Page 108 of Jagged Little Pieces

I can’t imagine how I would have coped without him. The woman I was back in Banta City is gone. She had to fade into the shadows if I ever wanted to claim Walla Walla. I’m no longer the fearless daddy’s girl from my youth or the timid mama’s girl like during my early adult life.

Thanks to Walla Walla, I’m someone new, and I really like the woman looking back at me in the mirror.

The funeral is terrible. Suzanne and Hunter travel to McMurdo Valley to support me. Even surrounded by my favorite people, I’m inconsolable as I watch the casket lowered. I cry so much I nearly faint.

Peter and Erik don’t speak to me at the funeral. The former has been openly hostile since the day I returned to the ranch. He even yelled at me once when I sat with Urick.

My father became upset until he saw Walla Walla literally chasing Peter away. Chuckling, he chose to ignore his son’s antics and instead told me stories about the Steel Berserkers from back when they were still finding their footing. That was one of my favorite visits with Urick.

My brothers can’t steal my memories. I doubt Erik even wants to, right now. He’s miserable to know he’ll never walk again. His girlfriend has dumped him. His mother won’t stop crying.

Though Erik barely shows any reaction when Urick’s will is read, Peter’s mother faints. Walla Walla gets a kick out of that, and his chuckles send Peter into a rage.

Later, the lawyer reassures me how this isn’t his first will reading to end in violence.

By then, I’ve learned I’m pregnant. My joy over carrying Walla Walla’s baby overshadows worries about my brothers. Yet, Peter is a man obsessed with what he believes was stolen from him.

My brother’s face is still busted up from the funeral when he shows up at the ranch to threaten Mack. When I watch the security footage later with Walla Walla, I sense my new husband is considering whether Peter needs to die.

By then, Mack’s living in the massive estate with his family. I’ve set up Erik in a comfortable house outside a city with top notch medical facilities. There’s room for his mom and a full-time caretaker. I also provide a monthly stipend and medical coverage to ensure he remains safe.

I help Erik out of pity rather than love. If he weren’t paralyzed, I’d have cut him off without a second thought. Yet, seeing him in the wheelchair reminds me of Urick at the end.

With Peter, I allow the lawyers to handle the issue. Hobo’s sister, Kourtney, uses her uber-bitch skills to make my brother bow.

Yet, Peter refuses to leave Canary Basin, finding a house nearby. He has money socked away from years of living in my father’s shadow.

More than once, I warn him how he’s putting his family’s future in jeopardy by pissing away his remaining wealth in losing battle.

My brother won’t be persuaded. I plan to ignore him. He isn’t a threat to me. Peter’s very aware of what would happen to him if I were harmed in any way.

Yet, one day, I’m at the ranch watching Mack work with his sons and grandsons. He’s teaching the youngest boys how to train a foal, just like Urick did with me.

I glance in the direction of the barracks and recall the men who once called it home. Some were like Mack, most weren’t.

A worry digs under my skin as I stroke my growing belly. My son will be born in the spring. He’ll be fragile in this sometimes-violent world. His existence nearly didn’t happen. Those ranch hands seemed insignificant against the Steel Berserkers’ power. They were beaten down and embarrassed. There was no reason to fear them, yet they nearly killed the man I love. Even after many of them died here, they refused to back down.

I know how my mother would handle a problem like Peter. Her method isn’t much different than Walla Walla’s. They refuse to turn away from the world’s ugliness, while I hid away from it for years.

No longer hiding, I won’t underestimate Peter. Though he may never dare to harm me, I can imagine a scenario where he might lash out at Mack or his family.

“Peter is unhinged,” I tell Walla Walla one night as we sit on the Pigsty’s back deck. “If he can’t have the ranch, he might burn it to the ground. If his sons can’t have power, he might steal our son’s future.”

Walla Walla’s a complicated man. Both rough and soft, he’s a ball of wonderful contradictions. He will be a tender father yet is perfectly capable of ending the lives of anyone who threatens his people.

Peter disappears during a trip to visit his lawyers in the city. The police claim he ran off. According to them, he checked into a room with an unknown woman.

His wife isn’t convinced. She makes accusations to the press. Things fester. Toward the end of my pregnancy, the police put out a statement suggesting Peter might have been the victim of a jealous husband. I can’t help wondering which one of the Steel Berserkers fed that idea to the local sheriff.

The back and forth between my sister-in-law and the police becomes background noise once I give birth to Rafael Folsom Carter.

My son arrives after a short, rather painless labor and delivery. He’s a gorgeous child with fair blond hair and big, blue eyes. Our boy is a solid ten pounds when born yet seems tiny in Walla Walla’s arms. I watch them from the hospital bed as the father falls instantly in love with his son. Without a doubt, these two will be inseparable.

My prediction isn’t wrong. Folsom is always in his daddy’s arms. First at the Pigsty, where we live until our boy is nearly a year old. Then, on the wild land where we build our gorgeous craftsman-style mansion complete with a supersized garage for Daddy’s bikes and state-of-the-art stables for Mommy’s horses.

Even before we settle into our new home, I learn I’m pregnant again.

“You really are in a hurry,” Coco teases when she hears the news.

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