The Ford Brothers Series Box Set, page 82
“If you don’t know, then why did you ask her to move in with you?”
“Because things were great. We wanted to spend more time together. I figured it would be great.”
“But it’s not.” He guesses. “I hear ya, man. I’d never ask a chick to move in with me. It would be a fucking disaster. I credit you for going the distance.”
“Thanks. It’ll be okay. We’re just adjusting to each other.”
“Wasn’t she married before?”
“Yeah, why?”
“Well, didn’t she live with her husband?”
“Obviously.” I scoff.
“Then why does she have to make so much of an adjustment?”
“It’s probably just me, man. It’s not her.” But then I think about the sex, the bathroom issue, and her ex, and I wonder if it’s about her, not me, but I don’t mention that to Jack.
“Either way, man, we have to cut the shit at work.” Jack says. “You’ve got to figure out a way to air out your frustrations and not bring them to work.”
“So, you’re just gonna blame it all on me? You’re not perfect either, Jack.” I point out.
“But you’re the one who keeps flying off the handle at the drop of a hat.” His voice has raised an octave.
“Because of you and your stupid-ass comments.” I raise my voice. I feel like an idiot sitting at the side of the road. The rain is still beating down hard on the windshield and the roof. Jack is completely oblivious to the noise, and that is something that is annoying to me. He can block out any distraction, but this trait sometimes lends him an air of ignorance, especially when you call him multiple times at work, and he ignores his phone. Another car crawls by as Jack laughs without a trace of mirth at my comment.
“You’re such an asshole sometimes, Dalton.” He’s still laughing, making my skin crawl. “You just can’t admit that you have your panties in a wad. Grow up and be accountable for your shitty temper.”
“Fuckoff, Jack.” I warn. “I’m not in the mood.”
A set of headlights is off in the distance. The car looks like it’s driving too fast and my eye immediately stays with it. Because my windshield is covered in a sheet of rain, my eyes are playing tricks on me, and the car looks like it has no tires, which freaks me out, thinking I’m hallucinating or something. Leaning forward, I open the window a little, and the car is clearer to my view. It is travelling way too fast for this weather, and I see it swerve. My heart starts to pound.
“Jesus Christ, buddy, slow down.” I say out loud to myself.
“What?” Jack barks.
“Nothing, just…shut the fuck up for a second.”
The car swerves outside of the lane, as it travels up the bridge. We’re right over a small body of water, a lock, and the car veers towards the barrier, and then back again.
“Jesus Christ.” I mutter, watching the car seemingly fight for traction on the bridge. Just when I think he’s going to clear the spot of open barrier, his car turns towards it…and he drives right over.
“Fuck!” I shout out, as another car pulls up behind me. He slams his brakes, and I’m guessing that he saw the car drive over the bridge, too.
“Fuck, I gotta go, Jack.” I say. My voice is panicked.
“What the fuck?”
“Some guy just drove over the fucking bridge, man.” I say quickly, unbuckling my seatbelt, hanging up and putting the phone in my pocket.
The second I step out of the Escalade, I can feel the water already penetrating my clothes. Running to the side of the bridge, I see the man who is parked behind me. He’s a very large man, and I’m no slouch myself, but I watch in shock as he unceremoniously removes his jacket…and jumps into the lock.
“Fuck…me.” I say to myself, wondering if I should jump in, too. I have no idea who is inside that car. It could be a family, it could be a serial killer, who knows. The rain actually hurts when it makes contact with my skin, it’s coming down so hard. Walking to the edge of the bridge, within seconds, I see the large man’s head bobbing up from the water.
“Anyone alive?” I shout, shielding my mouth with my hands for better acoustics over the rain.
“Call nine-one-one!” he shouts, and then his head disappears under the water.
I pull my phone out of my pocket, trying my best to shield it so it doesn’t get soaked and die before I make the call. I’m on the phone with the authorities when I see the large man reappear, and another head appears beside him. The guy isn’t moving. The large man is dragging him in the water, closer to the bridge.
“Anyone else in the car?” I shout.
“No, man. This guy’s either unconscious or dead. I can’t tell. He’s not moving at all.” He shouts back.
I hang up the phone and stuff it back in my pocket. Hopefully it’ll live.
…but I’m not sure about this other guy.
Extended Epilogue
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Slippery When Wet
Ford Brothers Series
Sandra Alex
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Copyright © 2019 Sandra Alex Books
All rights reserved
ISBN 978-1-989427-14-9
ISBN 978-1-989427-13-2
Chapter 1
Aaron
Margaret, my Executive Director, is a lunatic. The only reason why I keep her on staff, is because she’s willing to work ungodly hours for the same pay as everyone else. As she sits next to me while we go over notes for a meeting tomorrow, my cell phone begins to ring. Looking at the display, I see that it’s my wife, Amelia, and I’m irritated. Pressing the top button, I put the call through to voicemail. Amelia knows to send me a text message first before calling, and never to call me directly.
The lunatic gives me a look that I’d like to swat off her face, and we continue with our agenda. I’m the CEO for one of the largest packaging companies in the world. One of my patents is responsible for more than half of the shipping cartons you can find around the globe. We specialize in fragile and hazardous materials, and therefore we’re not exactly environmentally friendly. I’ve had activists on my ass for over ten years; case and point: the motivation for this important meeting in the morning.
After we go over some of the notes, I ask Margaret to get my directors in here, even though it’s after hours. I’ve ordered them all to stay late tonight, in preparation for this meeting. If I hadn’t just come back from Sri Lanka, on a conference, we might have had this discussion earlier. So they can all suck it up. Margaret rallies up the crew and we have a two-hour-long brainstorming session regarding how to nip this whole environmental issue in the bud. Satisfied that we’re prepared to tackle these son’s-of-bitches, I dismiss my staff, including Margaret, and sit in my office with the door closed.
It’s after nine o’clock at night, so I know I’m the only one remaining in the office. Pulling open the top drawer in my desk, I pick up the half-empty bottle of vodka, and down a healthy swig of it. The liquid burns on the way down, but it’s such a recognizable comfort, that I almost don’t notice. Once the magic juice makes its way down to my stomach, I start to feel like me again. Reading through some of the material that my directors and I came up with, I lose track of time, and before I know it, the rest of the bottle is gone, and it’s nearly two o’clock in the morning. Rising, I open the office door, and head down the hallway, to the back exit, where we keep our recycling bins. After placing the empty bottle inside the plastic bin, I head back inside, where I find the rest of my stash, and I place a new bottle inside my desk. I’ll definitely need this one for tomorrow.
Picking up my car keys, I head outside, to my assigned parking space, and climb into my late model BMW. My phone is dead, so I plug it in, and notice that Amelia has left me a voice message and two text messages. Turning on the engine, I read her text message. It says, ‘Honey, I’m sorry to bother you at work, but this is urgent. Please call me when you have a chance’.
“Oh…goodie. What does she want now.” I slur to myself in the darkness of my car.
Scrolling down to the second text message, I read it. ‘I’m getting worried. It’s late and I still haven’t heard from you. There is something I need to tell you. Please call.’
Then I realize that I’d sent Margaret home early, and my phone is always on DND, so had Amelia tried to call me on my desk phone, it would have been in vain. I never take direct calls at the office without the lunatic screening them first. As I turn on my Bluetooth, I tap into my voicemail, and listen to Amelia’s message. “Hi, honey. I don’t want to leave a message like this, so please call me, okay?”
Her voice sounds odd. She’s being too nice. Too sweet. She’s not usually rude or crass, but normally the sound of her voice makes my skin crawl. That message did not. As I begin driving, I contemplate whether or not to call or to wait until I get home. Our house is less than a ten minute drive from the office, so it’s almost not even worthwhile to make the call. Is she leaving me? Is the first thing that comes to mind. Strange how that happened. Amelia and I don’t have the best marriage, admittedly. Since my company took off five years ago, I noticed our marriage started turning to shit. Late hours and bringing a lot of work home has contributed to that, I’m sure. But this company benefits her, too. We have everything we want; a big, beautiful home in an affluent neighborhood, enough money to sink a ship, and a vacation home in France.
But she doesn’t want any of that apparently. Oh, no. Amelia wants a family. Isn’t that what all women want? A fucking family. That’s the last thing I want or need. I’ve told her that many times, but she keeps it in her head that I might change my mind one day. Not in her fucking dreams. Family sucks. Well, mine does. There was a time, many years ago, that I wanted a family. But that ship has sailed. Amelia knows that. When we got married, she knew that about me, that the last thing I want is kids and a family. But, like a fool, she took one look at me with my niece and nephew, and decided that I was a family man; I just didn’t know it yet…according to Amelia.
My niece and nephew are pretty cool kids though. Don’t know how they ended up like that seeing as my brother is such an asshole. Must be my sister-in-law that has moulded them. Thank Christ for that. My mom spends a lot of time with them, too, and she’s pretty decent. Mom and I are very close. Other than her need to have more grandchildren, she doesn’t suck the life out of me. The early spring rain is pelting on my roof, and I turn on my wipers. My phone rings, startling me. It’s Amelia.
“Hi, sorry it’s late. I’m just on my way home.” I answer
“Oh. Okay, good. I’ll see you in a few minutes.”
There’s that uncertain tone again. “Amelia, I know something is wrong. Why don’t you tell me what’s going on?” I ask, figuring she might as well come out with it while we’re talking.
“Baby, I’d really rather not tell you over the phone. Especially while you’re driving.”
Amelia hasn’t called me baby for as long as I can remember. Why would she call me baby if she was about to leave me? I’m getting a little freaked out and my buzz is starting to wear off. “Amelia, please tell me what’s wrong. I can handle it.”
As I drive over a bridge, I see the yellow ‘slippery when wet’ hazard warning sign just as the rain picks up, forcing me to lean forward and adjust the speed on my wiper blades. “Baby, your brother called earlier when he couldn’t get in touch with you.”
I lift a brow. “Uh huh. What does he want now?” My voice is terse. My brother Michael is always asking us to babysit when my poor mom can’t, or he’s always asking us over for dinner and gatherings, which I don’t mind so much, since they have a new baby now, but then it gets Amelia started.
“Honey, I’m sorry to have to tell you over the phone…but your mom died today.”
My heart skips a beat, and I feel my insides churn. “What?”
“I’m so sorry, baby.” I hear her sniffle.
Suddenly my back tire spins a little as I drive up a curve. Grabbing the wheel, I try to steer out of the other lane.
“Hon, are you okay? I heard a tire squeal.” Amelia says to me.
As I’m about to respond, I see headlights coming from the opposite direction, in the other lane. The back tire doesn’t want to grip the road, so I’m fishtailing towards oncoming traffic. “Jesus…fuck.” I swear under my breath. I hear the other driver’s horn honk and my heart races. Swerving to avoid hitting the Ford F-350 pickup truck, or something else incredibly fucking huge that would crush my BMW in two, I grab the steering wheel, pulling to the right, as the rain comes crashing down on my windshield suddenly; so hard that I can’t see a thing. The rain pellets are so thick and heavy, it sounds like hail. Blinded by the precipitation, I scramble for my wiper blades, when I hit something, probably the guardrail, and I feel myself freefall into the air.
The next five seconds will change my life forever.
Chapter 2
Amelia
Aaron and I were high school sweethearts. I loved him since the moment I saw him, and he always says he felt the same. We married very young, against my parents’ wishes. But I wasn’t pregnant, so they warmed to the idea quickly enough. From the moment I met Aaron, I knew he was the one for me. He was motivated to be successful; so smart it sometimes made my head spin, and incredibly good-looking. He’s always been stop-traffic gorgeous. He’s always told me I have it backwards. While he seems tough, Aaron is a very caring, compassionate person. Lately, I’m the only one who gets to see that side of him. Success hasn’t come easy for him. He started with nothing after college and built his business from the ground up. It all started with a tin paint can. He had a vision and followed it.
It wasn’t until about five years ago that we started making enough money that I didn’t have to work. Time and time again, the arguments started. He didn’t want me to work. But after taking a short sick leave when I broke my foot, I knew I couldn’t handle staying at home full time permanently. Besides, my job is noble. I’ve been working for a charity for so many years that my vacation accrual makes our payroll manager laugh. I love what I do. I don’t think I could ever leave it. Same with my husband. Many people think he’s a real asshole and they ask me how I’ve stayed with him for so long. But he has issues. And I know many have said that my marriage shouldn’t be treated like a project, but it’s hard for one to understand when he’s the only person outside of family that I’ve ever loved, and who has ever loved me.
There are moments when he looks at me like he did when we were teenagers; that’s what I live for. They don’t come often, but when they do, they are worth the wait. Aaron’s work is very important to him, and I’ve always been okay with taking a backseat to his career. As long as he’s fine with me keeping my career I’m okay with that. There is only one thing we argue about; having a family. I know he wants one. I know he thinks we’re too busy for one. And he may be right. But I’d love to hear the pitter patter of little feet before I’m too old to conceive. It’s not that far off. At this point, an accidental pregnancy would be a blessing, but certain requirements need to be met for that to happen.
Aaron loves his mother to death. That’s another reason why I love him. And I’m so lucky because she’s the sweetest woman ever. Which is why I hesitated when I heard the news. As much as Michael, Aaron’s brother, is close to Vivian, Aaron and Vivian have an incredible bond. Being the respectful wife that I am, I tried to follow protocol, but this situation was outside the lines. When I call him on his way home, I have a chill down my spine as I dial the number. With the rain, it’s hard to hear him, but I know that sound when I hear it. “Baby? Aaron??” I hear metal on metal and scraping, then a crash. “Aaron?” I shout at the top of my voice. “Aaron?” One last time as the background goes silent. The line goes dead and I dial nine one one, not realizing that my mother was right: the most dangerous accidents always happen close to home. I know that bridge and guardrail well. Many accidents have occurred there in the past, and I always cringe when I drive over it myself. Aaron’s car went over a bridge less than two minutes from our house. Dialing emergency services, I run to my car and hop in. I know the route that Aaron takes. I explain that I think my husband has been involved in an accident and I tell them where.
There is a large pickup truck pulled off to the side with his four ways flashing as I arrive. The man is bravely in the water, trying to help Aaron out of the car before he drowns. Standing at the side, I clutch my hands together, angling my head back and forth, trying to see any sign of life. The rain is beating down like nothing I’ve ever seen. It’s so heavy, the drops feel like slaps as they fall on my back. Finally, after a few more seconds, I see what looks thankfully like two heads floating up out of the water. One is moving, the other is not. The man treads closer to me, holding Aaron at his chest. I grab hold of his hand, helping him out of the water. The man is huge, which I’m grateful for. Anyone smaller would not be able to swim with such weight and with the inclement weather.
Bending down, I help him by pulling Aaron up by his underarms, hearing someone behind me. Another man grabs hold of Aaron, lifting him out of the water. Then he helps the larger man out, since he’s exhausted himself. The rain is so heavy, I can barely make out the second man’s face, but he sits next to me, speaking over the loud rain, asking if I know CPR. I shake my head no.
