Page 34 of Our Lips Are Sealed
“Scandals are bad for business, and when my uncle Trevor was alerted as to what was happening, he set out to clean things up,” Samuel replied. “The reports are there. You just have to look hard to see them. The only thing Mathis did at that time was keep what happened out of the public eye. Yes, he lied to you, but it wasn’t because he hid this. It was because of what happened later.”
Liam was almost scared to ask. “What in the hell happened later?”
“When we didn’t show up to meet my mom and Josie for the fireworks, they came to Haven and gathered us kids to take to Parkland Grounds. None of us returned until Simone was ready to bring Abe home from the hospital. My dad met us there. He was like a ghost, and just sat in a parlor chair, refusing to step further into the house.”
“Grief can rob people of who they are,” Liam tried to explain without sounding like an asshole. Or his father. “Sometimes they regain parts of their old selves, but honestly, they’re never really whole again.”
“Yeah, I get that.” Samuel blew out a breath, rubbing the palms of his hands on his legs as if he were oddly nervous. “On that first day back at Haven, Josie noticed a strange car in the driveway, and we all went outside in time to see Charlie coming out of the woods. He was still pretty bad off from being stabbed and was dragging a shovel, having gone out to the graveyard to bury Rebecca’s and Livy’s ashes.”
“Holy shit,” Liam let slip. “Why in the hell would he think it was okay to do something like that?
“I told you he was an idiot,” Samuel replied. “Earlier in the week, Mom had buried Laura Jean’s ashes in the same spot. It was a private thing, with only her and my dad, but she had mistakenly let my Uncle Trevor know what they were doing. He told Charlie, who wanted Rebecca and Livy to have the same honor. Trevor drove him out to Haven, thinking no one was home.”
When Liam had done his initial research, he’d found records of Charlie Fairweather, but nothing recent, and a horrible thought came to him.
“Did Ben kill his brother?”
“Don’t worry, the bastard lived again,” Samuel said, not bothering to hide his disappointment. “But yes, I think that’s what my dad wanted to do that day. He took one look at Charlie and lost his damn mind.”
Samuel’s lips curved in the corners. “Even my mother, the most forgiving woman in history, made no move to stop my dad from beating Charlie to near death. And they let us watch. The adults, I mean. All of us kids stood on the side porch, right in the spot where Laura Jean liked to paint, and silently stood witness. It was cathartic, in a way. A release we didn’t understand we needed.”
“So, where does Mathis come into play?”
“Trevor came back a few days later, demanding Toby and CeCe. Charlie was leaving for Texas, thinking his mother would support him since he’d been cut off financially, and he wanted the kids.”
“Ben didn’t let them go with him, did he?”
Samuel nodded. “It was awful. Simone was already grieving so much, but seeing CeCe begging to stay broke her. I think a part of her still hates my dad for doing what he did.”
“But why would he?” Liam asked. “Charlie sounds like the last person on earth that should be in charge of children. Even his own.”
“This is where Mathis comes in,” Samuel said, his voice flat. “Laura Jean had no will, and my dad had no claim to Evie, nor did Simone. Trevor told him Charlie was threatening to call social services. With Evie in such a fragile state, my dad didn’t want to chance it, so he sent the kids with him and had Mathis clean up the paperwork to keep Evie with us.”
“What did—“ Liam realized he was sitting on the edge of his seat and straightened. “What did Charlie do with Toby and CeCe?”
“He took them to Texas, like he said he would. My grandmother Helen was a different breed of woman, and I don’t mean that in a nice way. Charlie was always her favorite, and she let him and the kids live with her. However, once things were finalized regarding Evie, Simone pleaded for CeCe and Toby to come home.”
Samuel relaxed back on the couch, shaking his head. “My dad tried, but Helen wouldn’t let him near them. Then my mom went out there to talk some sense into Helen but got nowhere. At least she was able to see them, and they seemed happy.”
Outside, the sky darkened from the spring storms threatening on the horizon. The people on the beach scurried for shelter, but Liam ignored them, staring down at the paper filled withXmarks.
“Simone still had a hard time accepting it and didn’t stop trying to get them home,” Samuel continued. “That was when Toby and CeCe started calling Haven regularly, telling her how great things were in Texas. It seemed Charlie had gotten help and was doing much better. A few months later, the news came that Helen had died and left everything to Charlie. He inherited a villa down in St. Thomas and moved the kids there so they could have—in his words—a peaceful island life.”
“And did they?”
“Yeah, they even called once or twice to tell everyone how excited they were to be there. But after a while, the calls came less and less, and Simone stopped worrying and started focusing on rebuilding life at Haven.”
“Do you talk to Toby and CeCe much now?”
“No, we stay out of their lives, and they stay out of ours. Trevor keeps in touch with them every so often and told me once that Toby had gone to medical school in Grenada, while CeCe ended up studying to become a nurse,” Samuel said. “After all the shit they went through, I think life turned out pretty okay for them.”
Chapter 8
Imbecile.
Moron.
The absolute biggest dumbass in the known universe.
