Page 27 of Treasured
“Thunder Thighs, what’s going on?”
I pulled into Mary’s place, and a silver car bulleted out of the parking lot. I watched and waited till the dust settled and then retrieved Bruce. “Tomorrow, I’ll plant the bug. Have your wife and her CIA intel friends work fast.” I left the stroller and car seat and held Bruce to my chest.
“Why the sudden rush? Are you suspecting something?”
I shuffled Bruce while I retrieved the keys and said, “Maybe it’s nothing, but my gut instinct is she’s planning something.”
“With direct access, we should have everything on her drive within minutes. Trust me,” Mark said quickly.
I unlocked Mary’s place and locked up. “Good. I want you personally to check everything with Arthur Waterstone’s name on it.” I took Bruce to his crib and laid him down.
“Okay. Your girlfriend’s ex. We’ll be in touch when we figure it out.”
“Good,” I said, and I checked to make sure the baby monitor was on then slipped out of the room. Wanda had hired Arthur so she’d not directly deal with criminals, but those days were ending.
I still had an hour before Mary, so I made lemon-piccata chicken and pasta so she wouldn’t be hungry. Then I checked on amusement park times.
Perfect. There were later hours in the spring, which would give us enough time for Bruce to have fun while I guided his sexy mother around.
The idea of staying in Pittsburgh and spending every day with the two of them rushed into my heart like a small dream.
As the chicken baked, my phone rang, which woke Bruce up. He screamed. I answered my phone while rushing into the bedroom and picking him up. “Momma. Finally.”
“What’s going on? Do I hear a baby?”
I tapped his back like I remembered seeing people do when holding babies, and he calmed down while I brought him to the kitchen and grabbed one of the bottles. “I’m babysitting for my girlfriend.”
“And you’ve not brought her to me.”
Bruce suckled, and I took him to the couch to hold him as he drank. “Momma, did Devon ever explain why he suddenly left me all the shares of his company before he died? I remember his will was clear on it, and I never complained about the money, but I used to think my brother had a perfect life.”
My pulse raced. I’d had a gun held to my head and hadn’t blinked, but my mother still had this power over me. “He wasn’t perfect,” she said. “No one is. He hoped he’d guide Wanda to stay on the right path, but she stopped calling us after a while. I’ve been praying for her since you told me what Devon’s friends revealed.”
I closed my eyes. I’d not written a will. I’d just assumed whatever I had would go to my mother. Bruce giggled as he stared at me. “I should have come home sooner,” I said calmly.
“You needed to find yourself, and when you left, Wanda was still visiting. Don’t be hard on yourself.”
“I had blinders on when it came to my brother and Wanda,” I said like that was some answer. Seriously, my brother had trusted me, and so far, I’d failed his memory.
Owning my brother’s company with his fiancée was very different from what I had expected. When I had decided to come home from the service, I figured I would work with her because I knew people in the military and had connections that might be good for wanting new weapons.
Mark’s conversation had changed my goals. My mother just said, “You were a kid when he died, and you were serving your country.”
My skin prickled, but I tried to calm down as I asked, “Can I see his will again? I want to send it to my lawyers.”
“I’ll email you.”
“Thank you,” I said then hung up the phone.
On another day, I would have worked out at the gym for an hour. Today, though, I changed a diaper and settled on the floor to play while Bruce learned to stand up at his play table.
At three fifteen, the door opened, and Mary returned with a smile on her face that was clearly for Bruce.
He crawled over to her, and she hugged him. “How was your day?”
“We were good,” I said, but heat rose in my cheeks, too, the moment her lips met mine. I held them both for a moment then let them go and said, “I made us dinner.”
She let Bruce down and followed me into the kitchen. “Where are we going after?” Her gaze narrowed.
