Chains (3 page)

“Sorry. Don’t know her.”

“We’ll contact the attorney. Must be his next of kin.”

After questioning, they were allowed to leave. One of the deputies let Toby put the man’s mail in another brown paper evidence bag large enough to hold it, and said they would deal with it.

Toby didn’t want to see them wheel the man out. Fortunately, he didn’t have any pets.

When they closed the front door behind them, Logan turned to him, his hands resting on Toby’s shoulders.

“I’m sorry,” Logan quietly said, sounding, for once, like the man Toby had fallen in love with.

“For what?”

“For being an asshole the last few months. I don’t want to end up like that, alone and dead and the only reason someone figured it out was because the mail stacked up. I’m sorry. We can go to counseling, if you still want to. I love you, and I don’t want to lose you.”

Toby threw his arms around him. “I think that’s the best thing I’ve heard in the past six months. And I love you, too.”

* * * *

Normally, neither of them were heavy drinkers. But that morning, they both needed something after what they’d seen.

And smelled.

And now they knew what they needed to do, which was rebuild that shattered bridge between them. After they grabbed a shower to sort of symbolically restart their day on a more positive note, Toby made them a pitcher of mimosas while Logan prepared an omelet.

They took everything outside onto their screened lanai and talked.

And talked.

And drank, but they mostly talked.

Hope returned to Toby’s soul as Logan admitted he felt guilty about bringing Julie into their lives, only for her to betray them.

“You were so good about everything,” he said. “You agreed to trying poly, to letting her into our lives, and then she did…that. I feel like this is all my fault.”

“Hey, I was willing,” Toby said. “Don’t shoulder this burden alone. I fell for her, too. It wasn’t like you had to force me into it. You know I’m bi, just like you. I thought she was our unicorn, I really did.” He reached over and took his partner’s hand. “She just wasn’t the right unicorn for us.”

Logan let out a snort. “She was a goat masquerading as a unicorn.”

“Hey, that’s an insult to goats.”

Logan finally smiled. A genuine, pain-free smile.

The first one of those Toby had seen on his face since…
then
.

The
day.

The day their lives turned upside down and everything they thought they knew was questioned.

The loss of trust.

“I really want us to be okay,” Toby said. “I love you.”

“I love you, too. And if you can forgive me for being a jackass, and I haven’t totally screwed us up yet, I’d like another chance.”

* * * *

“You haven’t screwed us up,” Toby said. “And you’re not a jackass.”

Logan felt like a jackass. That morning’s discovery right next door, however, had rattled him to his core.

Life was too damn short. He didn’t want to waste another day. Especially not when he had a damn good guy by his side to share life with.

A guy he loved.

“So, date night tonight?” Logan asked.

Toby smiled, his handsome blue eyes lighting up. “We haven’t had a date night in months.”

“I know. I feel badly about that, too. I haven’t felt like going out much.”

“Sigalo’s tonight?”

“Sure. It’ll be good to see the gang.” They hadn’t even been out to the club in months. The first few times they had, it painfully reminded them of Julie and what she’d done to them. Add to that people who had no clue what had happened asking where she was…

It was a painful situation.

“I’ll text Loren and make sure that’s still happening,” Toby said.

“And we can go to the club after.”

Toby’s smile widened to a grin. “Really?”

“Really. I know we won’t play, but I miss our friends.”

Toby leaned in and kissed him. “I really missed you most of all.”

“I missed me, too.” He laced fingers with Toby, stroking his thumb across the other man’s hand. “If I let what she did to us ruin our life, our happiness, who we are, then she’s won. I choose not to be chained to her anymore.”

Toby lifted their hands to his mouth, kissing the back of Logan’s. “Thank you.”

He smirked. “Sure, you thank me
now
. Wait until I feel like playing again.”

“Maybe tonight after the club?” He waggled his eyebrows at Logan in a playful way, another aspect of their relationship that had been missing.

The fun.

“Maybe. If someone’s a good boy.” Between them, Logan was more dominant, even though they didn’t have a formal dynamic. And he was a bit of a playful sadist. Toby was a masochistic switch, which was why when submissive masochist Julie came into their lives, it seemed like a perfect match for them all.

“And I want to put it out there on the table that if we do meet another woman who we click with, I’m okay with exploring things.” Toby lowered their hands. “This time, we won’t let her have access to our bank account.”

“Damn straight,” Logan agreed. “Play only, at first. Or sex. She’ll have to prove herself before we take it any farther than that.”

“Agreed.”

Julie wasn’t the first woman they’d shared, or the first woman they’d played with.

But she was the first woman they’d felt a stronger, closer bond with.

Enough so that they’d moved her in with them when her roommate moved out, leaving her unable to pay her rent when she couldn’t find another roommate in time.

In retrospect, they knew that should have been a red flag, but they’d been so eager to help, to rescue the damsel in distress, that they’d ignored all the red flags.

After breakfast, they finished off the mimosas and headed into the backyard to work on their garden.

Logan was relieved to hear Toby humming, to see the change in him. That he’d relaxed, and not just because of the drinks. But genuinely happy.

He knew he’d been so wrapped up in his own pain and guilt lately that he’d neglected Toby, sinking deeper and deeper into a spinning cycle with no end.

That stops now. Today. It’s me and my guy. Julie can go fall off the face of the earth, for all I care.

Rebecca was having a very brisk day of sales. Even by Saturday standards, it was busy. She’d sold two of her more expensive pieces, as well as took deposits on three custom pieces.

It would easily take her a week or longer to get caught up at the current rate, which was a problem she definitely didn’t mind having.

Feast or famine.

She’d take the feast any day.

When she heard her cell phone ringing in her messenger bag, she ignored it the first time. She had several people browsing and didn’t want to take her focus off them for fear of appearing rude…or giving anyone a chance to walk off with something.

When it rang a second time fifteen minutes later, she still didn’t look at it.

The third time it rang ten minutes later, she had enough time to reach into her bag and grab it, glancing at the screen to see the three missed calls were from Eliza before she slipped the phone into a pocket on the front of her wench’s skirt so she could greet a customer who’d just walked up.

Then an alert for a text message, Eliza’s custom tone.

Finally, a half hour later, the joust was in session and Rebecca remembered the phone calls. Eliza had left voice messages, but the text said
CALL ME
in all caps.

A dark cloud shifted over her.
Couldn’t be about Sam, could it?

She called Eliza rather than wasting time listening to the messages.

“Hey, what’s going on?”

“Did you listen to my messages?”

“No, I’m swamped with this fair. What’s wrong?”

It sounded like Eliza had to take a deep breath. “Honey, there’s no easy way to say this, but your Uncle Jackson has died.”

Rebecca sank into her chair. “How? What happened?”

“Well, apparently he died maybe a couple of weeks ago, they don’t know for sure yet. His neighbors found him. The mailman had told them his mailbox was full, so they went over to check on him and then called the cops. His attorney just left here a little while ago. Your uncle had an envelope on his refrigerator with the guy’s name on it and yours. You’re the executor of his estate.”

“
Me
?” She was still trying to digest the news her uncle had passed. She hadn’t seen him in six years, but they usually talked a couple of times a month. He always called her, because he didn’t have an answering machine or voice mail. The man was very old-fashioned and technophobic.

Now she felt guilty she hadn’t tried to call him.

Jackson had been the eldest of three brothers, and the black sheep of the family. Never married, he’d pretty much cut himself off from everyone else, except, for some reason, Rebecca. She remembered as a kid going over to his place and getting to drive his tractor, thinking it was fun to mow the property.

He’d also been the one who, when he found out Rebecca was divorcing Sam, volunteered to front the money to her for the divorce proceedings. She’d paid him back in less than a year, but they’d remained reasonably close, when compared to his relationship with the rest of his family.

He’d retired from the military and purchased his property, living on his pension and buying and selling antique farm equipment at various shows.

Great.

“You still there?” Eliza asked.

“Yeah.”

“I’ll text you the attorney’s information. He asked me to have you call him.”

“Why didn’t he call me directly?”

“Your uncle didn’t list your phone number. He listed my address, which is why the attorney came by. And that’s why I’ve been trying to call you, while he was here. And you gave me specific orders to never give our your number. Duh.”

“I…”
Shit
. “I’ve got a show. I’m here the next two weekends.”

“Drive back. Leave the RV parked there and come stay with us. Booger misses Chewi anyway, I think.”

Their bulldog had been enamored with Chewi from the first time they met. Love at first lick.

“Okay.” She eyed a group of people approaching her tent. “Listen, I need to go. I’ve got customers coming. Please call the guy back for me and tell him I’ll call him tonight and talk to him. And yes, you can give him my number. The earliest I can get down there is Monday night.”

“Will do.”

She ended the call and slipped her phone back into her pocket. She didn’t want to think about this right now. She didn’t want to break down crying here.

Stuffing her emotions into her pocket as well, she forced a cheery smile as a group of several women gathered around her display.

“Afternoon, m’ladies. Lovely day, ’tis not?”

* * * *

It was when Rebecca was packing at the end of the day that she remembered what she’d struggled so hard not to think about all day.

Her uncle.

Dammit.

Eliza had texted her the attorney’s info. After packing and returning to the RV, she grabbed a quick shower. With Chewi curled up on the sofa next to her, she called the man.

“Hi, Mr. Payne? This is Rebecca Hames. My friend Eliza said you’re my uncle’s attorney.”

“Yes, she explained you were out of town. I’m sorry to have to be the bearer of bad news…”

By the time she got off the phone with Ed Payne nearly an hour later, she had a page of notes typed on her iPad and felt both stunned and emotionally drained. Yes, her uncle had left everything to her. The property, his bank accounts, she was listed on his insurance as the beneficiary, his military benefits—everything.

The attorney said that while the house was hoarded, it wasn’t a worst-case scenario. He had friends who ran a disaster recovery business, and one of them had gone in wearing protective gear to assess the house. He’d located where her uncle had kept bank statements and other records in a desk in the living room. The last bank statement listed accumulated balances of over one hundred and ninety thousand dollars, and there would be a life insurance policy to file a claim on as well for over two hundred thousand dollars, in addition to a few other things, like a retirement portfolio account.

And then there was the property.

The estimate for clean-up would be around ten thousand dollars, give or take, or she could agree to a film crew documenting the process and the production company would cover much of the expenses. But that the clean-up couldn’t go forward without her there to look at stuff to see what she wanted kept or salvaged from the property.

Not only did she now have a chunk of property tying her down, she was financially secure—really secure—for the first time in her adult life.

The retirement account and other things would have to go through probate, but since her uncle had put her name on the bank accounts and on the property, which he owned free and clear, she could access those at any time.

She stared at Chewi. “Guess you can keep eating the good kibble, buddy.”

He sniffed at her without raising his head.

* * * *

After Rebecca made herself a cup of chamomile tea to calm her nerves, she made the call she really dreaded—to her father. She had completely brainfarted on calling him earlier, between trying to run her booth at the show and deal with the emotional blow.

“Hey, sweetheart. What’s up?”

“I have some bad news for you, Dad.” She gave him the short version, the little that she knew.

He went silent for so long she had to look to see if the call had dropped.

“You still there?” she asked.

“Yeah,” he said, sounding somber. “Sorry. I guess I always thought we’d reconcile.” Her father was the youngest brother. The last time Jackson had seen his two brothers was at their mother’s funeral twenty years earlier. Their father had died the year before her.

Rebecca had been old enough to drive and still visit her uncle, but back then his house, while looking like a bachelor lived there, hadn’t been hoarded. Yes, he’d had lots of stuff stacked in the spare bedrooms, but nothing like the attorney had described to her on the phone.