The Secret Heir

by Gina Wilkins

  That simple. And that certain. Carl Reiss would do anything in his power to keep his family out of harm’s way. Unfortunately, when it came to this particular emergency, Carl was powerless. Jackson didn’t have the heart to point that out. It was the first time he had been faced so incontrovertibly with the proof that his wise, calm, mechanical-genius father couldn’t fix everything.

  The remainder of his appetite evaporating, he set his fork down and reached for his water glass.

  “You should eat, Jay,” Carl said gruffly. “Keep up your strength.”

  “Yeah. In a minute.” He figured it was time to change the subject. “You know what’s been bugging me all day?”

  “What’s that, dear?” Donna inquired.

  “The doctor said Tyler’s condition is hereditary. That Laurel or I carry a recessive gene that causes it. Yet Laurel insists there’s no history of sudden cardiac failure in young males on either side of her family. Though she and her mother were estranged from most of their family, Laurel said she would have known about something like that. Apparently, both of her parents bragged about what strong and healthy families they came from—people who tend to live to ripe old ages. It’s ironic, of course, that Laurel’s mother was only in her thirties when she died in a car accident.”

  He watched his parents exchange a quick, grave look.

  “Dad, are you sure you don’t remember hearing about any young uncles or cousins who died unexpectedly? You lost a younger brother, didn’t you? You told me he drowned, but it is possible he suffered heart failure first?”

  “My kid brother drowned when the old fishing boat he and his friends were in sank in the middle of a lake,” Carl answered without looking up from his food. “Had nothing to do with his heart.”

  Something in Carl’s tone let Jackson know that he found this line of questioning disturbing, perhaps because of the painful memories of his long-lost brother. Jackson regretted bringing that old pain to the surface, but for some reason this question had been nagging at him since the first conversation with Dr. Rutledge. “Okay, so that was an unconnected tragedy. But what about—”

  “Really, Jackson, there’s nothing to be gained by fretting about this, is there?” Donna’s voice sounded unusually sharp. “What does it matter whether you or Laurel carry the gene—unless you’re worried that you have the condition?”

  “I don’t,” he assured her. He still hadn’t confirmed that with his own physician, but he felt confident in that respect. “Still, if I carry the gene—if the Reiss family carries the gene—we should probably let Uncle Bill’s boys know about it. They’re still in college now, but they’ll want to be screened, and they’ll want to know about this recessive-gene thing when they have kids of their own.”

  Donna and Carl looked at each other again, and this time Jackson was puzzled by their expressions. As Jackson watched, Carl reached out to place a hand reassuringly over Donna’s. “We’ll think about that another time. Let’s just concentrate on getting Tyler well, okay?”

  There was something there, Jackson thought with a frown, his intuition ringing warning bells. Something that blanched his mother’s face and deepened the fine lines around her eyes and mouth. What the hell?

  He decided to let it go for now. “I stopped by the blood bank on the way back from the job site and gave blood, since they said that’s a standard request when a family member is having surgery. They won’t actually use my blood for Tyler, of course, but having family members donate keeps the blood supplies healthy. Maybe you want to stop by sometime tomorrow, Dad? Have you ever given blood before?”

  Jackson had always considered his dad the bravest, strongest man he knew, so it was with some amusement that he watched a bit of the color drain from Carl’s tanned, weathered face. “Um, no. I haven’t ever gotten around to it.”

  “It wasn’t bad, really. Didn’t hurt at all. I’ll probably donate again when enough time has passed. I’ll get a card in the mail in a couple of weeks that designates me as a donor and tells me my blood type. Funny, I don’t even know my blood type. I assume it’s the same as yours or Mom’s,” he added, glancing with a smile at Donna.

  His smile faded when he saw her expression. “Mom, are you okay? You’ve gone as white as a sheet. It’s okay, you don’t have to give blood if you can’t bear the thought of it. It won’t affect Tyler.”

  “I’m—” Donna looked to Carl.

  “Your mother’s tired,” Carl said. “And worried about the surgery tomorrow. Maybe I should take her home to rest.”

  “Maybe you should.” Jackson didn’t like seeing his mother in this condition. She had seemed fine earlier. Maybe it was just all catching up with her.

  He felt suddenly guilty for unburdening his problems with his marriage on her at this stressful time. “Take a sleeping pill if you have to tonight, Mom. Get some rest. Everything will be fine tomorrow, just like Dad said.”

  She nodded and whispered, “Yes, I’m sure it will.”

  Jackson was startled to see a glimmer of tears in her eyes as she looked away from him. He might have pressed for a better explanation of her distress then, but Carl put an end to the discussion by gathering plates and trays and escorting Donna out of the cafeteria.

  Jackson followed with a puzzled frown, wondering what, exactly, had been going on beneath the surface of that odd conversation.

  Laurel accidentally overheard a snippet of disturbing dialogue a short while after Jackson and his parents returned to Tyler’s room after dinner. Donna and Carl had said they were on their way home as soon as they’d had a chance to kiss Tyler goodnight. While they did so, Laurel slipped out of the room for a few minutes to walk down to the soda machine in the waiting room.

  Jackson used to tease her about what he called her addiction to diet soft drinks, she remembered as she fed quarters into the machine and pressed the selection button. He didn’t tease her about much of anything anymore.

  She had paused at the end of the hallway to open the bottle for a sip of her drink when she heard Carl speaking just around the corner. “Let it go, Donna. You don’t know for sure where the gene came from.”

  “I could call and ask if he knows anything about it.” Donna’s voice sounded different than Laurel was accustomed to hearing it. High-pitched. Almost scared.

  “And what good would that do? Tyler’s condition was discovered in time for treatment. That’s all that really matters. Jay doesn’t have to know.”

  “He’s going to find out, Carl. Don’t you see? Somehow during all this testing and discussion, he’s going to find out. And I’m not sure what that will do to him. He’s already under so much stress, with his relationship with Laurel so strained and Tyler so ill.”

  The sound of her name roused Laurel out of her temporary paralysis. She had no business listening to this, even if they were talking about her family.

  Making sure her heels clattered as she walked, she turned the corner and looked surprised to see Carl and Donna standing there in a quiet alcove, their heads very close together as they talked. Donna’s face was ashen and Carl’s grave as he held his wife’s hands. Both of them started guiltily when they saw Laurel.

  “I thought you two were on your way home,” she said, hoping her voice sounded natural. “Is anything wrong?”

  Donna made a visible effort to pull herself together. “I’m just having a bit of a panic attack, I suppose. Even though I’m confident everything will go well tomorrow, I can’t help but dread it a bit.”

  There was obviously much more to Donna’s distress than concern about Tyler’s surgery. Knowing this wasn’t the time to pursue it, Laurel merely nodded. “I know. I feel the same way.”

  “I’m taking her home to rest now,” Carl said, tucking Donna’s arm beneath his and moving toward Laurel. “I hope you manage to get some sleep tonight.”

  “I’ll try.”

  Carl reached out to rest a work-roughened hand against Laurel’s cheek. “You lean on Jay through this, you hear? He’s a str
ong man. He’ll take care of you.”

  Laurel knew Carl was trying to help, but her instinctive response was to assure him that she didn’t need anyone to take care of her. She was strong. She’d always had to be. She had learned very early in her life that being strong and self-sufficient earned her the respect and approval of others, while depending on someone else too often led to disappointment and heartbreak.

  “Take Donna home,” she said rather than directly responding to his words. “She needs to rest.”

  Both Carl and Donna looked vaguely disappointed by Laurel’s evasion, but then, she was used to sensing disapproval in them, she thought as she watched them walk toward the elevators. Still thinking of the words she had overheard, she entered Tyler’s room.

  Jackson sat in the rocking chair with Tyler on his knee as they watched a cartoon on the television together. Scooby-Doo. Their favorite.

  As usual, Tyler clutched the stuffed penguin he called Angus. Jackson had bought him that toy on one of their trips to the Oregon Zoo. Tyler was almost obsessed with the famous Humboldt penguins display there. He never tired of watching the funny little creatures waddling along their rock walkways or torpedoing through the waves and currents of their pool. Whenever Jackson took a rare Saturday afternoon off from work, he and Tyler usually visited the zoo, their special place.

  Laurel paused just inside the doorway for a moment, studying them. They looked so much alike. So perfect together.

  Emotions roiled inside her as she looked at them. Her feelings for Tyler, at least, were clear-cut. Overwhelming love. Pride. Fear for his future.

  It wasn’t so easy to define the way she felt about Jackson.

  He glanced up when she entered. Though he noted the soft-drink bottle in her hand, he made no comment other than to say, “Your boss called while you were out. He said to call if you need him or Emma for any reason. Said they would be checking on you tomorrow.”

  “That was thoughtful of him.”

  Jackson’s grunt could have been an agreement, or merely an acknowledgement that she had spoken. They rarely talked about her job, or his either, for that matter, since their work seemed to represent so many of the problems between them.

  Laurel settled in the recliner, cradling her soft drink between her hands. “I saw your parents on their way out,” she said, choosing her words carefully. “Your mother seemed rather stressed.”

  “I thought so, too.” He glanced at Tyler, whose attention was still focused on the television program. “I guess we can both understand why.”

  “I suppose.” But Donna hadn’t been fretting about the surgery. Laurel had gotten the distinct impression that her mother-in-law was worried about something else instead. It had sounded very much as if Donna were keeping a secret from her son—a secret she was terrified Jackson would discover.

  Laurel couldn’t help speculating about what that secret was, especially since Donna had worried about medical tests bringing it to light. Was Jackson adopted?

  And if that were the case, how would Jackson react to the news if he were to find out? Why would Donna and Carl have kept it from him?

  Through her job with the adoption agency, Laurel frequently counseled prospective adoptive couples. Her advice was that such information should be provided to the adopted children from an early age. Secrets had a way of coming to the surface, and it was easier for everyone concerned if the truth was known from the start.

  Knowing how close Jackson was to his parents, she couldn’t begin to predict how he would react if he found out they had kept something like this from him for so long.

  Laurel was also disturbed by Donna’s comment about the strained state of Jackson’s marriage. Had Jackson been talking to his parents about her? The very possibility made her chest tighten.

  She stretched out in the recliner, propping her feet up as she took another sip of her drink, then set the capped bottle aside for later. She hadn’t slept much the night before, and weariness and stress were catching up with her.

  Still mentally replaying Donna’s overheard words, she leaned her head back and closed her eyes, letting the sounds of the cartoon and Tyler’s giggles wash over her.

  Laurel dreamed of the day she met Jackson.

  The summer-afternoon party wasn’t a typical event for either of them. The purpose of the gathering was to celebrate the adoption of the homeowners’ infant son, and Laurel had been invited as the social worker who had helped arrange the adoption. The new father was a successful businessman who had recently hired the construction company Jackson worked for to build several new stores for him. Jackson, along with several of his management-level co-workers, had been invited to the gathering to welcome their client’s son.

  Later Laurel would think what a cliché their meeting had been. Eyes meeting across a crowded room. Everyone else fading into a misty background. Her toes curling when he smiled. Sparks of sexual awareness coursing through her when their hands touched.

  They had left the party together a short while later. They’d driven to Cannon Beach, where they’d walked barefoot in the sand at sunset, listening to the shorebirds that nested on Haystack Rock. The salty breeze tossed their hair and tugged at their clothes—clothes they had abandoned in a hidden nook among the rocks after sunset. They had been daring and reckless and impetuous that night. By dawn the next morning, they had been in love.

  She dreamed of that beach. Of the birds and the rocks and the sand and the stars spread above them like an endless, bright future. She dreamed of conversation and laughter, of passionate whispers and hoarse cries. Of two young people so desperately in love that they had let their emotions sweep them into a life neither of them had been prepared for….

  It was his gentle touch on her cheek that woke her.

  She opened her eyes to find Jackson’s face close to hers as he knelt beside the recliner. The room was quiet now, the television dark and silent. Tyler lay on the bed, curled around his penguin, sound asleep. Even the clatter from the hallway seemed unusually muted just then.

  “How long have I been asleep?” she asked, her voice still husky.

  “About an hour. You really went out.” His thumb moved against her cheek again. “There are tears on your face. Are you worried about tomorrow?”

  Tears? Remembering snatches of her dream, she pushed herself upright and ran a hand through her hair. “I suppose I am.”

  “It’s going to be okay, Laurel. Everything’s going to be okay.” His tone, combined with the set of his jaw, made it clear he would accept no other possibility.

  That obsessive need of his to be in control, to make sure everything in his world turned out exactly the way he wanted it to, was etched all over his face.

  As if he had read something of her thoughts in her expression, Jackson gave her a crooked smile. “I sound just like my dad, don’t I? Making well-intentioned guarantees I can’t back up. Dad’s philosophy has always been that nothing bad can happen if he refuses to acknowledge the possibility. I guess he passed some of that trait to me.”

  His comment reminded her of the conversation she had overheard between Carl and Donna in the hallway earlier. She wondered again how Jackson would react if it turned out that he was adopted. Would Jackson understand, as she had come to see during her years as a social worker, that Carl was no less his father even if it had been love, rather than biology, that had bestowed that title upon him?

  Or maybe she had completely misinterpreted what she’d heard. She’d never been a particularly skilled eavesdropper, had never wanted to be. And even if her guess had been right, that was between Jackson and his parents. Now that Tyler had been diagnosed and was being treated, she couldn’t see how Jackson’s genetic history mattered at the moment.

  “You’d probably better head home and try to get some sleep,” she told him, changing the subject. “Tomorrow’s going to be a trying day and it will start early.”

  “I thought maybe I’d stay here tonight. I know they only want one parent to stay in
the room all night, but there are recliners in the waiting room.”

  “There’s no need for you to do that. You won’t be able to sleep well here, and you’ll want to be rested tomorrow.”

  “What makes you think I’ll sleep any better at home?” He turned his head to look at the child on the bed. “I can’t imagine sleeping a wink tonight.”

  “Still—”

  “Laurel.” He frowned, his voice losing the gentle tone with which he had awakened her. “The decision is mine to make.”

  She locked her hands in her lap. “Of course.”

  For just a moment the invisible wall between them had lowered. Now it was back. She couldn’t for the life of her decide which of them kept rebuilding it—though she suspected it was a joint project.

  He covered her hands with one of his, his work-toughened palm pleasantly rough against her softer skin. “Don’t close me out of this, Laurel. He’s my son. We’re a family. We need to be together in this.”

  After a moment, she turned her hand so that their fingers linked. “I’m not trying to close you out. If it makes you feel better, you should stay. I simply wanted you to get some rest, for your sake.”

  “I appreciate that, but I need to stay.”

  “Then stay.”

  He looked down at their joined hands, his expression grave. “We’ll get through this.”

  She nodded slowly. For now, for Tyler’s sake, they would put their differences aside, she promised herself. They would face the problems between them when their son was completely healthy again.

  Four

  Jackson went home only long enough to shower and change and feed Tyler’s goldfish. The house seemed so quiet with no one there but him. To his anxiety-sensitized ears, the few noises he made seemed to echo through cavernous spaces.

  Though hardly a mansion, it was a nice house in a safe neighborhood, built for a growing family. Four bedrooms. Two and a half baths. The house also featured a good-sized fenced yard for Tyler to play in, a two-car garage, and a redwood deck Jackson had built himself, with help from his father. Not that he had a lot of spare time to enjoy that deck. He could hardly remember the last time they’d cooked out on the gas grill or dined at the umbrella-shaded wrought-iron table.