His Last Wife

“Remember that ten thousand dollars I requested?” Val asked.

“Yes. What about it?”

“It was for Coreen. I’ve been trying to keep up Jamison’s payments with her, but I can’t afford it and she just won’t stop. I didn’t know what else to do. She’s been threatening taking her story to the media and I didn’t want that to happen. I know that will have a horrible impact on Rake it Up,” Val revealed.

Kerry nodded and opened the car door without a peep.

Val looked at her, confused, until she’d gotten completely out of the car.

“What? You’re not going to say anything?” Val asked.

“I knew,” Kerry admitted simply. “I figured that was what was going on. I knew it wouldn’t be long before she came back around. Look, don’t worry about Rake it Up. Let her go to the media if she wants. Let her go on a full media tour, telling everyone about how she was extorting money from Jamison and that she intended on extorting money from Rake it Up. We’ll see how everyone takes that.” Kerry smiled and after stepping from the car, she added, “I don’t remember a lot of what my father told me before he died, but one thing I’ll always remember, one thing that’s always stayed with me. My father said: The truth will always come out. Sounds simple, but it’s true and easy to forget. You can pay that woman as much money as you want, but one day, the truth is just going to come out anyway. Why not now? I bet she’ll change her tune anyway. If she’s successful and the company does go under because of it, won’t she be losing out too?”

Kerry said good night and started walking toward the house.

“You going to be okay in there?” Val said just loud enough for Kerry to hear her.

Kerry nodded and kept walking, up her mother’s front steps and through the front door.

Tyrian sat up in bed and rubbed his eyes sleepily. He’d been pulled from his sleep by a noise and opened his eyes to see the light on in his closet. The door was open. The noise was coming from inside. Being seven years old and half asleep due to the late-evening hour that had the sky outside his window pitch-black, Tyrian’s mind went straight to all of those scary movies his mother had told him not to watch. Was there a ghost inside? A demon? A zombie? His little imagination was about to have him hollering.

Just when he was going to scream and wet his bed, the night ghost in the closet emerged. It was his mother. She had his suitcases in her hands.

“Mama?” he called to her

.

“Yes, baby. It’s just me,” Kerry said, dropping the bag on the floor and going toward the dresser to get more of her son’s things. “Did I scare you?”

“Yes,” Tyrian admitted. “What are you doing?”

“Just getting our things together,” Kerry said.

“Why?” Tyrian asked.

“So we can go home.”

Tyrian popped out of the bed like it was the middle of the afternoon. “We’re going home?” he repeated joyously to be sure it was true.

“Yes.” Kerry smiled at his excitement.

“Right now?”

Kerry hadn’t decided that, really. She was still trying to figure out what she was going to say to her mother. How she was going to say it. Still, seeing her son look so happy, she decided there was nothing wrong with leaving Thirjane’s house that night.

“Sure,” she said, throwing a pair of pants and a fall jacket to Tyrian. “Put those on.”

“Really?” Tyrian smiled. “Why are we leaving now? Is it because Grandma Janie is getting married to her boyfriend?”

“What?” Kerry asked.

“Her boyfriend. The white man with the black hat from the park,” Tyrian explained. With everything happening after Kerry got home, he hadn’t told his mother about the park or his investigation. He’d forgotten all about the recordings on his iPad. Until right then.

“Grandma Janie doesn’t have a boyfriend,” Kerry said.

“Yes, she does. He comes to the park. They talk. She gives him money.”

“How do you know that?”