Page 15 of Endlessly Yours
“There are a few aunts and uncles that are distant, but yes, the only family that Rory has are her two nieces. And now, according to what Rory said, she was in the will as their guardian.”
“How old are the kids?” Alexis asked as she leaned into Eli’s side. Their two children were upstairs, napping, along with Kendall and Evan’s kids. Elijah’s and Maddie’s kids were with the nanny at their place since I knew that they were trying to see if they could make a nanny work. With all of us working full-time jobs, Wilder childcare was now a thing we cared about.
It was odd to think that though I had been the first to get married, I hadn’t ended up with children. Amara and I had wanted to start right away, but the cancer had come first.
And there had been no time for children when we had been trying every clinical trial out there to save her.
“Brooks, are you listening?” Ava asked as she blinked at me.
I shook myself out of my memories and frowned. “No,” I said, and Wyatt snorted.
“At least you’re honest,” my brother grumbled.
“Sorry. My mind was wandering. What’s wrong?”
“Cameron’s twelve, Alice is seven.” Ava shook her head. “Right now she’s at her apartment, and while we did our best to make the guest bedroom no longer an office and a space for the girls, there’s just not enough space. I was looking at rentals for her, but I just don’t know what to do. There’s got to be something we can do to help. She hates taking help.”
It had only been eighteen hours since I had left Rory in Ava’s arms after I had called my sister-in-law to come to the apartment. I hadn’t said a damn thing, just stood there next to Rory as she shook, trying to comprehend the other line of that phone call.
There would be paperwork to deal with, and she’d need to fly out there and meet the children, but I hadn’t known what the hell I was supposed to do. So I’d run.
And yet, here I was, at the meeting.
“It’s all just so terrible,” Aurora said after a moment. “Their parents are gone, and they don’t even know their aunt. Do you know why Rory and her sister were estranged?”
I looked at Ava, honestly curious.
While I did my best to stay out of Rory’s way, the fact that Rory and her sister were so estranged to the point that she hadn’t seen them in years was a curiosity.
“It all has to do with that community they joined.”
“A cult?” Eli asked.
“I don’t know if we can precisely say it’s a cult, but it felt like that. They both worked within the constructs of it and had risen to the upper echelons. Hence why they could borrow that plane,” Ava explained. “They were going to a retreat, and I don’t know all the details. But she hasn’t seen them in six years.”
I did the math, realizing that maybe there was a reason she had been drinking as much as I had that night.
No. I didn’t want to know more about Rory. Because part of me always wanted to know more about her. There was a reason I had stayed away, and it wasn’t that I didn’t like her.
It was that she reminded me of something that I wanted too much. Something I craved. And I wouldn’t be having that.
“When’s the funeral?” Aurora asked.
“Tomorrow,” Ava growled, and I narrowed my gaze.
“So is she going to the funeral then?” I bit out. Did she not want to? Or were others making it difficult for her?
“She’s not invited,” Ava said pointedly. “Because while she is a guardian of the children, the will clearly states that the community gets everything. They’re going to organize the funeral, the remains, take the house, all funds, possessions. Everything that wasn’t in those little girls’ rooms goes straight to the community.”
“Are you fucking serious?” I burst out as the rest of them all spoke over one another, wondering how the hell that could happen.
“Is that even legal?” I asked.
“It sure seems like it,” Ava said as she wiped away tears. Wyatt pulled her in close, and she nuzzled into him.
“All I know is that she’s not going to be there to say goodbye to her sister, and she’s trying to get out there as soon as she can to see the girls and bring them back here.”
“To a place that they don’t know and away from people that they’ve grown up with,” Aurora said softly. “That’s got to be terrible and such a burden on all of them.”
