What could I say? That I understood? I didn’t. There was no way possible I could understand what must be going on in that man’s brain and heart. He must have stood on the precipice of insanity and fought to keep from jumping.
“Ben, I don’t know what to say.” I shifted uncomfortably in the seat. I was still wearing my western wear from work. I longed for a hot bath in a tub that I could trust was really clean.
“’s okay, people always feel that way. Sometimes I want to lop off my own head and shop for a new one.” He shoved his plate away, evidently his appetite was gone. “I’m going to ask you something and I hope you understand where it comes from.”
“Sure,” I said, anxious to make up for the awkwardness I’d created when I asked the question about family.
“Would you sleep with me?”
I choked on my drink. “Wha-at?”
“I just need to sleep with someone, to feel a woman’s body next to mine. It’s been so long and I haven’t met anyone who I’d even consider doing that with…until you, that is.”
I held up a hand. “Ben, if I’ve given you the wrong impression, I’m sorry. No, I will not sleep with you. That’s for you to do with someone who you love and who loves you. That’s no solution for what’s going on in your head.” I grabbed my purse and fished out a twenty-dollar bill, laying it on the table. “I’m sorry for your loss, Ben, but you’ve got me all wrong. I wish you the best. Bye,” I said and hurried out of the diner. Hurry probably wouldn’t be a strong enough word. I flew out the door and into the street, drawing in huge gasps of clean air. Was this the world I wanted to find? What the hell was I doing here?
CHAPTER THIRTY TWO
Worth
Auggie was gone. It had been more than a month now, but I couldn’t get the thought out of my head and I felt like I was going to go mad. Damn the woman! Couldn’t she see I was dealing with something bigger than both of us? Was her answer always to run when the going got tough?
I had the corner table at Joe’s. In fact, I’d had it since noon. He was coming and it was going to be a showdown. Once and for all.
I recognized his silhouette in the doorway, the sun and the noise from the overhead bridge framing him. It was a shape that delivered nightmares. It had come at bedtimes, a result of a broken window from a thrown baseball or a dandelion that had escaped my weeding. The nightmare carried a belt that flexed with vengeance.
There were others who looked up, who knew and who turned away to avoid the nod. He was not well liked. He was only permitted because I was here.
He advanced upon me, but this time, it was I who wore the look of disapproval. He stopped at my table and I simply looked at him, refusing to stand in acknowledgment. He finally slid the opposing chair back and fell into it. I noticed that he was moving more stiffly than he used to. I didn’t give a damn.
I didn’t waste the time with preambles or small talk. “Why have you sabotaged my business?”
“What makes you think it is me?” He was gruff, unforgiving, even in guilt.
“You just gave yourself away. You used the present tense.” I sipped my bourbon cautiously, keeping my head clear.
“Are you afraid of a little challenge, boy?” he asked, chuckling and taking a draw off his cigar.
The bartender called over to him, “No smoking in here, sir.”
He looked around at the filled ashtrays and puffs of smoke from around the room and swore as he smashed it into the tabletop. “Heard your filly left you.” He went for the juggler.
“I hardly think you’re in a position to discuss relationships, now, are you?”
He didn’t say a word.
“I want it stopped. Now. What will it take?”
“Give her up.” I knew who he meant and I didn’t think I could hate anyone more than I did him at that moment.
“Fuck you.”
He chuckled, stood, lit another cigar and then shrugged his shoulders. “Up to you, but you’re already fucked, son.” He strolled out, calling hello to each man sitting down the row of stools as though they were intimate friends on the golf course.
***
I drove to the condo, but barely. I’d only had a total of four hours’ sleep over the past two nights and I was barely able to distinguish the headlights that blinded me. I pulled in and realized I hadn’t locked the door when I left in the early morning. Nothing was touched. No one was here. Not even Auggie.
I found empty bourbon bottles scattered on the kitchen floor so I went after the wine in the rack. It would take more, but it would work. There was nothing edible in the fridge, so I grabbed a box of crackers and headed for the guest room, the last place she’d slept. If I tried really hard, I could still smell her scent on the sheets. Like a small child seeking comfort, I wrapped myself in them… in her absent skin.
The scene kept playing over and over in my mind. I had walked in, exhausted and in a mental turmoil and there was that awful silence. I called her name — no response. I checked and saw her car was missing, so I supposed she was shopping or maybe visiting her parents. I went in to shower and that was when I found the rings on my dresser. The exhaustion instantly disappeared and I went on mental alert. I called her phone, even though I didn’t expect her to answer and she didn’t. I called her dad and he would only say that she was fine, but she was gone. As pitiful as it was, it did give me a sense of relief that as long as he was in her loop, and apparently not worried, I knew she was safe.
There was only the one explanation for her absence — she had left me. The question was whether she was close at hand, or had gone some distance. I’d gotten back into the car and headed to the clinic, hoping against hope that there would be a message waiting on my answering machine or a note on my desk. There was nothing.
I drove to her parents’ farm. My headlights alerted her Dad and I found him waiting for me outside, away from the house. “Where is she?” tumbled out of my mouth.
“I honestly don’t know,” he said and I knew him to be a truthful man. He was also a calm man and he was calm now.
“Has she left me?” I dreaded his response.
“It would appear so. What did you do?” he asked in a solemn voice.
“Nothing, everything… I’ve been in a mess at the clinic and distant, but the alternative was to snap and be short-tempered with her. I thought it would be better if she slept elsewhere so we wouldn’t talk. I didn’t want her upset.”
“You didn’t realize it would upset her to be set aside? She’s too loving and nurturing to take that kind of treatment. She’s a wild spirit and as long as you let her be herself, she’s the most loyal damn person you could have in your corner. You, of all people, should know that.” That was the tersest I’d ever heard him be, and I deserved every fucking word of it.
We stood there in the circle of light created by the spot mounted high atop the pole next to the barn. It felt like a judgment, or perhaps more of a condemnation. “Can I see Carlos?” I asked, yearning to be close to something of hers that was gentle and innocent, if only by proxy.
“She took him,” her dad responded bluntly. “Right now, with the possible exception of me, he’s the only living thing on this planet she feels loves her and that she can trust. I’ll be damned if I’m going to betray her,” he said, pushing his hands into his pockets and turning back toward the house. He kicked at rocks along the way, his only method of displaying emotion in a house that belonged to his dramatic wife.
“Sir?” I called after him and he stopped but didn’t turn around.
“Did you know?” I couldn’t be any more oblique than that.
Now he turned and regarded me with, if anything, more disdain than before. “Know? Hell, I drove her down there the minute after I said ‘I do.’ Go home, Worth, or wherever that still means to you.”
His words were still fresh in my mind, despite the empty wine bottle and the lack of sleep. I ached for her. I realized now that I had responded in the same way I’d been taught to handle anything,
with cruelty and an utter disdain for those closest to me. They say you only hurt the people you love. In my case, he hurt me because he had loved my brother better. Perhaps in his world, I was all that stood between him and the pride he wanted to take in a son that stood for something better. Could I blame the bastard? I had lived up to every rotten thing he could have thought of… and then some.
I must have finally passed out because the burning came again and it was sunlight, forcing its way through the slats in the blind to scorch my already seared head.
I opened my eyes only a slit, at first, hoping to gradually acclimate but there was a figure standing in the doorway to the bedroom. I drew in my breath and sat upright, eyes fully aware and unbelieving of what they saw.
Auggie stood in the doorway, her face thin and her hair needing to be brushed. I couldn’t think of what to say. I’d rehearsed our reunion a hundred times with as many outcomes, but now I was struck dumb. She took care of the problem, as always.
“I’m pregnant,” she announced and turned to run into the bathroom. I heard her retching.
CHAPTER THIRTY THREE
Worth
I got caught in the sheets and fell to the floor in my scramble to my feet. I cursed and finally got to the bathroom door.
“Auggie! Are you okay? Can I get you something?”
She opened the door and looked at me, at the stubble on my face and the bloodshot eyes. “How about an abortion?” she said curtly and began stripping off her clothes while she turned on the shower.
I stood there, mute, trying desperately to remember whether her words had been real or a transition from my sleep. She stepped under the water and I decided to collect myself. I found another shower, washed quickly and threw on sweatpants and a t-shirt before setting off to find her. She was in the kitchen, a cup of hot tea steaming on the placemat in front of her.
“Auggie… I’m so sorry.” All the words, all the attacks, the condemnations, the accusations of cowardice I had planned, had all disappeared in that one moment. “I’ve missed you,” I added and went to stand before her.
She looked up. “Did you hear what I said?” I nodded. A thousand questions sprang to mind but there was only one I wanted to ask, only one that mattered and only one I could not ask. I didn’t need to.
“Of course it’s yours.”
I managed not to blink. I don’t know whether it was because my eyes were so swollen or that I was in complete shock as the realization of what she was saying found its way through the inflamed tissues of my sodden brain.
“I didn’t need to ask,” I said quietly.
“Liar.”
Then she did something entirely uncharacteristic of the stiff-chinned, unflappable Auggie. She began to cry.
I did the only thing I could think of, the only thing that came naturally. I knelt and put my arms around her, holding her against my chest and using the cloth napkin next to me to wipe her face and nose. Eventually, I picked her up and cradled her, carrying her back to one of the guest rooms that was as of yet, untouched. I laid her on the bed and collapsed gently next to her.
I’d admit to being a bastard when I said that even the sound of her crying was welcomed, if only because it meant that my Auggie was back.
I began to talk then, into the thickness of her damp hair, all the while petting her shoulder as I cradled her thin form against me. “I want to talk, Auggie, and I’m asking you to listen. Can you do that for me, just this once?”
I felt her head nod beneath my chin. So, I began.
“There is nothing I can say to excuse the way I’ve treated you. You have always been faithful and my rock. I need you more than any person alive on this planet. You’ve become the other half of my miserable self, and I’m not worthy of being half to you. I know I became distant and I know that wasn’t fair to you. What I don’t know is why I thought you would put up with that. I have no excuses but I do have an explanation as to what was going on and you may draw your own conclusions. If, when I’m done, you still want to leave, I’ll pack my things and deed the condo over to you without a word and leave you be. If, however, you can find it in your heart to understand, and if not to quite forgive me, then I will sleep in the other room until the time you think you want me back, and to once again wear my rings. Can we agree on that?”
I felt her head nod again and I handed her a tissue as she sniffed loudly.
“I’m about to lose the clinic,” I said and felt her stiffen immediately and felt her head tilting upward for an explanation. “No, just lie still and listen.” I kissed her forehead.
“Just after the grand opening, I received a letter from an attorney. It accused me of professional misconduct and assorted various personal attacks that damaged the reputation of Dr. Jervis. I made the mistake of not reporting something I witnessed, Auggie, and it will involve hurting you a bit more. Can you take it? Can I tell you this last thing so that all is clear between us?”
“Yes, it can’t get much worse,” she whispered.
“I walked in on Dr. Jervis and a woman having sex in his office one evening. The woman was a client and had other ties that made the entire thing more than inappropriate. Auggie, that woman was…” but before I could go on, she interrupted.
“My mother.”
“How did you know?” I felt relief that she knew and pain that she hadn’t confided in me, but then who was I to judge anyone for their lack of confidence?
“She has a pattern. I’ve come to know it fairly well,” she explained and I nodded, hugging her as if it were nothing more than a bee sting that would quickly fade, although I knew that would never happen.
“I’m sorry. I didn’t want you to find out and I took advantage of the situation to force Jervis into selling me his share of the clinic. Jervis has always had one hand in my father’s pocket. Evidently he knew about Linc and had blackmailed my father. I’d always known there was something shady and disturbed between the two of them; rather like honor among thieves. I couldn’t put a finger on it until just then and that was the beginning.” I gave her a few moments to digest this before continuing on.
“Jervis avoided confronting me directly but went to my father instead. His timing was perfect. Father was angry because his second-born, black sheep son had shown him up, outmaneuvering him using his own game. I owned the clinic, had the degrees and the success was about to follow. I had even captured the daughter of his former mistress.”
“Did you come after me because of who my mother is?” she asked and my heart ached that she would even question this.
“No, Auggie, even I am not that devious and anyway, I knew you before I figured out the affair with your mother. She gave it away herself, that first night when you introduced me to her and then later when you told me about the pictures in her album. It all snapped into place then.”
She sighed. “I wondered what that was all about.”
I nodded. “So, you take one pissed Jervis and one highly jealous bastard of a father and the result is a lawsuit that threatened to expose me and disgrace me forever in a professional sense, as well as drain me of finances through interminable lawsuits, all of which would be financed by my own father. That’s when it started coming down on me. I knew I was being short, being distant, but it was the only way I knew how to protect you. You see, as much as I hate it, there’s enough of my father in me to see the pattern, too. When crossed, I go for the throat. I didn’t want you getting in the way.”
I kissed her hair. Her forehead. Willing her to understand.
“So all those nights when I left you to sleep in your bed alone, I was craving you. I needed you. You belonged to me. But I was too dangerous to be near. I don’t know why I thought you would understand that. You had none of the facts and certainly none of the suspicion and background to even guess at what was going on. Your world may have been colored by a promiscuous, controlling mother, Auggie, but your dad is who you take after and he is a true gentleman.”
I held her tighter as sobs onc
e again wracked her shoulders.
“It was my mistake,” I whispered. “I should have never underestimated you. I should have realized that, if anything, it not only involved you but that we could have gotten through it better if we were together. I’m so sorry, Auggie… but once again, I didn’t give you the credit you deserved.”
She stirred in my arms and turned her face up to kiss me. It was nearly my undoing, but I had to stay sane for the moment. There was more to be said.
“I take it you met the statuesque, Dr. Hunt?” I asked and she nodded. “My father and Jervis knew me well. Not only was she the kind of woman I would normally have been attracted to, she was also in a position to bail me out. She was a staff doctor with a firm on the west coast. They approached me after the grand opening with an offer to buy me out. I refused. That’s when my father executed his next move and the letter and Hunt showed up. She was to be my partner, essentially taking up the share Jervis had sold to me. She had ruling control and if I screwed up again, she would see me barred from my profession. I found recordings from previous sessions with clients had gone missing from the server. Jervis had taken them for insurance. They were not illegal, per se, but definitely condemning because I overstepped my influence as a therapist to coerce patients into taking steps and actions they ordinarily would not have taken. In short, I chose to send some of them home still ‘broken.’ It would have never stood in front of a board of review, but I would have been disgraced and banished, nonetheless.”
Auggie hugged me tighter and I knew hope for the first moment in weeks.
“My father wanted me disgraced because he felt I had done the same to him. He knew you would see Hunt and leap to the worst conclusions. Why wouldn’t you? I was a known entity. So, all this time, I’ve been trying to figure out a way to get rid of her, my father, and Jervis’ threats. I never counted you would leave me. Nothing mattered once you were gone. I’ve only been going through hell worrying about you, but your dad wouldn’t tell me where you were and there was no way I could find you. I gave up on fighting. I’ve just been going through the motions. My father and the west coast firm is about to leverage me out of the business entirely.”
Claiming Amelia Page 44