Ronnie
I'm able to take the afternoon off and I'm lying out on the patio with the screens pulled down watching the rain as it patters against it. The small view that I have of the beach from my spot shows the whitecaps as they angrily reach the shore. My bones feel like jelly as I lay resting.
Tyler opens the screen door and walks out to where I'm lying on the reclining chair. "Hey. You look relaxed."
"Mmm, I am."
"Ready for Lunch?"
I shake my head, "In a few." He moves closer and sits on the side of the chair where I'm lying. His fingers reach up and feathers down the side of my face as a small smile graces it. He then leans down and brushes my lips with his, testing my reaction. When I respond he places his lips on mine again deepening the kiss immediately.
My hands grab his shoulders holding on tight as he ravishes my lips. His lips leaves mine and leaves a trail of hot kisses down my cheek as he works his way to my neck as he readjusts his body aligning it with mine. He kisses the spot right below my ear and I let out a low moan. He pays a little extra attention to that area, licking and nibbling before working his way lower.
He stops what he's doing and starts again at my feet. He nibbles and sucks on my toes and works his way up my feet and then my legs, pulling my flowy dress up and removing his clothes as he goes. He lifts my hips working the dress up and over them. A slow sensuous smile graces his face as he takes me in, "No underwear?" I shake my head and smile as he starts to feast on me. My moans fill the patio as he takes his fill, working his way further up my body. When he reaches my face I feel another connection and I close my eyes in ecstasy.
"I'm hungry," I mumble into Tyler's neck, replete from what we just experienced together.
"Give me a couple of minutes to catch my breath and then I'll heat up the food and we can eat." I pucker my lips and kiss his collarbone and he moans, "If you keep doing that, we won't make it to lunch." I move so I can pull my dress back on and his hold tightens on me, "Not yet. Give me a couple of minutes. I just want to hold you." I relax in his embrace, enjoying the closeness.
True to his word, a few minutes later, we get up and dressed and go into the kitchen. He heats up the clam chowder and cheddar biscuits that he brought home for lunch. It's the perfect meal for this type of weather. We enjoy the soup and conversation and he tells me that he has to go back to work.
"You can't take the afternoon off?"
"Quit pouting. I would stay if I could," his arms come around me holding me tightly. He makes quick work of the dishes and kisses me deeply before he leaves.
I make my way back to the patio with a book and spending the rest of the afternoon reading until it's time to pick up the girls.
It's back to the grind today. It's not a real busy day, so I'm going through my work pretty quickly. I get a skype notification and I answer it with dread as Manuel's face fills the screen again. I try not to whine when I say hello, "What is it now?"
"Hello Ronnie," He's smiling at me through the screen, "How do you know that I need something?"
"Because otherwise you would just email me. I know this has something to do with Griffin. Just tell me."
"Lydia wants you to go to court with her in three weeks."
"They got a really quick court date. How did they do that?" I grab my neck, because I can feel the knots starting to form again.
"The law firm there argued that since Lydia is a minor, they need to finish this as soon as possible so she can get on with her life," he shrugs, "They granted the date." I write down the date and tell him I'll be there with her. He thanks me and we disconnect.
I'm stress-free until Friday, when it's time to get the girls ready for the dance. They tell their dates they have to go next door until they are ready. We spend an hour fluffing and primping both of them until they are happy with how they look. When they're ready, I call Tyler and Solomon to come back over.
When they arrive, they ring the doorbell, and I answer it with two giggling girls hiding behind me. They run into the living room, so I can announce Tyler and Solomon.
After giving me a kiss, my handsome guys allow me to lead them into the living room, "Your dates are here." I stand back and let my suited men through to their very excited dates.
After they ooh and aah over the girls and how pretty they look, we take a lot of pictures and Frankie and my brother's come over and admire them also before they leave. After they leave, Frankie and the guys go back home, leaving me and Grey alone.
"I've made plans for dinner. Are you ready to go?" I nod and he takes my hand leading me out the door.
He takes me to a steakhouse and we're seated, "Although I'm sorry I missed out on the father/daughter dance this time, I'm glad I get to spend some alone time with you. How are you doing?"
"I'm doing great. I have you three and it makes everything better and easier. I never knew if I would fall in love. I thought I loved Griffin, but what I feel for you, makes what I felt for him exactly what it was, juvenile. I feel so lucky, that I have not one, but three men to love to distraction and to be able to love them back."
He leans forward in his seat and kisses me, "We love you too. I love you. So much."
Our server arrives and takes our order. She leaves to get our drinks and Grey asks, "What do you really think of your birthday gift?"
"I love it. The fact that everything you gave me came from the heart, made it so special. It's hard to think of gifts like that. It makes me love you all the more." I reach across the table and hold his hand. We spend the rest of the meal talking and enjoying ourselves. After we leave the restaurant, we head to the school so we can peek at our girls and watch them have fun dancing with Tyler and Sol and then go to a movie.
We arrive at home at the same time as my other two men and my girls. They're carrying them inside because they have both fallen asleep. We get them into bed and after Tyler and Sol changes clothes, we sit in the den and they tell us about the dance.
They danced and partied all night and then their dates took them to the nearby pancake house for pancakes. I'm glad they all had a good time.
Tyler takes the day off from work so he can go to court with me. I'm so ready for this day to be over and for Griffin to go away. I mean to jail so I don't have to worry about him bothering me anymore.
I mentally go over my day as I get dressed in one of my business suits. I settle on a black suit with a pencil skirt and a short jacket. I put a white blouse on under it and wear a pair of black high-heeled power pumps. Tyler matches me in a classic black suit and tie.
The ride to the courthouse is done in silence. I'm tapping my fingers against my knee and the console. Tyler's hand finds mine and squeezes. When he pulls up to the parking spot, he stops me from getting out of the car, "Are you okay? Are you sure you can do this?"
"I am. It has to be done. After this, he'll be out of our lives forever. He never needs to know Amy. He didn't want to know her when he found out I was pregnant. Then he tried to extort money out of me," I shake my head resolute. "This needs to be done. I just hope it's the last time."
I glance at Tyler and he's smiling at me. "What?"
"I love it when you get feisty."
I can't help it. I throw my head back and laugh. It takes one sentence from him to calm me down. It's one of the reasons that I love him.
We make our way to the courthouse and inside. After we find the room that we're in, we make our way inside. I immediately find Lydia. She waves me over and we sit by her and her family.
"Thank you so much for being here with me. I don't know what I would do without you."
"What about your parents? They are here for you."
She rolls her eyes and lean in closer to me, "I know they mean well, but they really don't know what I'm going through. I just need someone with me who's been there and can relate."
I nod and look forward as they bring Griffin into the courtroom. He's in a dark blue suit, probably the last one that he'll wear for a long time.
I feel Tyler caress my arm, reminding that he's with me and I relax.
Lydia leans in and whispers to me, "This is the first time that I've seen him since I told him I was pregnant." She lifts watery eyes to me, "Why does it still hurt so much?"
I take her hand, "It's going to hurt for a while. This is someone who you loved and thought loved you in return. You saw a future with him and when you got pregnant, he disappeared. You didn't get closure. Today you will get the closure that you deserve. The judge will let you speak to the court, so decide what you want to say when it happens." I just realized that I'll get closure here also.
I look up as his lawyer approaches me, "Griffin has asked to speak with you."
"Why?"
"I don't know. Please just speak with him before the judge arrives," he's looking around exasperated.
I follow him over to where Griffin is sitting and sit in the chair behind them. Griffin turns around and glares, "What are you doing here? I thought our business was finished."
I sigh, "Oh Griffin. Don't you think the fact that you can't keep your penis out of anyone under the age of eighteen and not use protection, will keep me away from you. I work for a law firm. I work for the prosecution on cases like this. You tried to sue me not a month ago. What makes you think that you wouldn't see me again?"
"Because the contract I signed said that you won't bother me again."
"The contract states that you won't bother me again and I won't ask for anymore child support as well as you signing away your parental rights," I roll my eyes. "This is a legal matter, not personal. Besides after today, we'll never have to see each other again."
"You told her to press charges," he accuses.
"Actually, her parents told her to press charges. I was called in because it was you and I had to go and counsel the poor girl. You literally have no one to blame but yourself. What is that girl going to do at sixteen and pregnant with a baby? She doesn't even have half of the resources that I did. You were going to leave town again like you did with me. How many times have you done this before Griffin?" He looks down.
"I thought so. At the very least, you could have used protection--Let me rephrase that, at the very least you could have just not done it at all. You better hope that the court doesn't decide to hunt down every little girl that you did this to. You are already going to spend a lot of time in jail, it may be hard labor for the rest of your life to pay for the children that you have created. Goodbye Griffin and good luck."
I leave him sitting there stunned and make my way back to my seat between Tyler and Lydia. They both look at me questioningly and before they can ask, the bailiff calls for everyone to rise for the judge.
I watch as the judge enters and everyone sits down. We listen to the testimony by the prosecution and they have Lydia write out her testimony since she's a minor. Then we hear the case from the Griffin's lawyers. After both sides have argued their cases, they ask Lydia to speak.
She steps up to the podium, "When Griffin first started talking to me, it made me feel special. My boyfriend had just broken up with me and I was crushed. The fact that the new, hot teacher was paying special attention to me, made all of the girls at school and my ex-boyfriend jealous. It felt so good. So I guess the next thing that would happen is that I would fall in love with him," She glances over at Griffin with tears in her eyes. "He told me a lot of things and now I know that they were all lies. It hurt when he disappeared after finding out that I was pregnant. I thought he loved me, but it was all lies. That's what hurt the most, was that he lied to me. No matter what happens here today, all I want him to do is to sign away his parental rights and stay out of my life forever."
She comes to sit back down beside me and I grab her hand on my side and her mother grabs her other hand.
"Ms. Matthews, I would like you to approach the bench," The judge directs his hand towards me.
I stand and walk through the swinging gate, approaching the judge, "Yes, your honor?"
"I need you to speak to the court on this subject. You were preyed upon by him, and have his child, correct?"
"I do. But what does this case have to do with me?"
"When this report is read, I want them to be clear why he got the sentence that he will get. I need your testimony to cement this." He reasons with me.
"Ok," I step back to the podium. I notice Griffin glaring at me again. I don't want to be more involved in this, but he bought this upon himself.
The judge, prosecution and defense asks me questions. When they finish the judge thanks me, and I can finally sit down. Tyler's arm immediately comes around me, pulling me closer to him. I sink into his warmth.
After an hour adjournment, we all gather back into court for sentencing. The judge comes into the courtroom and addresses everyone, "After the testimony received today, I'm going to sentence the defendant to more than the maximum four years. The defendant, Griffin Hall, will be sentenced to twelve years in jail. I'm also removing all parental rights of Ms. Graham's child."
His lawyer interrupts, "Your honor, with all due respect, why?"
"Due to the fact we are looking at two of his victim's right here and we all know that there are more, I think that twelve years is fair." The judge responds.
"One of them wasn't even supposed to testify. You called her up at the last minute," he thinks for a second, "What if we file an appeal?"
"You can, but then we'll just do a job search and find all of the girls that he did this to. I'm sure he has children all over the country." I look over at Griffin and he ducks his head.
"I'm sure that most, if not all of them will file against him if they find him, given the chance. Do what you may. Court adjourned." He hits the gavel and leave the courtroom. Griffin is lead out by the Bailiff and I stand up ready to leave.
"Thank you so much, Ronnie. We appreciate all that you have done," Lydia's parents tell me. I shake their hands and they leave the courtroom, leaving Lydia and me alone with Tyler.
"Do you feel like you received closure?" I ask.
"I do. Do you?"
"I actually do. Thanks to you. If you need anything, give me a call, okay?"
She nods and we walk out of the courtroom together.
When we get to the car and inside, Tyler sends a text to everyone, letting them know we're going to pick up the girls from school. It seems like it's been forever since I was able to do it. We reach the school and go over to stand in parent pick-up area. We wave at everyone and wait quietly. Beth approaches us and says hi, "I just want warn you there's a new child in their class and the mom is a barracuda. But you definitely will know how to handle her."
"Thanks. I appreciate it." Beth smiles and walks back to their group.
"What a change in her," Tyler rubs my back.
"I know. I think she got what she needed at home, so now she's not the bitch that she once was. We also talked at Meg's birthday party and cleared up a bunch of things. I don't know if we'll ever be friends, but we will live a peaceful existence."
He turns me around so that I'm facing him when I look up. "I just want to tell you that I'm proud of how you handled yourself today. I honestly think that if not for you, he would have only gotten the maximum of four years. He's gone from your life now. You'll never have to worry about him again."
"I definitely hope not. I've had enough of Griffin to last me a lifetime." The bell rings and the children start pouring out. We stand off to the side because we know that our girls will be the last ones out like they always are.
Finally they come out and are happy to see us. There are hugs all around and then we head home.
Tyler
Ronnie and the girls have gone upstairs to get ready for bed and of course Sol and Grey want answers.
"How did she do today?"
"She did really well. She ended up testifying against him." I tell them.
"What?" Sol asks, "Why?"
"Because the judge wanted to give him more time and Ronnie's testimony helped to achieve that. He also told Griffin and his lawyer that if they file an appeal, he will have every girl that he's done this to hunted down and give them a chance to testify against him. We'll see what happens in the future, but for now, I'm pretty sure that we'll never have to deal with him again."
"That's good. I really hope that this is over for her," Grey says.
"Just a heads up. There's a new mom at the school and she's a vulture," I warn them.
"How do you know this?" Sol asks.
"Believe it or not, Beth told us."
"Hm." Grey sits back in his chair.
"If she approaches us, we'll try the Rand method on her and see if it works," Sol sits back and crosses his arms.
"What's that?" I ask. Sol explains what happened a while back when Rand and Frankie was approached by one of the vultures." We laugh and agree to try it if needed.
We decide to go to go upstairs and see what our woman is doing. It's been a long few weeks and now it is finally over.