The Last Option
Chapter Seventy-Six: Promise Kept

Louis let go of Rebecca and ran up to Bernard with the intention of hitting him, but Bernard didn't let him get close, stopping him with a hard punch in the face. Louis fell backwards noisily, while those present in the church began to murmur, some frightened, others surprised. Two men in the front row went to help Louis up, while Phil grabbed Bernard's arm, preventing him from lunging at Louis. Rebecca was frightened and confused, asking for an explanation of what was happening. When Louis stood up again he roughly pushed the two men helping him away and adjusted his suit, placing himself next to Rebecca.

"He's the chauffeur!" Louis shouted, gasping, "He's your brother's damn driver!"

"What?" Rebecca asked, turning to Bernard, then back to Louis. "What are you saying? What are you saying?!"

Louis lowered his head and put his hands on his hips, laughing, then raised it again and glared at Bernard with both contempt and fury.

"That man you see there, the one you married," he said to Rebecca without looking away from Bernard, "was your brother's driver and the man behind the filiation petition for the child who was supposedly Nathan's son. Isn't that right, Phil?" "What?" Rebecca only asked that, still confused, unable to understand Louis' words, and looking at Bernard, who was unmoved. "What is he saying, Bernard? Is it true what he's saying?" Bernard just shrugged.

"Yes," he then said, coldly. "That's right. I was Nathan Hicks' driver, and now your husband."

The murmurs increased among the attendants, while Rebecca, processing this time the information she was receiving, felt the blood begin to boil in her veins, thinking that she had been made fun of, and in the worst way.

"I had to do it," Bernard continued, "because you denied Nathan's son what belonged to him. What you and that vermin next to you took from him."

"That child is not Nathan's!" yelled Louis. "You were just trying to take what is ours!"

"So this was your plan all along," Rebecca said, trying to control the anger she was feeling. "All that story about the dying millionaire was a lie to get close to me! You used me! How dare you trick me like that?"

"You were just part of the plan," Bernard said, "I had to get back what belongs to the boy. A child your cousin orphaned, because I know he had Nathan killed, but I have no proof of it, and when I do, he'll pay for what he did to him." "Ha!" Louis exclaimed, smiling cynically. "That will be hard to prove."

Hearing Bernard's words, Rebecca turned to her cousin, suspecting that perhaps there might be some truth in his words. She knew Louis very well, and she knew what he was capable of, even what Bernard was accusing him of. "It would hurt me very much to know you did that, Louis," Rebecca told him, her anger slowly changing to sadness. "I don't think you're capable of something like that. Not with your family."

"And you're going to believe him?" yelled Louis almost out of control. "I had nothing to do with what happened to Nathan! He's trying to trick you again!"

"Of course he had something to do with it!" a male voice said from the back of the church. Everyone immediately turned to where the voice was heard. A man came out into the center aisle and stood in front of everyone. Louis took a good look at him with a frown, and when he recognized him he paled, changing the expression on his face to one of terror. A deep terror. Bernard had recognized him too, and couldn't help but be a little frightened as well.

"I murdered Nathan Hicks and his wife on Louis Randall's orders," Duncan said, calmly. With one hand he removed the wig he wore, and then the false mustache. He looked older and sicker.

"Is it true what he's saying, Louis?" Rebecca asked. "Answer me!"

Louis was petrified with terror; he could not utter a word.

"It's true, Rebecca," Bernard said. "He is, or at least was, a professional killer under the orders of Louis Randall. He murdered your brother and your sister-in-law, and because of him my wife died. Louis ordered him to do it." Rebecca turned to Louis again, feeling anger again. She began to hit him with the bouquet of flowers and with her hands, and this time Louis reacted: he took out of the inside pocket of his suit a .22 caliber pistol and pointed it at her. Rebecca quickly moved away from him, scared, while the people around them also did the same. Suddenly, there was a human stampede trying to get out of the church, with screams of desperate women. The priest ran to the door next to the altar and disappeared behind it. Only the five of them were left in the hall: Bernard and Phil at the altar; Rebecca and Louis a little further down, and Duncan at the end of the aisle.

"Don't move!" Louis shouted upset and then pointed at Duncan. "Why are you doing this to me? Why?"

"You hurt me badly," Duncan said. "I would have preferred you to kill me that night in your apartment. Then I wouldn't have suffered so much for you."

"I never loved you! I never did! You were just a wimp I took advantage of! You want me to kill you? Then I will kill you!"

Louis pulled the trigger, firing the gun twice. Duncan also pulled a pistol from the back of his pants, as one of Louis' bullets struck him in the abdomen. He raised his pistol and fired twice in Louis' direction as well. Bernard grabbed Phil by the arm and ran with him to hide behind the pulpit. Two more shots were heard and then silence.

"Stay here, Phil," Bernard ordered him. Then looked out into the hall. At the end of the hallway lay Duncan on his back, barely moving one leg. He looked to his left and could see Louis Randall also on the floor, motionless. He couldn't see Rebecca to his right. Slowly he came out from behind the pulpit and walked over to where Louis lay; his eyes were wide open, with two reddish-black marks on his chest staining his light blue shirt and his suit. He was dead. Then he walked over to Duncan, who had stopped moving his leg, also dead, with two bullets in his abdomen. He separated the gun at his side with his foot a few feet and then started looking for Rebecca, who was nowhere to be seen. He went back to where Louis was and told Phil he could go out now. He did so carefully and then stood next to him.

"Where is Rebecca?" Phil asked.

"I don't know," Bernard answered, looking around.

He walked to the first row of seats on his right and then noticed a red stain on the floor in front of the benches. Then another at the other end. He followed them and saw another one in the aisle near the wall, and finally another one near a confessional. The wailing of police and ambulance sirens could be heard in the distance.

He positioned himself in front of the confessional and slowly opened the door. Inside was Rebecca, covering a red spot on her right side with one hand and breathing heavily. Bernard quickly went to her and checked the wound. "Easy", he said softly. "Easy, the help is coming. Hold on!"

From the location of the wound and the blackish color of the blood on her dress, Bernard knew that the bullet had passed through her liver. It was a serious wound. Rebecca was staring blankly, with a rictus of pain. She was saying words in a low voice which Bernard could not understand. Phil approached them and took a handkerchief out of his suit, giving it to Bernard, who with it put pressure on the wound, holding the bleeding, which was very profuse.

"I didn't want things to end like this," Bernard said, still in a low voice. "I didn't want things to end like this."

***

Bernard was meeting with Phil in his office discussing the new situation at Southern Hilltop Gold after the deaths of Louis Randall and Rebecca Hicks.

"You are now the rightful owner of the company, Bernard. You will inherit everything as Rebecca's husband."

"What about Louis Randall? Did he leave a will?"

"No, he never bothered to make one. Maybe he thought he didn't need it at the moment. You have the right to claim his estate as the husband of his only remaining relative, that is, Rebecca Hicks. She had the first option to do it in case he died. Now you have that option, since she is dead too."

Bernard could not say anything about it. I could not believe the turn things had taken. Everything now was in his favor, and especially in favor of little Nathan.

"As for the company, you must prepare to run it," Phil said. "The majority shareholder is the one who heads the board of directors, and that is you. You'll have to study a little again, study to direct it. A provisional shareholders meeting will do this until you are ready to assume the presidency. I will be there too."

"I don't have a choice?" Bernard asked jokingly.

"I'm afraid not."

At that moment Captain West entered Phil's office preceded by Phil's secretary, who announced him and then withdrew. They greeted the policeman and invited him to sit next to them.

"I'm come to tell you that the investigations are over," West said enthusiastically. "Duncan Smith's public confession had been recorded on a cell phone by a churchgoer just before the stampede in which they all exited. The unfortunate death of Rebecca Hicks was the result of the confrontation between the two men, accidentally."

"It was very unfortunate," said Phil. "She, like us, was shocked to learn that Louis Randall had given the order to kill her brother."

"Yes, it was also recorded when she beat up her cousin when she found out," said West. "Cell phones nowadays have been very helpful in investigations. It's a shame that people only recorded part of what happened." Bernard and Phil looked at each other suspiciously, not quite understanding the police captain's words.

"A part of it?" Phil asked, a little curious. "How so?"

"Some witnesses, who did not record the events, said they heard someone say something in reference to a 'plan'." West barely drew a smile. "We imagine he was referring to the one Louis Randall and Duncan Smith had in relation to Nathan Hicks, but as there is no recording to confirm it."

Bernard and Phil looked at each other again, this time with a relieved expression on their faces. From West's words, he intentionally left out the part where Bernard confessed to Rebecca Hicks that it had all been a scheme to take some of her fortune and give it to Nathan's son, but since she was dead, it would no longer be relevant to him. The child was his son in the eyes of the law.

"I imagine you and your son will take a few days before soaking in the affairs of a company as large as the Hicks's," West said. "There is no one left in the family to take care of it."

"There's no time to rest," Bernard said. "A business like this requires a lot of attention and work. And especially studies."

"You don't think like your late wife," West said, getting up to leave. "Your second wife, I mean. I wish you good luck."

West left the office, leaving the way clear for Bernard and Phil to take care of everything from now on.

"Are you finally going to go get Camila and the boy?" Phil asked. "You haven't seen them for several days."

"Yes, I was thinking of going as soon as we finish here. It was a good idea to send them to her parents before I got there. I really appreciate it."

"It was nothing. I just wanted to save them a lot of trouble, especially Camila. You know what? You should go now," Phil took and closed the folder Bernard had in his hands. "We'll deal with this later. Southern Hilltop Gold won't stop if you take a few days."

Bernard smiled and stood up. Before leaving the office, he shot a glance at his friend, who motioned for him to get the hell out.

As he drove to Camila's parents' house in New Jersey, Bernard thought for a moment about Nathan and Norma Hicks, and the fact that he had managed to keep his promise to them. Now he could take comfort in the knowledge that little Nathan would grow up protected in every way.

He would make sure it was that way.

As for her family, Camila was the eldest of three siblings; the only female, she was already twenty-eight years old, while her brothers were sixteen and ten years old. Her mother was an elementary school teacher, and her father was a merchant who owned a small restaurant in the center of the city. Not knowing the city well, it took Bernard some time to replace the address. When he arrived, he found them both in the courtyard of the house, little Nathan playing with some dry leaves, and she watching him carefully. He stood for a while looking at them through the door, while her mother retreated silently into the kitchen with a smile on her lips.

Bernard opened the door and stepped out, stopping at the top of the steps. The boy turned to him and recognized him immediately.

"Daddy!" he shouted, full of joy and starting to run towards him. "Daddy's here! Daddy's here!"

Camila turned to him and their gazes met immediately. Bernard opened his arms, bent down and received the child, hugging him tightly. Nathan hugged him too and laid his little face on his shoulder. Camila approached them slowly, also with a smile on her lips. Bernard stood up with the child in his arms. She came to his side and stood looking at him for a moment. Then she also hugged them.

"You don't know how glad I am to see you," said Bernard. She looked up and they looked at each other for a few seconds, and then kissed.

Nathan smiled mischievously as he watched them kissing.

THE END.