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With this segment of Chapter Sixteen 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 first part of Chapter Sixteen. There will be six parts to this chapter.

New to the series? Chapter order:

Chapter One, Section One

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)

Shadows, Redux (3 parts)

Accidents Happen (4 parts)

Maternal Memories (4 parts)

A Voice…Weeping for their Children (6 parts)

Winding Down the Years (4 parts)

June, 2073

GABE

Gabe startled awake, trembling and sweaty despite the fact he was in full shade. He sat up and shook his head.

“Now that was a weird dream.”

As he spoke, two whitetail does at the water trough spooked, flipping their tails high, waving them side-to-side to signal a warning. Gabe chuckled at the does, hoping to dispel the uneasiness washing over him.

But that dream—

It had seemed too damn real.

Unlike most dreams, it unfolded like a complete memory, as if he had really lived it. And he remembered the whole thing.

It opened with him en route to that fateful meeting with Philip on April 1, 2036, which led to their divorce. Ruby’s calls, that he rejected. Then that text.

Answer your damn phone, Gabriel Marcus Martiniere. You’re in serious danger.

Obeying the next time it rang, shaken by her use of his real name, that she shouldn’t have known back then.

Remy says turn back, Gabe. Philip will kill you. She was one of the assistant US attorneys on US vs. Martiniere Group. Please. I know everything. Justine is on her way here to help you—Remy called her. Come back.

Braking the truck, turning around in the highway.

Black SUVs suddenly in his rear-view mirror, in both lanes of the highway, gaining on him even though he had the accelerator pushed to the floor.

Desperately talking to Ruby as he did his best to outrun those black SUVs driven by Philip’s security. Encountering a blockade of them.

Gunshots. Trying to fire back as Ruby wept, not having a hand free to disconnect and spare her the battle as he did his damnedest to stay alive.

SUVs ramming him as he tried to evade them by four-wheeling across a wheat field. Shot in his shoulder. Flipping the truck. Unable to break loose from his seat beat and get on his feet.

Philip’s laughter as he marched up to Gabe.

I have you now, you worthless sprog. And I’ll destroy you, just like I will your wife and child.

Screaming I love you Ruby Barkley as Philip placed his pistol against the back of Gabe’s head, hoping she heard. A loud roar, a simultaneous moment of overwhelming pain, and then—

Darkness.

Gabe rubbed his face. He could still feel the impact of that bullet in his skull. With trembling fingers, he explored the back of his neck, poking and prodding.

Nothing. Not even a sensitive spot, as if he had accidentally rested his head on a rock or stick or pine knot while sleeping.

Just your imagination, Gabriel.

But what in hell had triggered that vivid a dream? Or was it like the other dreams he occasionally had that gave him glimpses of himself in a different life? Those dreams had been about meeting Ruby as himself, based on the notion that the plane crash which killed his family hadn’t happened.

This one—

Well, that had been the outcome he feared that fateful day, on April 1st, 2036. But the other pieces? Ruby spilling that she had gotten mad and called Remy because she thought he was leaving her? Pulling up his hidden messages on the computer to read Philip’s demands? Ruby knowing who he was because Remy told her?

No, that hadn’t even been close to the reality. For one thing, all those messages had been on his phone, not his computer.

Gabe pushed himself up, shaking, and went to the spring. This time he used water from the trough to splash over his upper body, taking off his sweat-drenched shirt to dip it into the water. Something he had done for years to cool off after working hard in the heat of the day. An old pleasure. He shivered as he pulled the shirt back on.

Then he returned to the blanket to write down his dream. As Gabe made notes, other memories started flooding back.

This wasn’t the first time he had this dream. And others, connected to it. Hovering in their bedroom, watching but unable to do anything to comfort Ruby while she sobbed, overwhelmed by the revelation of his true identity and her widowhood. Her alliance with Justine and Remy. The birth of their daughter, Gabrielle Marguerite, redheaded like her mother, seven months after his death—not a hydatidiform mole like the reality. Ruby and Gabrielle’s vengeance on Philip, aided by Justine and Brandon. Gabrielle becoming the Martiniere in her twenties…and nothing more beyond that.

Other universes, where Ruby’s pregnancy with Brandon triggered him telling her who he really was.

And the one he most clearly remembered, those dreams where he met Ruby as Gabriel Martiniere, and Gabe Ramirez never happened. Where there were no indentureds.

Huh. Maybe I should take up writing science fiction. Apparently, I have the imagination for it.

Gabe snorted at that thought.

But then there were other memories. Repeated visions of Philip, sneering at him.

You will be mine. All of you will be mine.

Brief flashes of the past few weeks, tied to those moments when the mental fog cleared and he stared at whatever the hell it was he had just programmed that didn’t make sense.

“You know, Gabriel,” he said out loud. “Those instances are also tied to your brief awareness of that damned worm.”

He should write every incident down—except his hands ached at the prospect. He thought for a moment. Then he set his tablet to record.

The worm seemed to ignore video files. So if he kept them short, maybe, just maybe, he might be able to keep it from trashing them.

#

Recording the files, then writing a simple upload program that would duplicate the video files and stick multiple copies in many separate folders, took longer than Gabe wanted. But for some reason he had more energy than usual. He wrote a stronger security program for the videos.

When he was done with that, he wrote one final program—an automatic sync that wouldn’t need him to trigger the upload once he returned to connectivity.

One way or another, he was going to beat Philip.

ATTENTION BARNES AND NOBLE/NOOK READERS

Apparently the universal link to The Enduring Legacy does not include Nook/Barnes and Noble.

So here it is!
Barnes and Noble/Nook

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