Page 114 of True Blue

22

TEDDY

AUGUST

She looks so beautiful.

That’s the only thing I can focus on. Her being this close to me after weeks without seeing her is like drinking water after wandering in the desert, like something vital finally being poured back into me all at once.

She, however, does not look happy to see me.

Which is understandable. I’m crashing her dream vacation. Interrupting what looks like a very good time with this petite, dark-haired woman. I have no idea who she is, but she seems to know exactly who I am with the way her eyes narrow after Indie whispers something in her ear.

Indie glances back over to me, blue eyes cold, and I lift my hand in another awkward wave.

Three days ago, as I was going over the will with Stephanie—who took a red-eye—and Danielle, who conference-called into Dunk’s office, we went over Nana’s estate.

I felt my heartbeat keep a steady, but powerful, pace as Dunk explained a family history I wasn’t even aware of.

Pop’s grandfather worked in steel and owned one of the most successful mills in Indiana, which honestly felt a lot like fate. Stephanie had even nudged me with her elbow when we learned that.

The Industrial Boom, spurred by the war effort, made the Ambroses rich. They sold the mill in 1955 and retired to Florida. World War II was pretty much the only reason they clawed their way out of near-poverty during the Depression, so the Ambroses just sat on their millions.

Pop never even realized the wealth he had until his parents passed away in a car accident. He and Nana had already been married by then, and she was pregnant with my Mom.

Pop and Nana loved the way they lived, though. They were never hungry or cold; all the bills were paid; they lived in a nice house paid for by Pop’s lumber business.

There was just no excess. No fancy clothes, luxury beach houses, mansions, cars, and caviar. It was all nonsense that my blue-collar Pop and free-spirit flower child Nana wanted no part of.

But Mom apparently found out about the money, and she wanted more than what they had. Stephanie thinks that’s what caused Mom’s rebellion, why she wanted a man like Dad, why she wanted to be pregnant with Danielle so badly. She didn’t want to work when there was a mountain of money just out of reach.

And she tried to use me to get to it.

When Pop passed, he left everything to Nana, his heart and soul. And then, when Nana passed, Mom and my aunts were trying to delay the reading because she somehow found out that Indie was one of her beneficiaries.

Dunk said she probably figured it out when he reached out to set up a will reading, but didn’t have any of my, my sister’s, or Indie’s numbers on file. Mom had provided him with false numbers and addresses for all of us, under the guise of being helpful. She also told him I was mentally delicate, and he was under the impression she was trying to set up a narrative.

That I was incompetent and couldn’t be trusted with the money.

“I’ve seen it all with family,” Dunk said, folding his hands on his desk in front of him. “Money gets involved, muddies everything up, and people start forgetting about loyalty and love.”

Probably why Nana cut out every single family member besides my siblings and me.

And Indie.

Nana placed everything of hers that was priceless in a safety deposit box we were able to get from her bank with Dunk’s help. In it was everything she didn’t trust to leave at Mom’s house, and everything she was leaving to us.

And what a fucking surprise it was.

“I’m sorry, could you repeat that?” Danielle was the first to break the silence, crackling from the conference phone.

“You each get five million dollars.”

“Each,” Stephanie clarified, which Dunk nodded. “Holy shit, Nana. I knew she was sitting on something, but—holy shit, Nana.”

“And Indie?” I asked.

“Indie will receive three million dollars,” Dunk said, reading off the paperwork. “‘With two million being given to the American Cancer Society in Indiana Miller’s name.’ Eleanor said she would appreciate that.”