Page 57 of Ma Belle Marguerite
I watch from the door and feel myself smiling despite the way today went. My life was so empty until now. I know what was missing now, family.
“Hey, come join us!” Bella’s voice sounds stronger than it did earlier. I can tell she is putting on a brave face for the twins.
“Coming, I just didn’t want to interrupt. It sounded like you guys were having fun.” I approach the table full of food and see that my chef took my words of ‘family meals’ to heart.
He has made maple-glazed ham, mixed vegetables, mashed potatoes, and gravy. It looks like there are even homemade buns.
Placing her hand on my arm, Bella looks at me with a small smile." This is your home; you’re not interrupting anything.”
“This is your home, too. Anyway, it looks like there’s enough food to feed an army here.” Looking to Remi, “I hope you’re hungry, bud. If not, there may be leftovers for a week.”
Laughing, the twins take seats on one side of the table, leaving Bella and me to sit on the other side together. I refuse to sit at the end of the table for meals. My father used it as a power position over us, and I don’t want that in my family.
I may end up having to take over my father’s role, but not when I’m at home.
We are able to relax and eat while talking about the kids' day at school. Remi's face lights up as he tells us about his new friends on the football team. His sister talks over him about wanting to try out for cheer. I can’t help but sit here with a stupid grin on my face joining in on their excitement. The fact that they are willing to share this with me is making me want more, babies, love, everything.
Once we have had our dessert of freshly made blueberry pie, I excuse myself to my office. I need to find where my brother is and get this dealt with so I can enjoy family dinners like tonight without the thoughts of him intruding.
I barely have time to sit at my desk before my door opens, and Josh walks through, pulling his case of computer equipment behind him. He nods my way and heads to the corner beside me to start setting up.
D follows in behind him, looking rough, and comes to sit across from me at my desk. “We have found everyone that was in the bunker. I have a few men staying with the bodies at our funeral home to make sure everything is done as we want.” Sighing he takes out his phone, “I will send you the list of names.”
We ended up buying the local funeral home so there would be less questions for times like this.
“How many did we lose?” I hate this part.
“We lost two of our men and three of your fathers. There are also two of our men with the doctor right now. He said they’ll survive., but it will take a while to recover.” Sounding defeated he lies back in the chair and closes his eyes.
“Thank you for taking care of that for me. I shouldn’t have left, but I couldn’t leave Bella’s side.” It’s going to take some practice to make sure I’m dividing my time properly.
Josh clears his throat from the corner gaining both of our attention. “I’m ready if you are.”
I roll my chair over to his setup. D pulls his chair over beside me so he can see over my shoulder.
“Where do you want to start? Cole or Amara?” Josh doesn’t even look at me as he talks too focused on his screen.
“Start wherever it makes sense, I guess. I just need to hear this to have more reason to kill him when I find him.” I can feel my blood starting to boil just thinking of his name. He will regret laying hands on Bella.
“Okay, well, Cole and Amara seem to be together. They have been seen around often at the same places. From the financial records I was able to pull, they bought a place together last month not far from your father's home.” He types away the whole time he is talking. All the files and surveillance records popping up on different screens.
How did they end up together? I’ve never seen them together before now.
“So, it looks like Cole started out sending her money about a year ago when the first attempt on your life happened, actually.” Josh pulls up some more bank transcripts on one of his screens highlighting the matching transactions.
I had someone plant a bomb on my car this time last year. Thankfully, it malfunctioned, and we found it when my car wouldn’t start. We figured it had to be someone inexperienced in order to fuck a simple bomb up. So it seems Cole was behind that and probably anything else since then.
“Each payment up until about three months ago coincides with many other incidents we couldn’t explain.” Josh is flipping through pages faster than I can read them, but I know he’s done his research and I trust what he’s saying.
“So, not only am I going to be killing my brother, I’ll be killing Bella’s half-sister. This isn’t going to go over well.” My fatherwill be livid with me, not that I care. I can only hope Bella doesn’t freak out. I doubt she has much attachment to her after today, but murder is murder. She’s been away from here living a normal life for thirteen years, how much has she changed?
Chapter 25
Isabella
After we eat, Rex slips away towards his office down the hall. I want to follow him and find out what’s going on, but I’m not sure I want to know.
I get to spend some time with the twins and enjoy their company. We go over their homework and then decide to go for a swim. Might as well take advantage of things while we’re staying here. I am excited to wear my new swimsuit, it’s been a long time since I have been brave enough to wear one. Havingtwins wasn’t kind to my body, but time to let that go. Besides, Rex did say to make ourselves at home.
