One Secret Night, page 20
part #3 of Ivy Avengers Series
He straightened his head and she saw the ravaging emotion in his eyes.
“You’d rather not care,” she said. “Maybe that’s why you do what you do. You can be a loner and never care about anyone other than yourself. It’s easier that way, right? Not caring is so much easier.”
“Isn’t that what you do? Travel to faraway places so you don’t have to care about what the media is saying about you?”
“We’re talking about you right now. Your father might be dying in there and you wish you didn’t care.” If he cared enough about her and their baby, the media wouldn’t matter at all.
“That’s right. I wish I didn’t care. He was a horrible father. Why should I care now that he’s dying?”
“Is he a horrible father now?”
Raith turned away.
No, his father was not horrible anymore. “Alcohol is what was horrible. It was never him. It was his addiction. He overcame that addiction and reached out to you. So what if he waited too long. You should be grateful that you had one last chance to see that he isn’t the horrible man you grew up with.”
Standing, Raith walked over to the window and leaned on the sill, looking outside. Autumn left him alone.
His comment about the media didn’t ring as true as it normally did. That had her a little perplexed. She had no desire to take on a new translation assignment, and she had no desire to travel to a faraway place. Moreover, she didn’t feel trapped with Raith. She didn’t feel like everyone saw her as a celebrity, either. She wasn’t Jackson Ivy’s daughter with him. She was just Autumn Ivy, the translator who loved to travel. She had a feeling that the next time she traveled it wouldn’t be to escape the media. It would be for the adventure.
Why didn’t she feel trapped with Raith? With the boyfriend who’d lasted six months, she’d felt trapped. She’d liked him a lot, but she’d still felt trapped. In the end, that’s what had driven her to take a translation job. She’d escaped.
Looking back, she realized that she hadn’t felt as though she could be herself with him. She had liked many things about him, but he hadn’t liked her for herself. He’d been impressed over who her father was, but he hadn’t made her feel as if that was the only reason he was with her. It had mattered to him, though, and it had changed how she behaved with him. She was the bimbo again.
She was no bimbo with Raith. She was Autumn Ivy.
That insight didn’t go over so well with her. Her mood plummeted and added to her worry for Leonardo. As she turned to look at him staring out the window, tall, dark and brooding, she ached for him again, for his touch and the man who tugged at her in a deep, intimate way.
Maybe this time the heartbreaker would become the heartbroken.
“Let’s go get coffee.” Raith pushed off the window sill, jarring her.
She walked with him down a long, bright hall, following the signs to the cafeteria: a large, open room filled with beige-topped tables and wooden chairs with a food counter along the opposite wall. Beverages were situated along the adjacent wall on a smaller counter.
She and Raith went there.
Autumn poured some creamer into her cup while he poured his.
“This reminds me of when my mother died,” he said.
Looking up at the ceiling and all round the room, he carried his cup to the register at the end of the food counter. There weren’t many people in here. A solitary man sat at one table and a couple at another.
Autumn waited for Raith to continue. This was the most open he’d been about his mother.
“My dad took me to the cafeteria so he could get coffee.” He paid for both of their cups.
Autumn led him to a table by the windows, which ran the length of one side. She sat across from him and watched him stare out the window.
“My mother was sick in bed when I left for school that morning. I didn’t think anything of it. She had pneumonia. Death was the last thing on my mind.”
“You were fourteen,” she said.
He turned to her, his eyes a window into the past. “I didn’t think of her at all that day. I flirted with a girl in science class.”
She held back on commenting, sensing he needed to talk about this, also sensing he had never done so before now.
“I thought I had a chance with her. I thought about her all the way home. I was in a good mood. Happy. It was one of the rare days when nobody yelled or fought.” His eyes focused on her then. “She was too sick to fight him.”
“Raith...” Reaching for him, finding only the cold surface of the table beneath her palm, tears burned her eyes. Pregnancy hormones intensified the reaction. Autumn was not known for her weepiness. She rarely cried.
His eyes became unfocused again, lost in memory. “When I got home, she was still in bed. I went in there and noticed right away that something was wrong. My dad was on the couch watching a football game. He was drunk.” He paused, the traumatic emotion of that moment so strong Autumn could feel it herself. “My mother...” He lowered his head, a powerful man choked up over the death of his mother. A few seconds passed before he was able to lift his head, his eyes still clear. “My mother’s face was a grayish-white color...pasty...and more wrinkled than usual. She was dehydrated. I went to her and tried to talk to her. She opened her eyes and mumbled something.” Raith shook his head slowly and fractionally. “I’ve been haunted all my life wondering what she said.”
Autumn couldn’t stop the trail of first one then another tear down her face.
“I ran out to my dad and shouted for him to go help her. He yelled at me. He told me to go to my room. I flew at him then. I punched him and told him he’d better go help my mother. He hit me and I fell backward onto the ground. He was going to beat the hell out of me, so I ran away. I had to sneak into the kitchen to call 911.”
Autumn wiped her face.
“When the paramedics arrived, my dad wasn’t going to let them in. You see, deep down he was ashamed of what a drunk he was. He couldn’t let anyone see him like that. My mother was deathly ill and he wasn’t going to let the paramedics in.” Raith’s jaw clenched. “I grabbed the nearest hard object I could find. A picture on the wall. And I hit him in the head as hard as I could. I wanted to kill him. I was hoping he’d die.”
Autumn found herself barely able to make the connection between Leonardo and the man Raith described.
“While he lay there unconscious, I unlocked the door and let the paramedics in. They worked on my mother. I stayed with her. I rode with her in the ambulance.”
His jaw clenched again and he had to stop and look out the window. Wrenching emotion gripped him. Autumn was certain he’d never felt it so strongly before. He’d been with his mother. He’d tried to save her.
She couldn’t fathom how he could be so stoic.
“She kept looking at me.”
Autumn stifled a sob.
“She had brown eyes. Beautiful, golden-brown eyes. I could see her love. She thanked me for helping her.”
Sniffling, Autumn said, “That’s awful but at least you have something good from the memory, Raith.”
He didn’t hear her. “She had thick dark hair. It wasn’t even graying back then. She looked ten years younger than she was. Not then, though. She was thin. Sickly. I didn’t see it until then. Until I was on the way to the hospital with her.”
He sipped his coffee and put the cup down.
“It’s not your fault.”
“Oh, I know. I was just a kid.”
“And that’s why you blamed your father all these years.”
He nodded once, firmly and with conviction. “When we arrived at the hospital, I kissed my mother on the forehead and told her I loved her and she was going to be all right. She smiled. It was a weak smile. She believed me, I think. That she was going to be all right.”
His mother had believed her son had saved her life. She may have died believing that.
“She held my hand and kissed me back and then the paramedics took her away. I followed, but they put her into intensive care. A doctor came out later and said she had pneumonia and the infection had spread to her organs.” Raith looked out the window again, not seeing, staring. “He said there was nothing they could do. That it was too late. If he’d gotten her sooner...”
He looked at her. “I was allowed into the room. The doctors had her heavily sedated. That’s what they do for people they know are going to die. Numb them so they aren’t aware. I held my mother’s hand while the heart monitor slowed until it stopped. It took several minutes.”
That was terrible for a young teenage boy to go through. “Did...did your father ever show up?”
“No. And neither did my older brother. I didn’t call him. It took years for him to forgive me for that. My dad? He declined medical care that night and passed out on the sofa. He was there when I eventually made it home. I walked. He heard about it in the morning. From me. I told him if he ever touched me again I’d kill him. And I would have.”
That must have been his turning point. He’d gone to college with the intention of going into politics, but his heart had already made up his mind for him. He’d veered off his path and done what he couldn’t do for his mother.
“Do you see now why I never wanted to see my father again?” he asked.
All she could do was nod.
“And why I dreamed of killing him? Why I hoped he’d give me a reason?”
Again, she gave a nod. “And he’s been dead to you all these years...until now.” That had to be why he was telling her all of this, and in such detail.
Long seconds passed before he finally said, “Yes. It’s different now.”
“You want him to live.” He’d forgiven his father, or had begun to. “That’s good.”
He shook his head. “I’m not so sure about that.”
“Be sure.”
“Why? He’s going to die. My wish is coming true.”
Was he beating himself up over that? “Your father would never blame you for that. You could tell him every one of your dark thoughts and he’d forgive you. It’s your forgiveness he needs, nothing more.”
Leaning back, he stared out the window awhile, drinking coffee. After a few moments, she saw and heard him sigh. His eyes took on a more animated shape, not so drained by the past. Talking about this had lifted a great burden from him.
When he turned to her again, he was still somber, but a much different man than the one she’d seen before, confessing something he’d confessed to no one else. She felt honored.
Autumn sipped her coffee and stood. “Let’s go back to the waiting room.”
Raith stood and walked with her out of the cafeteria. As they approached the waiting room, a doctor appeared.
“Raith De Matteis?” the doctor asked.
“Yes.” He sounded shaken.
Autumn took his hand, leaning against him in support.
“Your father is stabilized and resting,” the doctor said. “His cancer has advanced rapidly. He had an infection that caused sepsis in his body. That affected some of his organs, the most significant being his heart. In his weakened state, he also experienced cardiac arrest. We got him in time, however. If he had gotten here minutes later, he would have died. We came very close to losing him.”
Raith’s head went down briefly with that news, like a flinch from the emotional pain it caused.
“I spoke with his oncologist,” the doctor went on. “He told me about the experimental medication they were going to try. We’ve decided to go ahead with it here. He’s too weak to move or travel and time is going to be precious over the next week. We can’t afford to wait.”
Raith met her look. The weight was back in his eyes. Where he’d felt it for one parent, now he felt it for another. Losing his dad this way, at the last hour, too late to do anything, would devastate him.
“Experimental treatment might work, Raith,” she said. He needed encouragement, her dark, sweet, sexy hero who obeyed no laws but didn’t need to.
“Is he conscious?” he asked.
“Yes. We’re going to keep him in ICU for a few more days. Then he’ll be moved to a recovery room for a few more. We’ll see how he does. His release will depend on how quickly he regains his strength.”
If he ever did. That part was left unspoken.
“Have you started the experimental treatment?”
“Yes, but as I’ve said, his cancer is advanced and he’s so weak...”
“What do you think his chances are?” Raith asked.
The doctor sighed and took a moment to reply. “Depending on how he recovers from the septic shock, it will still be difficult to predict. Each patient responds differently to the treatment. We’ll monitor him closely over the next week.”
The doctor said depending on how he recovered, but what he was really saying was whether Leonardo recovered.
“Can I go see him?” Raith asked.
“Of course, just keep in mind that what he needs most right now is medication and rest.”
Raith turned to her, eyes clouded with apprehension. He had an opportunity to bond—one last time—with his father.
“You go alone,” she said. “I’ll wait out here.”
As she watched him go, Autumn felt her feelings shift to another level. Raith had given her a glimpse of the boy who’d tried to rescue his mother and who’d grown into a man with unwavering drive to rescue anyone else he could. No lawless rebel. Just the opposite.
* * *
Raith entered the room. His father lay semi-reclined, pale and wrinkled, tubes in his nose and arm, and another surgically implanted into his chest, feeding his body with powerful antibiotics to fight the septic shock. Raith stopped at the sight of his father’s body so vandalized by sickness.
“You weren’t supposed to see me like this,” his dad said, his voice gravelly from the breathing tube.
Raith moved toward the bed. “I’d much rather see you climbing Mount Everest, but walking out of this place will do.”
His dad laughed feebly. “I did do a lot of hiking in the Selkirk Mountains a few years ago.”
“You shouldn’t talk too much.”
His dad patted the bed in dismissal. “That was a good trip. Have you ever been there?”
“The Selkirks? No, but I’ve heard of them.”
His dad took a few breaths through the tubes in his nose. “Have you ever taken a trip for yourself?”
He hadn’t. “I’ve been all over the world.”
“Anywhere for fun?”
Nowhere for fun. Raith stepped forward and sat in the chair beside the bed.
“You should stop burying your past in rebellion, Raith.” He took some time breathing again. “Do it now while you’ve still got several good years left.”
Maybe he had rebelled by getting into the kind of work he did. But he’d also had a passion for it. Upon reflection, that passion had waned in the last few years. He’d grown tired of traveling so much, especially to third world countries.
“Do you have any great memories from any of the trips you’ve taken?” his dad asked.
Great memories? He had to think long on that. He wouldn’t call any of them great. Successful. “I do things for fun, Dad.”
Leonardo smiled a little and Raith realized he’d called him Dad. But his father was careful not to point it out. “Like what?”
“Festivals. Home projects.”
“Alone?”
“I have friends in Lander.”
“But not family.”
“They’re like family.”
“You need the real thing, Raith. Festivals and home projects and close friends are a nice start, but you need a wife and some kids. Maybe a dog and a job where you don’t have to travel.”
The truth was he could retire now. “I’m happy with the way my life is.”
“I don’t believe you.”
Raith didn’t, either. As soon as he spoke it aloud, he felt the lie.
“You can be happier,” his dad said. “Don’t make the same mistakes I made.”
“You shouldn’t be talking so much. Rest.”
His dad rolled his head from side to side. “I need to say this. I had a family and I threw them away. I’ve lived alone a lot of years. It’s not a natural existence, Raith.” He took some time to breathe through his nose. “Autumn is a fine woman.”
“Let’s not talk about that.”
“Why? So you can keep burying your past? No, Raith. If there’s one thing that would make me die a happy man, it’s knowing you’ve changed your ways. Your forgiveness would be the icing on the cake, but I’d settle for you letting go of what a bad father I was and...” He breathed deeply awhile. “Moving forward with Autumn and the baby.”
“Stop talking like you aren’t going to make it.” And stop talking about Autumn and especially the baby. It had just made him break out in a cold sweat.
His dad grunted weakly. “I might not. Chances are in favor of death. Doc didn’t say it, but I saw it in his eyes and heard it in his voice.”
Raith reached over and put his hand on his dad’s frail arm. “You want me to tell you I’m going to marry her and we’re going to live happily ever after?”
“Only if you mean it.” His dad shifted his head on the pillow so his eyes could search Raith’s. “Do you love her?”
Raith leaned back against the chair. “I don’t know.”
“You know.”
He was burying it. That’s what his dad was saying. He buried anything that resembled a chance at a normal, happy life. Being a loner, he wasn’t in any danger of feeling too much, of hoping for too much. Like the love of his father—something he was getting a good dose of right now.
“It’s too soon to talk about love with Autumn.”
“You could love her if you let yourself.”
