weren’t even a good lover to me. You’re a mean, cruel person that is finally getting your just desserts.”
She stood up as far as she could and told him to get his lying ass to her right now. When one of the screens was moved, she looked at the man sitting in the chair next to the judge. Merriam didn’t know who he was. There as a slight resemblance to her husband, but she didn’t have any idea who he was.
“It’s me, Janet. Roger.” She could hear him there, but it wasn’t until he smiled that she recognized him. “I’ve not felt this good in years. Decades. I’m walking around the neighborhood again. Playing in the yard with Molly. I’ve even managed to lose a few pounds while I was at it.”
“You look terrible. Too much sun, and look at your hair. When was the last time you had it groomed? I’m betting since I’ve not been home. I’ll just add that to my list while I’m at it. You’re much too old to be running around with your hair that long.” She shook her head at him. “Roger, you will stop hanging around with that little bastard too. Also, don’t be parading around the neighborhood like you’re nothing but a commoner. I swear to Christ, if you didn’t have me around you would have—”
“I’d have been a better father and grandfather. A better man to the people who worked for me. I would have been happier. I know for a fact that I would have had a great many more children. Children like you disposed of like they were nothing but an inconvenience.” She told him that they would have been. She knew what was best for him. “You don’t know shit about me, Janet. You only know things that you told me to think, to do, and to wear. I’m a new man, a better man, and you’re never getting into my life again. Not ever.”
“Don’t be ridiculous. You were nothing before I turned you into an Addington, a name that means something.” No one moved or said a word. It took Merriam a few seconds to realize what she’d said. But instead of owning the fact that she’d messed up, she lifted her chin and stared Roger right in the face. “Yes, I said that. You were doing nothing to my name when I married you. Had I not been able to trick you into marrying me, you’d still be nothing. That mother of yours and your daughter with her little bastard shouldn’t have been kept alive. Raven. What a low life name. You just had to do that, didn’t you, Roger? Name her after some blackbird that scavenges for food. Just as you were doing before I gave you a life worthy of the name Addington.”
When Roger stood up, he stood in front of her, his body lean looking, like a much younger man who had nothing more to do than to lift weights. His laughter was different, as well. Instead of sounding forced, as she’d always heard from him, his laughter sounded like he was jolly. As if he meant to sound like he was enjoying himself. Even his face looked younger. The tan or whatever he’d been doing to himself made him almost sparkle with health. When he continued to laugh, Merriam opened her mouth to tell him to stop braying like some jackass and get to the point. But he spoke before she could.
“You’re not worth it. Not one minute more of my life will be wasted on you or whatever it is you’re thinking. Janet Stipple, or whatever you’re calling yourself now, you can rot in hell for all I care about you. I will never think of you again after I leave here today.”
Then he did just that—he left. Even with her screaming at him to get back, that she wasn’t finished with him yet.
She looked at the judge, who was staring at her with his mouth open. Merriam sat down, trying her best to look like nothing Roger had said to her made a difference. It didn’t, not really. She’d take him to task about this when she was home. Right now, she would do damage control on how he’d been shameless by leaving her here to deal with it on her own.
“He just doesn’t understand what is going on around here. I’ll have to straighten him out when I return home. And I will, too, see if I don’t.” She looked at the jurors, another waste of her tax money, and glared hard at them. “I’ll find out where you live if I don’t make it home. You just remember that. I’m not opposed to killing off each and every one of you. You just remember that when you’re back there deliberating.”
“What did you just say to them?” Merriam told Judge Henry that it was none of his concern. It was between her and the people sitting together. “You just threatened an entire jury. Do you have any idea what the penalty is for that in the state of Ohio?”
“What do I care what the penalty is? I won’t have to do it if they know what’s good for them. Will I? But it’s not a threat at all, just so you’re clear on that.” He said that she’d implied that it was, by voice and by look. “You misunderstand, as most people do about me. I’m not threatening them at all. I will do it if they find me anything but free to go home. The same goes for anyone in this room with me today.”
“Bailiff, I want you to call the Feds in here. Ms. Stipple is going to be charged with….” Merriam watched him count everyone in the room twice before he spoke again. “Twenty-six felony counts of intimidation of a jury. Also, twenty-six misdemeanor counts of aggravated menacing, and one count of threatening a sitting state judge. I’m sure that before they get here, we can add on a few more things.”
As soon as she was unchained, Merriam hit two of the officers. On one of them, she bloodied their nose, while the other one she thought she broke his leg. Jumping up and down on it, Merriam heard it snap. The jury, where she’d been headed when she’d been knocked to the floor, was scrambling like cockroaches when the lights come on. Damn it to hell.
Merriam thought that if she could just hurt one of them, it would show the others she meant business. All she got for her efforts was a bloodied mouth herself, and her entire body twisted up in a knot so that they could carry her out.
“I’ll get you all. You just remember what happened here today and know that I’m not a fool like this bunch is. I’ll get each of you.” She thought that she heard someone saying that she was resisting arrest as well, but she didn’t care. She wanted blood from these fuckers now.
She was tied up in a large rug or something when she got out to t
he van they’d been driving her around in. After that, they actually chained her to the floor like she was some sort of animal. Then, of all things that had been done to her, someone actually put a piece of tape over her mouth so that she wasn’t able to speak. They were going to pay for this. Merriam was going to make sure that every single one of them paid big time for this shit.
Chapter 9
Raven was still laughing every time she thought of her mother being hogtied and taken away in the van. She wished that she’d been able to see it in person, but the recording of it had hit the Internet and had, in only four hours, been viewed over seven million times. Her mother was an Internet sensation. It was just too funny to think that her prim and proper mother had stooped so low.
“I guess from the look on your face that you’ve seen it.” She nodded at Sasha. “I’m so glad that there was sound to it, aren’t you? I thought hearing her tell the judge to fuck off three times as they were dragging her out of the courtroom was about as funny as anything that I’ve ever seen. Has your mother always been that mean?”
“Worse. The fact that she thinks she should get away with threatening people is what I find so like her. She told one of the officers when she got back to the jail, and they took the tape off her mouth that she wanted the names of everyone that worked in the system.” Sasha said she bet that went over well. “Yes, but he played right along with her. He asked her if she wanted them by dates worked or did she want them in alphabetized order. She told him both. Like she thought he was actually going to get the names for her. If I didn’t know for a fact that she’d been tested for her competence, I’d swear that she was off her rocker. To think that...well, she’s always thought that of herself. That she was so much better than commoners, like you and I, and that rules have never applied to her.”
When Sasha sat down with her, Raven noticed something she’d not seen before. There was a mark on Sasha’s neck that looked like a bruise. Standing up, she pulled her hair back and was surprised to see that it looked like a tat. A fresh one too.
“Is this something that we’re all getting? I have to tell you, I’m not too terribly big on pain. Unless I’m applying it to someone else.” Sasha said that it wasn’t a tat. “Well, it’s not a bruise, like I thought it was. What’s going on?”
“I’m being marked. Both of us are. Chandler has this beautiful set of wings on his chest. They just appeared this morning, and his is complete. Mine is almost that way, but I can’t see it.” Raven asked her what hers was. “Wings on my shoulder, just like Chandler’s, but much smaller. His started getting color added to it by an unseen force when he left for classes this morning. I was bored at home, waiting to see what else I got when I decided to come here.”
“What else is on either of you?” She told her how Chandler had this crown on his upper abdomen. “And you? Do you have a crown as well? Where is it coming from, Sasha?”
“What we have been promoted to, I guess you could say. And yes, I have a nice crown as well. It’s in the same place that his is. So that if we were standing toe to toe, even though he’s taller than me, they would touch. The same with the wings. When I have my back to his chest, they touch there as well.” Raven asked her what she thought they might mean. “We know what they mean. We were told about them last night. You should have seen us, waiting up all night for some unseen hand to start punching into our skin with little needles marring us up. It didn’t happen that way. All we did was go to sleep, and they came over us.”
“You’re starting to freak me out a little. A lot, really. What do they mean?” Sasha got up and poured herself a glass full of bourbon. Then when she drank it straight down, like it was a glass of tea, she refilled her glass. “Sasha, please tell me what’s going on.”
“Just don’t freak out more, all right?” Raven said that she’d try not to. “I guess that’s about the best that I can hope for. The wings that Chandler has are to protect us. When we’re touching our wings, even an atomic bomb going off will not harm us if he’s wrapped around the two of us, and we’re touching. He can also, sort of, fly. Not where you could see him, but in the ghost world, he can travel a great distance if he needs to look for someone. It will come in handy a great deal, I was told. I can’t fly, but my wings will do so much more for children once they are in this family. Such as brush away sadness and sorrow, and protect them. They’ll not have to suffer overly much about things that hurt their hearts or their bodies. Are you all right so far?”
“I think so. What happens to the rest of us? I mean, when disaster strikes, our children are safe, but we’re to be shit out of luck?” Sasha shook her head. “Well, that’s good. I’d hate to have to try and get under yours and Chandler’s wings to be safe, so I can take care of my children.” Sasha asked her not to joke about this. “It’s joke about it or freak the fuck out, honey. Joking about it means I get to keep my dignity. Freaking out means that I’m a ball of sweat and messy shit trying to think this thing to its end. What else do I need to know?”
“Our crowns are there for all dead to see. The living can only see them if we allow it. They were a little vague on why a human would need to know about that, but I was just trying to absorb as much as I could at the time.” Raven nodded. “When we’re surrounded by some dead—it needs to be more than four—the crowns that we have will glow above our heads like a beacon for them to know who is in charge.”
“In charge of what? Or do I want to know?” Sasha told her that she was working up to that. “Okay, but I want you to know that the next time you have some real world shit to tell me, I like it all at one time. Rip the fucking Band-Aid off and tell me all about it. Okay?”
“Yes. Good to know. We’re immortal.” Raven nodded. “No. You nod, but we’re all immortal. I don’t know if we’re true immortals or not just yet. I have some things that I’m still asking questions about. All of the Bishops, the family of the Bishops, as well as any children that come to us by heart or birth will be the same. No one dies.”
“Okay, immortal. I understand the word, but I need to process this a little more. In the meantime, are there exceptions to this rule of yours?” Sasha told her that her mother and her family would need to be excluded from the family by telling them that they were no longer her family. “I need to tell my mother that she’s not my family, and she dies when her time comes. Same with your mother and sister, I’m assuming. They just grow old and die like everyone else. I can live with that if you can.”
“I can. They’d be trouble forever. I no more want that than I want you to ever be pissed at me. I think I can take you, but I don’t want to have to figure it out.” Raven just grinned at her. “Also, not only are we immortal, but we won’t ever get sick. As it is now, you can heal quickly, but when you’re sick, say from someone or something that poisons you, it will have no effect on you.”
“Back to the immortal thing. When you say children of our heart, you’re talking about children that we might adopt. Because I know for a fact that we both love Pip as if she were our own.” Sasha told her that was correct. “Good. I like that. Okay, sickness. Not a sniffle? Or something like an ingrown toenail?”
“Nothing. No. However, I didn’t ask about ingrown toenails, but I guess we can figure that out as we go. Do you get them often?” Raven told her that she’d never had one. “Me either. So I guess we can mark that one as a when-it-happens-we’ll-know sort of thing. Also, and I didn’t understand this until just this moment, once you tell a person that they are no longer a part of your heart and family, then you can never take it back. I asked about something with that, and you might understand it better than I do, but if a person is very ancient, say someone that has been around forever, once you tell them that they’re no longer a part of the family, they are dead to dust.” Raven leaned back in her chair. “You understand, don’t you?”
“I think so. It would be like a vampire meeting the sun. They would just be gone to dust. That’s
pretty harsh. I don’t know that the family has anyone like that hanging around, but I’d think that if my grandma would be around forever and someone said that to her, she’d just simply turn to dust as well. I think, just so there are no mistakes, children should never know that tidbit. I can see a child, pissed off because of something we’re doing to keep them safe, saying that and killing off the family member that is there. Okay?”
“I agree. My goodness, I would never have thought of that one.”
Raven watched as Sasha made a note in her notebook. She had thought that it was goofy that the woman had to write things down. However, once she started doing the same thing, making herself notes about other things that had popped into her head, she got more things finished in a timely manner. Raven noticed that Sawyer had started doing it as well.
“I have more information. Are you ready for it?”
“I think I am. Will we be marked like you are?” Sasha simply pulled Raven’s wrist to her and moved up her sleeve. There was the tiniest little heart there that she’d ever seen. “This is all we’ll get? I mean, it’s sort of small for anyone to notice, don’t you think?”
“When it’s necessary, it’ll be larger. I’m not sure how that works, but that’s what I was told. Hailey, she’s the ghost that is helping me, she said that she’d answer any questions that you all might have about anything pertaining to this.”
Raven looked closer at the heart and saw that it wasn’t just black, but a lot of colors. She supposed there was a reason for the colors, but something else popped into her head at that moment.
Chandler: Bishop’s Snowy Leap – Paranormal Tiger Shifter Romance (Bishop's Snowy Leap Book 2) Page 12
