With this segment of Chapter Eleven of Repairing the Legacy, we continue the serialization of Repairing the Legacy. This is a rough draft work in progress and may not reflect the final form. Time period: set after the ending of The Martiniere Legacy main trilogy. I’m breaking longer chapters into sections for readability. This is the second

part of Chapter Eleven. There will be three parts to this chapter.

New to the series? Chapter order:

Return of the Prodigal Son (2 parts)

Conversations and a Dinner (2 parts)

Dancing into Change (2 parts)

Sisterly Compromises (3 parts)

Conspiracies at the Rodeo (3 parts)

Passing the Baton (4 parts)

Research Complications (3 parts)

Chasing After Shadows (3 parts)

Fifth Anniversary Present (3 parts)

Mariah (5 parts)

April, 2067

“Time with Mikey? You bet,” Justine said, grinning, when Ruby brought it up after breakfast. Brandon was working, Lily in the office with him doing schoolwork before going to her first dance class.

“Maybe we can go to a baseball game,” Donald suggested, a matching smile on his face.

“They start this early?” Ruby didn’t have a clue about non-equestrian sports. She had never possessed the time to care, her grandparents hadn’t been into sports, and Gabe was like her—interested in equestrian sport, especially rodeo, but nothing else.

“Early games. I’ll see what I can do about tickets.” Donald finished loading the dishwasher and started it.

“We might stay down there for several days,” Ruby cautioned.

“After this last session on Nameless, I’m more than ready to do some urban things,” Donald said.

“You won’t need to rush back?” Justine furrowed her brows at him.

“Finally have this caretaker trained,” Donald said. “Might even be able to stay for a couple of days once Mike, Ruby, and Gabe go back to the Double R.”

Justine smiled. Their gaze locked for a few moments and Ruby felt like she might be intruding. She slipped out of the kitchen to prepare for taking Lily to class.

The question nagged at her all the same.

So why was Donald tied down to Nameless Island, to the degree that a caretaker’s training made a difference? Did it have something to do with why Justine wouldn’t remarry him—and why wouldn’t she remarry Donald, given that they were still clearly in love with each other?

#

Gabe and Mike arrived around noon the next day, shortly after Brandon and his family left. Mike looked around the living room cautiously.

“Lily’s gone,” Ruby said.

Mike exhaled in obvious relief.

“Feel like going to a baseball game this afternoon, Mike?” Donald asked. “Gabe, you can join us if you’d like.”

“Thanks, Don, but I’d like to get down to the coast fairly quickly. There’s a storm due this evening.”

“Ah. Understand.”

But the intense scrutiny that Gabe fixed on Ruby suggested to her that there was more involved with his urgency to get to the cliff house than beating a storm.

That look sent tingles up and down her body, and the way he stalked toward Ruby made her shiver in anticipation. Gabe’s come-hither, seductive gaze was amped up to full burn. He took her into his arms and kissed her hard, intensely, almost too much given that they had an audience.

No, this urgency to get to the cliff house wasn’t about racing a storm.

Springtime, perhaps? Or just missing her presence?

No matter which this was, Ruby was going to take full advantage of the situation. Lovemaking when Gabe was in this mood was marvelous. These occasions had significantly declined as they aged and Mike entered his teen years.

She was most definitely ready for a few days alone with her husband.

#

Gabe held Ruby’s hand all the way to the cliff house, periodically rubbing his thumb across her palm. Then he would raise her hand to his lips, kissing it. Their eyes met each time and that little tingle ran through her, in expectation of what would happen once they were alone in the cliff house. Oh, this was so much like the first date that led to them becoming lovers. Maybe not in location but that gaze. The way her heart pounded.

The question was, who would act on it first?

#

Both of them, as it turned out. Once security had cleared out of the house, and they finished arranging kitchen supplies, Gabe glided toward Ruby. She grabbed him around the waist and pulled him close, backing up until she leaned against the kitchen island. Gabe purred as their lips met and parted, tongues teasing each other before he began kissing her chin, running tongue and lips down her neck, fingers fumbling with her shirt snaps.

“Bedroom,” Ruby finally gasped. “Too old to screw in the kitchen.”

“Agreed,” Gabe growled. “Bed. Now.”

She clung to his hips as he backed her into the bedroom, his hands supporting her upper body firmly against him. Some fumbling as they kicked off shoes and pulled off clothing, but before long they were on the bed.

Oh. She was on fire, so on fire, and so was he, enough to think that they were in their twenties again.

#

They crawled under the covers once they were sated, holding each other. Gabe stroked Ruby’s face with his index finger. She closed her eyes, thrilling to the contact.

Gabe chuckled. “Sixty-five and fifty-nine, and we can still get it on like we were kids. Occasionally.”

Ruby opened her eyes. “No complaints from this party. I think it must be going around, from the vibes that Justine and Donald were putting out.”

“Mmm, didn’t hurt that Mike and I were working with broodmares. Both Crystal and Legacy came into heat, pretty intense.” Another chuckle from Gabe. “Star wasn’t complaining. They’re definitely bred. But I also missed you pretty bad.”

“It has been a while since we’ve had time for just us.”

“Too long.”

“I won’t argue with that.” Ruby reached up to cup Gabe’s cheek.

He turned his head to kiss her palm, then sighed. “Poor Bran. Poor Kris. I did speak to Bran last night, as the Martiniere Emeritus, to advise him that they shouldn’t feel pressure to have another kid just for the Family’s sake.”

“I’ve told him that as well. So has Justine. Probably with similar results. I don’t think their desire for more kids is about the Family.”

“That’s my impression, too. How’s Tine been taking this situation with the hydatidiform mole?”

“She drank pretty heavily the first night, once we were settled in the condo. We were sipping from her flask while watching Lily’s class.” Ruby paused. “That led to a conversation about our divorces. She said she had several men lined up as backup, but wouldn’t say anything more except to talk to you. Too close to home for her to say more.”

“Yeah.” Gabe propped himself up on his elbow. “Justine and Donald’s divorce, given that it happened just before ours—honestly, I hoped it would be a distraction for Philip. That the timing of the AgInnovator would give us a break.”

“It didn’t.”

“I knew Don and Justine’s divorce was coming. They had agreed to it before their marriage.”

“What the fuck, Gabriel?”

He sighed and stroked her shoulder, beginning to trace the Martiniere trefoil on it, an action which usually marked their discussion as involving Family politics.

“Their prenuptial agreement included a mutual pact to divorce after seven years, unless they rescinded that aspect of it.”

“Wow. She said it was political.”

“Very much so. Tine married Don to get away from Philip, avoid being drugged into compliance so she would marry Walter Braun.” Gabe’s lips tightened. “I don’t know all the details of the divorce proceedings. But her hysterectomy made it inevitable, because Philip dragged her into the Martiniere Group, and she and Don decided that what she could do in that position was more important than their marriage.”

“Philip forced their divorce, too.” Another instance when she wished to hell that she could resurrect her late father-in-law and make the asshole pay.

“Yes. And apparently Tine’s involvement with Eliot and Nick was a coverup; nothing more than friendship and alliance, meant to distract Philip from scrutinizing her further clandestine work with Don. They chose Rescue Angel’s survival over their marriage.”

“Fuck.” What else could she say? “She’s pretty adamant about not remarrying, which really surprises me.”

Gabe shook his head. “I have no understanding of my sister’s rationale for that choice. To all appearances, she and Don are as close a couple as they were before I left the Family.”

“She won’t give a reason. And Don’s tied down to Nameless. He said something about finally training a caretaker, the first night we were all in the condo, so he could have a few extra days.”

“I have no idea, either. Maybe it’s because he’s still involved with those women who were a part of their divorce? Then again, casual observation would make outsiders think the same about Justine, Nick, and Eliot.”

“Maybe that’s it,” Ruby said slowly. “But I don’t think so.”

Gabe shrugged. “Eh, who knows? Those two have always kept their long-term plans to themselves. I’m just happy they’re our allies and not our opposition.” He pushed a strand of hair back that had fallen into her face. “But here’s something else to think about. Remember when we talked about how things might have been different if my family hadn’t died, after Mariah’s funeral?”

“Yeah.”

“I had some very vivid dreams about what that might have been like over the past few nights.” He smirked. “Somewhat erotic, in fact.”

“Aha.” She chuckled. “I knew there was more to your mood than separation or horses breeding.”

Gabe’s laugh echoed hers. “Yeah, you were just as hot—if not hotter—in those dreams as you were as a twenty-one-year-old barrel racer. But it was an interesting set of dreams. Sequential. Detailed—or at least what I remember of them.”

Now that was interesting. “What kind of details?”

“Four years age difference between us instead of six. While I still spent time in Philip’s house, it was only two years, and I hauled Justine out when I left. She spent her teen years growing up with my sister Louisa, and oh were they ever a pair.” He kissed her forehead. “You and I married within a month of meeting each other, because I became the Martiniere and Philip had threatened to kill me. I didn’t know if I would live to see our first anniversary. Our mutual science and technical interests were a huge factor in how fast we became a couple, because there just wasn’t anyone else that clicked like we did.”

“Close enough to our real lives. So did you survive to our first anniversary?”

“I never did dream the rest of the story, at least anything I remember. The last pieces included the two of us fighting Philip at the Double R. We both nearly died, but you killed both Philip and his girlfriend in a shootout.”

“Damn, that’s a dream I really wish I could have shared.”

More forehead kisses. “And then we were in Paris, still recovering from our injuries from fighting Philip. That was the last part I remember.”

“Sounds like you did survive. That’s good.”

“Yeah.” His fingers kept tracing the trefoil. “No indenture in that world, but accelerated climate change. And—no Brandon. No Mike. A quick flash of Justine and Donald with a daughter, but that was it. No indication if we stayed married.”

“I don’t know if I like the sounds of that world.” She considered the possibilities.

Gabe was silent long enough that she would have thought that he had fallen asleep, except that he kept tracing the trefoil on her shoulder.

“We were both a lot more emotionally and physically damaged by what happened to us in that world than we are in this life,” he said finally. “I like this one better. Even if we spent twenty-one years apart in this world. I have the distinct sense that we died before we reached our fifties, in that universe.”

Ruby yawned. She turned and snuggled in close to Gabe. “Then I definitely like this world better.”

He nuzzled her ear and threw one arm over her. “Living to a ripe old age is the best revenge, as far as I’m concerned. I just—regret the years we lost.”

“Nothing to do about that, except to make our remaining years the best that they can be.”

“Agreed.”

#

Pounding rain on the window while it was still dark stirred Ruby from a restless, foreboding dream that featured Philip laughing and promising future vengeance. Much as she tried, no further details came to her, except an ominous fear that the rain, and the storm, foretold problems ahead.

Stop it, Ruby, she chided herself. You’re just being fanciful.

But no amount of self-reprimand could banish her sense that shadows were gathering to do them harm.

She pressed closer to Gabe. His arms tightened around her, but he didn’t waken.

Please. Keep everyone I love safe, she thought, imploring—the Universe, she supposed. She had never been a church-goer.

Normally that invocation settled her concerns. Not this time. Instead, further worries about Brandon and Kris, Lily, Mike, and—Gabe, oh Gabe, her beloved—roiled through Ruby’s thoughts, each one darker than before.

She lay wide awake in Gabe’s arms, troubled by that lingering sensation of dread and doom, until darkness started to fade into gray dawn, and she had a reason to get up and make coffee.