Not long thereafter, those on the wedding entourage headed for the airport where their private jet was waiting. Of Xavier’s immediate family, only Zeke and Audrey were going. They were rather delighted with the idea of going on a trip with their big brother.
After landing in Kansas, they located the coach they had chartered to take them to Electra’s hometown, two hours away. The time seemed to fly, and when they finally arrived at the inn where they would be staying for the night, Xavier had to carry Audrey, as she had fallen asleep.
Xavier and Electra had decided it would be better to use her last name instead of his when booking the rooms, considering their public profile. At that Xavier and his three cousins were going to discreetly wait outside.
The following day, they checked out and headed to Electra’s mother’s home. She had decided to hold the ‘pre-reception snack’ in the backyard. It was certainly large enough, and she and her friends had obviously gone out of their way to make it just perfect.
“You know,” Electra said thoughtfully at one point. “I think this is the first time my parents have been in the same place since the divorce was settled.”
“Ahh… I didn’t think of that…” Xavier answered. “Think we’ll have a problem with them and your stepfather?”
Electra turned up her nose.
“I prefer to think of him as ‘that guy I’m in no way related to who married my mom’.”
Xavier laughed.
“And no, I don’t think they’ll be a problem.”
Electra spoke to her older brother Tim at one stage. It started off with Tim teasing her about being a married woman now, and then moved on and eventually came to her career.
“By the way, did I tell you I read your book? It’s awesome.”
“Aww, thanks. And yes, you did tell me before.”
“Oh. Well, credit where credit’s due.”
Electra smiled.
“Why do you write under ‘Electra’ anyway?”
“I happen to like that name. I think it makes a good pen name.”
“Except that I’ve noticed an awful lot of your friends - including Xavier - call you that.”
“I’ve trained them well. Actually I’ve been thinking of actually changing my name to Electra Hanson.”
“What’s wrong with Connie?”
“Nothing. Say, I have a thought… I’ve been thinking of changing my hair colours to give it an electric blue look instead of fire.”
Tim groaned.
“You’re always gonna be Connie to me. I will never be able to call you ‘Electra’.”
Electra smiled.
“That’s okay.”
Mid afternoon, the wedding entourage packed up and got back into the coach to go back to the airport.
“I noticed you were talking to that guy the law calls my stepfather today,” Electra commented at one stage.
“Yep,” Xavier answered.
“So, what was it about?”
“Oh he wanted to bludge some money off me.”
“What?” she exploded.
“He wanted to -”
“I heard - what did you say?”
“I told him ‘no’ of course.”
“I have never known him to take ‘no’ for an answer…”
“Well, he then come up with some crazy story about us being family now. I asked him how on earth we could possibly be family and he said it happened when I married you. I asked him how marrying you made me related to him. He pointed out that he was your stepfather,” a smirk crossed his face. “I pointed out that he was not biologically related, and he had never even had legal custody of you ever. We are therefore not family, and never will be, and he will not get money from me.”
“I can’t believe he had the nerve - actually, no I can believe that. I can’t believe he actually thought he would have gotten anything. Although… he never had very flattering opinions of you while we were dating… maybe he thought you were stupid?”
“He wouldn’t be the first one,” grinned Adam.
“Yeah, well, as I like to say: I may be silly, but I ain’t stupid.”