Lyndsey asked again if she might be the old man’s kid, but she hadn’t taken up with Kimber until Lyndsey was seven. It would be difficult for her to be his baby. Then Lyndsey got to hear, again, that she was the product of a booze-soaked bar fling. The child of a one-night stand.
The night her mother went to jail, she’d been at yet another bar, where she’d gotten it into her head she wanted to confront Kimber. On the road to the farm, she spotted them leaving Kimber’s. She recognized that bitch’s car, coming from some holiday party her mother wasn’t good enough for any more.
That’s when she jerked the wheel into their lane with only one thought in her whiskey-sodden brain.
To end that bitch.
And so she did. She hadn’t planned to survive the accident, and ended up doing twenty years in prison instead of ending her misery.
It wasn’t fair Kimber had treated her mother like trash.
He’d driven her to do it.
He’d ruined her mother’s life.
I am here to set things right.
I am an avenging goddess.
Lyndsey knew her new problem was blood. It was one thing to talk the old man out of giving his house to Mina. It was another to keep him from handing it down to his kids. His real kids.
That’s when it hit her.
Uncle Kimber is nuts.
Not only was he losing his mind, but her mother had had an affair with him. He’d seduced her at work. She’d gotten drunk at an office party and they had sex in the copy room. That’s how it started. She’d heard that story a million times, too.
Uncle Kimber wasn’t great at times and places any more.
Lyndsey had started a new plan.
She’d doctored the paternity results so they pronounced her his biological daughter. She’d showed the modified document to him and asked if he remembered when he’d found out that she was his daughter.
He did.
Thank god I never showed him my tits.
After that she helped him call his lawyer to request a will edit. He’d done that part very well. He’d sounded very business-like explaining the mistake and that he’d been confused about the identity of his daughter. All she had to do was give him a storyline about business and set him loose—he was terrifying. The lawyer did as he was told.
“Mina!”
Lyndsey put down the mayo-covered knife.
I shouldn’t go up there. Just ignore him—
“Where’s my will?”
The blood drained from Lyndsey’s face so quickly her cheeks prickled.
She looked towards the stairs.
What does he want?
That was the problem with his brain. Every once in a while he’d have those moments of clarity. She lived in fear he’d have another moment like that, one that didn’t work in her favor.
One where he realized what she’d done.
Maybe this is it.
Lyndsey went up the stairs and peeked into Uncle Kimber’s room. He was standing in front of his closet. A collection of papers covered in light blue paper dangled in his hand.
“You,” he growled upon spotting her.
“What is it? You should get back in bed,” said Lyndsey, entering.
“You’re not my daughter.”
“Yes I am. Of course I am. I’ve been here forever.”
“You’re that whore’s daughter!”
Lyndsey gasped. “What?”
Kimber raved. “I remembered. I remembered, you little bitch. This is all wrong. I never should have let Mina bring you into this house!”
He took a step forward and shook the will in her face, spit from his sputtering lips striking her on the cheek.
“Mina!” he screamed, trying to push past her toward the door.
Lyndsey wasn’t sure what came over her. It might have been the way he’d spoken about her mother or the insults he’d thrown at her. It could have been fear that her plan was about to unravel. Mostly, she thought it was the paper. The way he rattled the pages so close to her face.
I am an avenging goddess.
She swung at him, clocking him on the side of his head with a closed fist.
He crumpled to the right. The will flew from his hands and landed on the bed. His head struck the side of his night table and bounced, the sound hollow.
Lyndsey stood there, breathing, her fist still balled at her side.
Uncle Kimber didn’t move.
“Uncle Kimber?”
She knelt down and shook him. She rolled him on his side and his mouth hung open.
Not breathing.
She put her head on his chest to listen for a heartbeat.
“Kimber?”
It’s Mina! She was calling from downstairs.
She’s home. She must have heard something.
Terrible luck. She never came home from mahjong this early.
Lyndsey jumped to her feet and grabbed the will from the bed. She smoothed the ruffled pages and refolded it before slipping it back into the lockbox at the top of the closet. The key was sticking out of the top of it. She locked it and panicked.
Where does he keep the key?
She didn’t know where to hide it. She tossed it in his bedside drawer and hoped Mina wouldn’t notice it out of place. She’d probably blow it off as him losing track of things.
She sprinted into the hall.
That’s when she heard Mina’s thumping footsteps on the stairs.
She’s coming.
Lyndsey opened the nearest door and slipped inside.
Puppies swarmed around her ankles, yapping.
No!
This is where they keep the puppies? In the spare bathroom?
She tried to crawl into the closet and shut the door to keep the puppies out, hoping they’d settle down, but as she cowered inside, they threw themselves
