Chapter 1

Chapter 1

Brad felt terrible for what was going on with Becka, his mate and the new to the family. There were a total of thirteen files in front of her, plus the one in her hand. Each one of them, all labeled with a sticky note, told her not only things that she needed to know but things that she would need to take care of in the immediate future. There was also the issue that some of it had come to her too late for her to have been able to do anything with it. The filing of the birth certificate of her nephew, as well as her adoption of him, had been taken care of by my Launder. All the paperwork had been filed away so that no one was the wiser about it not being done before. Brad was happy about that. One small detail that neither one had to worry over.

With everything going on when Toby was born it had been difficult for her—nay, impossible for her to have done anything about that part of her raising the young man. Both his parents and grandmother had been brutally murdered while she’d been babysitting him. Not only the three of them but the entire pack had been murdered, including the children, in the most heinous way imaginable. If he could, he’d hunt all the men down who had been responsible and murder them in the same ways.

Brad was having a hard time gauging her reactions right now. They’d only known one another a few weeks, and most of that had been with her being an over-the-road trucker who had been working for him without his knowledge for the last few years. Laughing, he thought that he’d not want to play any games of chance with her until he got to know her better. Maybe not even then.

When she picked up one of the files that had been marked with an address, she asked Launder how they were able to figure this out. Brad could see from where he was sitting that it was an address that seemed familiar to him. Then, he only just remembered what the address meant when Becka spoke. That not only had arson been the cause of the fire that took her home and only stationary place for her, but they also had a good idea of how it had started. She’d lost everything in the fire. And Brad would bet that she’d say that it was worth it to have been able to save Toby from the same death as his parents had had to endure.

“I didn’t know about it until I started digging into your past. I must say, I’m pretty impressed with your driving record as an over-the-road driver. I didn’t know if you were the norm or not in never having a ticket, but it was pointed out to me that you’d not have had any serious accidents either. Congratulations on that, Becka. You should be proud of yourself. I would imagine that has a great deal to do with Toby riding with you all the time.” Becka glanced at Toby and then nodded. “As for knowing who might have set the fire, that came from Toby. He told Brad that he smelled the man that was around your truck recently as well. That’s when we were able to attach his name to a few other things that had gone on around the area.” This time, she really looked hard at her nephew.

“Yeah, it’s nice that he’s so forthcoming with his information, isn’t it?” It didn’t take a rocket scientist to hear the sarcasm dripping off of each word. He had a feeling that Toby was going to be in the dog house for a good long time because he did not share information with his aunt that could have been lifesaving. Lucky for all of them, neither of them had been hurt and that was because the two of them kept an eye on each other while out on the road. “What do we know about this Danny person other than he’s not a bear, but he has several bear friends? I’m assuming more than I have.”

“You’re being very calm.” Becka glared at him, and Brad laughed. “I’m sorry. But I’m barely holding onto my anger about what they did to you, and you’re very calm looking. You’ve had less time to deal with this mentally than I have, and I’m still raging inside how they screwed the two of you over.”

“I’m far from calm. However, what you just said isn’t true. I’ve had a little bit longer to deal with this than you have simply because I’ve had to be on my guard all the time. I might not have known the players that were around, but I did know that we were being watched all the time. They took everything from Toby and me when they burnt down my home in addition to his family home as well.” She looked at Launder, Hamish’s mate, and asked her if she was sure she needed the details about the sloth that had been destroyed the night that Toby’s parents had been bears with, too. “The only reason that I have any idea what went down is because when I sent Toby to the then-local sloth of a friend of mine, he took me aside and told me everything he knew. Which is a great deal more than the police did. He was also able to get me some information about Toby that I didn’t have. Weight and things like that. It had been filed with the local doctor’s office, and he found me a copy so that I could get him registered for the doctor’s office. Then later to get him into school.”

“Were they all killed to take over the sloth? That is one thing that I’d like to know.” So did he, but Hamish would get more answers from the king of the bears rather than just him. He wasn’t even sure that Becka was going to answer him when she got up to pace, something that he noticed that Toby did as well. “I’m assuming that you’ve had your ear to the ground for some time now. At least sixteen years, correct?”

“More than I think most have, yes. Liza and Roman Jermon had been married for two years when they found out they were going to have a baby—Toby. Liza is…was my sister, and I couldn’t have been happier for them than I was at their wedding. Then, just a few years later, they had Toby.” Calhoun, the king of the bears, asked if Toby knew anything about that day or the days before and after. “He does. Of course, he didn’t then. He’d only been an infant. And I don’t know how well I would have been at keeping him safe if not for staying with Liza when he was born. Changing diapers and that sort of stuff is not intuitive, no matter what people think. Besides, I would never keep something like that from him. The issues came up at one of the schools he attended and I had a duty to his parents to tell him what had happened. The real truth of it. I think that it helped him a great deal, or perhaps not that he didn’t remember them at all. He was sorry for their death, but since he’d been so small, it was only words I was telling him and not that he had much of a bond with them.”

“Good for you. I think that’s what I would have done in the same circumstances. I honestly only heard bits and pieces about what had happened over the years. It will be…well, not nice to hear it all, but it will be helpful in getting to the bottom of what is going on now. I’m to understand that you believe that one or more of the men that night has targeted you at your personal home and work?” She told him that was what she’d been told and that she didn’t have anything personal anymore but her truck, and that was getting too old for anyone to care about breaking. “If anyone in this room told you that, you might as well take that as gospel. There isn’t a better group of people to get to the bottom of things than this group.”

When Becka stood next to him, he didn’t know what to do. It had been three days since he’d figured out that he was her mate, and it bothered him on so many levels that he’d not told her yet. He knew that it was well past time and stood up. Everyone turned to look at him, but he felt like he was on a mission. And it was to make sure that she didn’t find out that he belonged to her from someone else.

Grabbing her hand and nearly dragging her out of the office they were in, he pulled them both into an empty office after trying door after door to find one open. As soon as he found one, nearly weeping when it turned in his hand, he pressed her against the door they’d only just come through. Backing away when she looked afraid, he just said what he should have said to her a few days ago.

“I’m your mate.” He wiped his hand over his face, pissed off with himself that he’d just blurted it out there like that. That was when he started pacing. It was time for him to spill his guts as Toby had told him to do before it was too late. Perhaps it was, he thought before speaking again. “I’ve known for three days now. I didn’t know, but Toby told me. I don’t know—it’s been pointed out to me that I don’t know shit about what I am and what I have as an immortal bear friend. Anyway, I want you to know that I have no desire to piss you off. While I more than likely have, it wasn’t my intention to do so. Nor to overwhelm you with me. With all you have going on right at the moment, I would think that you’d have enough without me adding to it. But I guess that I fucked that up, didn’t I. Oh well. I know that I’d be both pissy and overwhelmed if I was handed all the information that you just got, then on top of that, finding out that you have a mate there too. I’m profoundly sorry for dropping this on you so quickly and all at once, but—” She put her hand over his mouth.

“One thing at a time, if you don’t mind. You said that Toby told you three days ago. That means the night that you were at the campsite that we’d stayed at, correct?” He said that it was. “I see. All right. So you knew this information that they were going to dump on me, too.”

“No. I didn’t. In fact, I wish with all my heart that I’d never done it today, but—again, it was pointed out to me that I’d better tell you before—I didn’t have a background check done on you either. That was Launder. She’s been looking for a driver to get delivery of items for the charity that she and the other women are working on. I mentioned you, not knowing who you were to me at the time, but I know that you were an upstanding person, according to the people who have used you before. I also let her know that you were mostly armed and you knew how to take care of yourself. Shooting that guy…never mind. They said you’d done a good job with that, too.” She nodded but didn’t say anything. For the first time in his life, Brad hated the silences and filled them with babble. “I ended up staying the night in my car that night, just down the road from where you and Toby were sleeping. However, I didn’t stay there alone. Not with a woman, however. It was Hamish, Launder’s mate, and my dearest friend, who popped over to see me. We talked about some of the things that Toby had told me. Not just about you being my mate but other traits that I have that are bear-like. I’ve never had anyone point them out to me before. Like how my hair is the color of a black bear. Which is what I have been magically enhanced by.”

She asked him if he was finished telling her things or simply out of breath. He told her that, for now, it was both. But that didn’t mean that things wouldn’t come to him again and that he might need to tell her.

“I’ve known a great many shifters in this line of work. I don’t have any trouble with them and having mates. But I will need to talk to you about it at some point. Toby is my nephew, as you know, and I won’t have you killing him off to make some sort of statement to the world. Nor will I allow you to treat him any differently than you would a child of your own. He’s all I have left of my sister and brother-in-law.” Brad told her that he could be honored to treat Toby as he’d been treating him. “Good. I don’t know what that means for you, but he is a good kid and comes first in my life over someone I’ve only just met. No matter what you might think of as being my mate.”

“Great.” While she paced, he looked around the office that he was in. “This is a lovely office. I love all the bright colors. My office looks like a turd redecorated it. Everything in it is a different shade of brown. Nothing else, no white or even black. Just brown. That’s from my secretary. She asks me daily if I’m allergic to color. If I showed her that this is what I wanted, then she’d probably love it a good deal more. I’m not good at arranging. You know? Colors or flowers. I would just stick them in a vase or whatever and be done with it.”

“You’re babbling again. But my office is the back of my sleeper.” He nodded but didn’t ask her anything, trying his best to keep his mouth shut so he wouldn’t babble like an idiot again. She seemed to be processing things. “They’re not going to like the way this story goes. Not any of them. It bothers me to no end how these people met their deaths in the sloth. Is that what you call a group of bears? It was Toby—again who told me what the group was called that he studied at. Why is it really important to them? To find out what happened, I mean? Do you suppose they think that I had something to do with it?”

“No. I can tell you right now that they don’t feel that way at all. They really want to get to the bottom of this for you. And now me. Since we’re mates, and I’m not trying to force you into anything, but since we’re mates, they want to protect you as much as I do. And if this guy is lurking around your home, the truck, then he has to be dealt with sooner rather than later. Before it becomes an issue. And I, along with Hamish, believes that it will. It’s been all this time, and he’s still sniffing around, which makes me think that he’s not finished yet.” She asked him if he had any more information for him that she needed right now. “Just this. I’m an ancient. Very old, and with that, I have a great deal of power and magic. Also, we have more money than we could spend in several lifetimes. While I’m not at all sure what you’d want or need, I want you to know that I’m going to bend over backward to give it to you. To be honest with you, I’m excited to have you both in my life. I feel better and more alive than I have in some time. What I have is now yours and Toby’s. The magic, too, is yours that I can share with you and Toby. It will not only protect you but also make you immortal. I do believe that you and Toby are that now.”

“Too much information right now. Just let me process this and if I have questions—which I’m sure that I will, I’ll ask you. But if you don’t mind, I’d like to get this over with. I have shit to do, and it’s not getting done while I stick around here. Most of it is some of the deliveries that I had to cancel or were canceled for me.” She left him there, and he had to laugh.

Well, he thought to himself while wearing a sappy grin that he could feel on his face, she was going to fit right in with the other women in this kiss, and he couldn’t wait until the two of them could get some downtime to get to know one another in all ways possible.

When he walked into the room that he’d been in earlier, she’d not started talking yet. As soon as he was seated, as close to her as he could be without crowding her, she started on the story. He knew that she was reliving it just by her tone and her words. It must have been the most difficult thing for her to tell them than anything that he’d seen in all his life. His heart broke for the things that were coming out of her mouth. And for the things, the people that she lost when she’d been sitting for her nephew.

“Liza had a great pregnancy. She wasn’t sick at all, and Roman was the most doting husband and father-to-be that I’d ever seen. Just after they had Toby, things started to fall into place for them. They had extra money, and they wanted to spend all their time with Toby. Which was possible for the two of them as they both were able to work from home together. However, they also needed some adult time, a time to be with other adults that were about their age. That night…I was staying at their home because I didn’t want to have to drag all the items that went with having an infant in my care to my house.”

~*~

The rig that she’d purchased had been delivered to her home that late evening. It had been on backorder when she’d ordered it but had come in about two weeks earlier than planned. She’d been so excited that she’d danced around her sister’s living room with Toby and singing at the top of her lungs while doing it.

She called her sister and asked if they minded if she took Toby to the house to see that it was what she had ordered. She didn’t really care if it was all wrong; she was going to take it on a long test drive if she could and take her first nephew with her on the ride of their lives. At least, that’s all she had planned that night.

“My family was more than happy for me to be able to get on the road. It had been my plan then was to only do it part-time, but things changed for good that night. It was a way for me to make some good money while on the road so that I could take some online classes and make money at the same time. It sort of worked out that way but Toby was the one that was going to school.” She let herself think hard about the events that had led to the two of them, herself and Toby, that saved their lives.

“I need to start from the beginning. It’s not much more than you already know, but for one thing. Roman’s mother lived with the two of them when her husband had passed away not long after they were married, within a couple of weeks, I think.” Becka laughed a little when she thought of the faces that Ms. Jermon would make at her when she didn’t think anyone was looking. “She wasn’t particularly a nice person and hated me on sight. I was fine with that, I didn’t much care for her either. She thought that I was a bad influence on the two of them, and I might have been. But they were happy for the most part, and I was going to help them afford to get out of living with the old dirtbag and get a home of their own.

“They lived in a tiny two-bedroom apartment then. Calling it an apartment was really overstating things. It had the two rooms that beds were in, but it was far from large enough for them to have even a dresser in there. The elderly Jermon woman decided that she wasn’t going to be giving up anything just because they decided against her advice to have a child. The old bitty not only took over one of the two bedrooms as her own, but she also had her things in the living room that she’d not allow them to touch. She, of course, hated me with a passion simply because I wasn’t going to allow her to treat me like she did my sister. Toward the end, just before they were killed, they purchased a house and were going to move in the week following their date night.” She thought of how beautiful her sister had looked on the night they were killed. “While they were out and I was on my way toward my home, the sloth was attacked. While I don’t understand the full reason for why someone would do that to the entire group, it was made clear that they only wanted to kill the people there and not take over anything. Every person was killed, all the houses were destroyed, and even the pack house, which I’m to understand now, was supposed to be left standing for the next group that might take over. It was not just burnt to the ground, but people—the older and infirmed group had been locked inside before setting it to flame, and they were burnt alive when they found them hiding there.”

“They wanted them out of the way so that the land could be sold off and developed into a strip mall and some high rent apartments. But as it turned out in so many other takeovers, the land didn’t belong to the man who ordered their deaths, but it reverted to the king when it was no longer considered land for the sloth. That’s a new law now that I’m liking, but not in the way that I inherited the land that your family was on. I’m profoundly sorry for your loss, Becka.” Calhoun explained how he’d not been the king then, or he might well have been looking deeper into things. “As it turned out, the land and all the houses that had been left standing, even for as damaged as they were, were given to me as king when I took over the position. I’m sorry to have interrupted you.”

“No. That’s fine. I didn’t know that part. That explains why I wasn’t able to go on the land to see if there was anything left that I could save for their son.” Calhoun nodded. “So, they asked me to babysit Toby, and it ended up being the thing that saved both of our lives. I was thrilled that they were going to have some them time and agreed easily. I was watching Toby at their home when they left to go to dinner. It didn’t even stress my sister out all that much while, getting into all kinds of arguments with her mother-in-law. And I didn’t mind telling her to shut up when Liza and Roman left, either. However, when I got word that my rig had arrived, I was very happy to get out of the house and leave her to whatever she thought that she needed because I was there. I needed an excuse to get away from the old bitch, and that was perfect. So I asked my sister, and she told me that was a good idea—the two of us had a good laugh when I called her after leaving the house too. It was then that I decided that I was going to keep Toby all night so that they could have some fun. I even sprang for a hotel room for them so that they could be together. We couldn’t have been off the phone for more than a few seconds when it started. They were at the house when the door was broken into, and they were…the three of them were taken to the sloth field they had meetings at.”

She thought about what she knew and decided not to sugarcoat things. Toby already knew the entire story, so she wasn’t worried about him being upset. He would, she knew that, but it wouldn’t be a surprise to him what she was going to tell them.

“The group was gathered in the field and tied up everyone that they’d been able to round up—I’m sorry. This is going to be out of sync. I remember it how I was told, and it was so…I think you can understand that it was brutal to even hear what had happened that night. It wasn’t a big sloth, only about fifty or so people not counting children. The women, including the old bitty—I didn’t care for her at all, but it hurts me deep in my heart whenever I think about how they were brutally murdered. The women were all raped while their families watched. No one was spared. Young or old, they were raped and then killed. While the men watched, they were killed by having their heads bashed in with stones that made it so that they were unrecognizable even with dental records. After they went around the group of children, shooting them once in the head while their fathers watched on, they turned to the men.” She thought about what she’d been told. “Their animals were even tied to the back of the cars they’d found keys for and dragged them until either they were so damaged that they again could not be recognized or the rope broke. After piling them all up in a large pile, all the dead, they were burnt, and their bodies were tossed onto the fire pit until there was nothing left of them but a few skeletal remains that made it impossible to tell how many bodies had been there.”

Toby got up to leave. She knew that even though he knew what had happened, it still bothered him as it did her the way that his parents were murdered. He hugged her tightly before stepping out of the room. Hamish asked her if he was going to be all right.

“No. Never.” She sat down then and was glad that Brad had taken her hand in his hand while she finished the story. “I’d tried to get in touch with my sister the next morning. Getting in the rig with Toby, I made my way to the house. As I was getting closer to their home, I noticed the smoke first, then all the police presence around the area. Instead of stopping, knowing on some level that they were all dead, I made my way out of town and to the first parking lot that I could find to turn on the radio to see if I could get some information.”

“It was on the news for weeks. I remember that. I also remember thinking that whoever did that to the group should be treated with the same disdain.” Ruby, visibly shaken up by the story, said that she was going to step out and check on Toby. When she left them there, Hamish asked her to continue.

“I didn’t return that night nor for a month afterwards. It was difficult to travel with an infant, I didn’t know a great deal about babies then, but Toby had been such a good kid that I never had any trouble with him being my sidekick while driving. So, while we were getting to know one another, it became evident that, to me anyway, that by going home, I saved both our lives. And I was going to make sure that I kept on keeping him safe.” She looked out the window at the office. She could see Ruby and Toby talking and had to smile. He was so much taller than her that it was comical to her. “No one ever contacted me about Toby. I wasn’t notified that my sister had been murdered until a couple of years later. By then, I was traveling full-time. When I was informed of their deaths, no one mentioned Toby and where he might be. I think, like a lot of people did, that he was a part of the mass killings that had occurred.”

“How did you get around explaining that you had a child? I mean, some people might have noticed that he was a bear, and you weren’t.” She told Launder that no one had ever asked, and she didn’t explain. “Good for you. I wanted to remind you now that the adoption paperwork has been filed and no one is none the wiser that it’s sixteen years too late. He is legally yours now. Toby told me that you had a bit of an issue with him getting into school a couple of times. That should take care of it.” She thanked the other woman.

“Sometimes I can go for weeks and not think about how they must have suffered. Then it will hit me how much…there was no reason for what happened to them. It will take me to the floor when I hurt for them. But I keep telling myself that I got to save Toby. Although it’s been hard on both of us, he’s alive, and a part of my sister that I might never have gotten if they’d not decided to go out that night. Nor with me going home would I have been able to keep him safe.” Calhoun asked her if she thought they’d have killed her, too. “Without a doubt. They were there for one thing, and that was to kill as many people as they could. So far, they’ve gotten away with it, too. No one has come forward talking to the police—there was no one left, and no one has ever connected me to the next of kin to my sister.”

“You think that they thought that you were in the death toll too then.” She nodded. “Were there any death records files? For you and Toby?”

“I don’t know. I do know that there is insurance that was taken out on the two of them. But I think that when I disappeared too, they just assumed the worst. I was among the dead like—Someone is with Toby and your wife, Mr. Meyer. And from here, it doesn’t look like a social…Your wife has it under control.”

When she turned to tell them that she’d knocked the man on his ass and had him down, she saw that it was just her and Brad in the room. He had the strangest smile on his face when she asked him where they’d all gone.

“I don’t think you finished your sentence before they all just disappeared. I might not have said this to you before, but they’re very protective of each other. And that would include you and Toby now.” She asked him why he’d order them to protect her and her nephew. “Oh, I didn’t. I would have if it had occurred to me, but they see an issue and take care of it. I have no doubt too that soon, if not already, you’re going to know who the man is that has been following you around as well as getting any answers that you don’t yet have about their murder, too.”

They ended up going down to the first floor of the massive building the old-fashioned way. Becka didn’t ask if he could do the popping thing and was glad that he didn’t suggest it. As she’d been saying before, she was overwhelmed by everything.

Toby was laughing when she got to him. When he hugged her to him, something he’d done all his life, she put her hand on his chest and asked him if he was all right. He told her that he was better than all right and was looking forward to having dinner with all the people present. She looked at Brad, the first she’d heard of them having dinner together and he said he’d not known either. But he thought that it would be fun. She did, too, but had a lot to do before she went out again.

“The man was making lude comments about my wife hanging out with a younger man. He wasn’t believing the fact that Toby was her nephew, so she showed him that he’d better be more polite or she’d show him how. I don’t think that he’s going to be assuming anything anymore.” They all laughed, and Calhoun, what he asked to be called, thanked her for telling him about it. “I’d find out about it, but it wouldn’t have been all that big of a deal to her, and it would more than likely have been about six months from now. Not only do we protect each other, but the wives keep us out of trouble as well.”

Dinner was loud and friendly. It took both her and Toby a while to get used to the noise. Having only been the two of them for so long, it was as if the volume had been turned up as high as it would go. She figured that when they’d been put into an empty room with the door closed, that this group must do this a great deal. Especially when they could all get together. When her salad was brought to her, she remembered the last time she’d had one and how it had been covered in specks of blood. She looked over at Toby when he was laughing.

“I was just thinking the same thing.” The story was related to the table by Brad. Toby was helping him tell the story, and it was louder and longer than she thought was necessary. But she really didn’t mind. They were having a good laugh, and sometimes that was all that was needed to bond people. A good story and some fun times.

She’d killed a man while she’d been enjoying her lunch, the first real salad that she’d had in a long time, when a man approached her, thinking that she was Brad’s wife and could make him do what they wanted. However, when he tried to muscle her, she killed one of the men and held the second one with a gun to his head. Toby had kept eating his meal, telling her that he’d not had a good home-cooked meal in some time and was going to enjoy it.

After dinner, the lot of them helped the waitstaff clear the table so that they could use it for talking. It wasn’t like her nor Toby to be up so late, but she tried her best to hang on. Toby, his body growing by leaps and bounds, was nearly asleep while sitting in one of the many lounges that were throughout the restaurant for people to sit on while awaiting a table. Waking him up, he stood up and looked like he was ready to do battle. Something that he did every time they were out and not in their usual bed. The two of them had to be on the go at all times when they were using a parking lot to sleep in sometimes.

On their way to the rig, Brad asked them if they’d like to stay in a hotel tonight. He just happened to have three rooms, one for each of them, that were connected by connecting doors. She no more believed that he’d just happened to have them, but she was exhausted, and a bed did sound really good.

Toby just looked in her direction when she asked him if that was something that he might enjoy. He told her to have a bed that he could stretch out on sounded like a dream come true. They decided to stay the night in the hotel. She thought it would be nice to stretch out, too.

Just as she was ready to turn off the lights, Toby asked her if he could talk to her. When she agreed, he came into her room and sat on the floor. The kid was getting taller by the day, she’d swear, just remembering how tall his father had been when he married his mom. But he didn’t look like he was in the mood to remember things, and she asked him what he needed from her.

“What do you think of the family? I guess all of the families.” She asked him why he was asking her that. “Because it’s the first real friends that we’ve ever had. They are helping you out with some of the million questions that you’ve had over the years about being a bear and having one in the family. Not to mention, they all seem to be genuinely nice.”

“I don’t know what I’m to think. To be honest with you. In actuality, I never gave it any thought. Why do you ask? Is there something that I should know?” He asked her what she meant. “They’re really nice, but I’m worried that they’re only pretending to like me because of you. Also, the fact that—I’m still wondering about that, but because of Brad, supposing to be my mate. I only have their word for it and, of course, yours. I don’t know all that many people like you do. I have a very limited pool of information about a great many things concerning you.”

“Okay. That’s just silly. Why would they only tolerate you to make me happy? I don’t know if you realize this or not, but I’m just a small cub in comparison to having the king of my kind—not to mention the king of vampires in the family.” She answered him. “Okay but you do realize that, like I said, I’m only a little bear compared to them. If they really were afraid of me attacking them, which I don’t see, then I’m reasonably sure that they could each take me out before I was able to shift. I don’t want to attack them, but they have more firepower than I will ever have. You’re goofy if you think that I’d even contemplate doing something like that. But however, I want to point out that I’d give my life if they hurt you in any way, Mom.” Her heart swelled up with the love that she had for this kid. She couldn’t have loved him any more than if he’d been her biological son.

She got up to pull the blankets off the bed to join him on the floor. Giving herself a few minutes to get her emotions under control, Becka sat with him. She asked him, point blank, and he’d better be honest with her if he was tired of being on the road all the time. Becka knew or thought that she knew the answer to that. He was sixteen and wanted to drive and meet girls. And that would be difficult to do with his aunt/mom hanging around him because he wasn’t yet old enough to drive a big rig.

“Not sick of it. I do enjoy the traveling. And I’ve seen more of the country than most adults have. It would be nice to have someplace, like this room, to be able to have a couple of days of downtime in.” She said he was just thinking about the showers. “That would be my number one complaint about being on the road. The lack of really nice showers. Also, not having to take my gear with me every time I want to get cleaned up. I most assuredly don’t like having to share said shower with everyone that wanders in there either.” They both laughed. “Are you thinking of giving it up, Mom?”

“Yes. I’ve been thinking about it for the last several months. I’m not old, but I do not like having to think about hooking and unhooking my trailer. You’ve been a tremendous help with that, but you’ll be off to college soon, and I’m going to have to do it myself again.” She smiled at him. “I still remember the first time that you did it on your own.”

“Yes, I remember that too. You sent me to someplace and then redid it. I wasn’t embarrassed so much as I was a little mad at you about it. Then I thought that you were going to need me, so I decided to have you teach me the ropes so that I could eventually do it on my own. And I ended up being able to do it as well as you did. I’m happy. No, I’m thrilled to have had you as my mother. I don’t believe that I would have had the confidence and knowledge that I have about the world without you there with me all the time.” She thanked him and wiped the tears away before they fell. “Ah, mom, don’t do that. You’ll have us both blabbering here in a few minutes, and I need to get some sleep.”

When he stood up, he put out his hand to help her up. Instead of letting her go, he hugged her to him and kissed the top of her head. Emotionally overwhelmed, she held onto him tightly as she thought of all the times they’d done this very same thing. Hugged before going to bed for the night.