Chasing His Brother's Bride

Queens Don't Need Kings

She was a wreck. A certifiable, walking human disaster and she needed to get her s**t together.

The drive from the office in the silence of her car with its broken radio made her ponder far too much the problem at hand.

“Think logically, Jolie,” she reminded herself for the billionth time. “He doesn’t know who you are. Keep your head down. Do your job. Don’t draw attention.” She was suddenly cursing the purchase of a pair of shoes two weeks before. Opal had insisted she spend the nearly hundred dollars on something which would be comfortable in the office and now it was one hundred dollars less in her account should she need to run.

She’d been granted a reprieve. When they’d come back from lunch, Brixton himself had called down to Mordecai’s office and had called her Julie. He’d misheard Mordecai’s introduction and it was buying her time. She didn’t correct him and had immediately said she would send up the specific report he was looking for and had almost hung up on him.

Once she’d sent the report off, she began immediately looking at her bank accounts, her savings accounts and cursing herself for listening to Mordecai for putting them into thirty-day investments which would automatically roll over if she didn’t cash them out. In his words, anything which comes up emergency wise, take from a savings. Have thirty days of savings always on hand and then the investments are the backup for when it runs out.

She shouldn’t have bought the shoes. She certainly couldn’t run in heels.

She arrived to her destination and got out and watched through a fence as children of various ages played on gym equipment, wearing hats and mittens. It was late March and March in Boston was still cold. She found the familiar set of brown eyes hanging upside down by her knees with one of the teachers holding onto her. The squeals of laughter told her the daredevil child was thrilled with the notion of being upside down.

Opal reassured her this was a phase. Her son Axl had done the same thing. Went from being afraid of the dark to bringing creepy crawlies and putting his very own little monsters under his bed. The story of him putting a snake under his bed at six still haunted her. She prayed Pia never got into snakes.

“Mommy!” the girl squealed clamouring to get off the equipment to run to her.

“Mia Pia!” she opened her arms as she stepped into the gated area. “Ouf,” she grunted as the child slammed into her. Tiny for her age of five, the little girl was painfully shy and steered away from anyone and anything she wasn’t comfortable with and Jolie knew a lot of it was her fault. Constant fears, moving frequently and always looking over her shoulder had made her little sprite, as she called her, a bit of a nervous child. They had settled the last three years in their little rental house but they had moved six times before this while in Boston.

“Hi Mommy! I missed you so much. I didn’t like my lunch today.”

“You didn’t eat?”

“I don’t like cheese sandwiches anymore.” She told her matter-of-factly, with a tone suggesting she should have miraculously read the ever-changing mind of a five-year-old.

“I’m sorry to hear this. What would you prefer tomorrow?”

“I don’t want to go to school tomorrow.” Pia stomped her foot as they entered the after-school daycare to collect her backpack and lunch bag.

“Kindergarten is important, Pia. You have to go to school.”

“I don’t like it. It’s boring.”

“It’s not boring!” Jolie made big eyes. “I thought you were learning numbers and look,” she pulled a coloring page out of the bookbag as she sat on a bench. “You even spelled your name.” The P was backwards but Jolie didn’t care. She was trying.

Pia folded her arms and pouted and Jolie noted for the millionth time in the little girl’s life, she was the spitting image of her father, especially with the temper on. She had his black hair and dark eyes and while she had Jolie’s oversized mouth and rounded cheeks with the dimples, the patrician nose taking prominence on her face was definitely her fathers. Val might have been a sadistic son of a b***h but he’d been gorgeous to look at.

She cupped the rounded cheeks and spoke softly, “can you tell mommy why you had a bad day and why you don’t want to go to school?”

“Norman made fun of me for being short and all the kids laughed. They started calling me shorty and I don’t like it!” she stomped her foot furiously. “I’m not going back.”

“Hm,” Jolie fought the urge to find the little s**t named Norman and smack his arse. “You think you should not go back to school because a boy teased you?”

“They all teased me mommy.”

“What did you do?” Jolie already had a feeling she knew what the child had done. Gone to her cubby and cried was the likely answer.

“Nuffin’,” she wiped an angry tear slipping from the corner of her eyes. “I wanted to punch him in the face but you said hitting is wrong.”

“It is wrong. You never raise your hands to anyone, ever,” Jolie lifted her up in her arms and looked her square in the eyes, “but you are allowed to defend yourself. You can also tell your teacher when someone is bullying you. Mommy will have a talk with Mrs. Harmon tomorrow and make sure she let’s Norman’s mom know to talk to him about bullying.”

Pia rested her head on her shoulder and sighed exaggeratedly, “can we have pizza?”

Clearly, they were done with the conversation, Jolie thought and hoisted the backpack which was nearly the size of the little girl onto her shoulder. “No pizza tonight.” Her original plan to have dinner at Opal’s was quashed because the woman was helping Mordecai with the special project Beckwith had demanded. “I’ll make spaghetti though.”

It was her second favorite meal and Jolie prayed it would take the edge off. No more eating out. No more special purchases. Every penny was going to count if they had to run.

“I don’t like spaghetti.”

“How are you Italian?” she tickled the little tummy. “All Italians love spaghetti.”

“I’m an alien,” Pia shrugged as she bounced on her mother’s hip. “Alien’s like to eat space food.”

“Oh,” she made wide eyes at her. “What kind of space food?”

“Rocks!”

“Well, you’re in luck! I’m going to make spaghetti and asteroid meatballs. Do aliens like asteroid meatballs?”

“We do!”

Jolie buckled her into the car seat and then closed the door. The drive from the daycare to her home was less than ten minutes and yet, with every glance in the rear-view mirror and every red light, it felt like an hour trapped in a car like a sitting duck.

Once home, Pia zoomed through the house, running, screaming, and playing as if she hadn’t had a mild tantrum at school. She was taking her two favorite dolls on an adventure to Mars and they were now under the kitchen table while Jolie dished out dinner.

“Is my little Martian going to eat at the table or in her secret cave on Mars?”

“Will you eat in my cave with me?”

“I’m allowed in the cave?” Jolie leaned down and looked under the table, “I feel very special.”

“You are special, mommy. You’re the queen Martian and I am the princess Martian. Dolly and Polly are princesses too.” She waved her dolls at her.

Jolie shrugged and figured she may as well let the kid have a handful of good memories because if they had to sudden start running from Cacciola family, moments like pretending under the kitchen table was a sanctuary could end up being reality. She carried the two plates and scooted under the table and sat on the floor with her daughter.

“Mommy, we need a king.”

“No, we don’t,” she corrected with a shake of her head. “Queens and princesses do completely fine without kings.”

“Felicity’s daddy picked her up at school today and he threw her so high in the air she almost touched the sun. I bet he would be a good king.”

“Not all kings are good kings.”

“Kings have to be good kings. They have to take care of the queens and princesses.”

“Queens and princesses can take care of themselves,” Jolie muttered as she stabbed a meatball and considered she may have overcooked them. They were almost as chalky as moondust and hard as an asteroid.

“I want a king to throw me in the air and catch me.”

“I can do that.”

“Not as high as Felicity’s daddy.”

“He’s as big as a house. Nobody could ever throw you so high.”

“I want a daddy like Felicity.”

“I’m sorry baby but we talked about this before. Your daddy died before he even knew you were in my belly.” Thank god otherwise Pia wouldn’t be here to make her life so much brighter.

She pouted, “why did my daddy die?”

Because he was an evil vile bastard who got so drunk and high, he forgot he left the front door wide open and one of his enemies walked right into his bedroom and shot him in the head while he was passed out naked next to her. She softened the story, “because it was his time to go.”

“Like my goldfish.”

“Like your goldfish.” Except far more brutally and coldly than the goldfish.

“Did you flush him down the toilet like a goldfish?”

Jolie tried hard not to snort laugh at the question. “No baby, I did not. He had a funeral and they put him in a box and buried him in the ground.”

“Like Norman’s cat.”

“Norman’s cat died?”

“Norman said he buried his cat in a box in his back yard by his swings.”

Considering what she knew of Norman, she suddenly was worried about the cat. “Well, yeah, I guess.” She pointed to the food on her plate, “eat your asteroids.”

“They’re crunchy,” Pia complained.

She didn’t disagree. “I know but you wanted asteroids so I cooked them to taste the way they would if you were on Mars.” She was owning it and going with it.

“Mommy, we should have got pizza.”

“Pia, please eat.”

“Can I have toast?”

Jolie considered she was ready to pull her hair out. She knew she was frazzled from running into her daughter’s uncle today but the little tyrant was really pushing all her buttons at the wrong time.

“Eat the noodles. If you eat all your noodles, you can have your cookie for dessert.”

“Did you make the cookies?” The child eyed her dubiously.

Jolie was starting to realize her kid was at an age where she was learning her mother couldn’t cook very well. “No. Mordecai bought my lunch today and it came with a cookie. I saved it for you. It has M&Ms in it.”

Suddenly the child was shoveling noodles into her face with gusto, slurping and smacking as if she were devouring the most scrumptious meal she’d ever had. She rolled her eyes as she pushed her own meatballs to the side and also only ate the noodles.

“Mommy?” Pia asked suddenly, her face coated with red sauce.

Jolie found herself wondering how the child got the lick of sauce across her eyebrows. She reached out with a thumb and wiped it off.

“I know we don’t need a king but can I have a daddy? If my daddy died like my goldfish and we got a new goldfish, can’t we just get a new daddy? I really want one.”

Jolie closed her eyes as the question tore her heart in half. She was absolutely terrified of most men. The possibility of Pia ever having a daddy was a hard zero. “Pia, I’m sorry baby but you can’t replace humans like you do goldfish.”

“But Norman has two daddies. He has his regular daddy and he has his daddy who lives with him and his mom. He drew it on a picture. It’s not fair he gets two and I don’t have any. We have to share.”

“No, we don’t share people.” Jolie corrected and sighed. “Pia. There are things little girls might not understand but please know Mommy loves you enough for both a mommy and a daddy. And” she tweaked her nose, “daddies don’t always let their children do the things they want. When I was a little girl, my daddy never let me watch television. Ever. He wouldn’t even let us have a television in the house!”

“You didn’t get to watch tv?”

“Nope. He said reading books was better for my imagination.”

“I like books but I like television. I like my tablet too.”

“I never had a tablet growing up. I had a computer though I was only allowed on it to do homework.”

“Sounds more boring than kindergarten.” Pia moaned exaggeratedly and held up her plate which now held only three meatballs and a smidgeon of sauce. “Can I have my cookie now?”

“Yes. Let’s exit the cave and go get your cookie.”

As they made their way out of the cave, Pia asked another question. “Where is your daddy?”

Cavorting with the enemy, she thought rather snidely and instead shrugged. “He lives in a city called Las Vegas.”

“Can we visit him?”

“No.”

“Why not?”

“Pia, enough! No more of this nonsense!” she snapped and then caught herself when the dark brown eyes immediately filled with tears and stared at her as if she’d struck her with an open palm. She groaned at her short temper and how she’d raised her voice. “I’m sorry. I’m sorry.”

Pia wasn’t having it though and pushed her away and ran down the hall towards her bedroom screaming, “you’re a big meanie head! I want my daddy!”

Jolie plunked onto a chair and dropped her face into her hands and felt the tears which had been threatening all day finally give way. She might be a big meanie head but Pia’s father would have killed her before she had even made it out of a molecular stage and she wasn’t certain the pair of them would live to tell the tale if his family ever found out about her.

With that thought in her head, she began cleaning up the kitchen and reminding herself, she had to do what was best for her little girl. If she ran now, they would know something was up and would chase her. No. She had to play it right. If Brixton Beckwith was as thorough as she thought he was going to be, it was a matter of time before he realized her name was Jolie and not Julie and from there, her days were numbered. As she flicked a glance to the thumping of fists and feet pounding on the floor in a terrible display of temper, she prayed she could find a way out of this and fast.