My niece squealed and threw her hands up in the air, giving the devil horns her best try with the cast on one wrist. “Awesome!”
It was later, as I went through the mail that a thin, long box caught my eye. I’d contacted the company Carter had recommended to do the DNA tests on Jeremy and me, and this was my part of it.
Carefully opening it in case any small parts dropped out, I fished out the instructions and read through them. All I had to do was do the test, put it in the fridge, and a courier would come and collect it. It was that simple. I could also hand it in to one of their chosen laboratories and given that one was in the town next to ours, that wouldn’t be all that difficult.
Something about our time away had flipped a switch in my brain. I’d gotten to see Carter with his family and had loved it so much that I’d changed from dreading the answer to this DNA test to being hopeful.
I wanted a half-sibling, a person I could call family. I’d also read through the information Carter had gathered on Jeremy, and he seemed like a good guy and a decent person.
So, the second I woke up the next morning, I took the damn test. And then I drove to Palmerstown and handed it to the laboratory there. Now, all I had to do was wait a couple of weeks for the answer and enjoy Christmas.
Carter didn’t have it as easy as that. While we’d been away, a clusterfuck had happened. Evan McGill had brought Teddy McGill into P.V.P.D. stating he’d made a citizen's arrest on the man pretending to be his adoptive father.
While the police tracked Teddy via online records, Evan had been tracking him via inside knowledge. In the process, he’d saved the life of Margaret, the chick from the gas station.
After seeing the photos being circulated by P.V.P.D. and finding some letters from Judge Ingleston dating back to when Evan had been snatched, he’d found out what Teddy and his wife had done and had decided to rob the gas station. His aim had been to get enough money from his dad’s business to leave and track down his biological parents.
It wasn’t until he was holding the shotgun at Margaret that it all clicked, and the impulse to run away turned to making Teddy pay legally, not financially. That’s when he’d turned to tracking and retrieving him.
The Lewis’s had been alerted that their son may have been found. They were also doing their own DNA tests to ascertain if that was the case or not, but their hopes had been raised to the point we were all praying the test came back in their favor.
Margaret didn’t want to press charges against Evan, and with the help of a lawyer, Evan/Ainsley may even end up being released without charge due to mitigating circumstances.
Total clusterfuck.
In the process, it’d also come out that it’d been Teddy McGill who’d vandalized my house, too. He’d been worried that I’d tell Carter everything I saw once he found out I’d been there. The aim had been to try to threaten me into staying quiet, but all it’d achieved was to make the police even more determined to figure it all out—which they kind of had.
Crime doesn’t pay, people. If ever the world needed proof of that, this was the case for it.
Christmas Day…
Our first Christmas as a family was incredible.
June and Mi-mi had arrived two days previously, unable to stay away from us for long. It went without saying that Shanti had two more surprises when they’d turned up. Yep, they’d brought Melba and Toast with them.
Seeing the two excitable pups with red velvet ribbons around their necks had been a sweet moment, until they’d started unloading stuff from the trunk that’d hinted at their stay with us being slightly longer than I’d anticipated.
It turns out the stay was a case of forever, and Mi-mi was gifting them to her new granddaughter.
Seeing my face, Carter had turned away from me and burst out laughing. It was all fair and well, but I didn’t know how to look after a dog. I was drowning under fish, still finding my way through parenthood, navigating being a girlfriend… two dogs could kill me. It could be the sprinkly topping on my shittastic life.
At least, it would have been if they hadn’t taught Shanti what to do and made a reward chart for her that included caring for the dogs and fish. Carter had also taken on complete responsibility for the duo if Shanti couldn’t do her duties with them.
On Christmas morning, something clicked for me. We were sitting under the tree, opening our gifts, and watching Shanti as she tore her own open, when the dogs each started pulling on opposite sides of a wrapped present. Once the paper tore, they’d began yapping and nipped a corner of the paper, then excitedly ripped it off whatever was inside. Shanti loved it so much she laughed to the point of tears, meaning I got the best photos I’d ever taken of her.