Chapter 1
It had been three days of no calls from someone who hadn’t said anything.He was happy.Zander didn’t want to have to change his phone number and go through all of that, but he would have if it had kept up.He was sick of getting them all hours of the day and night without anyone saying anything to him when he spoke.Most of the time, he would only say his last name, but they should have been answering when he said that.It was the least they could have done when they were calling him.Hopefully, he’d not have to worry about it again, and for that, he was thrilled.
He was going over some contracts for the family when Knox called him.They usually worked in the same building, both being lawyers for the family, but today he was having a shake-down of their new camper with his wife, and he’d asked for the day off.He was happy for Knox and Elaine.If anyone deserved some time off, it was the two of them.He leaned back in his chair to listen to his brother have a conversation with whom he could only assume was Elaine.
“ I’m sure I have it right.It says right on the box where it’s supposed to be plugged in.Didn’t we plug it in here the last time we used the camper?”He didn’t know what the other person was saying, but it must have been something along the lines of not knowing.“ I’m sure that I had to plug it into this.If not, then I have no idea where it belongs.I knew I should have taken pictures of the things that we were using.”
“ Hello, Knox.”The laughter on the other end had him smiling.“ While I’m thrilled that you are having fun, I don’t know where the plug goes either.What did you want?”
“ I’m sorry about that.I get caught up in things when they’re happening.I wanted to ask you if you’d gotten around to signing off on the contract from the bean company?They just called me to see if you’d gotten around to it.Is that one of the contracts that you decided to dump?I know there was one of them, but I don’t remember which one it was.”He said that they were dumping the coffee project.“ That’s the one with beans.I remember now.They wanted to buy land in another country and grow their own beans for coffee.”
“ That’s it.They should have gotten their contract back yesterday, about us not wanting to take them on as an investment.I sent it by courier, and they signed for it yesterday.Sounds to me like they’re trying to play us off one another.”Knox said he wasn’t surprised by that.They’d told him that he was their last hope.“ I don’t know how they expected anyone to finance their venture.It would be hard enough to buy the land, but getting the coffee beans to grow and then be picked would be expensive.I’m glad you did the search on them before it got too far.”
“ I am as well.”There was a shuffling noise and then silence.He wondered if Knox had gone into his office and shut the door.As soon as he began speaking again, he knew that was what he’d done.“ Did you hear about Allen Sharp?He was killed this morning when breakfast was being served.Something about him not liking the seats that were left over for him to sit at, and he got pissed.I guess it took them about an hour to figure out that he’d been stabbed three times before he was killed.”
“ I did hear about it, but I don’t think that anyone has told Carrie yet.She’ll be all right with the news if I know her very well.I know she’s been sleeping better since he and the others had been put in prison awaiting trial.”Knox said that he could tell her tonight, but was afraid that she’d hear about it through the grapevine, and that wouldn’t be good.
Six months ago, Carrie Sharp had been working three jobs and taking care of her mother by herself.She had five brothers and three sisters who were about as bad as they came.They would beat her for her mother’s social security check each month, telling Carrie she was going to have to do better for them to have the money.It was difficult enough for her to buy her mother’s meds, much less put food on the table for the two of them at the same time.Allen had been by far the worst of them, andhe’d beaten Carrie so bad once that she’d been in the hospital for a month and couldn’t have children because of it.
They were all in prison now because they had forged the checks that had come to their mother and had beaten her up.Mrs.Sharp had end-stage Alzheimer’s and was doing much better being in a nursing home where she could get round-the-clock care.Carrie worked for the family by writing programs and teaching people how to order their groceries online.She’d been terrified that some of her family would have gotten out of prison and killed her.That was what Allen had promised her the last day of court, which had sent him away.
“ I can go over and tell her.I need to look some things up anyway.”No doubt about how to use the plug that he had no idea where it went.“ There are days when I can’t believe that we bought ourselves a camper to see the country with and not have any idea what we’re doing.”
“ You’ll get it, I’m sure.You’ve only had it about a month now, right?”He said they’d gotten it exactly one month ago.“ I think you’re doing fine.Better than I would have.I’d have given up on the second day that I had it.You guys have camped in it how many times now?”
“ Four.We’re getting better.This time, we decided to take it all down like we’re moving and see if we could hook it up on our own.That didn’t work out as well as we hoped.”Then he laughed.“ But we’re having a blast, and that’s what we bought it for.Who are you taking to the house tomorrow for Thanksgiving?You have a plus one invitation, correct?”
“ I’m bringing Carrie.If she still wants to come after you talk to her.”He said she’d be relieved about him being dead.“ I’m sure she will be, but he’s still her brother, and she might be a little upset.”
“ I don’t know.I know that I’d be devastated if anything were to happen to any of you guys.”He would as well and told him that.“ I’m going to be leaving here soon.I do have to look up where the plug goes, and then we can decide if we need a couple more shakedowns.It’s going to be fun if we ever figure this out.But that’s fun as well.I’ll tell you what she said, and if you want, I’ll ask her about tomorrow.”He said he’d call her later.
Carrie was a good friend of the family.Unlike what any of his brothers wanted, she wasn’t going to be his wife.The other five had fallen in love with their wives within hours of meeting them.He and Carrie didn’t have that kind of relationship, and he was sort of sad about it.She really was nice, and he did love her, but more like a sister than anything else.
Going on with his work, he was finished up by five o’clock.He might have been done sooner, but Carrie had called him, telling him that Allen had been killed.Like he figured, she didn’t seem that upset with what had happened, and he was glad for her.She was still going with him to the family Thanksgiving at Locke’s house tomorrow, and he was happy for that.She was fun to be around, and she had a good sense of humor about herself.He did love her like he’d said, but it was more like she was his sister than anything else.
Tomorrow, he was going to get his fill of food.Not that he didn’t under normal circumstances, but since it was being catered, he didn’t have to worry about having leftovers.He was thrilled that there were going to be other things other than turkey.He didn’t care for it and was happy that Alex, Locke’s wife, was going to have things like lasagna, too.He could eat his weight in that stuff and didn’t care if they made fun of him while he did it.
On his way home, he thought of Carrie.He’d been doing that a lot since she’d come into their lives.He just couldn’t get past the point where she felt like nothing to him that would make him think that he was madly in love with her, like his brothers did with their wives.He liked her a great deal, but nothing romantic at all.As soon as he got home, he decided that he was going to run for a while and changed into his jogging clothes.It was the perfect night out for a good long run, and he couldn’t wait to get started.
He was nearly home again when he heard from August.Like Knox, he wanted to make sure that he knew that Allen had been killed.He told him that he knew now and was happy for it.He told him that even Carrie seemed to be happy about the turn of events, and he was happy for her as well.He asked him if he’d run into many people while out running.
“ It was busy out.I’m not going to lie to you.It would have been better if there weren’t stupid people out driving.Last-minute deals on food for tomorrow made the grocery store busier than normal, too.Their parking lot was full when I went by it.”He asked if he was driving or walking over tomorrow.“ Driving.I’ll have to pick up Carrie, and I don’t want her to get slush on her clothing.”
“ I’m going to walk.Jack said that we’ll both need it after getting our fill, and I believe her.The same people who catered the Fourth of July are doing the food for Thanksgiving, and I’m excited for that.They make a great peanut butter pie that I love.”He asked him if he ever thought about anything other than food.“ Sure.I think about desserts and drinks to go with my food, too.”
They both laughed, and August said he’d let him go and would see him tomorrow.Dinner was at five, but they were all supposed to show up at three.There would be finger food.He wanted real food, but could understand the need for little food too.There would be a lot of kids at the dinner, and they might not make it until dinner.He might not either, so he was looking forward to having something that he could munch on with the kids.He loved his nephews and niece very much.
Going to bed early, he wanted to go over the contracts for the new firm they were hiring in the morning, before going to his brothers’.It wasn’t necessary to go over right away, but he hated to leave things last minute.January tenth was coming up fast to him, and he didn’t want to leave things undone.Something might happen to him, and he didn’t want anything to happen to the business if he was laid up.
At a quarter after three, he was picking up Carrie.She’d been running behind all morning and wasn’t going to be ready by the three o’clock hour.He was fine with that.She’d called the family to let them know she was the one causing Zander to be late, and they were all right with it.Apparently, she’d been to see her mom at the nursing home, and she’d not had a good visit.As soon as she got into his car, she started apologizing to him.
“ She didn’t know me today, and I had such good news for her.I honestly didn’t know how she’d take one of her children being dead, but I knew she was still having nightmares about Allen getting to her when she was with us.”He asked her if she got to tell her.“ I did end up telling her.She knew who he was if the fear on her face was any indication.They told me there that she still has nightmares where she wakes up screaming that he’s got her.I know how she feels.I do the same thing myself.”
“ I can’t imagine being so afraid of someone that you’d wish them dead.Especially when it’s family.”She said she’d never wish him to suffer, even though he did make people suffer when they didn’t do what he wanted.“ I’d die if something were to happen to one of my brothers.Or their wives.It would devastate me if that were to happen.”
“ You guys are incredibly close.I don’t think I’ve ever seen a family as close as you guys are.It’s wonderful to see, and sometimes I get really jealous about it.”He told her that she had his family, too.“ I know.I don’t know what I would have done without them around all this time.I know for sure that I wouldn’t have my mom in that nursing home.I wouldn’t have been able to do it with them taking her checks each month.You also made it so that I could hide out, too, and if that hadn’t happened, I’d be dead for sure.Those last weeks that Allen hadn’t been arrested yet were the scariest times of my life.Just knowing that he was out there looking for me—and Syble, she would have turned me over to him had she been able to find me too—it gave me nightmares even during the day.I still think about how he said he was going to kill me while in the courtroom, and I nearly wet myself thinking about it.But he was put away, thanks to you and your family, and I can’t thank you enough.”
Dinner was epic.There was so much food that he was able to get his fill and have leftovers to take home as well.He’d be eating lasagna for a month daily if not for his family, and he was delighted about that.He even enjoyed the finger food with the kids.They thought of him as their greatest uncle because he told them he was.Laughing hard, he wondered what he’d do if the right woman came along and snatched him up.He thought that he’d still be the greatest uncle of all time because he’d make sure that he was.
