by Kait Nolan
He didn’t hesitate. “Absolutely not.”
“Okay then.” She stroked his cheek. “I admit the timing is awful, but we didn’t do this. It is a thing that happened. It’s no one’s fault.”
What she said made sense, but it didn’t combat his biggest fear. “But...what if he dies? What if he dies, and that’s the last thing I ever said to him?” He’d never forgive himself.
“Don’t think about that. You need to be putting out positive energy. He’s going to come through this. He’s going to get better. You’re going to get to talk to him again. You’re going to get the chance to forgive him.”
The anger flared anew amid the maelstrom of other emotions. Even with his father possibly dying, he hadn’t let go of that. “Forgive him? After what he did to you? To us?”
Kennedy framed his face in her hands. “And we’re together despite it. We’re together, Xander, despite everything. Yes, he did a terrible thing, but that doesn’t negate the fact that he’s your father and he’s still basically a good man. The forgiveness isn’t really for him. It’s for you. Because as long as you hang on to that anger, it’s going to poison you from the inside out. It’s going to eat away at you.”
He searched her face. “Can you forgive him?”
She didn’t answer immediately, clearly giving the question some serious thought. Her whole life had changed because of him. She’d lost time with her mother that she’d never get a chance to make up. Her relationships with her sisters were rocky, at best. All that was on Buck. It was a lot to forgive.
At length, her expression smoothed out. “I think I can. Because, in the end, he’s the one who has to live with what he did. I don’t. Not anymore.”
“Mr. Kincaid?”
They both turned as a white coated woman approached.
“Your father’s out of surgery.”
~*~
“He’s awake.”
Marilyn shot out of the chair. “Can we see him?”
“One at a time, and only for a little while,” the nurse cautioned.
“You go in first,” Xander urged.
With a quick nod, Mom disappeared into the room across the hall.
Xander dropped his head to Kennedy’s shoulder. “Thank God.”
She ran gentle fingers through his hair. “I told you it would be okay. Power of positive thinking.”
“You’ll have to give me lessons in that.”
His father was awake. He’d survived a massive heart attack and double bypass surgery. The old bastard was tough. According to the doctors, he should make a full recovery. Relief left Xander feeling weak and exhausted. Or maybe that was the fact that he’d been up for somewhere around twenty-eight hours now.
“I’m glad you’re here.”
Kennedy leaned her head against his. “Wouldn’t be anywhere else.”
They sat like that for several minutes. Xander thought about what she’d said earlier. Could he really forgive his father for his own sake? He didn’t know. Probably wouldn’t until he saw him again.
The door opened and Mom slipped out. “He looks rough, but he’s going to be okay. He wants to see you.”
Kennedy squeezed his hand. “Say what you need to say.”
It would be awesome if he knew what that was.
With a bracing breath, he went inside.
His father looked smaller somehow against the crisp white sheets. His face was sickly gray and seemed ten years older than yesterday morning. But the steady, incessant beep of the heart monitor was a clear reminder that he was still kicking. Although it seemed he’d fallen back asleep.
Buck’s eyes opened. “Got things to say to you.” Even his voice sounded weaker, his words slurring. It freaked Xander out. His father had never been anything but hale and hearty.
“You shouldn’t talk, Dad. You need to rest.”
“I need to talk and you need to listen. If nearly dying didn’t grant me that right, then I don’t know what can.”
At the brash reminder of his brush with death, Xander’s own heart squeezed. “Look, Dad, I said some things yesterday—”
“You didn’t say anything that wasn’t warranted. Now shut up and listen, boy.”
With no other choice, Xander sat in the lone chair and shut up.”
“I’ve been a cop for going on forty years. I devoted my life to serving our community and keeping it safe. And somehow that night, I pushed all that aside.”
Xander didn’t need to ask which night.
“I can’t tell you what was in my head. I don’t know. It was late, and I saw an opportunity, and I acted on it. I used scare tactics on that girl that I normally reserved for hardened criminals, and I strong armed her into leaving town and walking away from you. I made threats I’d never have carried out, pressed on every weak spot I knew she had. I’m not proud of that. And I regretted it within a week when I saw what I’d done to you. But I convinced myself that it was for the best. That if she was really yours, she’d come back, and if she wasn’t, well, it wasn’t meant to be. When she didn’t come back, I figured you’d eventually get over it and move on. You didn’t. She stayed gone, and I never had a chance to fix it.”
It turned out Xander’s anger wasn’t entirely extinguished. The simmer and bubble of it had him clenching his fists, though he kept his voice level. “You could’ve gotten her contact information from Joan or Pru. Let her know it was all a lie.”
“Not without good reason. Not without admitting to what I’d done. And I—I was too much a coward for that. What I did to Kennedy is my greatest shame. And I’m sorry for it. I know that’s not worth jack shit. But maybe this will be.” Buck struggled to sit up in bed, cursing when he couldn’t. “Damn it, I’m not saying this while I’m flat on my back.”
“Wait just a minute.” Xander helped him find the remote that lifted the head of the bed and adjusted it so he was a bit more upright.
“I spent the afternoon drafting my letter of resignation.”
Xander’s mouth fell open. “You did what?”
“You were right. My behavior was a disgrace to the badge. I’m not the kind of man Stone County would want as its Sheriff.”
“Dad.” Never in a million years would he have expected this.
“The letter’s in the top drawer of my desk. I want you to go find it. Read it.”
“Why?”
“Because I wanted you to know I was planning on turning it in before this shit.” He waved a weak hand toward the IV and other assorted tubes and wires. “Doctor tells me I gotta retire anyway unless I wanna end up in the ground sooner rather than later. That’d really piss your mama off. I been promising her for twenty years that we could do some traveling when I retired.”
Xander felt his lips twitch. “I’ll find it. What do you want me to do with it after?”
“That’s up to you. I’d rather publicly retire for health reasons, if only to save your mother from the gossip and backlash the other would bring. But that’ll be your call. Either way, I think you should replace me. You’ve got more honor and integrity in your little finger than anybody else I know. And I’ve known some fine men and women. You deserve the job.”
Him as Sheriff? Xander had never even considered it. He’d just kind of assumed his father would live forever. But he found he didn’t hate the idea. Did he really want to run for Sheriff? That was not something to ponder on this little sleep. “I expect that’ll be up to the people of Stone County.”
“Expect it will. Your girl still here? Marilyn said she came.”
Xander tensed. “She’s in the hall.”
“Bring her in. Please.”
“If you upset her—” Xander let the threat hang between them.
“Not trying to upset anybody. I’m just trying to make amends.”
When Xander got back to the ICU waiting room, Kennedy rose from her seat beside his mother. “You okay?”
“Working on it. He wants to see you.” At the look of outright shock, Xander took her hands. “Yo
u don’t have to if you don’t want to.”
“No, it’s fine.” Squaring her shoulders, she followed him back inside.
From the bed, Buck watched them, eyes skimming over their linked hands.
“How are you feeling, Sheriff?”
“Like I got hit by a Mack truck. But they tell me I’ll live.”
“That’s good. You gave everybody a scare.”
How could she stand here and have a conversation with his father, as if they didn’t have all this toxic shit between them?
“Seems I’m right good at that,” Buck said. His head drooped a bit, but the old man strained to keep eye contact with Kennedy. “I want to apologize to you. I was wrong. Completely. I know that’s not worth anything at this late date, and nothing I can say or do will make up for what I took from you both. But right now apologies and regrets are all I’ve got.”
Kennedy angled her head in acknowledgment. “I appreciate that. And, for what it’s worth, I forgive you.”
Buck’s head dipped, his gaze dropping to somewhere around his toes. “I don’t deserve that.”
“That’s the thing about forgiveness. It’s not something you earn. It has to be given freely or it’s not really forgiveness at all.”
God, this woman. She had more compassion and wisdom in her little finger than most people learned in a lifetime. That she could stand here and honestly mean everything she’d just said—and Xander had no doubt she meant it—left him absolutely in awe and so proud of her, his chest felt fit to burst.
“You’re a far better person than I ever gave you credit for.”
Kennedy offered a rueful smile. “I get that a lot.”
Xander drew her into his side and pressed a kiss to her temple. This woman would never cease to amaze him. “For what it’s worth, I’m not quite there yet. But I’m working on it.”
“Better than I can expect,” his father said equably.
They lapsed into a weighted silence.
“So…you two are back together, then.”
“Yep,” Xander answered.
Buck nodded, something lightening in his face. “I reckon that means we’ve gotta find a way to co-exist.” He looked to Kennedy, flummoxed. “How do we do that?”
“You love your son.” She looked up at Xander. “So do I. Why don’t we start there?”
Chapter Sixteen
“ARE YOU SURE IT’S okay if I sleep here?”
Kennedy was pretty sure if she didn’t steer him toward a bed in the next five minutes, Xander would collapse on the nearest horizontal surface. “It’s fine. Go on up to my room. I’ll be up in a little bit after I give everybody the update.”
He stroked a thumb across her cheek. “Don’t be long.”
She found a smile for him and nudged him toward the stairs. He trudged up, each step seeming to take twice as long as it should have. Kennedy hoped he managed to get his shoes off before he tumbled into bed.
Hearing voices, she headed for the kitchen.
Her sisters looked up from the table when she came into the room.
“Kennedy! You’re back.” Ari leapt up and came to hug her.
Pru followed suit. “What can I get you? Coffee? Food?”
“Nothing. I’m loaded up on crappy hospital food and coffee. I’m about to go pass out. And just so you know, Xander is sleeping here. He’s had a really rough couple of days. If anybody has a problem with that, I’ll sleep in a different bed, but he doesn’t need to be alone.”
“Of course it’s fine. How’s Buck?” Pru asked.
“He’s a tough son of a bitch. Double bypass surgery. But they say he’s going to be okay.”
“Gotta say, a massive heart attack seems like karmic payback to me.” Athena’s disembodied voice came from the iPad on the table. “Like the guilt finally got to him for what he did to you.”
Apparently Kennedy had arrived home in the middle of a family meeting. One excluding her. Again.
“I’d hate to think that,” she said.
“You’re nicer than I am. I have a much finer-tuned sense of vengeance.”
Maggie rose from the other end of the table. “Listen, Kennedy, about last night—”
Kennedy held up a hand. “Can you not? If you want to yell at me some more, fine, but it’s going to wait until I’ve had some sleep. I’ve been up for thirty hours, and I’m feeling mean.”
Maggie’s cheeks flushed. “I don’t want to yell at you. I want to talk to you. Which is what I should have done in the first place. I’m sorry.”
The sudden turnaround had Kennedy’s head spinning. Or maybe that was the lack of sleep. “Okay?”
“You want to turn the house into an inn.” It wasn’t a question.
Kennedy realized that all her notes were spread out over the kitchen table. “Where did you get those?” It was a stupid question. From her room, obviously. That was where she’d stashed them.
“Ari pulled them out after you left last night,” Pru explained.
Kennedy wished she hadn’t done that. Wished she’d had the chance to organize everything the way she’d wanted. But wishing something didn’t make it true. So she mustered up a smile of thanks for the girl, who’d only been trying to help.
Maggie laid a hand on the open binder. “You’ve put a lot of work into this.”
That sounded like the kind of statement you made when you weren’t impressed with the end results but needed to find something positive to say, and it put Kennedy’s back up. “I’m not finished with it.”
“If you did this much in just a week, I’d love to see what you could do with more time.”
Kennedy squinted at Maggie, trying to decide if she was being punked. Or maybe she’d really fallen asleep, and she was still curled up in a chair at the hospital. “You would?”
“The design layouts for each room, the costs and time projections for getting each one ready for guests, the expected costs per guest with the anticipated revenue generated—that’s all very well done. The phased rollout and expansion options based on success rate is brilliant. And the website mock up…Kennedy, this is really amazing work.”
Amazing? Maggie The Wunderkin thought she’d done something amazing? Kennedy glanced out the window, searching the sky for flying pigs.
“Where did you learn to do all this?”
“On the job.” Kennedy jerked a shoulder. “Over the years, I’ve worked in pretty much every segment of the hospitality industry, learning anything anybody would teach me.”
Pru smiled at that. “You always were more of a hands-on learner.”
“There’s totally a market for this kind of thing,” Athena agreed. “People who want to get the hell out of the city and have a more homey experience than a luxury hotel. Your sketches and business plan totally capture that. Good job, sis.”
Praise. From Athena. Oh yeah, the devil was strapping on ice skates right about now.
“I ran the numbers myself, based on your projections,” Maggie continued. “We could be open by Memorial Day.”
Yep, she was definitely dreaming. “I’m sorry, it sounds like you actually want to do this.”
“It’s a totally viable plan with relatively minimal outlay to get started. The concept can be dialed up or down, depending on how the tourist sector develops in Eden’s Ridge, and it would ultimately be self-sustaining, which is more than I can say for any of the ideas we came up with. Why wouldn’t we want to do it?” Maggie asked.
“Because it’s my idea. Because I’m the uneducated screw up, who’s been off playing Peter Pan for a decade. Because you utterly lost your shit last night over what I’d already done.”
“Did you really?” Athena asked, interested. “I’ve never seen you lose your shit.”
Maggie scrubbed a hand over her face. “I’m sorry. You had no way of knowing, and I shouldn’t have taken that out on you. Being back here stirs up all kinds of memories for me. But that’s not really the point. Is that really what you think we—I—think of you?”
“I—” Maggie closed her mouth. They all knew she couldn’t deny it.
“I’m not sure any of us should be held accountable for the things we said right after Mom died,” Pru put in.
“This is not new. It’s not because Mom died. That just stripped off whatever filters we walk around with all the time. You’ve all been waiting for me to grow up since I left, and not a single one of you realized that I did. I grew up the moment I walked out that door. I had to because I was completely on my own, whether I was ready to be or not.” Her hands fisted as all that remembered fear and absolute isolation came flooding back. The dam holding back all of it simply burst, the words coming in a torrent. “And I wasn’t. I wasn’t ready. I was so fucking scared, and I had no one.” She was horrified to realize she was crying, but she was too damned tired to fight it back.
Suddenly she was in the middle of a tangle of arms as they all closed ranks around her.
“We had no idea.” Pru’s voice was choked with tears, too.
“We didn’t know,” Maggie said.
“I couldn’t—” Kennedy choked on another sob.
“I know you couldn’t tell us. I know.” Maggie stroked her hair. “And it shouldn’t have mattered. It should never have stopped us from seeing what you were going through. From taking more of an interest. I’m so damned sorry that our hurt got in the way of that. That we got caught up in all of my crap and didn’t see any of yours. I never meant to make you feel like a screw up or an outsider. You’ve turned into an amazing, well-rounded woman, with a lot to offer, and I should never have made you feel like you couldn’t contribute to the family.”
“You’re our sister, and we love you, no matter what. We should’ve made that clearer,” Pru said.
“You’re awesome,” Ari put in. “Obviously.”
Kennedy gave a watery laugh at that and buried her face in the teenager’s hair.
“Hellooooooo. I’m still over here, and I have something to say.” Athena’s voice interrupted the group hug.