Chapter 5

Douglas hadn't said a word since he'd been arrested while coming out of the motel four days ago. He wanted to find and ask Shelly what the fuck she'd done, but no one was telling him anything. She was going to pay for this shit if she had told where he was. This time, he might well kill her. Things were not going as planned, and he was pissed off.

Yesterday, he'd demanded to speak to his sister. He knew as soon as he was told they'd contact her to see if she wanted to talk to him that it was her and not Shelly who had figured out where he'd been. He wasn't sure how she'd done it, but it would be just like her to go snooping around in shit that wasn't any of her concern.

"You've been asking about Shelly Gibson. Well, I'm finally able to tell you that she died a week and a half ago from a brain bleed brought on by blunt-force trauma. She was coherent enough when she showed up at the emergency department to tell everyone that the two of you had had a fight and that it was you who had hit her several times about the head and face. You're going to be charged with her murder. There are other charges too that are pending so I'd not expect to be getting out all that soon." He could only stare at the woman officer when she then asked him what he wanted for dinner. "The menu that you got at lunch needs to be turned in now. If you don't tell me what you want, then I'm—"

"What the fuck do you mean, Shelly's dead? That's not possible." Breaking his code of silence seemed not so important when he'd learned of her supposed death. "I just saw her a few days ago. There is no way that she's been gone that long. What the fuck are you playing at?"

"Playing at? Nothing. She went into a coma on the operating table and never recovered. As I said to you, she had a brain bleed that was well advanced when they opened her up to work on her." Douglas said that she was a liar. "Whatever. I don't care if you believe me or not. Are you going to tell me what you wish for dinner or not?"

"I demand that you bring her here this minute." She said that once he gave her his order, then she'd do just that. He looked over the menu, thinking that this was one of the worse jokes anyone had ever played on him. After ordering, the officer walked away. Douglas waited ten minutes before he started yelling about Shelly. Finally, the door at the other end opened up, and he could see her in the overhead mirror that she had a brass colored jar in her hand. "What's that?"

"Shelly Gibson. There wasn't anyone to claim her body, so Mr. Sheppard did it. Since she had no family to speak of, he had her cremated. Also, I brought you the newspaper so that you can read about it yourself." He snatched the newspaper out of her hand and leaned back to read the front-page article. "You can have that copy. There are several more of them around, too."

"It says here that she was murdered. You're not pinning that on me. I had nothing to do with her bleeding out." If the woman said anything, he was no longer paying attention. Reading about his long-time lover's demise was upsetting him enough.

Douglas read it four times before he let it sink in that she might well be as dead as he'd been told. Looking at the vase that the cop had brought with her, he could see the nameplate on the bottom of the jar with not just her name but the dates of both her birthdate as well as her death. He couldn't believe that no one thought that he'd be interested in knowing that she'd died. He'd wasted a great deal of his time in yelling about her when he could have been trying to get someone else to come and—It occurred to him that she'd told the emergency department that he'd killed her, and that was why he was stuck behind bars. He needed an attorney. Now.

His meal was brought to him at six. Having enough food to fill him up was wonderful after spending so much time locked in the hotel room without any means of getting something to fill the void in his belly. The fact that the article said that he'd been the one that she'd claimed had killed her, he surmised that they'd known he was stuck in the hotel room and hadn't come to see him. No one had brought him any food or water either. Fuckers.

Finishing up his meal, he laid on his cot and thought about what he was going to do now that he was stuck in jail. There was no way that they could pin the death of Shelly on him. It would mean that they were taking her word over his own. And who was alive to do that? Only him. So that was taken care of.

"Now what?" What else did they have him for? Nothing that he could think of right off the top of his head. He'd not even resisted arrest when they picked him up. Douglas hadn't had any insurance to claim, so that couldn't have been it. So he'd faked his death? So what? It's not like he hurt anyone by him doing that. Of course, he did plot to have his sister robbed several times, but again, who were they going to believe over him? His sister? Not likely. Even the men that he'd had working for him weren't around anymore. It did stick in his crawl that they'd told him about Shelly. Damn, but he was going to miss that bitch. Sitting up on the side of his cot, he looked at the mirror again to find out what the clicking noises were that were getting louder.

"I'm here. What do you want?" Douglas hadn't a clue who the woman was that was standing across from him. But she was a fine-looking piece of ass, and he wondered if he'd already found— "I'm your sister, dumbass. Get those thoughts out of your head right now."

"Nah, you can't be my sister. She's as ugly as sin." She sat down on the chair that he'd not noticed before now. "Is it really you, Carrie? I won't believe you even if you swear on a bible that it's you. Who are you, and what the hell are you doing here?"

"Your full name is Sherman Douglas Hunter. Our parents were Caroline and Peter Hunter. They've been gone for about five years or so now. They died about four days apart. You hired thugs by the name of Skank Eye and Whistle Stop to rob the restaurant where I was working at. They're both dead, as is Shelly Gibson. She died of—" He told her that he believed her now. "I'm so very glad. What is it you want with me? I'm going to start this off with me telling you that I'm not going to bail you out. I like you being here. Also, you have no bail set as you're in here because of the shit that you've pulled for so long and finally got caught at. Also, I'm not going to testify for you. I loath you as much as you do me, I suppose."

"I'm going to need some money when I get out of here. The best that I can figure, they only got me on some trumped-up charges about me hitting around Shelly or something. I wasn't the one that beat her to shit all the time. She did that on her own." Carrie just laughed and told him that he was also directly being charged with his buddies that came into the restaurant for the money."

"Right, like that's going to be believed. Nothing to do with me. They could have been hired by anyone but not me. What else? I'm sure that you have the low down on what they think they have on me." She told him that she wasn't his attorney but knew that they had a long list of things he'd done. "Nothing then. They have nothing on me, so I'll be getting out soon. As I was saying, I'm going to need some money. Someone said that you married one of the Sheppards. I don't care how you got him to put a ring on your finger, but you'll get some money from him for me. I'll need a couple of million to start out with. Then I'll figure out an amount monthly that I'm going to need when I get myself a place to stay and some staff. I'd forgotten how much I love having someone clean up after me. What do you know of my parent's house?" She told him that they were her parents as well. "All right, if you insist, our parents. Though, I don't think you should be counted as you didn't live at home as long as I did. But I'm willing to allow you to buy me out. But I'm still going to be living there."

"They left everything to me." He nodded, asking her if she had a comedy routine she was heading up later because her delivery needed work. "No. I don't. However, I was left their things, including money and all the property that they had amassed while they were alive. Grannie, too, is leaving everything to me in her will. She is still around—thanks for telling me that she was dead, but I've gone to see her now, and she's going to be coming home with me."

"You think. And I want her in the nursing home where she can't cause any trouble. She's going around telling lies about me." Carrie told him that so far, the police have found out that she wasn't lying about his involvement in the murder of a few people around town. "See? That right there is why she should be put back there. She's going to make me trouble, and I don't have time to mess with her now."

"What else do you want, Douglas? I have shit that needs my attention, and I'm not getting that done sitting around here with you going over things that you already know about." Douglas told his sister that she would leave when he was good and ready for her to leave. "I don't know if you realize this or not, but I've not done what you wanted me to do for years. Also, I'm on this side of the bars, and you're not. So if I wanted to walk away, there isn't any way for you to stop me. You have ten minutes. After that, I'm leaving you to never return. Tell me, in simple terms, what it is you seem to be needing, what you want so I can tell you that it's not going to happen."

"You'd better watch yourself, Carrie. All kinds of things could happen to you and your husband if you don't mind me." She smiled at him. It wasn't anything that he had seen on her face before. In fact, it kind of scared him a bit. "You're going to help me or so help me. I'm going to find you and murder you and that husband of yours."

"I'm not at all worried about you, Douglas. Archie, my husband, is the leap leader to a bunch of jaguars. Also, as I'm sure that you've heard, there are five more of the Shepherds that have taken me under their paws and treat me as their sister. They love me too." He told her that she was too ugly to have anyone love her. "And when I got here, you were thinking that I was a fine piece of ass. Make up your mind. Not that it matters to me one way or another. You have five and a half minutes left. And I still don't know what it is you think I'm going to do for you."

"I told you. You're going to get me some money so that I can live a good life. And you're going to keep me supplied in money until such time as you die. And you will, if only for me to collect money off your dead ass when you pass over." He laughed when she stood up. "Sit your ass down, Carrie. I'm not nearly done with you. You're going to stay here until such time as we work out what amount I feel you should be giving me."

When Carrie left him sitting there, he could hear her laughter as she moved down the hall. He'd not gotten a chance to ask her about any payment, nor did he settle up on the amount that she was going to give him. He told himself that he wasn't entitled like he knew people would call him, but since she'd gotten all the money from their parents, though he really thought they were more his than hers as he'd been around them longer, she should want to help him out. It was the least she could have done, considering the fact that he'd been in jail all this time and could have been helping him easily.

He laid back on the cot, nervous about how much it was creaking and making noises. He thought about what she'd told him. It was then that he realized that she'd not had a ring on her finger. Not even a nice watch or something to prove that she was married into money.

"She's a stupid liar, is what she is." It tickled him to no end that she was trying her best to make herself out to be more than she was. Married? Not likely. She was also more than likely lying about the money, too. He'd never seen his parents spend anything more than they had to. Not to mention, they seemed to be struggling to make ends meet when he'd been home. Christ, his sister was worse than he was. "A fucking cunt liar."

The more he thought about what she'd told him, the funnier he thought that it was. He would have been informed about his parents having a will. He was sure of that. And the very fact that she thought that she could get away with saying they left her everything was wrong too. Why would they do that? Carrie wasn't all that much, and he was their firstborn. He should have had it all by default. As soon as his attorney showed up, he'd have to tell them he changed his mind and wanted one now, Douglas was going to have him look into the things about the wills. Also, to have his grandmother put back where he'd put her after they'd died and make sure that no one else could take her out again. Christ, the old buzzard, had been telling lies about him since he'd been a kid. Not really lies, he supposed, they were all true, but she'd been telling on him anyway.

It was nearly midnight when he could finally sleep. Pondering and plotting was something that he did a great deal and tonight hadn't been any different. The day of his court hearing was on Monday, two days from today so he was going to have to get himself an attorney so that he could collect what was rightfully his. And damn, Carrie for not telling him about it sooner.

Closing his eyes, he popped them back open when someone said his name. It was eerily said like they were trying to spoke him. Sitting up, when he could see the light coming down the hall, he yelled at whoever it was that he was trying to sleep and didn't appreciate them waking him up. As soon as the woman, a very beautiful woman, stood in front of his cell, he decided to ignore her over laying back in his bed and pretending to be asleep.

"I know that you're awake, dumbass. I've come to make you aware of a few things. My name is Sunny Sheppard. Your sister is now mine because we married brothers. Technically, we're not sisters, but I already think of her as mine." He asked her if she was stupid. "Stupid? No, I don't believe so. But I do have some information for you about the wills that your parents have left behind. It really is telling that you don't believe that they'd leave you out. When I found out how much they paid for attorney fees, greasing palms to keep you from prison, as well as paying someone to keep you safe, it's small wonder that they didn't leave you shit. If it had been left up to me, I would have let your ass rot in prison, but I didn't know you then, or I would have taken care that you were out of Carrie's life. Anyway, according to the wills, they paid out the ass for you to be on the outside instead of prison, and that was your inheritance."

"No. That's not the way inheritances work. When they die, I get their money. They can't charge me for doing what they should have been doing anyway. I was their responsibility to keep safe and not use the money that was to be left to me. You have it wrong." She asked him about Carrie. "What about her? It's not my fault that she was Ms. Goody Two Shoes. Carrie has always been a stick in the mud about having fun, and that's why I know that they didn't leave it all to her. Maybe half of it, maybe. But not it all. Not that it matters. I'm going to make her give it to me anyway. It's the least that she can do because she took her time getting my money to me."

"Well, you go on believing what you want. Also, I'm here to talk to you about Shelly. Did you know that she kept a diary? And that she wrote down in it every misdeed that the two of you ever did? It's been a lot of fun going over the notes that she left and finding the bodies. She even wrote down what you used to kill them with. Isn't that the nicest thing she could have done?" He told her that she had no rights to Shelly's private things. "Of course, I don't, silly. But you know who does? The FBI. Also, you might want to think on this too, her ghost is talking to Carrie about some little things that you have too."

When she put up her pinky finger and wiggled it, he knew just what she was saying to him. It had been pointed out to him the same way by Shelly a couple of times when she was pissed off that he didn't have enough dick to satisfy even himself when he jerked off, he was so small. She'd even called him pencil dick too. One of those golfer pencils, she told him.

Standing up, telling her to come to him so that he could pound her head and then show her what a real dick looked like, she laughed and walked back down the hall toward where she'd come from. No amount of threatening her would make her come back and when the door slammed behind her, he let his temper go and pounded on the bars, his commode as well as the walls to burn his frustrations out.

~*~

Mikey didn't move around very much. It hurt to just blink his eyes right now. But his sister was there with him, her bed next to his so that they could hold hands. He noticed that she needed it as much as he did. The contact with each other. When the door opened to their room, he was sure it was his father coming back, but it was Jameson. He was smiling when he pulled a chair up to talk to him. Sissy was sleeping, having gotten some pain medication from the nurse a little while ago.

"There are several things that we need to talk about. I'm glad that your sister is sleeping. Even though she's younger than you, she will need to be made aware of a few things later. When she's better. All right?" He told Jameson that he was ready. "Ready? I guess that would be something that you'd feel like the way that you grew up. All right then. Your grandmother on your mother's side is going to take the two of you in. I'm sure you're aware that your mom is gone."

"Yes. I was too late to save her." Jameson told him that had he been there when she was killed, then he might well have been murdered as well, leaving Sissy all alone. "I guess so. But she was all the family that we had."

"As I said, you have a grandma that is going to take you in. Also, you have all of us that will be there for you. The reason that I'm here is that I'm going to represent you, I'm an attorney when the case is brought before the court. It will have to be done, even though he's dead, so that you and your sister can collect on the insurance that was taken out from when your biological father was killed. And Benson is the one that killed him." Mikey nodded, knowing all his life that Benson had had a part in his dad's death. Not what he'd done, but all the same, he knew that he'd been the one who had killed him. "You know anything else that I can look into for the two of you? So you understand, the sloth will pay your grandmother for raising the two of you. If she does anything wrong, not that I think she will, but if you have any trouble, you just come and find one of us, and we'll take care of things."

"Thank you. I didn't know I had a grandma so that will be new to us." Jameson said that he'd not known either until he spoke with Carrie. "She's a nice lady, you know? I like her a lot."

"So do I. She's very special to all of us, as is Sunny, Nash's mate." He said that she scared him. "To be honest with you, Mikey, she scares me as well. But I don't tell her that. I don't want to be hurt."

They both laughed and he realized that he didn't hurt as much as he had before. Maybe it was because he knew things were going to be all right or that his bear was making it better. Either way, he was glad for the company that he had.

Jameson talked about the things that were going to happen to him and his sister. The sloth leader, Roger Mann, said that a fund was being set up for him and his sister to pay for them to go to college, too. That was the best news that he'd heard all his life. That he was going to be able to go to college. He loved school.

When the nurse came to check on him and Sissy, Jameson told her that he needed something for the pain. He was correct, he was hurting pretty badly, but he didn't think it was very nice of him to get the meds when he had company. Jameson told him that he was going to have to make sure that he didn't get too overwhelmed with the pain. He told him that Carrie had given them a bit of magic so that he and Sissy would heal quicker.

When he started to drift off, he remembered about his mom. Feeling his eyes, even though they were closed, fill with tears at how she was gone. She had been the best mother in the whole wide world, and he didn't know what he was going to do without her there for him and Sissy all the time. He was just going to have to make sure that his sister was safe now that he was the man of the house. He knew that it was a lot of responsibility for a ten-year-old, but he thought that he was up for it. Plus, he had the Shepherds to look to when he needed advice. He wasn't entirely sure what their grandma might do for them. Mikey was slightly untrusting of a lot of people and was worried that she'd be just like Benson had been—he decided right then and there that he wasn't going to call him dad anymore.

Drifting in and out of sleep, he woke up a couple of times when he had to go to the bathroom. His wounds weren't on his legs, so he figured that he could go on his own. He barely made it to the bathroom and had to call for help to get him back to bed. Mikey had never felt so weak in his life as he did right now.

Archie was in his room when he made his way to the toilet the second time. He had a pizza with him, a cheese on one half and a pepperoni on the other half. He ate the cheese side, and his sister ate most of the other side. He'd never had a hot pizza since he'd been a little boy. It was a treat that he loved a great deal.

"How are the two of you feeling?" The chocolate milk was another thing that he'd not had in a long time. Drinking half of it in one drink, he smiled at Archie when he told him that he had more milk if he needed it. He told the man that he was doing a lot better now. "Good. I have some news for you both that I think that you'll like to hear about. Your grandma is coming by tomorrow to talk to the two of you. She thought that the two of you were dead. That's what Benson told her. She's been grieving so much lately. She told me that she was so happy to have you both come and live with her. She really seems like a very nice lady. I think that you'll love staying with her."

He told them things that Jameson had told him about the college education as well as other things that would come to them as they were orphaned now. Sissy cried a little bit, but she stopped when Mikey hugged her.

"The house that you were living in when your father passed away and Benson moved into is going to be torn down and rebuilt. As soon as it's finished, the three of you will move into it. It's going to be bigger than the one before with each of you having your own rooms along with your grandma." Mikey hadn't had his own things before and told Mr. Archie that. "I know. You two have had a bad life for a long time and we're going to help you as much as we can. You won't have to worry about a lot of things, including not having enough to eat again. I swear if I have it, you two will as well. And your grandma is going to benefit from taking you in as well, so you don't have to worry about her."

Archie was true to his word and Mikey had all the milk, switching to white milk after dinner that he wanted. His sister wanted some juice and he thought it was odd that he had some of that in his bag as well. Not wanting to mess things up for them, he didn't voice his questions but enjoyed having a good hot meal, the first in a very long time.

After Archie left, promising them that he'd be there in the morning before his grandma showed up to make sure that things were all right between them. Mikey was a little afraid, not remembering his grandma all that much. But he was assured, several times by Archie that he and his sister were going to be in good hands. He hoped so. He'd hate to have all this taken away from him now. It was nice to have clean clothing on and food in his belly when he wanted it.

Dozing off, he thought about his mother and Benson. He'd been so mean to his mom that there were times that he wanted to kill him himself. Mikey had wanted to grow up fast so that he could be big enough to make Benson gone but he was also glad now that he didn't do anything stupid. What Carrie had told him when she'd come to visit him earlier. When his sister said his name, he looked over at her and smiled.

"Will we be all right, you think? I don't want to go anywhere anymore if people are going to hurt us. Do you?" He told her what Archie had said. "I know that people have different faces, Mikey. One that they show the people from the welfare and the one that they show us. I'm worried that our grandma has been showing them the other face and that when we go and live with her, she's going to be like Benson."

"Don't you remember her from when you were little?" Sissy told him that she didn't remember her at all. "Well, I remember some of her. Christmases were so nice. There was so much food on the table that I nearly burst. She had so many different kinds of cookies and cakes. I just remembered what she told me once. That Christmas was for sweets, and Thanksgiving was for food. I forgot about that."

He grinned, holding his sister's hand while he told her of other stories that he was just remembering about grandma. The one about his grandpa, who he'd forgotten about until then, made the two of them laugh.

"Grandda used to read the Christmas story to us. He held you in his lap, and you just stared at him like he was speaking right to you. He might have been, now that I think on it." She laughed asking him to tell the story to her again. "We'd lay out cookies and milk for Santa, too. He even had some carrots that he put into storage that still had the tops on them. He told me once that the reindeer loved the tops more than the carrots themselves."

Mikey had long since given up his belief in Santa. It was mostly because Benson had told him he was a baby for believing in him. But he'd keep believing if he could see how happy it made his little sister to believe.

"He'd sing with us too. I never told him, but he was a terrible singer. But he did it with gusto, as mom used to say. I was so sad when he passed away. He'd been really old, in his fifties, but he had a bad heart that nobody knew about, and it took him from us." Mikey was going to tell his sister stories about their mom, too, things that had to do with before Benson came into their lives. His dad, too. So she'd know what awesome people they were. "Dad was the only one besides Grandma that would eat pecan pie. I don't remember if I got to try it, but Dad would be sick the next day for eating too much of it. He'd swear that he wasn't going to eat it again, only to eat it again the next year. He was funny like that."

Mikey told his sister about birthdays, his and hers, until he was too tired to speak. Sissy had been asleep for a few minutes when he finally thought that he could sleep too. Closing his eyes, he let rest take him under and hoped that he didn't have any bad dreams tonight. Mikey couldn't believe how much better he felt, just talking about the family with Sissy than he had in a very long time. He decided that he was going to get him a notebook and write some of the things down that he remembered so that he could share them with his sister. And her kids, if she had any. Mikey didn't think he'd ever have children. Benson had told him that he was just too stupid and ugly to have a mate.

His dreams had always been nightmares. Tonight, it started out with the same dream he'd had every night since being in the hospital. It was his mother being dead and Benson trying to kill him. It was all out of order this time, but he saw things that he'd not remembered before. Like his mom telling him how much she loved him and Sissy as she hid away from Benson. How sorry she was that she'd not been able to protect them better. There were other things, too, good things like the stories that he told his sister that he'd loved. Mikey finally felt at rest when his mom, as she used to do before Benson, kissed him on the forehead and told him that he was the best little boy in the world. Rolling to his side, he remembered believing her and he wanted to be able to remember things like that all the time.