AllFreeNovel
Share Us
I spent the rest of the morning watching news and wondering what was going to happen with Eric. Luke would text me once he had finished talking with Pete and with police about the accident, but I felt really bad for Dana and James. Dana called me around noon, her voice filled with anger.
"I'm so damn sorry," she said, and I could hear James making baby sounds in the background. "Luke just called me and told me what happened. What an idiot. Honestly, Alexa, I never thought he would be stupid enough to do something like this. What on Earth was he thinking?"
"He was obviously drunk, Dana. Drunk people don't think straight. They lose inhibitions, so whatever he was feeling he just let it come out. What did Luke say about how he was planning to proceed?"
"He's not going to press charges," Dana said with a sigh. "Thankfully. I mean, the bastard deserves to be charged, but I don't want Jamie to grow up thinking his dad is a felon. It's bad enough that they won't be seeing each other often. I don't want him to have to go to the prison to visit him."
"It won't come to that," I said. "Maybe this will help Eric see what a mistake he's made and that he has to rethink his life."
"Maybe," Dana said. "Hey, kiddo. Why don't you come and visit me before you deliver that little guy? You're going to be so busy for the first few months, you won't know what's up and what’s down."
"That sounds great. Maybe we could do brunch on Sunday?"
"That sounds perfect."
We said goodbye and I was happy that Luke wasn't going to press charges. Maybe this would be a wakeup call for Eric to get his proverbial shit together.
One had to hope...
Later that afternoon, Luke called me, to let me know he'd be late getting home.
"You'll never believe who I got a call from," he said, his voice sounding excited.
"Who?"
"Adam Pierce, Seneca."
"No way! He called? How come?"
"Apparently, he heard through the grapevine that Eric tried to run me off the road, and he said he realized that it was my crazy brother-in-law who had been at fault in our earlier altercation and that he figured he wouldn't want to miss out partnering with us because of Eric. In fact, he said Eric had a friend badmouth John and me to Adam as a way of stopping us from working together. So he decided to give us a second chance."
"That's great," I said, butterflies in my stomach. "That's what you wanted from the start. Seneca was your first choice of companies to work with, right?"
"Absolutely. I'm going over to have a drink with Adam after he's finished a meeting, if that's okay with you. I'll be home a bit later. Maybe we can have a late supper? Say eight o'clock instead of six thirty?"
"Of course," I said. "Take whatever time you need. I'll see you when you get here."
We said goodbye and I hung up, glancing around the kitchen to think about what we could have for supper. I had some time to kill, and since the weather was so nice, I decided to go for a walk along the beach.
I called over to Mark, who was on security duty, and let him know.
"I'll be right there, Mrs. Marshall. Gotta change my footwear if we're walking along the beach."
On my part, I pulled on some running shoes and a sweater and put on my sunglasses. The day was partly cloudy with sunny breaks and I wanted to watch the sun setting over the ocean. I'd decided to cook some pasta and have a salad, so that wouldn't take much preparation. I could get in a walk before I had to do any work.
Once Mark was ready, we walked along the beach, with him trailing me a dozen feet behind, his eyes roving the beach and road that bordered the ocean for any sign of danger. I had grown accustomed to his presence, and while I had been awkward at first on our walks along the beach, I was now so used to them, I barely noticed he was there. My walk lasted about twenty minutes and on my way back, I picked up a few shells and bits of beach glass for my collection. On our way back to the house, Mark got a message on his cell. He came running up to me and stopped me.
"Mrs. Marshall, I'm going to have to ask you to stay here. I got a message that the house security system was activated and so one
of our guards is going to check it out. I don't want to go back there right now, just in case there's an intruder."
"Oh, God," I said. "Do you suppose it's Blaine?"
"I have no idea, Ma'am, but our guard will check it out. It could be a false alarm. If not, the Westhampton Beach Police Department will send officers to the scene."
"Okay," I said and pulled my sweater around me. I didn't have my handbag or my cell, and felt scared that it was Blaine trying to break into the beach house to hurt me. He must have realized we had security and maybe knew we were out on a walk. My heart raced while we waited for word on how to proceed.
Mark spoke into his cell and glanced around. "Okay, thanks. I'll bring her back."
