The Inheritance (Forever Bound #1) (10 page)

Damian: I take your busy tonight. No worries! We can do it some other night.

Damian: Charity, are you going to at least respond to my messages?

Tiffany: Hey, Sis…long time no hear. Hope all is well with you. I have a vacation coming up next

month, and I thought I would come to Maine. Let me know if that works for you. Love ya!

Damian: This is my last message tonight. Let me know that everything is alright. Sleep tight!

She sighed, looking up from the phone. Derek had pulled out of the driveway and was long gone. She put her phone on the passenger seat and started her car. She drove away from his house and thought about what she planned on saying to him. Spending time at Jesse’s house made her wonder if spending so much time with Damian was really the smart thing to do. Sure, before she met him she was open to hanging out with multiple guys, but deciding to focus on one man seemed too much of a commitment. Then meeting Derek and fully getting to know him, made her question everything. Was she really interested in a
friend with benefits
package? Or, did she want more? She turned onto her street and went a few blocks before pulling into her apartment complex and weaving her way through her building. She parked in her parking spot but didn’t move.

She sat in the car for a while, just staring ahead. “Why do things have to be so complicated?” she asked out loud. She heard her cell phone go off with another text, and she glanced at it from her seat.

Ana: I’m sorry for throwing this night at you. I hope you’re not too angry.

She smiled at the message and picked it up from the passenger seat.

Charity: Not angry at all. I had fun. Call me tomorrow!

She then put in Tiffany’s number and typed in a message.

Charity: I would love to see you. Can’t wait!!

She scrolled through the messages and stared at Damian’s name. In a heartbeat, just twenty-four hours earlier she would’ve jumped at the chance to see him and probably paid a late night visit to his house. Now, she just wanted to go into her apartment and crash in her own bedroom. She hit reply to his latest message.

Charity: Been a long day. Have a good night!

She got out of her car and walked up the stairs to her apartment, unlocked the door, and entered her empty apartment. For the first time, the quiet was actually inviting. She tossed her purse on her couch and went to her bedroom. Before she laid down, a message lit up her phone.

Damian: Thought you were giving me the silent treatment. If you’re stressed…I know how to destress

you.

She put her phone down on her nightstand and didn’t respond to his message. It was best to make sure a little space was between them…at least for now.

Charity woke up early the next day so she could work on her resume. It'd been a long time since she had to put one together, that she forgot how draining it could be. When she finished it, she looked it over and inwardly groaned in disgust. It seemed so minute to what Mayor Derek Worthington would probably be interested in. She wanted to come across as the textbook candidate, and yet she felt more like a child applying for an elite job. She was way out of her element.

“There’s nothing else I can do to make it any better,” she mumbled, placing a clean copy into her folder. Her stomach growled, signaling it was time for her to eat. She’d been going gung-ho on her resume that she nearly forgot it was past lunch time. “I hear ya,” she replied with a laugh.

She got up from the kitchen table and went over to her refrigerator. She opened it up to find that the only thing she could lunch on was a piece of cheese and a cup of milk. She groaned. It's been a while since she had gone to the grocery store. She shut the refrigerator and grabbed her purse and keys, then left the house to go do some much-needed grocery shopping. She opted for the closest grocery store to her house. She pulled into the parking lot. It was dead for the most part, so she would be able to get in and out. She hurried into the store and grabbed a shopping cart and started with the first aisle. She threw in things that were easy to fix and wouldn’t require a lot of prep time. She reached the frozen aisle and grabbed some French fries, vegetables, and pizza, then whipped around to the next aisle, when she bumped into another cart.

“Sorry!” she mumbled.

“Charity?” She looked up into the eyes of Damian.

“Damian? What are you doing here?” She stared at him, and he held a smug smile on his face.

“What does it look like? I’m grocery shopping.”

She folded her arms in front of her, feeling like something sketchy was going on. “You came to a town that you don’t even live in to do your grocery shopping? Seems a little fishy to me.”

He shook his head. “I have a party I’m catering that is two blocks away. I forgot to get a few items. That’s all. Why? What do you think’s going on?”

“I’m thinking you’re following me.”

He laughed. “You're full of it, you know that?” She looked away from his wandering eyes. “Do you think I put a GPS tracker on your phone?” She didn’t say anything, just looked back into his general direction. She kept her eyes away from his. “Wow…you must think I’m an ass. Don’t worry, sweetheart, I didn’t track your phone. I seriously had other things on my mind. Besides, I think you made yourself perfectly clear by not responding to my last text last night.”

“I was tired,” she replied casually, shrugging. “Besides I didn’t think this type of relationship demanded mandatory…” she glanced around the grocery store to find them alone, before saying, “sex.”

“Right! I’m not going to pressure you into doing something you clearly don’t want to do. All you had to do was be honest. That’s all I asked.”

“Get over it, Damian. We knew what this relationship was the minute we brought it up. We know where we stand with each other, right?”

He nodded. “I suppose we do.”

Without trying to pursue her further, he moved past her, ignoring her like she was just another shopper. She stood there, stunned. She didn’t know why Damian was taking it so seriously, but clearly there was a different understanding from him, than from her. He seemed angered that she didn’t come over to his place, and she couldn’t even talk some sense into him, because he was already halfway out of the store.

She stared at her shopping cart that was only half full, suddenly not in the mood to continue shopping. She went to the checkout and paid for her items, then carried her three bags to the car. She fumbled with her trunk, but finally got it open and shoved the bags into the bag. Her phone started ringing, and she fished it out of her purse.

“Hello?”

“Hey, Charity. I was just seeing if you could come over about ten thirty to help out? You can arrive at my apartment, and we’ll load up the vehicles. We might only need a few trips.” Charity didn’t respond, at first. She stared out the window and saw Damian walking to a truck, pushing his cart. “Charity? Still there?”

“Uh…yeah, I’m here. Tomorrow…I’ll be there.”

“Great! Thank you so much.” Before she hung up, she added, “I don’t want you to think I’m hiding anything else from you, but Jesse is going to see if Derek can help, too. Are you alright with that?”

Charity laughed under her breath. She watched Damian pull out of the parking lot. “That would be fine. See you then!” Charity hung up the phone and sat there for a long time. She needed to get home before some of the food melted, so she turned the car on and pulled out of the parking spot. She hoped she did the right thing letting him go.

***

Derek sat at his computer in the den. He had to focus on what the next steps of the project would be, should he have to postpone it for a while. The idea bothered him, but eventually he needed to come to that understanding. He shot emails back and forth between Ted, Ray, and himself. It was when he received a call from Lily that put things into perspective. He answered the phone. “This is Derek.”

“Did you get the email I sent you?” she asked. He looked down at his emails. Unless he accidentally deleted it, he didn’t know what she was talking about.

“No, I’ve been on my email all day and haven’t seen anything coming through.”

“Hmmm…that’s strange,” she mumbled on the other end of the call. “I’ll resend it. I was wondering why you didn’t respond. Give me a sec.” There was a long pause, before she said, “I resent it. Let me know when you get it.”

While he was waiting, he asked, “Hey, are you at the office? It’s Saturday.”

“I know. I have a ton of things that I need to get done before I leave here.”

“Oh!” He loved her commitment to the job, and he still worried that he would never get anyone as dedicated as she was. “I just got it. Give me a minute to read it.” He skimmed over it, throwing out the sentences that didn’t make much sense, then landing on the words that threw a wrench into his plans. “Marcus Bradshaw owns it?” he asked.

“Yep. I thought the name sounded familiar…then it hit me. Your ex, Jenna Bradshaw, isn’t that her name?” she asked.

He hesitated. “Yeah! It is! Marcus is her dad.” This wouldn’t be easy to contact Jenna’s dad. Derek hadn’t spoken to him since long before Jenna left town. Last he knew, Marcus had decided to leave town when he was going through marital problems with his wife. He wouldn’t even know where to begin to look for him. “Thanks, Lily. I’ll take it from here. Don’t stay too late at work.”

“I won’t. Thanks!”

After he had hung up, he went back to the email. The records department had clearly stated they didn’t have information about where he was so this would require more detailed work. He brought up the contact list on his phone and rummaged through it until he landed on the name of his private detective. He dialed up the number and waited for him to answer.

“This is Calvin.”

“Hey, Cal…it’s Derek Worthington.”

“Derek…how you doing?”

“Well, pretty good, but I have a favor to ask of you.”

“Sure. What’s up?”

“I’m sorry to bother you on the weekend.”

“No worries,” Calvin replied.

Derek told him how he needed to find Marcus Bradshaw. He had very little information, other than about fifteen years ago, the man left Belfast, Maine. He had a daughter named Jenna and perhaps a wife named Victoria. If they were no longer married, then it would be an ex-wife. He mentioned that the sooner he got the information, the better. He explained how there was a building he couldn’t destroy without the information because it’s only been abandoned for four years.

That’s when Calvin pointed out something that Derek had also thought of. “If he’s been gone for fifteen years, then why has the building only been abandoned for four?”

“I don’t know. I thought maybe someone has been taking it over since Marcus has been out of the picture…perhaps his wife, or a friend.”

“Maybe his daughter has been managing it,” Calvin pointed out.

Derek couldn’t believe that. He wanted to believe that if Jenna had been back to Belfast, he would’ve known it. However, it was possible he wouldn’t have. She was upset and hurt when she left and maybe she didn’t want to see him again. “I suppose that’s possible. Whatever the case may be, I really need to see if you can locate him.”

“Not a problem. I’ll add your bill to your tab.”

Derek snickered. “Thanks, Cal.”

“I’ll be in contact with you soon!” Cal said, before hanging up the call.

Derek sat in his chair, and it didn’t take long before he dialed up another number. This time, he called Jenna’s old number. It was a long shot, as it’d been twelve years since he tried calling it, but he had few options. It rang three times before a recording came on and told him the number had been disconnected. He put his phone down. He wasn’t surprised. He got on his computer and went to whitepages.com. He did a general search for Marcus Bradshaw, and it pulled up six thousand men with that name in the country. That’s the only ones it found. He then searched all of New York, and it pulled up thirty-three phone numbers that corresponded with a Jenna Bradshaw. He wasn’t surprised. He narrowed it down to New York City and found fifteen people by that name. That was closer.

He then searched the Maine directory, and it located five women by that name. He doubted she came back to the area, but there was one that lived in Bangor, which was only an hour from Belfast. He grabbed his phone and dialed up her number. “Hello?” A little boy answered the phone.

“Hello. May I speak to your mother?” he asked.

The boy sounded like he wasn’t much older than six or seven. “She doesn’t live here,” he responded.

Derek frowned. That wasn’t the response he looked for. “Oh! I need to speak to Jenna Bradshaw please.”

“Just a minute. Grandma…telephone.”

“Wait…” Derek frantically said. He didn’t need to speak to anyone’s grandma. It hadn’t been that long. When she got on the phone, he even thought about disconnecting the call, but that was the chicken way out. When she answered, he had, to be honest. “I apologize, I was looking for a Jenna Bradshaw, but she’d only be thirty years old.”

The woman on the other end laughed. “Nope…I wasn’t thirty for a long, long time. Sorry, I’m not who you’re looking for.”

“Thanks anyway. Have a good day!” He disconnected the call and looked at the other four numbers. He chose to go with the narrowed down numbers and then work up from there. He dialed one of the numbers, and it rang and rang until it went to an answering machine.

A man’s voice came on the phone. “You’ve reached the Bradshaw’s…” He hung up because the guy wouldn’t have the last name, Bradshaw. He dialed up number three on the list, and it rang twice before someone answered.

“Hello, this is Jenna.”

He tried to hang onto her words to see if he recognized the voice. Even though it had been so long ago, he didn’t figure her voice changed much. However, as hard as he tried to imagine her voice in his head, he couldn’t. “Hello. I’m sorry for bothering you on this Saturday afternoon, but I’m looking for a Jenna Bradshaw.”

“You found her,” the woman said.

He waited. He still couldn’t gather whether it was her. “This might be a stupid question, but did you use to live in Belfast?”

“No…I’ve never lived in Belfast. I did live in Bucksport for a time. That’s the closest I’ve ever gotten to Belfast, though.”

He sighed. It was partly with relief and partly with discontent. He wanted to get to the bottom of things, but he didn’t want to talk to her. “Sorry for your time, Ma’am.” He hung up the call and moved down the list. As he read over her white pages listing, he got a little hopeful. Listed as possible people, she would know, was an M. Bradshaw. He figured that could be her father. He dialed up the number.

It went straight to voicemail. The moment he heard the voice he knew he found the right woman. “Hey, you’ve reached Jenna. I’m not available right now, but leave a message, and I’ll get right back with you. Thanks for calling.”

He didn’t leave a message. Instead, he hung up and stared aimlessly at her information. She was back in Maine, living in Ashland, less than two hundred miles from him. Yet, she never tried to contact him to see how things were going. He put her number into his phone and got off the website. He would use it as a backup, but for the time being, he didn’t want to talk to her. He needed to find Marcus, and he hoped Calvin could get that done.

***

On Sunday, Charity stopped at a coffee shop and paid for four cups of coffee. She didn’t know what Jesse and Derek would want in their coffee, so she grabbed several packets of sugar and cream. She got back to her car and headed toward Ana’s house. The moment she got there she spotted Ana’s vehicle, a big box truck, and Derek’s vehicle in the driveway. She pulled into the open spot in the driveway and turned off her car. The door was open and out walked Jesse with some furniture from her living room. He loaded it into the back of the truck.