Legal Heirs - Box Set Edition: Books 5-8 (Surrendering Charlotte Chronicles) (44 page)

“I love you too, Atti, you’ve got my back, right? If Mom goes on a rampage about college? Okay, see you soon.”

*

Hadley sat back in her chair and closed the script that lay open in front of her. She couldn’t remember the last time she’d had anything to eat—days on the set were grueling. She arrived at dawn, slept in the chair while her hair and makeup were done, rehearsed and shot her scenes, and napped in her trailer when she had ten minutes free. It was the hardest thing she had ever done and she loved it, but she missed Holden terribly. He had to be back at the Naval Academy in a week and his father had insisted he fly to New York to visit Mia.

Alexander Bly liked to keep a tight rein on his children, although he given up on trying to control Atticus a long time ago. Anyway, Mia was at an extended stay spa according to Alex Bly, but Hadley knew that was code for some kind of intervention most likely.

Oh, Holden
, just thinking about him made her wet and needy. She had become addicted to him and his beautiful sea-glass colored eyes and that huge, magical cock of his. He’d only been gone a few days and she’d already worn dark sunglasses into a Brookstone store at the mall to buy a personal vibrator. He had unearthed a vein of sexual desire in her that she never dreamed existed.

“Hadley, are you busy? I need a moment of your time please, doll.” Sammy, her personal assistant tapped on the door and she told him to come in. “Hey, Hads, I’d like you to meet the set’s technical advisor. This is Reef Townsend and he’s yours for as long as you need him. Anything you ever or never wanted to know about motorcycle gangs, he’s your man. By the way, the producers are in a big fight with the director, so you’ve got a couple of hours free. Have fun, kids, toodles!”

“Hi, I’m Hadley Hale. You’re Reef? Your name is Reef, like a coral reef? I’m not sure if I heard it right,” Hadley said.

“You heard it right. My name is Reef, short for Reefer,” he said and she understood immediately the meaning of a man’s voice being dark and dangerous.

“Reefer? Like… marijuana?”

“You got it, Hadley Hale. Just like that barely legal weed. My parents were hippies, and I’d be willing to bet they were stoned when they named me.”

“They were hippies, what are they now?” she asked, and wondered why the hell she sounded like some little girl who still wore a training bra rather than the lead in a major movie.

“Now they’re
old
hippies. What would you like me to teach you about bikes and bike clubs?” he asked, and he took a cigarette out of a pack then looked in her eyes and crushed it in his fingers.

“You’re funny,” she said. She was feeling more like herself, more in control as she recognized the unmistakable glint in his eye. “But, funny in a scary, who knows when you might slit my throat sort of way.”

“I would never slit your pretty throat, but there are things I can teach you… and you’ll want me to.”

That stopped her from uttering a single word for the next five minutes. She finally realized her mouth was hanging open when he laughed and scratched the short blonde stubble on his chin. She needed to tell him to leave so she could lie on the sofa and call Holden. The man standing in front of her was older than she was, probably twenty-three or -four, and he was
way
too sexy. He was rough and rugged and wild looking, with tousled blonde hair and eyes that moved leisurely over every curve of her body, and he didn’t try to hide it. She could tell it wasn’t because she was a woman on the verge of success. He looked at her like a lion sizing up his prey, and he very much liked what he saw. He made her think he could easily capture and devour her, without a hint of remorse, and the scariest part was, she was afraid she might let him.

“Okay,” she said, pulling herself together and doing some major acting so that she seemed calm and cool. “Teach me about the life of a biker chick, that’s my role in this movie. I know a few things about motorcycles, like, Harleys are cool, Ducati’s are for rich old men, and any other bike is unacceptable. So, you wanna get a cup of coffee, a bite of lunch, or whatever? We can sit and go over the parts of the script I need help with.”

“Sure,” he said, and when they stepped outside her trailer he smiled a killer smile and handed her a motorcycle helmet.

*

Finn and Charlotte had relived their honeymoon in Villefranche-sur-Mer. They stayed for a month, until the symptoms of Finn’s disease began to make themselves known. Charlotte didn’t notice them, she was too happy. She felt completely free, she said, for the first time in ages. Finn hid the signs well, he made excuses for his forgetfulness and occasional loss of balance. He didn’t tell her about the constant ringing in his ears and the feeling of waves sloshing in his head, or the tingling, followed by numbness that caught him unaware. Charlotte had insisted on getting another small tattoo, a second heart that looped through the first one. The original heart, tattooed low on her left hip, had Finn’s name inside, and the new one proclaimed, “
My love
.”

Back home in San Diego, Finn saw his doctor and with a saddened sigh he was told he had been lucky so far, but the end was in sight. He was given the number for hospice. They would come to his home, kind-hearted caretakers, with gentle hands and plenty of morphine. Finn crumpled the paper into his pocket and went home to tell Charlotte that he would love her until the end of time.

“Hey, you brought wine and chocolate soufflés, what’s the occasion, my love? Not ready to give up on our honeymoon just yet? That’s good, neither am I, you know. It’s like a whole new fire has been kindled inside me. I don’t think I’ll ever get enough of you, Finnegan, isn’t that crazy?” she said, as he pulled her to him and covered her mouth with a kiss so passionate it left them limp and clinging to one another when it finally ended. “Whoa! You always surprise me, am I the absolute luckiest woman, or what? Okay, I’ll get the wineglasses. It’s so gorgeous out tonight, let’s sit on the porch. We should talk about Hadley, she said something about this biker guy she’s met; he sounds like trouble.”

“My love, listen to me, this is important. Do you love me, do you trust me?” Finn asked. He held her face in his hands, caressing her cheek, his fingertips lingering on her lips.

“Yes, my love, always. What is it Finn, what’s happening? Something’s changed, you’re scaring me.”

“No, don’t be afraid, Charlotte. Your heart is safe with me, that can’t change.”

“Alright,” she said, her arms circling his broad shoulders, her hands at the back of his neck, clinging to him. He held her fiercely, pressing her body into his as if he were trying to memorize every little nuance of his Charlotte.

“Just let me be sure Charlie is safe and sound in his bed, and all’s right in our fine little world. Here, find one of our special songs on my iPod,” she said, smiling as she backed away, holding onto him until the very last moment, her eyes never leaving his. “Don’t leave, stay here and I’ll come right back to you. Wait for me, my love.”

He sat on the front porch step, searching for a certain song, with the majesty of the California evening spread out around him. The stars blinked on in the inky sky as if God had flipped a celestial switch, and the whoosh of the great blue Pacific whispered through the canyons. Dogs barked, a last flutter of wings as sparrows settled into branches, the smells of cooking and laughter from neighboring houses, so sublimely simple. He closed his eyes and leaned back on his elbows and Charlotte’s voice wafted out an open window then mingled and became part of the night as the song began to play.

“
Tonight looking back on all this life, funny how the time goes by, and how sometimes it slides away. Time sliding through the dead of night, you shake until you start to cry, your eyes won’t dry, ‘til light of day. And sleep away, don’t let it go, don’t let it fade, your dreams may cave, and falling apart is the only way, we go so low, when you don’t know… I will… I will. If you go, take a little piece of me, hang it by the place you sleep, and dream of me
.”

END

THE HEIRS ORIGINS:

Atticus – Charlotte and Alexander Bly

Hadley – Charlotte and Finn Hale

Holden and Mia – Alexander Bly and Maddie

Jack and Ava – JP Thomas and Amanda Bly

Skyler – JP Thomas and Lizzie

Beau – (Elliot) West and Lizzie

Vivi – Billy Kipling

Matilda and Cuatro – Belinda Rhodes

Keller – Jude Hale and Meg

Milo – Maddie and Spencer Beck

Charlie – Charlotte and Finn Hale

Coming Early Summer…

LEGAL LEGACY…Surrender Charlotte

(Surrendering Charlotte Chronicles Book 9)

**
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