Climax

by Lauren Smith

  “Are you sure we’ll be able to get into the hospital?” Kat asked.

  Carter growled softly. “We’ll find a way in.”

  Yes, we will, Kat vowed. No one would stop her.

  When they reached the hospital, they saw hundreds of people lining the sidewalks. Everyone in the crowd held little candles. The night fell around the streets, but the hundreds of candles danced like fireflies on a summer’s night. If her heart hadn’t been breaking, Kat would have been mesmerized by the sight.

  “Celia, take Kat inside, I’ll see to the car and join you in a few minutes.”

  Celia leaned over in the seat, her lashes lowering as she brushed a kiss to his cheek, and then she got out of the car. Kat followed her. Celia slipped one arm through hers, as though needing the strength.

  We’ll lean on each other.

  “It’s her!” someone called from in the crowd. Dozens of faces close to Kat turned her way. Cameras started appearing and bodies started to pack between her and the door. But she wasn’t going to let them stop her. She had to find Tristan.

  “Please!” she shouted. “Let me through!” For a long moment nothing happened, and she feared she’d have to start shoving people away.

  Finally, after an agonizing pause, cameras slowly lowered and the reporters backed away, forming a clear path to the hospital door.

  She and Celia hurried past the watchful crowd, the candlelight casting shadows against their faces and the hospital exterior.

  “This way.” Celia guided Kat to a bay of elevators.

  As they rode up the few floors to the ICU, Kat could barely think beyond that she was helpless to do anything for Tristan.

  At the end of a long white-walled hall, she spotted her father and Lizzy huddled by an open doorway. A few feet apart from them stood Edward Kingsley.

  “Dad!” Kat tore free of Celia’s gentle hold and ran to her father.

  He held one arm out, catching her as she threw herself at him.

  Every pain fracturing inside her chest seemed to intensify.

  “Shh…It’s okay, honey. Everything will be okay.”

  Kat almost believed him, but when she rubbed the tears from her eyes and turned to look through the open door, everything inside her stilled.

  Tristan lay in the hospital bed, one leg in a cast. His face was a little bruised, with a few cuts on his cheekbones and chin. His head was fine except for a patch of white bandage by his right ear.

  “They were able to reduce the swelling, and the internal bleeding has stopped. He’s still in a medically induced coma, but they’re hoping he’ll wake soon.” Her father’s voice seemed so distant, as though he spoke to her from another world just out of reach.

  She took a step toward Tristan, but a hand jerked her to a halt. It was Edward Kingsley.

  Chapter 14

  He’s lying there because of you. Haven’t you done enough?” Edward’s eyes were wide, wild, and a range of emotions, from anger to pain, all sparked and churned as he stared at Kat. She dropped her gaze to where his hand was curled around her arm in a viselike grip. He released her with a soft growl. His face was etched with lines of pain, and his eyes were too bright, as though he was fighting off tears. This wasn’t the monster she’d wanted to believe he was. This was a man hurting for his child. It didn’t erase his mean-spirited treatment, but it made him human.

  Her heart, beating, aching, opened wide inside her, and she reacted without thinking. She hugged Tristan’s father.

  He muttered something but didn’t push her away. When she stepped back, he swallowed thickly and met her gaze.

  “I love him. I’m not leaving. I don’t know what I can do, but…” Her voice faltered, and more tears pooled in her eyes. What else could she say?

  She went into Tristan’s room and pulled up a chair by his bed. His right hand lay close to her, and she curled her fingers around his, squeezing. She wasn’t sure how long she sat there, monitors beeping softly in the background, memorizing Tristan’s features, the way his dark hair fell into his closed eyes.

  Kat was flooded with too many emotions and a thousand thoughts that moved through her with tidal force, pulling her along to one steady burning realization. She couldn’t live without him, and she would do everything in her power to help him survive this.

  Come back to me. Find your way home.

  She parted her dry lips and spoke, hoping her words would reach Tristan in whatever twilight world he was trapped in. “From the moment I met you, I loved you.” She smiled through her tears. “Even then I recognized you as my other half. I never thought soul mates existed, but when we kissed…It was like something inside of me unlocked a secret place in my heart just for you. Do you hear me, Tristan? That’s only for you. No one else.” She stroked her thumb on the side of his palm as she talked on.

  I would do anything for you. You woke me up from a dream and taught me to live…to love.

  “Please, Tristan. Find your way home to me.”

  Hours passed, but Kat was aware only of Tristan and the monitors that showed no changes in his vital signs besides an indication he was still asleep. She continued to talk until her voice grew hoarse.

  “Here.” A gruff voice interrupted her exhausted thoughts. Edward was standing beside her, a plastic cup in his hand.

  She glanced up in surprise.

  “You’ll get hoarse if you keep on and don’t have some water.” He pressed the cup into her free hand.

  Kat drank it, the cool water a balm to her raw throat. She set it on the little table and glanced at the doorway.

  “Where’s—”

  “Your father took Elizabeth to the empty room next door to rest. She’s exhausted. I promised I would stay with Tristan and if he started to wake, I’d get them.” Edward walked around to the opposite side of the bed and seated himself in the other chair, then with a little exhale, reached out and touched Tristan’s other hand.

  Edward didn’t speak for a long while. He sat in stony silence, his mouth forming a hard, angry line.

  “Talk to him. It will help him to hear your voice. Please,” she begged softly. “We both love him.”

  When Edward finally tore his gaze from Tristan to stare at her, there was less anger and more sadness in his eyes.

  “It’s not that I don’t like you. I just believe my son should be marrying someone who…” He paused, and Kat finished his sentence.

  “Someone you approve of? Or someone you can use for a political advantage? Oh, I understand, Mr. Kingsley.”

  He laughed bitterly. “That is just it. You don’t even know to call me Lord Pembroke.”

  She fought off the need to bristle at his exasperated sigh. “I can learn to be what Tristan needs me to be. I’m not afraid, Lord Pembroke. Is that your only objection to me? That I’m not a British aristocrat?”

  Tristan’s father was studying her intently now, and she sat very still beneath his intense scrutiny.

  “I have plenty of objections, but I have a feeling you’ll argue against all of them. Typical American behavior.” He stayed silent for another minute and then shook his head. “At least the media likes you. I saw the article, of course. The two of you ice-skating, singing at church. I don’t think Tristan’s been inside a church in years…” As Edward opened up about Tristan, the anger in him seemed to be slightly diffused. “I had no idea he could skate. I don’t know when he learned to do that. We never took him skating as a boy. He doesn’t do things like that with other women, just you.” He was still staring at her.

  Kat swallowed, unsure what to say to that. “Would you tell me about when you used to take him to the Kensington Gardens? He told me it was one of his happiest memories.”

  “He said that?” Edward’s brows raised.

  She nodded.

  A hint of a smile curved Edward’s lips. “The boy always had so much energy. Best to get him up and running about.” He chuckled. “He was quite a scamp.”

  Kat kissed Tristan’s hand as she listened to h
is father talk.

  “Did you know he had a wild imagination as a boy? Always playacting with Carter. The two of them never stayed out of trouble for long.” Edward shook his head, still smiling.

  “Carter is like a brother to him,” Kat said. “I think, one day, they’ll make Pembroke a wonderful place. He has so many ideas—” She halted, not wanting to anger Edward or get Tristan in more trouble with his father.

  Edward stared at his son, but when he spoke the words were for her.

  “Ideas? What sort of ideas?” Rather than sound upset, his tone was gentle, almost curious.

  “He wants to make Pembroke a place where people will come from all over the world to visit. He thinks if you allow some film crews on the grounds to use it for period dramas, it’ll make the estate famous,” Kat explained. She detailed Tristan’s plans and watched Edward, expecting the building storm again, but it didn’t come.

  “Tristan told you his plan? I admit when he first told me I wasn’t thrilled with the idea, but it has grown on me these last few weeks.” Surprise colored the earl’s voice.

  “Yes. He was so excited about it. He and Carter have it all mapped out…” She paused. “Did you fire Carter and his father?”

  Edward finally looked at her. “No. I would never sack them, no matter what I said. John tried to resign, but he reminded me, well…that we were more than a team. Long ago, we were friends. I’d forgotten that somehow, in the last thirty years.” Lines of worry carved into his face and he scrubbed his jaw. “So…you love my son.” He seemed to be speaking more to himself than to her, but she replied anyway.

  “Yes. I tried so many times not to love him. I promised to stay away from him, but it’s like…”

  “Like you’re the sea and he’s the shore? You always come crashing back to each other by forces greater than you can understand.” Edward glanced at Tristan. His lips quivered and a tear rolled down his cheek.

  With a muttered apology, the man wiped away the evidence of his emotions.

  “Who was it…?” Kat could barely get the words out. “Who did you love so completely like that?” She knew deep in her soul that this man understood them more than she’d ever imagined someone could.

  Edward closed his eyes, exhaled, and then looked out the window at the dark, sleeping city. Their reflections on the glass from the hall lights made them appear to be frozen phantoms.

  “Her name was Lydia. Her family lived on the estate and worked as part of the household staff. My father never knew she and I…how we felt about each other. I knew if he discovered us, he’d send her family away.”

  Kat covered Tristan’s hand with both of hers, holding on to him as she listened to his father open his heart and expose his painful past.

  “What happened to Lydia?”

  Edward’s head lowered a few inches. “John Martin came to work for my father. He was my age. Twenty-four. He took over as steward and met Lydia. There was nothing standing between them. No grand house, no titles, no traditions. I stood next to John in the church the day of their wedding. A man’s heart can break and not kill him, I found out as I watched them get married.” Edward didn’t wipe the second tear away as it coursed down his cheek.

  “What about Tristan’s mother?” Kat asked, almost afraid of the pain the question might cause, but needing to know.

  “She came into my life a few weeks after the wedding. She was like Lydia in so many ways, but she was never mine, not like Lydia had been. Every hurt I’ve suffered since I lost Lydia, I took out on Elizabeth…” He didn’t finish, but it wasn’t necessary.

  “The world is different now,” Kat whispered. “Tristan and I can be together.” She held her breath, waiting to see what Edward would say.

  “Much has changed in thirty years,” he agreed.

  Several long moments passed while Kat and Edward kept a vigilant watch on Tristan’s condition.

  Then at last Edward spoke.

  “Why don’t you try to rest? I shall stay with him for a few hours.” Edward shifted in his chair as though settling in for a long watch.

  “No,” Kat whispered. “I won’t leave. I made a promise, one I’ve broken too many times. I was always the one who gave up on us because I was too afraid of what I felt for him. I’m never going to hurt him again.” Thick tears blurred her eyes enough that she had trouble seeing. She blinked rapidly, sending the tears trickling down her cheeks.

  The hospital monitors beeped away, steady and unchanging, measuring the silence in the room by the slow beat of Tristan’s heart.

  “Then sleep here. I’ll watch him if he wakes.” Edward’s suggestion was the only option she could accept.

  Every muscle in her body ached. Worry and fear had drained her to the point where she couldn’t fight sleep. Scooting her chair closer, Kat rested her elbows on Tristan’s bed and folded her arms so she could lay her head on them. She kept hold of his hand, unwilling to lose that connection to him.

  She slipped into that twilight place between wakefulness and sleep. Dreams of him came to her, one at a time in shimmering incandescent waves that blinded her with their brilliance. His arms about her, his lips feathering over hers, the way his eyes sparkled as he laughed. She loved how he talked of his dreams for the future with such hope. The way he spoke of Celia and Carter with such affection. Tristan was so much more than the charming womanizer the press painted him as. He was a loyal friend, irresistible lover, a man with dreams to build a greater life for those in his world.

  Lost in her own dreams, Kat didn’t immediately feel the gentle pressure on her hand. She came awake slowly, convinced she’d imagined it. Bleary-eyed, she glanced at the clock above the bed. Two hours had passed. She peeked at Edward, who was still watching Tristan, weary but awake.

  There it was again, that hint of pressure.

  Kat squeezed back, staring hard at Tristan’s face for any sign of him coming around.

  A flicker of his lids, a tensing of his jaw. Surely I can’t be imagining this.

  His fingers tightened around hers, the sensation clearly recognizable now. Her heart leaped into her throat and she gasped breathlessly.

  “Take his other hand. He’s waking up. I have to get Lizzy and Dad!” She jumped up, waited impatiently for Edward to do as she ordered, and then she rushed out of the room to get Lizzy.

  Tristan was waking up at last.

  * * *

  They say life flashes through a person’s eyes when they’re about to die. But no one says anything about the moments before you come back to life. This was the hazy thought that lay at the back of Tristan’s mind as he watched the play of images and sensations roll through his mind.

  The light glinting off the top of Peter Pan’s flute in a garden, the feel of his father’s arms catching him, both of them laughing. The bright colors from a stained-glass window of a knight and his lady. Chasing Carter through the woods, laughing as they followed the groundskeeper to collect grouse eggs. The bite of a winter’s night and the hot kiss of a girl with silver eyes. The flutter of a butterfly against his cheek as he leaned in for one more kiss, one last taste. The glow of winter sunlight on an antique compass in his hand, the arrow pointing him toward his future…toward her.

  “Kat.” The name came out a rough, raspy whisper that scraped his ears.

  “I’m here.” Her voice was so clear, so real. Was he still dreaming?

  “Kat?” Tristan coughed, and suddenly pain flared inside every cell of his body. His eyelids scratched against his eyes like sandpaper as he forced them open. Everything was blurry, and he had to blink a few times.

  A group of people were huddled around him. His father, his mother, Clayton, Celia, Carter…and Kat. His Kat.

  “You’re here,” he whispered. The other people in the room vanished, and he saw only her. A hundred emotions smashed into him and tears burned his eyes because he was too bloody weak to get up and take the woman he loved into his arms.

  Kat bit her lip and nodded, tears streaming down her fac
e. Her dark hair fell about her face in wild waves, as though she’d been running her hands through it in worried distraction.

  She was still beautiful.

  “Yes, I’m here, and I’m not going anywhere,” she promised.

  Hearing that made his entire body relax, and yet he still needed to hold her.

  He struggled to sit up, but his father touched his shoulder gently. “Easy, boy. Plenty of time for that later.”

  Tristan glanced at Edward, blinking slowly. His father’s eyes were red-rimmed. Why?

  “Father, what—”

  “Shhh…” His mother hushed him. “Don’t speak. Just rest. We’re all here and so glad you’re all right.”

  The heavy weight of his head was too much to hold up. He let it drop back onto his pillow, his eyes falling closed again, but he was afraid Kat would leave once he was lost to sleep again.

  “Kat, don’t go.” Tristan squeezed her hand, and sighed in relief when she squeezed back.

  “I’m right here. Not going to anywhere.” The faint press of her lips on his forehead filled him with an intense, overwhelming joy. He exhaled a happy, exhausted breath.

  “We…belong together.” He kept a hold on her hand.

  “Yes, we do. Sleep now, my prince.” Her soft laugh was in his ears. “I’ll wake you with a kiss.”

  He smiled as he drifted off. The message from the stained glass at Fox Hill came back to him.

  Love conquers all.

  Chapter 15

  Five months later at the Pembroke estate…

  I can’t concentrate when you do that thing,” Kat murmured as electric tingles shot down her spine.

  “What thing?” Tristan’s voice rumbled against her ear as he folded her into his embrace from behind.

  “That thing…with your tongue.” She rolled up on her tiptoes, breathless and flushing with heat as he licked the shell of her ear before he nibbled on the sensitive spot behind it.