The moment my clammy hands met the cool wooden podium, a sense of calm and peace overtook me.
Sienna’s laughter had me glancing in her direction once more, and the words just started to pour out.
“He was such a good daddy. I remember the first time he met our girl, Sienna,” I wiped my eyes that I hadn’t realized were leaking as I remembered that day with such clarity that I couldn’t stop the smile from lighting my face. “He held her up to his face, and breathed in her scent. And what did he say? She doesn’t smell like a baby is supposed to.”
I laughed, sniffling slightly.
“I had to tell him that she probably would once they managed to wipe the blood off of her,” I smiled wistfully, momentarily forgetting why I was standing at this podium in the first place. “That was one of the best days of my life, second only to the day that I married him.”
Sometimes, if I didn’t think too hard, I could pretend that Tunnel was just at work or attending a party with The Dixie Wardens.
But it didn’t take long for the horrifying memories to return.
“It was comical, really, watching us bring this little girl up.” I bit my lip. “Neither one of us knew what we were doing, but Tunnel…” I shook my head. “He was a natural. If Sienna was crying just to hear herself cry, then Tunnel would scoop her up, curl her into his muscular chest, and walk around, talking to her like she was a wise-ass fifteen-year-old instead of a fussy fifteen-day-old.”
Sienna’s beautiful hair, so much like her father’s, caught the light just right, and I saw the hints of red that Tunnel had, too. Had.
Jesus, she was the only thing I had left of him now.
“Through colic, teething, and her illnesses, she always, always wanted her daddy.” My throat welled. “And now her daddy is gone.”
I bit my lip.
“Tunnel was over the moon four times in his life. The first time, when we got married. The second time, when our daughter, Sienna was born. The third, when he joined the Benton PD. The final time was when he was patched in with the Dixie Wardens MC.” I looked at each man in the Dixie Wardens MC—Benton Chapter, hoping they felt the emotion I was trying to convey.
They’d saved my husband. They’d brought him into the fold. They’d been there for him when he needed it the most.
“Tunnel loved the Dixie Wardens. He loved the police department. He loved his life.” I paused. “It wasn’t always that way. We had a tough couple of years, but he made me a promise when we found out I was expecting. And that was that he’d give our girl a life that we would be proud of. And he succeeded by leaps and bounds,” I said as a lone tear fell down my cheek.
I couldn’t speak anymore. Couldn’t tell them that they were his best friends.
“Thank you all for coming,” I said as I looked over the crowd. “He would’ve been so happy.”
Chapter 3
How’s adulting going? Well, I turned on the wrong burner and I’ve been cooking nothing for the last thirty minutes.
-Being an adult sucks
Mina
Present Day
“Sienna, did you get your homework done?” I yelled across the house.
Sienna, my eight-year-old daughter, poked her head out of her room.
“Yes, I did it with the tutor,” she explained. “Why?”
I resisted the urge to snap at her.
I was in a bad mood. I’d had a bad day at work, and I was literally trying to hold my anger inside until after she was in bed, and I could drown my problems in a bottle of wine.
My phone rang, and my heart jumped into my throat.
That was normal, though.
Six years ago, I’d received a visit that no wife of a police officer wanted to receive. One that rocked my perfect little world and left my life, as I knew it, in ashes.
My husband, Tunnel Morrison, had been killed doing what he loved. Like the hero that he was, he’d gone into a burning building to help someone and had died from smoke inhalation. However, that wasn’t his only injury—not that I’d been able to look at his body for confirmation.
Although my husband had been a police officer, I hadn’t really thought about the fact that something could happen to him. I refused to admit that it was a possibility.
Sure, he routinely went into dangerous situations. Sure, he’d been involved in something that had to do with his sister, Audrey. Sure, in the back of my mind, I knew it was possible that he could get hurt —but death? That had been a shocker. I hadn’t even acknowledged to myself that it might happen.
We’d talked about it, yes, but talking about it and it actually happening were two different things.
I let myself drift back in remembrance of that night, feeling him hug me as he told me all those wonderful, lovely things, things I had needed to hear. Things that had left with me one last beautiful memory of him.
***
“Baby, we need to talk about this,” Tunnel said.
I whirled on him. “We don’t need to talk about anything!” I yelled. “Because I’m leaving you! I can’t do this if you’re going to die.”
He reached out and pulled me to him so fast that I didn’t even have time to blink.
“You’re not going anywhere,” he snapped. “Now sit down, let’s go over this, just in case, and shut up.”
I bared my teeth at him, and his lips twitched.
“You’re just turning me on here, darlin’,” he admitted. “I know you don’t want to sign a will. I know you don’t want to even think about a will because you think that if we make this decision, that it might happen, but you have to put those feelings aside. And this isn’t just about me passing away. Just think if something were to happen to both of us,” he paused, letting that reality sink in. “If we’re both in the car, Sienna’s with Silas or one of the other brothers, and we got into a wreck and both died. Who would you want Sienna to go to?”
I bit my lip.
“Not my mom,” I finally admitted.
My mother hadn’t been a very good mother. Sure, she’d provided for me, but that was about all she did. She hated my guts, hated that I was the reason she had to work. Hated that because of me, she was forced to get a job when what she really wanted to do was live a life of leisure and do something that the rest of society did when they had enough money.
So she took it out on me, repeatedly telling me how I had ruined her life. Slapped me whenever she felt like it. Though, my dad hadn’t been aware that she was doing all that. But then again, he wasn’t much better. He had a drinking problem, and he knocked my mother around when she didn’t get dinner on the table fast enough. She then took her frustrations out on me. I hated every single day of my life with them.
“No, not your mother,” he agreed. “How about my mother?”
I shivered. “Damn.”
That was something that neither one of us wanted to happen. However, if we had no wills, the next of kin was usually chosen, which just hammered the point home that we really needed to get our wills done.
Son of a bitch.