Chapter One Hundred One

Lena rang the bell at her former in-laws, Denise and Alan Scott’s home, and stepped back. She and Kenzie didn’t have to wait long before Denise opened the door and gasped in surprise.

“Nana!” Kenzie cried, obviously not noticing the immediate tension as she leaped into her grandmother’s arms.

“Kenzie! Oh, I’m so glad you’re okay. Come in, dear,” she said to Lena over Kenzie’s head.

She hadn’t even closed the door behind her before Alan rushed into the living room.

“Are you both okay?” Denise asked as Kenzie ran to her grandpa.

Lena had called them after Brandon took Kenzie, hoping he had gone to his parent’s home in Charleston, South Carolina. When that hadn’t been the case, she told them not to contact the police, that she would take care of it.

All these months later, she finally had.

“We’re fine now. I’m sorry I didn’t call sooner. We were dealing with…some things, and I wanted to come speak to you in person.”

Lena had wanted to make sure the body found in Vancouver was, indeed, their son before she faced them with the news. She’d just gotten verification last week that his identity had been confirmed. The death certificate had been overnighted to her, and was in her purse.

“I’m afraid I have some bad news about Brandon.” There was really no good way to say this.

Alan was holding Kenzie. He looked at her, his face going pale. “Sweetie, why don’t you run downstairs to the playroom? I’ll be down in a second,” he said.

Kenzie clapped. “Can we play restaurant?”

“Sure we can,” her grandfather promised. “Go on. I’ll be right there.”

When Kenzie was out of earshot, they all sat at the dining table.

“Can I get you something to drink, dear?” Denise asked. The Scotts had always treated her like a daughter. Even after the divorce. Not having parents of her own, it was important to Lena that Kenzie got to visit them whenever possible.

“No, thank you,” she said, gearing up to tell them.

“He’s gone?” Alan asked, though it came out as more of a statement.

“Yes. I’m sorry.”

“He was killed?”

“Yes. About four months ago, the coroner said.”

“Was it drugs?” Denise rubbed her temples. “I knew something was terribly wrong when he came here asking us for money. We offered to help, but when he said he needed a hundred thousand dollars, we realized it was more than just a few late bills.”

“If I thought it would help, I might have given it to him,” Alan said with a sigh. “But I could tell from his behavior it would only be the first time. He’d be back, asking for more and more.”

“I’m so sorry,” Lena offered helplessly. “Maybe if I hadn’t—”

“This is not your fault,” Denise was quick to say. “He gave you no choice but to file for divorce when he started fooling around with other women and not coming home. No one expected you to put up with that.”

Lena leaned over to hug the woman who had been like a mother to her. In the years since the divorce, Lena had backed away from the Scotts because there was no legal tie anymore. They came to Miami to visit Kenzie once, and last summer they’d bought Kenzie and Lena tickets to come to Charleston, but Lena had assumed they’d only been interested in seeing their grandchild, not her.

She realized now she’d misunderstood the situation.

“I had Brandon cremated after they were done with the autopsy, but we could have a service here,” Lena suggested.

“That would be nice.” Denise sniffed and pulled a tissue from a box on the side table. “We’ll keep it small,” she said.

Lena swallowed, unsure if now was the time to ask for a favor. But she didn’t really have a choice if she wanted a place to sleep tonight.

“I had something else I wanted to speak with you about.” She swallowed down a wash of guilt over not being able to provide a home for her daughter. She hated Viktor Kulakov for putting her in this position.

“What is it?” Alan asked.

She took a steadying breath. “Because I’ve been searching for Kenzie all this time, I’ve been out of work for eight months, and I lost the apartment in Miami. Kenzie and I are basically starting over.”

“We can give you some money,” Alan offered easily.

Lena’s tight muscles relaxed just a little. “I appreciate that. But what I was going to ask was, can Kenzie and I stay with you for a few weeks? Just until we’ve found a place to stay and get settled. Since we’re starting over, I’d like to live here in Charleston, so she’s closer to you. Once I find a job, I was wondering if you might be able to watch her some of the days I’m at work?”

The two retirees looked shocked.

Oh God. Maybe she was asking too much. They probably didn’t want to be strapped down by a child when they could go play tennis at the country club, or travel the world.

Lena plunged on. “It’s just that, after what happened, I’m kind of leery about sending her to daycare.” Leery was not the right word. Terrified was more accurate. She knew it hadn’t been the daycare’s fault. Brandon was Kenzie’s father, and they hadn’t had any reason to stop him from taking her. If the person in charge hadn’t been new, or if Lena had been there, or had thought to leave instructions to prevent him from taking Kenzie, it never would have happened. If they’d even called her to ask first, Brandon might have been stopped.

“Of course, dear,” Denise said quickly, and gave her a wide smile. “We’d be delighted. You can stay as long as you like. Between the three of us, we’ll make sure Kenzie has someone with her at all times.”

Denise seemed genuinely excited to be able to help, and Lena felt the stab of guilt again for thinking they only liked her when they were legally obligated to. Her own mother hadn’t been very interested.

“Thank you. I’m sorry to impose, but I just need a little help getting back on my feet.”

“It’s not imposing, Lena. You’re family,” Alan said with a watery smile.

Denise met her gaze. “We’re just a little shocked, because right after you got married we asked Brandon if you would move to Charleston, and he said he wanted to, but you refused.”

A familiar surge of irritation went through Lena. Brandon had always been a liar, manipulating people so he wouldn’t be the bad guy. Even with his own parents, apparently.

“He never asked me,” she said.

She bit back the urge to defend herself by showcasing Brandon’s many flaws. They knew their son as well as she did. They knew how he was.

Denise nodded and patted Lena’s leg. “The important thing is you’re here now. I guess I’ll get started on Brandon’s service. Let me go find the number for the funeral home.”

Lena was surprised they were taking all of this so well. Their son was dead, but they were handling it like troopers.

Denise left the room, and Lena looked over at Alan.

“We lost our son many months ago,” he said with a shaky voice. “We knew where he was headed and expected someday we’d get a knock on the door telling us he was gone. It hurts like a son of bitch, but it’s also a relief in many ways. We don’t have to wait any longer.”

Lena stood and went to hug him. He allowed a brief squeeze, but then he pasted a smile on his face and pulled away. “I’m fine. Really. And I promised a certain little girl I’d go downstairs and pretend to eat plastic food. If you’ll excuse me?”

Lena smiled and nodded. “I hope you have a taste for it. You’re going to be eating a lot of it.”

“Thank you, for giving us Kenzie.”

She swallowed down the emotion and smiled back. “Thank you, for giving us a home.”

Alan blinked a few times, then looked away, as if her words had reminded him of something. Instead of going downstairs, he turned and went the other direction, toward his study.

Denise returned to the living room, talking to someone on the phone. She covered the phone to speak to Lena.

“Would you come with us this afternoon to help set things up? I know you two weren’t married anymore—”

“Yes. I’ll go with you.” Brandon hadn’t been her husband for three years, but he’d still been Kenzie’s father. And she wanted her little girl to be able to say goodbye properly.

Alan had come back to the room carrying a piece of paper. He twisted it into a cone and let it uncoil. Denise said goodbye and disconnected her call.

“What is it?” Denise prompted when her husband hadn’t spoken.

He shook his head and looked up at Lena with an unreadable expression. Whatever he was going to say, it was big.

“When Kenzie was born, I told Brandon he needed to make sure his family was taken care of, in case something happened to him. At the time, he was working on the docks, and it was a dangerous job. I helped him get a life insurance policy.”

Lena recalled paying the annual premium while they had been married. “I remember.”

“When he moved out of your home after the divorce, he had his mail sent here since he didn’t have a permanent address. When the bills came, I paid them myself, because I knew whatever he was doing was far more dangerous than working on the docks.”

Surprise shot through Lena. “That’s… I had no idea.”

He unfolded the document and handed it over to her. “He never changed his beneficiary after your divorce.”

Wait. What?

She stared down at the paper, seeing her name at the bottom. She scanned back up to the top and saw the policy amount. Good lord.

Five hundred thousand dollars.

The rest of the words became unreadable as tears filled her eyes, and the paper shook in her trembling hands.

“My God. I’ll be able to buy a home for Kenzie. I won’t have to struggle to make a good life for her.” Her voice came out as a strangled whisper.

“Honey, we never would have let you struggle, anyway, but now you don’t have to worry about a thing,” he said.

There were now two men in her life she would never be able to thank enough.

Which brought her thoughts straight to Dane.

She hadn’t reached out to him, partly because she knew he would want to help her, and she already owed him too much.

And then there was the issue of his dangerous job. She’d had her fill of danger, more than enough for a lifetime, regardless of how much she loved him.

So, why was the first thing she wanted to do was to call and tell him about her good fortune?

And, yes, how desperately she missed him…