Carson stops talking while I sob against Audrey’s shoulder, and Mom swipes at the tears streaming down her face. After a few minutes, I manage to compose myself, and the attorney continues. I purposely avoid looking at Dillon across the table, staring at the glossy walnut tabletop, wishing I could press the fast-forward button because I don’t know if I can survive this.
Reeve left a few personal items to Easton too. The golf watch I’ve already gifted him is one of them, and I burst into tears again as another wave of grief washes over me. We knew each other inside and out, and our thoughts were often in sync. Our connection is so intimate it even transcends life and death, and I’m missing him so acutely right now. What I wouldn’t give to feel his comforting arms around me or to hear his quietly uttered assurances.
I feel so lost without him. Like I’m wandering aimlessly through life, with no one to guide me along the right path. Reeve isn’t here to hold my hand when I veer in the wrong direction, to help me to get back on track. Unlike the last time, there is no overcoming it because Reeve isn’t merely on a different continent. He exists in a different realm. He’s gone, and he’s not coming back. He won’t be waiting for me like last time. He can’t ever be there for me again, and I want to die every time I remember that. It feels like I’m missing half my soul, half my heart, without him, and that’s before I contemplate the gut-wrenching loss of the baby I had nurtured so lovingly in my womb.
The pain is never-ending, and I’m like a shell of the person I used to be.
Carson asks if I want to reschedule the meeting, but I struggle through my pain, shaking my head as I blot my tears with the tissues Audrey hands me from my purse. I’ve stashed tissues in all my purses and bags because I never know when grief will attack. Sometimes, the smallest things set me off. Something almost insignificant will happen to remind me of Reeve or the daughter I lost, and I’ll fall apart, crying until my throat aches and my eyes sting. I tell Carson to continue, and he moves along to the next item.
Reeve bequeathed some personal belongings to my parents, along with the vacation house on the Italian Riviera. We hardly got to vacation there, with our busy schedules, while Mom and Dad spent several summers relaxing at the small Mediterranean-style villa. It makes sense Reeve would leave that to them, but it’s odd in another way. It’s almost as if my husband had a sixth sense about his passing. Why else would he leave my parents a house when they should have been gone before he was? My heart swells painfully as these thoughts flip-flop around my brain.
To Alex, he leaves a couple of his prized sports cars, a few of his expensive watches, and some mementos and framed photos from high school.
Audrey gasps when she discovers Reeve purchased a unit in a new modern office building being built in downtown L.A. in her name. Carson explains it is for her future medical practice and Reeve had initially planned on surprising her with it upon graduation.
Now it’s Audrey’s turn to dissolve into heartbreaking tears while I comfort her. She holds my shoulders, crying into my neck, and her pain speaks to mine. Reeve was her friend, and she’s tried to be so strong for me, but she’s entitled to her tears. She’s allowed to mourn him too, and I feel selfish in this moment for not even considering her grief as I’ve been drowning in mine.
“Did you know?” she croaks, swiping at tears.
I smile softly, nodding at my best friend. “We were out for lunch one day, and we came across the development. The guy building it happened to be there, and he and Reeve got talking. He told me a week later he had purchased one of the larger units, thinking you might want to do something with it in the future. He made me promise not to tell you.” Probably because he knew Audrey would not accept it easily. “You don’t have to do it though,” I add, not wanting my bestie to feel like she’s forced into coming back to L.A. after she has graduated or that she even has to set up her planned practice here. “It’s yours to do with as you please. Use it, or sell it, or whatever.” I shrug casually as if I wouldn’t be devastated if my bestie never returned home.
“Viv.” Audrey kisses my cheek. “We were always coming back to L.A. after my graduation. Alex even has a potential job offer on the table.”
Shock splays across my face—even if I’m thrilled—because this is the first I’m hearing of it. “Why didn’t you say anything?”
“We were going to tell you on our Mexican vacation.”
We had planned a trip to Mexico for September. It was going to be our first family vacation with our new daughter. I squeeze my eyes shut as brutal pain slaps me in the face. It is always like this. I might find a few minutes where I’ve forgotten the shitshow my life has turned into, and then something happens to remind me of everything I have lost.
“I’m sorry.”
I blink my eyes open, brushing tears away. “It’s fine,” I whisper, deliberately not looking at Dillon or Ash. I’m clinging to my sanity by my fingernails at this point.
“I think it’s wonderful you’ll be permanently returning to L.A.,” Mom says from the screen. “And now, thanks to Reeve, you have a location for your new practice.”
“Yes, I do.” Audrey hugs me quickly, and we manage to compose ourselves so Carson can finish the meeting.
“That brings us to the last item.” Carson shuffles some papers on the table, pushing his glasses up the bridge of his nose as his gaze moves between me and Dillon. “Reeve came to see me one week before he died to make an alteration to his will.” He wets his lips before reading from the papers in front of him. “In the event of my death, the inheritance I received from Simon Lancaster’s Last Will and Testament, excluding the shares in Studio 27, will be split equally with one share going to my children, to be divided between them, and the remaining share will transfer to my twin brother, Dillon Thomas O’Donoghue.”
18
Dillon
“What?” I almost fall off my chair in shock. Why the hell would Reeve add me to his will at the eleventh hour?
“It’s a substantial inheritance,” Carson Park continues as if he hasn’t noticed the startled expressions on everyone’s faces. “As well as the bank accounts, there are investment portfolios and several properties. The forty percent stake in Studio 27 now transfers to Vivien, as a caretaker, until her eldest child comes of age, and then it will pass to Easton.”
“I don’t want it,” I blurt, gripping the edge of the table. “I don’t want anything that once belonged to my asshole sperm donor.”
Carson blinks at me through his glasses.
“What my brother means is, he needs time to digest this,” Ash says, slipping into a practiced diplomatic role. She smiles that bullshit polite smile she usually rolls out at these rodeos. “You have my number. Please send me all the paperwork, and I’ll handle it.”
“Why would Reeve do that?” Viv asks, looking as confused and shocked as I feel. Her gaze bounces between the solicitor and me. “He suspected who you were. Yet he changed his will? I don’t understand.” She chews on the corner of her mouth, and the familiar gesture is like a punch in the gut.