Doin' a Dime

by Vale, Lani Lynn

  She snorted and turned so that her face was nearly in line with mine. I nearly had to cross my eyes to look at her.

  “You mean the world to me, Hunt McJimpsey,” she whispered. “Thank you for squishing the spider.”

  I grinned and covered the last two inches separating our lips, placing my mouth to hers. When I pulled back, I said, “I don’t think you realize just how much you mean to me in return. I’d break into the White House for you, baby.”

  She squinted her eyes. “The thing is, I wouldn’t ask you for anything that might take you away from me again. Now that I know what it’s like to live with you, to love you, I wouldn’t be able to make it four more years without you.”

  I groaned and looked back down at our bathroom floor.

  All the spiders were gone.

  “We can go to your house tonight,” I suggested as she hopped down and looked around much like I had.

  “How?” she asked. “It’s not been released to us yet.”

  “As of right before I came in here,” I disagreed, “it had. I made sure to expedite that for you, too.”

  She laughed and carefully kicked the tennis shoes that I’d left on the floor after my run.

  “Anything more on my aunt?” she asked as she carefully picked them up by the shoestring and tossed them into the bathtub.

  “She was moved to the county jail where she’ll remain until her trial. Her trial that, according to the prosecutor’s notes on his computer, will be a slam-dunk. I made sure to make it easy for them to find everything that they needed on her computer. I conveniently labeled it as ‘summer vacation’ right on the desktop. They found it within five minutes. In there were all her misdeeds from as far back as when your parents were killed. I have the dates, transactions, payment amounts, any and all communication that I could find. You name it, I found it and put it into that little folder on her computer. I had to pull that shit off of four of her computers to get to it. But I did it,” I explained. “And the lawyer dropped her case as well as the suit. It’s all yours. They just haven’t had a chance to give you a call just yet.”

  That’s when she smiled wide and did the cutest little fist pump.

  “So how many counts of murder is she charged with right now?” she asked carefully.

  “I didn’t go that far into his notes. But, from what I can tell, your aunt getting rid of anything that fucks with her isn’t a new thing. She’s left a trail of dead bodies behind her since she left whatever hidey hole she was hiding in when she first came after your parents.” I paused. “At a glance, it’s at least eight, if not more.”

  Wyett looked thoughtful for a few seconds, then sighed, her shoulders drooping.

  “I wish that I had a reason,” she grumbled. “I want to know why. What did my parents ever do? I mean, those contract killers? I don’t care all that much about them. I mean, other than my aunt has no problem doing her own dirty work. But… why didn’t she kill me?”

  I didn’t have an answer for her.

  “I don’t have an answer for you, and your aunt is the type of person, I’m getting, that doesn’t like to share her motives or intentions.” I shrugged. “I’m not sure you’ll ever really know why.”

  Which sucked.

  What sucked even more was the fact that she had to live with the questions of why her aunt didn’t just take her out, too.

  “How attached to the stuff in this house are you?” she asked, still glancing around the room warily.

  “As long as I can get my computers, clothes, you and the dogs, I think that I’ll be okay,” I admitted. “The rest can be sold as is.”

  “Your couch is really nice, though.” She paused. “And our bed.”

  “Then we can take what you want,” I said. “Sin’s been looking for a place to stay. He can take this place until he can find what he really wants.”

  She looked at me curiously. “Do you plan on telling him about the thousands of spiders we just released in the bathroom?”

  I pinched my lips closed. “I won’t tell if you won’t.”

  • • •

  Four hours later, I emerged from the hell of unhooking and packing up my computers to find myself alone in the loft.

  Not even the dogs remained.

  Frowning, I went to text her after making a loop around all of the rooms when I found a note attached to the door that led to my office.

  Picking it up, I glanced at the paper and nearly rolled my eyes.

  Went to talk to my aunt. I took the dogs. Don’t be mad. Love you, W.

  Sighing, I grabbed my keys and headed for the garage, choosing to take the bike because it’d get me to my destination faster.

  I did stop to get the cut and throw it over my shoulders before mounting the bike, though.

  After starting it up, I pulled up the app that told me where she was, and then headed to the prison.

  It was surreal, being on this side of the gates.

  And I was tense as hell as I made my way through the front doors and found the guard standing there waiting for me.

  “Hello,” I said to him. “My wife is here. Her name is…”

  “Cute little thing with curves? Two dogs that she refused to leave outside?” the guard drawled.

  My lips twitched, and I tried not to laugh, but it didn’t hold.

  “Yeah, she’s in with a detective,” he said. “They went in about twenty minutes ago. I can’t take you back, though. There are only two allowed per inmate.”

  I didn’t say anything, just took up the spot near the door and hacked into the security feed that was in the rooms beyond using my phone.

  I scanned the feed for a good two minutes before I found what I was looking for.

  Wyett was seated at a table with her aunt across from her, arms crossed, glaring.

  Wyett was glancing back and forth from the detective who was talking, back to her aunt who was hissing ugly words, and then down to the dogs who were flanking her like they were her protectors.

  They were.

  And it made me happy that she had them.

  It made me even happier when, every time an ugly word would come out of Stella’s mouth, one or both dogs would growl.

  I was highly entertained as I listened to Wyett do the questioning.

  Then, all of a sudden, someone knocked on the door and the detective got up and left.

  I turned the audio up on my phone and listened intently when Stella’s eyes narrowed on Wyett.

  “What the hell are you doing here?” she hissed.

  “I want to know why.” She paused. “I think I can guess all the rest of why you did what you did. But I’d really like to know why I was spared. Why you didn’t just take me out.”

  Stella pursed her lips and looked away.

  When she looked back at my girl, she had this hatred in her eyes.

  “I felt it was better this way,” she admitted. “I mean, what better way to stick it to your father than to treat his child like the piece of shit she was?”

  I fisted my hands in anger. I wanted to go in there and punch that bitch straight in the throat, woman or not.

  I hated that she was treated so badly by this woman. Before I was in the picture and after.

  I hated that I had to let her do this, too.

  I wanted nothing more than for Wyett to turn her back on this woman and never look back.

  Yet… that wasn’t going to happen.

  I had to allow her to do this. I had to let her get her closure.

  In the meantime, I needed to control my shit.

  And act like I wasn’t about to lose it, seeing as I was sitting out in the open watching this all go down because I’d hacked into the prison’s security cameras.

  “Well, I just wanted you to know that you didn’t win,” she said softly. “I’m here. I’m happy. I’m married. I grew up well. I have my degree, and I’m working on a second. You didn’t win.”

  Stella laughed then.

  “You think?” she asked carefull
y. “Because I think that I won. No matter what ends up happening with me, I won. My brother’s dead. You’re going to have kids, and you’re always going to wonder if I fucked you up. You’re never going to have a grandfather to give them, either. You know, I did a little research on my end, too. Your husband doesn’t have great family, either. Y’all are going to be all alone. Your kids are going to have no family.”

  That was it.

  I stood up, ready to break into whatever room I needed to, but before I could so much as take a threatening step toward the locked doors, Wyett laughed.

  The sound had me freezing.

  “You think that Hunt’s and my kids are going to want for anything?” she asked. “Would it be the best thing ever to have my mom and dad there? Yes. Would it be great for Hunt to have parents that weren’t assholes? Again, yes. But will they realize they’re missing something? No. Because Hunt and I will try doubly hard to give them everything they need. And I don’t know if you know this, but Hunt’s in a motorcycle club. There are eight men in that club off the top of my head that I know would drop anything when it came to our children.”

  Stella narrowed her eyes.

  “My children will never know the hell I went through. They’ll never realize that the house that they grow up in was the hellhole you made it for me for those years that I lived with you after they died and then I moved out. Because I’ll treat my kids how they’re meant to be treated. Unlike your ass. Do you want to know what you’ll be doing while my kids are living their best life?” Wyett pushed as she stood up and gathered herself up. When Stella didn’t answer, Wyett gave her the answer anyway. “They’ll be living off the money that you tried to keep from me. They’ll be playing in your room. Jumping on your bed. They’ll be happy while you’ll be… what?”

  Stella again didn’t answer.

  And just as she started to walk toward the door, the detective on Stella’s case returned, looking between Stella and Wyett.

  “Ahh, good timing,” Wyett said as she headed toward him. “I’m ready to go, and Stella needs to find her way back to her cell. Enjoy your life, Aunt Stella. I know that I’ll enjoy mine.”

  And when, ten minutes later, Wyett finally made her way outside to where I was standing next to my bike, she saw me and gifted me with the biggest smile I’d ever seen grace her face.

  Before she could overthink it, she started running toward me.

  I caught her in my arms and brought her to my chest.

  “Missed you,” I whispered as I pressed my mouth to her temple.

  She squeezed me even tighter. “I love you. Thank you for coming.”

  I pulled her even tighter. “I love you, too. And even if you would’ve asked me to go, and I would’ve tried to talk you out of it, I’d do it all over again. I’d do anything for you.”

  Her face flushed with happiness. “Let’s go home, Hunt McJimpsey.”

  I winked at her and caught her hand up with mine. “Yes, ma’am, Wyett McJimpsey.”

  • • •

  Four months later

  “You are found guilty of the murder of Mr. and Mrs. Wyett Villin.” The judge read the results. “You are sentenced to sixty-two years in a federal prison effective immediately. Chance of parole at fifty-one.”

  Stella’s face went slack in disgust.

  She was not happy to be found guilty of yet another murder. So far, she has accumulated one hundred and seventy-three years in jail and there are two more trials she has to go through.

  Wyett’s beaming smile, on the other hand?

  That one was brilliant.

  EPILOGUE I

  Did you know that the flesh inside your cheek is identical to the flesh inside your vagina? And now you’re licking your cheeks.

  -Text from Hunt to Wyett

  HUNT

  “I, Hunt, take you, Wyett, to be my wife. To have and to hold from this day forward. For better or for worse, for richer or for poorer, in sickness and in health, to love and to cherish as long as we both shall live.”

  Wyett’s eyes filled with tears as I recited my vows.

  They started to spill over when she recited hers.

  “I, Wyett, take you, Hunt, to be my husband.” A tear fell down her rosy cheek. “To have and to hold from this day forward. For better or for worse, for richer or for poorer, in sickness and in health, to love and to cherish for as long as we both shall live.”

  The preacher, not a judge this time but a real, honest to God preacher, grinned. “The rings?”

  I turned and grabbed mine from Sin, who’d been holding it in his hand, then turned back to my wife—soon-to-be wife times two—and reached for her hand.

  “With this ring.” I slid the warm metal onto Wyett’s finger. “I thee wed.”

  She sniffled hard, as did a few others in the audience.

  Wyett turned to grab my ring from Six, who had it stored in between her boobs.

  Wyett shook her head and laughed when she turned back to me.

  She reached for my hand, and I said, “Wrong hand.”

  She snickered and reached for the other hand.

  I wiggled the correct finger at her, and she sniffled as another tear fell.

  As she slid the ring onto my finger she said, “With this ring, I thee wed.”

  Excitement beyond any I’d ever felt before burned through me.

  Now, in front of all of my friends and limited family that Wyett and I both wanted there, I’d made her my wife.

  For sure.

  Lock, stock, and barrel—she was mine.

  There was no way she would be able to walk away now.

  “What’s that smile for, Hunt McJimpsey?” Wyett asked as we walked down the aisle toward the back of the church.

  The same church that, forty years ago, Wyett’s parents had gotten married in.

  When I’d surprised her with this wedding—dress, makeup, hair, everything that I could think of to make this day special for her—she’d been happy.

  She didn’t realize the significance of this place, though.

  Not yet, anyway.

  That was what I was taking her to do—realize what was so special about this place—right now.

  I thought to do this before our wedding, but then I decided that she’d be a crying mess and that wouldn’t be too good for her wedding photos.

  “What’s that look on your face for, Hunt?” she asked curiously. “Are we going to go take photos?”

  We were, but we were also doing more than that.

  “Yep,” I semi-lied.

  She squeezed my hands and then leaned her head on my shoulder as we walked to where I’d set up a place for her to go over the information I’d found for her.

  A letter from her father, to be delivered to Wyett on her wedding day.

  Something that I’d had to go procure, which had taken a lot more effort than I thought it would, and bring to her.

  See, after Stella and her ‘talk,’ I’d decided to look for information on her family.

  My hope was to find Wyett some information. To help her understand.

  And eventually, six months later, I’d found that for her.

  Last night to be exact.

  It’d been rather tricky to get Wyett to her friend’s house to start getting her ready for our wedding, only to turn around and drive four hours to get this letter from a post office box.

  I was scared as fuck as to what was in it.

  Which was why, when I finally handed it to her, I felt bile rise up my throat.

  She looked at me worriedly as she took the letter from my hands.

  “What is it?” she asked curiously.

  I cleared my throat.

  “After your meeting with your aunt,” I started. “I began looking into her with a relentless determination, that was why I was so stressed out. I wanted to know why. Why did this all happen the way it happened. And I found out that your father, a couple of months before he transferred the entirety of his fortune into your name, had finally ‘
written off’ Stella. He explained to her that he was leaving everything he had to give to you because Stella couldn’t straighten herself out. From what I can tell, Stella got pissed that she had to ‘fall in line’ with her brother’s edicts to get money that should’ve been half hers. Your parents were given custody of Stella when she was seventeen after your grandparents were in a boating accident. Stella went wild, and your father tried everything he had to keep her safe. Only Stella wouldn’t follow through with her brother’s pleadings. He spent years trying to straighten her out before he gave up on her,” I explained.

  Wyett frowned. “How did you find this out?”

  I rubbed my hands up the length of her arms. “Your father’s lawyer. He was really, really old school and didn’t keep anything electronic for me to find. Until I decided to just grow a pair and talk to him in person.”

  She gasped. “You’re kidding.”

  I winked at her.

  It surprised the two of us because I had to agree with her silent words. “Yes, I did go on my own. Thank you very much.”

  She snickered and headed in the direction of the walkway, only to turn around again with the envelope and head back our way.

  She tore into it and ripped the envelope in a careless disregard that wasn’t like her.

  The moment that the paper was revealed, she gasped.

  “My dad used to have stationary like this,” she whispered.

  “It’s from your dad, baby,” I told her.

  She looked at me with tears in her eyes, then shakily handed the letter to me.

  Before I could pull it from her fingers, not only did I have my woman in my arms, but I also had the miles and miles of tulle swirling about my feet.

  I caught her hand and led her to the chair that I’d brought just for this occasion.

  And then I pulled her into my arms and read the letter to her.

  Wyett,

  If you’re reading this, then it means that I have died.

  I wish that it hadn’t come to this, but unfortunately it has. I apologize profusely for not being there for all of your special days. Your graduation. Your wedding. The day you bring my grandchild into the world.