“So, Pop, what’s this meeting about?” Lance asked curiously, drawing Jeremiah out of his thoughts.
Releasing his wife’s hand, Jeremiah stood and reached for the packet he’d placed face down on the coffee table. “I received this in the mail this week.” He pulled out the envelopes. “There are six letters, one for each of us,” he said, moving around the room to pass them out.
“Who is it from?” Carrie’s husband, Connor, inquired.
Jeremiah wasn’t surprised that Connor, a former cop who owned a private investigative firm, would ask. Obviously, everyone who had received a letter was wondering the same thing, since all eyes were on Jeremiah.
He spoke. “The letters came from Edwina.”
Both Carrie and Lance threw their letters down on the coffee table, as if they contained poison. “What does she want with us?” Lance asked in an angry voice.
“I think you need to read the letter and find out,” Jeremiah said.
“Thanks, but I’ll pass, Pop,” Lance replied.
“I’m with you there, bro,” Carrie agreed.
“She’s dying of pancreatic cancer,” Lyle said.
Everyone turned to look at him. He was silently reading the letter.
“How many ways can you say good riddance?” Carrie asked, a sharp edge to her tone.
“Not enough,” Lance answered.
Jeremiah didn’t say anything because he understood the resentment his youngest two offspring must be feeling. Carrie had been mistreated and sexually abused while in her mother’s care. And Lance had never gotten over their mother’s abandonment.
“I’ve done what she asked of me, which was to make sure you got the letters. What you do with them is up to you.”
“Surely you don’t think we should give a damn, Pop,” Carrie said.
“You four are adults. You can make your own decisions,” he responded.
“Did she ask you to come see her, too?” Lyle asked as he got up and crossed the room, tossing his letter on the coffee table beside Lance’s and Carrie’s.
He nodded. “She did.”
“Are you going?” Lance questioned.
“I haven’t decided yet.”
The room got quiet, and then Carrie said bitterly, “I bet she’s not even dying. It’s just a ploy to manipulate us.”
“She’s dying,” Jeremiah said. “I had Reverend Holland call the prison to speak with the chaplain there. What she wrote in the letters is true. She has less than eight monthsto live.”
“And again, I say, good riddance,” Carrie snapped.
“I second my wife’s position,” Connor said.
Jeremiah wasn’t surprised. Connor had met Carrie when she’d hired him to find out who was trying to blackmail her. During his investigation, he’d discovered all the abuse his future wife had endured. “Like I said, it will be your decision, Carrie,” Jeremiah said.
“You said there were six letters, Pop. But there are only five of us. Who’s the sixth letter for?” Logan asked, although Jeremiah had already told him about it. Jeremiah glanced at his firstborn. “It’s for a man named Silas Kingston. Edwina asked that I find him and make sure he got his letter.”
“Who’s Silas Kingston?” Lance asked.
Jeremiah didn’t know any other way but to come right out and say it. “Mr. Kingston is the father of Edwina’s fifth child.”
Ignoring the loud gasps sounding around the room, he continued, “She gave birth to a son less than two years after Carrie. Edwina doesn’t even know her son’s name. She deliberately got pregnant and then offered the baby to Kingston for a price. He paid her and took the child the day it was born.”
