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Chapter Forty-seven

Author: NYDIA WILLIS
last update Last Updated: 2025-05-15 01:21:11

The air inside the Oden home was unnaturally quiet that morning—a thick, tense hush that clung to the family like an imminent storm. Jackson Oden read blueprints for the new waterfront project in his study, sipping black coffee and unaware that a storm of a different kind had already begun to brew on the other side of the house.

Stacy leaned against the railing of the grand staircase, her hands pulling at the hem of her ivory blouse. Her face was unnaturally pale, eyes puffy from sleeplessness, but she had made up her mind. She was not going to be pushed around anymore—certainly not by Luke, and certainly not by his ever-cold stepmother.

She climbed the stairs and straight into the family lounge where Mrs. Oden sat flipping through a fashion magazine and lip glossing. The woman barely even looked up.

"Thanks for coming," Stacy said in a rush. "We need to have a word."

Mrs. Oden shot one eyebrow up, taken aback. "Is this yet another of your over-the-top scenes, or is it actually someth
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  • RECKLESS DESIRES: THE ODEN LEGACY    Chapter One Hundred And Two

    "I discovered something," Luke said, the envelope loosely held in his palm.Mrs. Oden didn’t lift her gaze from her tea. Her aged hands, draped in gold rings, trembled slightly as she stirred honey into the bubbling cup. The spoon clinked softly against porcelain, the only sound in the sunny breakfast nook where light danced on ivory tiles."Where?" she asked, finally glancing at him.“In one of the drawers in the old desk in Jackson’s office. Buried under financials. Looks like it was forgotten there.”Her expression didn’t flicker. “What is it?”Luke stared down at the yellowed envelope. The ink had faded, but the handwriting was unmistakably hers.“To me?” she asked.Luke nodded. “It’s got your name on it. But I hadn’t seen it before. Not once.”Mrs. Oden reached out for the envelope, but Luke instinctively pulled it back. “You didn’t put it there, did you?”“No,” she said quietly. “It must’ve… slipped through the cracks. Or maybe Jackson—” Her voice trailed off, her hand returning

  • RECKLESS DESIRES: THE ODEN LEGACY    Chapter One Hundred And One

    "Why doesn't anyone see your father?"It was said during snack time, in harsh and blunt words, like a boulder thrown through stained glass. James winced at the boy across the table, an orange-fingered boy with a brash, wide mouth that put punchlines into all his words.James did not answer right away. He chewed slowly on his apple instead, narrowing his eyes, compressing his lips into a straight line—the way Amiriam had taught him when he was still speechless.The other boys were gaping now."My brother picks me up," James answered after a while, quietly, even politely. "His name's Luke."The boy snorted. "That’s not what I asked. I mean your real dad. No one's ever seen him."James blinked. "He’s just… busy.""Sure," the boy said with a smirk. "Busy for six years? Sounds fake. Brothers don’t count. They're not real dads."James didn’t reply. He just turned around.But stillness persisted.— That night, when the sky became pink and the garden outside was filled with cicadas' hums, Am

  • RECKLESS DESIRES: THE ODEN LEGACY    Chapter One-Hundred

    "Want me to read it to you?" Luke whispered, his hand brushing Amiriam's arm as she sat cross-legged on their porch, the sun dropping low behind her, casting golden edges on the outline of her form.Amiriam looked down at the journal in her lap—leather-bound, worn creases at the corners, filled with years of her writing. Her fingers caressed the last page."No," she breathed. "Not him. This one's for quiet."James was sleeping in there, wrapped on the couch with a comic book still on his chest. The garden was quiet, the air being hushed with that holy silence only the end of a very, very long journey could possess.Luke didn't push. He just sat beside her, his hand over hers.She breathed slowly and closed her eyes, her voice little more than a whisper as she started to read—not for him, but for herself.—Last Journal EntryDate: One year after deciding to remain. Three hundred and sixty-five days of attempting, healing, hoping. And loving.It wasn't a fairytale.I have to start with

  • RECKLESS DESIRES: THE ODEN LEGACY    Chapter Ninety-nine

    “Does my bow tie look crooked?” Luke asked, standing in front of the mirror, fumbling with the pale linen knot.Zack leaned against the doorway, grinning. “You’ve redone it six times. It’s not the bow tie, man. It’s the nerves.”Luke exhaled, tugging it one more time before giving up. “How do people do this and stay calm?”You're not human beings. You're Luke Oden. The one who endured fire for love. You've got this," Zack said, stepping up behind him and adjusting the tie in two swift motions. "And besides, she's probably ten times more nervous."Luke laughed. "She isn't. Amiriam doesn't get nervous. She breathes it away and writes it poetry."Zack playfully elbowed his shoulder. "Well then, you're marrying poetry."---ávisA few doors down the corridor, Amiriam was in the doorway of an enormous window, the soft golden light of dawn spilling around her like a blessing. Her dress was austere—plain silk, off-white, low-backed and thin-strapped. Beautiful. Unpretentious. Like her.Rita

  • RECKLESS DESIRES: THE ODEN LEGACY    Chapter Ninety-eight

    "James, I told you specifically not to tip the toy box over," Luke called from the end of the hall, frustration mixed with laughter.James' high-pitched voice shrieked back from the next room, "But I was searching for the pirate sword! The pirate sword! Not the baby one!"Luke groaned as he stepped into the spare room that had unofficially become James’s kingdom of chaos. Books, crayons, toy cars, action figures, and various half-built Lego projects were scattered like the aftermath of a small explosion.“Pirate sword, huh?” Luke muttered, kneeling and beginning to gather the mess into piles. “We’re going to need an excavation team.”When he pushed an old box from off the corner, the cardboard cracked along the side, revealing a smaller dusty wooden box concealed underneath. Luke froze. He knew it.It was the old keepsake box his mother had given him when he was ten years old—the one he'd nearly forgotten he even possessed.He opened it slowly. Inside were folded drawings, a rusted to

  • RECKLESS DESIRES: THE ODEN LEGACY    Chapter Ninety-seven

    "Why do people take pictures when they already know what occurred?" James asked, his voice a bit more muffled by the strawberry he'd half devoured and held like a precious gem.Amiriam smiled as she sat with him on the gravel edge of the lake. "So that they won't forget what it felt like."James stared at her, squinting in the sun. "You remember things in your chest, not your head?""Yes," she whispered softly. "Right."Luke, standing on the beach in his bare feet, his rolled-up khakis brushing the waterline, turned to them. "He's asking the right questions again.""He always does," Amiriam replied, smoothing a lock of James's curls back under his cap.It was a warm, wind-bruised afternoon. The sun pounded high, bright but not burning, the lake sparkling like a painting of soft colors. The photographer—a The Bloom Initiative volunteer, a young woman—stood several feet away from him with her camera slung casually around her neck, anticipating the shot to develop on its own.Luke bent t

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