Chapter 1 EPISODE ONE.
1.
KIMBERLY.
"And may the Lord accept the deceased in his warm hands."
"Amen." Followed by the grieving crowd. I watch the alter men lower Fredrick's casket into the deep ground.
A crooked grin slices on my face, taking the scene with my eyes carefully, making sure it's imprinted in my brain so it stays there for a long time.
I don't want to forget how exhilarating this feels in years to come, because I've prayed so hard for this day.
Ever since my Mom collapsed to the floor after watching Dad do the same at the mercy of Fredrick's gun, I wished him death, it didn't happen so fast, of course, Karma is slow and this isn't Hollywood, my wish got granted years later in a more pleasing way because I watched him writhed to death.
Suddenly, rain starts to pour which causes the officiating priest to hasten the funeral process but I stay, because I don't want to miss the relaxing sound the shovel produces after every drop of sand on his casket, different shoulders starts to bump me as every other person finds their way out of the place until a hand taps me from behind.
I feel the person's head lower behind my left hair, grinning against me.
"How does it feel watching Frederick being buried?" Eliana, Fredrick's wife asks with a deep smile on her face.
I turn to her slightly, quite surprised to see the glow in her dark eyes, complementing the black outfit she's in.
Before, I would have been terrified and scared to raise my head up at her, but since her protector is dead, I have no reason to be.
Shrugging, I lick my wet lips."I don't know, maybe you tell me."
She opens her mouth a bit, scoffing in an incredulous manner, as if she's taken back by my reply.
"What do you want to hear from me? Kim."
"Maybe you tell me how much you regret making my life hellish to live."
A shocked laugh erupts from her, She cackles hysterically and grabs me by my shoulder."You're fucking crazy, Kim."
"Who knows? I might consider not letting you go through what I went through."
"Wait." Her face morphs into a surprised one."You think I'm at your mercy now?"
"I hope you don't eat your words later."
"You're a delusional one, Kimberly." Eliana says, kicking her legs out of the already muddy sand.
I resume watching the men burying Fredrick but realize sooner that I'm not the only audience. Raising my head, I found Rafael, Fredrick's last son staring at me intently, his hands in his pocket and water drips down from his face to his hair.
His large frame remains imminent despite the people passing beside him, his whole attention focused on me.
Rafael has been out of the country for more than seven years so I don't find him familiar, when I was freshly captured by Fredrick after the death of my parents, I was busy trying to keep myself alive because of the debilitating nightmares.
We didn't really get along, I always find him ominous, oddly quiet and calculative.
"What the hell" I mumble to myself, treading carefully out of the place. I can't believe he ruined the fun for me.
"Hey!" Cora, my friend calls out the moment I am out of the cemetery.
She's standing out there with a large umbrella over her head, the moment I acknowledge her with a wave,she starts walking towards me.
"Hi." I mumble, suddenly feeling teary.
Cora is a friend I made in Fredrick's house, just like I was taken because of my parents' inability to pay their debts which led to her death, our story is almost similar, just that her mother is a gambler who ended up writing her off to him.
While I found it hard to adapt to the new life, living as one of the girls who serve Fredrick's guest, Cora received the brunt of it, Our Master found her attractive which made her end up warming his bed every night.
But she managed to scale through and I admired her for that.
"You're good right" she asks, wrapping her arms around me.
"Heck,I should be asking you." I sob.
She chuckles lightly and pats my back."Silly. I'm okay. Let's go home, The lawyer is on the way home and our attention is needed."
"Our attention?" I echo her words, surprise written all over my face. She flashes me a knowing stare.
"You know how obsessive Fredrick was with us? He listed us as part of the witnesses to his will hearing. What a weird man, I can't wait to leave that house."
"Same here." I huff, bobbing my head closer to the umbrella range as we both walk towards the bus station.
Getting to the house, we are greeted with stares from Eliana and Fredrick's two sons, sharing the longest chair in the house, while Eliana and her daughter are seated closely with the lawyer.
"What took you guys so long? You think I have all the time in the world to wait?" Eliana roar in an exasperated tone, reading to tear us down with her clenched fists.
"Sorry, we don't have the luxury to ride in cars like you, the bus took so long to come." I throw back at her defensively, but it seems like my reply was received collectively by everyone in the room.
Rafael's dark eyes are on me again, his head tilts in amusement over his broad shoulders and he offer me a dark smirk.
Gosh. What's his deal with me?
"Let's get to it." Baxter, Rafael's elder brother says, easing the tension in the house a bit.
Cora chose to stay at the door with me because she knows how anxious I get in the house which I'm grateful for.
"I will commence the will reading of Mr. Fredrick Rollers to the witnesses he chose carefully himself." Clearing his throat dramatically, he opens the briefcase and raises a document in the air, showing the contents to everyone before proceeding to read it out.
"Mr. Frederick's total worth both in cash and assets amounts to two hundred million dollars before his death and he wishes to do all of this to Kimberly Sloane, a worker in this house." He announces, folding steel into the last words.
Shock rolls through me like an eruption, my jaw drops in the silence that followed his announcement.
Fredrick including me in his will, that, I expected because I didn't spend his last moments with him to recite his favorite poem but giving me everything he owned?
What the hell was going through that geezer's head?
"What the fuck are you talking about?" Eliana seethes, dragging him by his sleeves, her eyes drip with fury and condescension.
"Kim, did you...." Befuddled Cora gasps behind me, surprise swallows the rest of the words in her mouth, I turn to her sharply, confused as hell.
"Cora, I swear I didn't..."
"That's not all, people." Mr. David, the lawyer's voice shook through the room again after swatting Eliana's hand off his clothes.
I turn to Rafael but surprisingly, he didn't seem surprised like his brother whose face is as white as ever, instead, he stays relaxed, smirking at me all through.
Did he find out about the night Fredrick died?
Oh,God!
"What more do you have in stock than this you just dropped on our head?" Baxter's deep voice growls at him but he remains unabated.
"According to the protocol binding to every will under the law, we are to check the properties and credibility of the cash owned by the deceased after death to check for any alterations. After our findings, we found out that Mr. Fredrick borrowed about three hundred million dollars from a private organization and he wasn't able to pay before his death."
A gasp slips out of me before I could control it, the realization of the whole situation starts to settle in my brain.
My chest tightens immediately, dreading the next words he has to say.
"So, according to the law, the inheritor of the assets is to pay the debts owned by the deceased which automatically means that Miss
. Kimberly Sloane is to pay the debts before the end of the year."