Another email captures my attention. It’s dated a month and a half before Granny Ellie’s death. This one is from an attorney, and the title is:Copy of Last Will and Testament of Mrs. Eleanor Elliot. The subject makes my blood run cold because not only did Jeremiah know about the will, he knew about it all along, way before I left. It confirms what I suspected. That he and his brother had been plotting to get their hands on the money for some time.
One of the shocking things that I’d discovered over the last three and a half weeks was a note from Granny Ellie. I’d found it under her mattress when I searched her room. It was written in her own handwriting, warning me to be careful of her sons. She said Jeremiah had asked for money and she told him no. She said if something happened to her to contact her attorney and get out of the house. I wonder if she’d hoped to sneak me the note the night she was murdered. Because that’s what I now know for sure.
I have the emails, and the drug order. Surely, this is enough to get the police to investigate?
My hands move automatically. I print everything, page after page spitting out of the machine, the printer whining like it is as nervous as I am. I snap photos with the burner phone and upload copies to the cloud, one after another, until my fingers ache. Just when I think that I’m finished, I find more.
There are documents buried in folders that I never knew existed, records that show the foster parents abusing funds meant for kids who had nowhere else to go, using their money like it was personal income. I’m not sure what evidence CPS found when they investigated. But as they were only investigating David and his wife, and not Jeremiah, I wonder if they’d seen the worst of it.
Then I have another thought. What if this is all Jeremiah’s doing? That he had plans to blackmail or manipulate his brother as well?
By the time I shove the last stack into a folder, my arms are full. I grab my duffel bag which I’d left by the front door, and head out to my car.
Halfway to my vehicle I hear the sound of someone approaching. Fear creeps up my spine. I take off in a sprint but I’m not fast enough.
“Where are you going?”
Panic hits me hard and fast. All I can think about is getting the hell out of this place with the incriminating records intact.
Suddenly, Jeremiah is standing between me and my car. He looks at the papers in my arms, and his face changes. I would have called it anger but truly it’s more of murderous rage.
He takes a step towards me. His voice is laced with menace as he commands, “Natalie. Put those down. You are not leaving.”
Instead of answering him, I run for all I’m worth.
He chases me and eventually his hand clamps around my upper arm and he jerks me back hard enough to make pain flare up my arm. Papers spill across the ground and I scramble to twist out of his hold so I can grab them. I manage to pull free and immediately feel his hand snag my hair and wrench my head back. Pain explodes along my scalp and I gasp.
“Enough,” he growls. Gone is the preacher’s cadence, replaced by something raw and vicious. “You will submit.” I tear free again, sprint towards the back of the house, towards the storm cellar, the one place that has always been my refuge.
I throw myself inside, slam the metal door shut and slide the bolt into place just as his weight crashes against the other side. I can hear our mild-mannered preacher cursing under his breath, the demon he kept hidden, now finally unleashed.
He pounds on the door, his screamed demands barely carrying through the thick steel door.
“Natalie,” he roars, “open this door. You don’t get to defy me. Not in my house. Not under God’s roof.” The cellar might be cold and damp, but it’s lit by a single bare bulb that flickers overhead, giving me just enough light to do what needs to be done to save myself and my unborn child. I slide down the wall to the floor, with my back pressed to the brick. My hands shake when I pull out the burner phone.
I type as fast as I can.
Me: He knows. I found it. Get me out. Now.
Above me, Jeremiah paces, his voice a distant snarl as he tries to figure out how to break through something that was designed to keep tornados and hurricanes out.
I press my free hand flat against my stomach.
“Daddy’s coming,” I whisper into the quiet room. Tears sting my eyes, even as my voice remains steady. “Hold on, baby. He won’t let us down.”
The bulb flickers again. The metal door shudders under his blows. I wait for the man I love to come and rescue me, clutching proof that Jeremiah killed his mother in one hand, and my future in the other, as I listen for the distant roar of incoming motorcycles. I only hope that Bear got the photo of the pregnancy test stick earlier and is already halfway to Sacramento.
Chapter 17
Bear
I can’t believe I’ve been in a holding pattern for three and a half weeks. Natalie wanted to do this and after I understood why, I couldn’t keep cock-blocking her. She told me this wasn’t just about money. From what we know David and Jeremiah had a hand in their mother’s death, and if she finds out it’s true, she won’t let them get away with that. Objecting to her wanting to find justice for the woman who was like a grandmother would have made me the worst kind of asshole imaginable. So, I got on board, tried to anticipate all the ways this could go wrong, helped her come up with plans and workarounds for every possible problem she might encounter and gave her my blessing. What else could I do?
If I’d had my way we would have handled this in a way that didn’t put her at their mercy. I would have preferred just giving the fuckers a dirt nap. It would have been a quiet, permanent way to solve the problem. I’m no cold-blooded killer but if it came to find out her foster father and his brother did kill their mother, I would have dropped them where they stood without a second thought and made damn sure no one ever found the bodies.
My second choice would have been going the legal route by involving lawyers, seeking search warrants, and subpoenas. I’d have sicced law enforcement on them in a heartbeat. If they couldn’t find enough evidence, I’d even have settled for charging him for something un-fucking-related, like tax evasion. As long as they ended up behind bars and couldn’t hurt the people I care about, I wouldn’t have given a shit. Either of those paths would’ve kept her out of danger.
But she dug her heels in, and once she made her decision, all I could do was support it. That’s what love is in my world—being there for someone, even when you don’t agree with their choices.
