“You sick fuck!” Helena howled.
“Now, I’ve had about enough of you. It’s time to send you on your merry way. See you in hell.” Richard smacked her across the face with his free hand. Helena winced. He hit her again, harder this time, with the back of his gun, knocking her back onto the large glass coffee table, shattering it. Shards of glass spread everywhere.
It was a lovely watching her crash hard against the floor. “Ouch, that must’ve hurt,” Richard said. No response from Helena, no cry, no movement, nothing. Richard turned his eyes to the kitchen where his Francesca could be heard screaming.
Frankie watched in horror from the kitchen as her mother smashed right through the coffee table. She sobbed, thinking both her parents were dead.
“No more games, Francesca. Come on out here now, so we can talk. I love you, I really do. But we need to get straight on a couple of issues. Come out on your own, I don’t want to be forceful. I’ll give you a minute to compose yourself.
“You, know, I’m not thrilled about the way you left the cabin. I don’t take lightly to being teased. I’ll have to punish you for that. It really hurt me when you did that. I thought we were friends. After all, it was you who said that we were going to have a special night together. I even told my mother about you! Why did you leave me? I know it’s because of your mother here. Mothers can be so opinionated. My mother didn’t like a lot of the women I brought home over the years. I know how it feels to make a parent proud, how important it is. But Francesca, she doesn’t deserve your love. She abandoned you.”
Frankie saw him pace around her mom. She inched her way into the family room as quietly as possible by going around the other side of the kitchen, through the dining room. Thankfully, he was busy with his tirade. She made it to the fireplace that opened up into the family room and grabbed a poker propped next to it.
“What are you doing, Francesca?” He looked up at her from her mother’s body. “You wouldn’t want to do anything stupid, now, would you?”
“I wouldn’t?” She charged him as he raised his gun to shoot her. She concentrated forcing the sharp end of the poker straight through his stomach, knowing he could fire and kill her at any second. Richard screamed as the point went through him, dropping the gun as it fired into the air.
He fell to the floor, screaming. He grabbed Frankie’s ankle, and even though he’d been grievously wounded, his strength was unworldly. With the stake sticking out of the side of his body, he pulled her down to the ground. She struggled, while he grappled to put his hands around her neck. She kicked him in the stomach and was able to push him off. He tried to lunge for her again as a loud pop sounded from the floor near the coffee table.
Richard fell on top of her legs, dead. Frankie screamed and squirmed out from underneath him. She saw her mom sitting up, the silenced gun shaking in both hands.
“It’s over, Mom.” She went to her and put her arms around her. “It’s finally over,” Frankie sobbed.
The gun slipped from Helena’s hand as she stroked her daughter’s silken hair. “Yes it is, baby. It really is.”
Eighteen months later . . .
Helena tried to hold onto a wiggling twenty-month old Jeremy Winters as his mother Rachel cut the white satin ribbon strung across the front porch of the newly rebuilt Shea House. The baby had grown into a toddler and desperately wanted down.
The crowd that was gathered all cheered. Rachel walked over to Helena, taking Jeremy from her arms. They embraced. Tears of joy blurred Helena’s vision as she walked up the stairs to the top of the porch. She saw Tyler and Claire, now newlyweds, up front holding hands. Claire’s slight bulge in the tummy showed off her early pregnancy. Her book about their ordeal had sold as she’d predicted, and because of the profits, Shea House had been rebuilt faster than expected.
“I want to thank everyone for coming. This truly is a dream come true. Shea House will be able to provide housing for thirty women and their infant children. The goal is to help these women to not only find shelter but to also regain a sense of self-esteem, to become educated, and to help them become self-sufficient. When the women do find work, Shea House will provide childcare until they can afford housing and care on their own. What we’re doing here is very exciting. And we appreciate all of your support.
“Now, I’d like to introduce a few of my favorite supporters—not that all of you aren’t wonderful—but these people in particular have really helped to get this project off the ground. Please welcome Tyler and Claire Savoy, major contributors to seeing Shea House rebuilt. And Claire, who is the new pregnancy columnist over at
Parenting Magazine,
will be by the House twice a week to provide advice and support to our pregnant ladies.
“I’d also like to welcome Rachel Winters. Rachel will be working in the daycare center. As many of you know, Rachel survived the fire here a year and a half ago, and she’s come so far since that time. I can’t tell you how pleased I am that she’s decided to take a position with us, and we gratefully welcome her and her wonderful little boy, Jeremy.”
The crowd cheered for Rachel and her son. Rachel
had
come a long way from that day when Shea House burned down with her trapped inside. She’d undergone several surgeries and extensive therapy, and was progressing rapidly. Upon her return from Maui, Helena researched and found the best plastic surgeon in the country who’d done a wonderful job with the skin grafts Rachel needed done. It was an excruciating ordeal, but Rachel proved yet again what a brave young woman she was.
“Last but not least, I’d like to welcome my daughter Frankie and my fiancée Patrick Kiley. They, along with many others, have actually come out here on weekends and put their own blood and sweat into building Shea House. They will also be here on a volunteer basis on the weekends, as they’re moving back to Los Angeles soon. I love you both very much.” Loud applause erupted through the crowd. “Now, everyone please come inside, enjoy the tour and lunch.”
Helena stepped down off the porch, allowing the guests to come through the front door. Patrick and Frankie and Frankie’s boyfriend Chris Highland approached her. The kids were holding hands. Helena couldn’t help wishing her daughter wasn’t almost grown up. She was getting ready to graduate from high school and would be attending USC in the fall, with plans to study, of all things, forensic science!
Frankie had finally gotten that kiss from Chris Highland. The one she’d thought about way back on the night Richard had abducted her while she was on her way down to the beach to be with her friends.
Patrick limped slightly from the gunshot he’d taken in the leg eighteen months earlier, but other than that things had gone very well. He, too, had gotten back all that he’d ever wanted.
“Thanks for embarrassing me, Mom.” Frankie laughed and threw her arms around Helena.
“Any time.”
“I’m starving. We’re going to head inside for some lunch, okay?”
“Great speech, Ms. Shea,” Chris said.
“Thanks, Chris. You can call me Helena.”
The young man nodded and led Frankie into the house. Helena and Patrick watched the two of them together, knowing that before long Frankie would be out on her own.
Patrick put an arm around Helena’s waist and pulled her close. “Ever thought this day would come?” he asked.
“Not in a million years, but I’m ecstatic it did.”
“Me, too. We’re finally a family, Lena.”
“Yes we are. We really are.”
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