Hands To Heaven

All Grown Up

Carrick
I am sitting watching my great grandchildren, I can't believe the number of great grandchildren I have. Grace would love this. I know she's looking down from heaven right now happy to see all our great grandchildren and very proud of how our grandchildren have turned out. Elliott, Christian and Mia have built a huge compound for all of us to stay at and I am proud of it. I visit each of the homes. Ray and Lydia have their own home here as well. We have a no fly zone over the compound and we shoot drones down regularly. My aim isn't that good so I let my oldest grandson David shoot them down. We have Barney's children dismantle them for their parts. They get the serial numbers and trace them back the purchasers addresses. A few were stolen credit cards.

Christian
We are having a birthday party for dad probably for the last time. We got the news that his cancer has spread and he has very little time left. All of us decided that we will be spending plenty of time with him in his last month. All the children are here with their children as well. When mom died we had no warning at all. She died at work of a brain aneurysm and went quickly. That was five years ago, it was the hardest time at all. Dad lost a lot of weight grieving over the loss. She just missed her first great grandchild's birth. Once they started having babies we were blessed by so many. The Grey Steele family expanded into such a huge family. Our children are running our companies at this point. Dad got his wish for A Grey to take over his law firm. He got three of them. Mom got three little doctors from Annabelle's children. That was shocking to all of us.

Anastasia
I am writing books now and Annabelle and I have collaborated on a few books. I am not sure if they will be best sellers or not, but I wrote about what I know. Annabelle is a widow and she has been for ten years after her husband was killed in a carjacking. She was distraught and had to be put in the hospital because she wasn't eating. She was grieving herself to death. All her children forced her to stay alive because they knew their father wouldn't want her to die from grieving his death. We all rallied around her and she finally saw she needed to live on and she wrote her best book yet after that. She threw herself into writing away the fries and putting all of her husbands good qualities.

Elliott
I push dad out of the sun and get him something to drink. I think he's thinking about mom because he has a smile on his face. I am sitting beside him when he took his last breath. A smile appeared and I thought I saw a white glow appear and float away. I call Mia and Christian over and let them know that dad has left us to be with mom. It is a sad day and a good thing we were all here for him on his last day. He got to hold his great grandchildren and he was a happy man. We called the ambulance and the coroner was called.

The funeral
Carrick Grey was buried beside Grace in the family plot. At this point it is being expanded to hold all the Grey family and offspring and their offspring. The attendance was huge because of the large number of people he had been there for over the years and the numerous charities he had helped. His law firm opened a pro bono office and hired only the best lawyers to help the poor. These were the people who begged and borrowed to say their final respects to him. Grace Grey had the same attendance to her funeral. All the Grey children and their families had been taught to be charitable and look out for those less fortunate. They might have been ruthless in business takeovers, but they made sure the employees had jobs once they took over. Most companies were being ran by people who only looked out for their own pocketbooks.
Carrick and Grace left a legacy and their grandchildren are following in those footsteps as did their children. They are a huge family at this point.

Christian
Theodore told me that Carrick his oldest wants to be an attorney like his grandfather. The boy was always wanting to see his great grandfather. I can see why he wanted to be like his namesake. Anastasia thinks that he wants to be just like Carrick.

Anastasia
Christian and his siblings had a hard time losing Carrick. We will always recall the day he died because it was his last birthday. He died on his birthday at 100 years old. I don't want to tell Christian about my cancer because they can't do anything for me. I want to live fully like Carrick did. No treatments that might kill me anyway.

Three months later I am finally able to tell Christian about my cancer diagnosis and only after I was hospitalized. I wanted to die at my home sitting in the sun and watching all our family just like Carrick did.

Kate
We are called to say our last goodbyes to Anastasia. Everyone was here including nieces and nephews and even her father and stepmother. Her grandchildren have hugged her and everyone has said their goodbyes as she leaves her body. She was 62 years old. She wanted cremated and Christian wanted a burial. He had her cremated and placed on his mantel where they put their Christmas stockings every year. Anastasia had something built to hold all the Christmas stockings for the entire family. This year Anastasia is center stage on the mantle. Christian has been keeping busy and he has started a new company. It has grown twice it's size in two months. He brought in our son in laws to help run it. Then he brought in his daughters to run a new company that he knew they would build into a success in no time. He had just finished his will the week before he passed away in his sleep. We were dumbfounded when he had three billion dollars allocated for an education center for children and adults to get properly educated. It was to be self sustaining in the future. He put Theodore and David in charge of completing this project. Elliott's construction company is going to build the place.

He left all his billions to his family after that. It was divided equally and among all of the families and each individual offspring of them and their spouses. Well the ones who are still married to them. We had no idea how much money Christian and Anastasia actually had. The properties were another matter. The compound is left to his children along with his nieces and nephews. We had hoped he left it to us. He wanted it to stay in the family and it would. His island was something he left to Elliott and myself. Mia he left the Paris home. The New York apartments he left to the family members who were running GEH. The actual homes he decided to leave to each of his children. His will was well thought out and divided between everyone fairly. The one thing he forgot was Anastasia and his jewelry and automobiles. Those had to be appraised and split between his children. I think our children wanted a car or two but didn't ask.

Elliott
The funeral was a huge affair because everyone wanted to know who was going to inherit Christian's estate. We ignored the press completely. None of us cared about the will, we cared about Christian.

The end I hope you enjoyed this story.