Legal Legacy

By Kimball Lee

LEGAL LEGACY
Surrendering Charlotte Chronicles Book 9
The legal action continues with Charlotte, Bly and all of the Legal Heirs!
Legal Legacy 2 coming late August 2014.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Kimball Lee
• Release date: Jun 13, 2014
• ISBN: 9781310096563

Kimball Lee

Hi, I'm Kimball Lee and I'd like to welcome you to the many worlds of my imagination! The topics of my novels and novella-series will vary but my style of writing remains the same. I don't write 700 page books padded with useless words that take three chapters to describe a doorknob! I do write funny, interesting, happy, sad, romantic, often titillating and always thought provoking works that pack a lot of good reading into just the right number of pages. I hope you enjoy my writing and know that it comes from the heart and I give every spare moment to creating characters you would want to have as friends and worlds you would want to visit or live in. Happy reading! Kimball Thank you for visiting my author page, please connect with me on my social media sites! [e-mail]

Book preview

Legal Legacy

Book 1

Surrender Charlotte

By Kimball Lee

ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

Smashwords Edition

Copyright 2014 Kimball Lee

Chapter One

I wish you could see what I’ve seen, not the terrors of the world, but the miracles. You, especially, my love, what a wonder you are, you saved me from living a brutally shallow life. I could never have endured a mundane existence and loving you has been the greatest adventure of all. I just thought you should know, Charlotte, in case I forget to tell you later on. Do you remember that New Year’s Eve in Paris, when I asked if you were glad that you married me? You recited a line from a poem… Finn smiled his perfectly crooked smile and squeezed Charlotte’s hand, or perhaps it was Hadley’s hand. No matter, oh how he loved his girls, the thought took root in his mind and then it quickly evaporated before he drifted off to sleep under the warm October sun.

Charlotte curled next to him on the chaise lounge in the back yard of their ‘love-nest’ cottage and whispered the line, ‘I have no saying bright enough to tell about our love.’" She rested her head on the firm muscles of his chest and her tears splashed in huge drops that stained the front of his shirt as he slept. His body was strong and flawless, his clean, safe smell was as unchanged and alluring as ever, but his mind was a ruin. How well she remembered that New Year’s Eve in a restaurant high up overlooking the glittering expanse of Paris. The ‘City of light’ it was called, but Paris was a mere flicker in the darkness compared to the light of love that surrounded them. They had been married only a few months then and Charlotte was pregnant with Atticus. They were wild in their need for each other and they had left the restaurant and barely made it to their hotel room to peel away clothes and make love through the night without a care in the world. Their lives stretched out ahead of them, years and years of happiness, the baby growing in her belly would be the first of many and his birth would make them a full-fledged family.

Charlotte sat up and smoothed her fingers through Finn’s hair. He had let it grow and it was as wild and unpredictable as he was. As she looked down into the handsome face that she loved more than life itself, a stab of pain pierced her heart as cold and sharp as a surgeon’s blade. Finn hadn’t allowed such a blade to touch him, if he had to die, as every man surely did, he wanted to be whole, at least in his body. His mind was doomed to cloud and wither and there was nothing to be done about it, he accepted that and he wouldn’t hinder the process and slowly decay while his family watched in pity and sadness. He didn’t welcome death but he’d been close to it many times before and now he felt it settling around him. He had eluded killers most of his adult life and he knew that this cancer was the most deadly of all, the one he couldn’t escape. He wanted his wife and children to go on with their lives, to mourn him and remember him and to let his spirit go.

Finn’s wish was to live out the time left to him in the cottage where he and Charlotte had started their love affair, so they’d moved in two months before, after a trip to the renowned cancer center in Houston. Charlotte and Hadley had insisted on an entire battery of new tests and Finn let them have their way even though he was certain it was too late. He knew the trip would be of no use and he only wanted quality time with the ones he loved. When he had gathered his family together to tell them about his illness they had all been stunned. It was impossible to imagine that anything or anyone could end the life of this courageous, seemingly invincible man. He was their rock, their safe place in the world, his love, strength, and devotion were steadfast, solid and unwavering. The news left them reeling and each member of the family reacted differently. Charlotte lost her legendary composure and crumpled to the ground in tears and misery, Charlie refused to accept the truth and had rushed upstairs and locked himself away in his bedroom. Atticus became belligerent, throwing an entire set of dining chairs through the dining room window in his anger, all the while shouting at Finn and arguing with him over his nonchalant attitude toward the disease. Hadley alone remained calm. She immediately called Holden, and he and Bly had arrived just in time to stop Atticus from beating hell-fire and damnation out of a neighbor who knocked on the door to complain about the noise and the flying furniture.

That very night Bly’s jet soared through the sky toward Houston and the atmosphere was eerily quiet except for the hum of the engines. Finn had fallen asleep ten minutes into the flight and Atticus sat across from him just staring at his father, trying to make sense of such an unexpected tragedy. Hadley and Holden huddled together without speaking on one of the leather sofas, and Charlie had stayed behind with Finn’s mother, Georgina. Bly had brought Billy Kipling along but Cruz De Leon was assigned to keep an eye on Mia during her ‘vacation’ in upstate New York. When the jet reached its cruising altitude and leveled off Charlotte left her spot bedside Finn and settled into a seat across from Bly.

I don’t know what to think about this, Bly, I’m scared, I’m really, really scared of losing my husband, Charlotte said.

I know you are Charlotte, but let’s see what the doctors in Houston have to say. M.D. Anderson is one of the best cancer treatment centers in the world, they have a specialized team waiting for us.

Bly wasn’t sure he could survive Charlotte’s pain if she lost Finn, hurt and confusion were written sharply across her face and echoed in her voice. She was not one to give up easily, she didn’t believe in losing a fight, but it was obvious that she realized she wasn’t going to win this one.

In the next few days Finn humored them and submitted to the burdensome tests the ‘miracle worker’ doctors in Houston put him through. In the end their diagnosis simply confirmed what he already knew and his family refused to accept. He had a month, maybe two to live, he should go home and settle in, put his affairs in order and do all the things that brought joy to his heart.

They flew away from Houston and left the doctors behind, but the grim death sentence followed them and couldn’t be shaken or undone. It was a solid thing in their midst, like the bell on the beach during Finn’s SEAL training, all a man had to do was ring it three times and give up and go back to an easier existence. But that was something that Finn hadn’t done, he and JP had stuck it out through Hell Week and beyond. Every other man in their recruit class dropped like flies and crawled toward that bell, worn down and defeated by suffering and torment and exhaustion. He and JP were the only two who stayed the course and they had made a pact to never give up until an enemy was defeated, no fight was abandoned until they were victorious. But this cancer, these wickedly merciless tumors were unbeatable and only a foolish man would fight against their inescapable power.

Their little group settled back into the roomy seats on the jet and silence hung in the air, thick and oppressive. Silence could be deadly just like the cancer that had taken up residence in Finn’s brain without remorse or conscience.

Words unspoken, those that were held inside festering for too long, could cause irreparable damage and become malignant. Atticus had words inside him that had been quietly waiting for him to spit them out. They were words that promised to set him free, free of his guilt for having loved two fathers, and having loved Finn the most. Freedom from always doing the right thing, for wanting to disappear into the world and shake off the burden of being the first born son. He was tired of the way the shallow people in society