The Wedding

by Lorhainne Eckhart

  Chapter 31

  “What do you mean, she’s gone?” Neil said. He stared at the freshly made, empty, hospital bed, which was waiting for another patient. Candy was supposed to have been released that morning.

  He hadn’t gone right home to Emily and Brad’s after leaving the night before. He had driven around for hours, pulling into their driveway just before dinnertime. He had been greeted by icy glares from Emily, Diana, and his mother. Rodney had seemed distant but asked him how Candy was doing, and he had replied that she was fine, letting them believe he’d spent the entire time he’d been gone at Candy’s bedside. Andy and Laura were there, too, but only to say goodbye, as they were driving home at first light. Andy and Neil had exchanged a hug, and then Neil had disappeared upstairs to his bedroom.

  Now, as he stood in the doorway, wondering what the hell he had missed, Emily appeared beside him.

  “Where’s Candy?” she asked, holding a bouquet of flowers and staring at the empty room.

  “The nurse just said she’s gone. She’s already been released.”

  Emily’s expression filled with alarm. “Where is she?”

  Neil started toward the nurses station. “Excuse me,” he said to one of the nurses in blue scrubs at the desk.

  “Yes, can I help you?” She glanced up at him.

  “I was just told that my…” he cleared his throat, “that Candy McCrae was released. We’re here to pick her up, and she’s not in her room. She had an emergency hysterectomy. I’m confused. Is she waiting somewhere?” He looked around behind him and back at the nurse.

  Another nurse leaned down and whispered something to the first, who typed something into the computer. “She was released last night,” she said.

  “What?” Emily said. “Where did she go?”

  “Don’t know,” the nurse said. “Excuse me.” She grabbed a handful of charts and walked away. Neil spotted the doctor as he approached the desk.

  “Mister Friessen, what can I do for you?” he asked.

  “We came to pick up Candy, but we just found out that she was released last night. No one called us to come pick her up,” Neil said. An awful worry had started to prickle the back of his neck.

  Emily chimed in, saying, “She has no clothes here. I brought something for her to wear.” She showed the doctor the bag she carried. “What could she be wearing?”

  The doctor frowned and then called one of the nurses over. “Did someone pick Candy McCrae up last night?”

  The nurse glanced at Neil and then back at the doctor. “No, she took a cab, told me she had no one coming for her.”

  “I don’t believe this. What is she wearing, a hospital gown—and wandering the streets?” Neil barked.

  “We loaned her some scrubs,” said the nurse before walking away.

  The doctor shook his head. “I’m sorry.” He shrugged, flipping through her chart. “I don’t know what to tell you. I see it was the doctor on call last light who released her early. Very odd. The only thing I can suggest is to check with security downstairs to see if they know the cab she took.”

  The doctor was then called away, and Neil could feel Emily’s gaze burning into him.

  “What happened when you were here yesterday?” she snapped. “Obviously it didn’t go well, so tell me again how she’s ‘fine.’ She took a cab in her condition?” She was getting a little loud, so Neil guided her to the elevator. He jabbed the button and stepped inside, and she followed like a cat stalking its prey.

  “She said she was tired,” Neil tried to explain.

  “Were you or weren’t you here with her for the four hours you were gone?” she asked in a determined voice Neil had heard her use a time or two on Brad.

  Neil shut his eyes. “No.”

  “Oh, Neil, what is going on with you?”

  She touched his arm, and he wanted to weep as he stared at her and shook his head when he couldn’t get a word out.

  “Neil, does she have any money?” she asked.

  He shook his head again.

  “We have to find her,” Emily said.

  They stepped out of the elevator, and Neil stopped and stared at the front door as a cab pulled up. “I have an idea,” he said as he jogged to the front door, waving at the cabby just as an older man opened the back door and started to climb in.

  “Excuse me, sir, but this is my cab,” the man said.

  “It’s all yours. I just need to ask the driver a question.” Neil opened the front door and leaned in as the cabby stared from Neil to the older man in back. “There was a woman who took a cab last night from the hospital,” he said to the cabby.

  “Sir, I wasn’t working last night. You’d want to talk to dispatch, but there are two cab companies in this town,” the man said.

  Neil knew the man wasn’t going to be any more help, so he thanked him and shut the door, watching as the cab drove away. Emily was standing behind him, wide eyed, and seemed to say with her hands, What’s next?

  Neil started walking inside, extending his hand to turn Emily and guide her back in. “Let’s find out who called her the cab,” he said. He stopped at the front desk, where a chunky older woman with short curly hair was sitting.

  She glanced up as they approached. “Can I help you?”

  “Yes, my fiancée was released early last night, and apparently she took a cab. We’re trying to find out where she went and which cab was called for her,” Neil said, hoping it didn’t sound as strange as he thought it had, coming from his own mouth.

  The woman acted as if she’d heard it before and asked the name of the patient. She typed something on her keyboard and said, “There’s a problem, sir. We didn’t get the settlement of her hospital bill, and there was a long-distance charge on there, as well. Will you be settling the account?”

  Who would she call? raced through his mind as he fumbled for his wallet. “I already filled out the forms. I had medical insurance for Candy. It’s under my name.” He slid the medical card across the counter to the woman.

  She typed in the numbers and then printed something off. “The insurance didn’t cover everything. This is the balance due.” She set a printout in front of him.

  Neil pulled out his credit card and handed it to her, and then he asked, “Excuse me. Can I see the number she called?”

  The woman pointed with her pen to the bottom of the page, which showed the long-distance phone charge and the phone number.

  Neil looked at the number and then shut his eyes. “Oh, shit.”

  “What is it, Neil?” Emily asked as he stared at the number again.

  “That would be my banker, a friend of mine, Stella,” Neil said.

  Emily appeared confused and asked, “Why would Candy call her?”

  “To try to get money—and because she doesn’t have anyone else,” Neil said just as the woman came back with his credit card and receipt.

  He pulled his cell phone out, opened the phone book, and dialed Stella’s number. She answered on the second ring.

  “Well, hello, Neil.” She sounded frosty and cold, as if she had a bone to pick with him.

  “Stella, did Candy call you last night?” he asked as he stepped away from the desk and into the middle of the lobby.

  “She did. Quite the story, too. Seriously, Neil, I don’t understand how you could hurt her like that. Do you have any idea what a woman goes through after a hysterectomy? It’s even worse at Candy’s age. My God, she’s a young woman, Neil. Her life is just beginning, and because she can’t give you a child, you throw her to the curb and let her know she’s of no use to you anymore? Neil, I’ve always liked you. We were friends, but I never in a million years pinned you as the same type of dirty dog as Candy’s father, old Randy McCrae. Look at the mess and the debt he left her! She trusted you, Neil, and you broke her heart.” Stella sighed on the other end.

  “That’s not how it was at my end. She hurt me, and she scared the hell out of me. I may have not handled it right―”

  Stella cu
t him off, yelling through the phone. “Did you end things with her and tell her you were done with her, that she was of no use to you anymore?”

  “No, I didn’t say that,” Neil spat out.

  “Then why does she think that?” Stella snapped.

  “Because I’m a bastard,” he snapped. “I couldn’t be honest with her because I was too angry with her, so instead I stayed away because I didn’t want to hurt her. I needed to figure out what I wanted out of this mess.”

  Emily was standing in front of him, gesturing, trying to figure out what was going on. Neil pulled the cell phone from his mouth and started to say something before shaking his head. He felt as if his world had splintered into a million pieces, and it couldn’t get any worse.

  “By the way, Neil, she kept asking about her property.”

  Okay, he was wrong. It could get worse, much worse, as an icy dread slithered down his back. He had a sick feeling that all of his choices had been made for him. “What did you say to her?” he growled.

  Emily looked around to see if anyone had noticed. Neil didn’t care and started walking toward the door.

  “She kept pushing, Neil. She wanted to rent a piece of the property. She asked who bought it. She wanted to talk to them, and then she wanted to be part of the cleanup crew. Neil, she had major surgery, and she was all prepared to work herself to the bone,” Stella added.

  “Stella, what did you tell her?” he asked again, the warning clear.

  She sighed before saying, “I’m sorry, Neil. I didn’t know what else to say, so I told her that you bought it.”

  This time, Neil pulled the phone from his ear as he pressed his hand to his head.

  Emily touched his arm. “Neil, what’s going on?”

  He wanted to weep, and he had to clear his throat so he could speak. “Where is she, Stella? She has no money. We just found out she borrowed a pair of scrubs to leave the hospital. She has no clothes, not even a coat. She just had major surgery.”

  “I arranged for a plane ticket home. She took that small commuter plane last night to Seattle. She’s on the morning flight home. It leaves in an hour,” Stella answered.

  “I don’t understand,” he started.

  “I paid for everything, Neil. I took care of her arrangements, the cab, the flight, even her hotel. I sent some cash so she could buy some food, some clothes, whatever she needed. I’ll pick her up when she gets home.”

  “Stella, I have to talk to her. She won’t understand why I bought it, and she’s going to think the worst.”

  “Well, of course she is. You should have told her already. You told me you would. It was only a matter of time before she found out.”

  Neil started walking in circles, thinking, trying to figure out how to stop Candy. “Stella, I need your help. I have to talk to her. I need time to get to Seattle. I need to make her understand why I bought it.”

  “Neil, unless you have some magical way of getting to Seattle before her plane leaves in an hour, I don’t see what I can do to help. The ticket’s waiting for her, and there’s nothing I can do to stop it.”

  He was thinking, and he realized in that second that she couldn’t go anywhere. “She doesn’t have her passport,” he said.

  Stella said, “They won’t let her on the plane. What are you going to do, Neil?”

  “I’m going to go get her,” he said as he grabbed Emily’s arm and hurried her to the truck with him.

  “Well, how are you going to make her go with you? If you recall, Neil, Candy can go nose to nose with you when she wants, and I’m pretty sure she won’t let you touch her,” Stella said.

  “Well, I don’t plan on giving her a choice.”

  “So does this mean you’ve figured out what you want where Candy is concerned?”

  Neil opened Emily’s door and gestured her inside. “Yes. Oh, Stella, try paging her at the airport so she doesn’t take off when she finds out she can’t get on the plane. Make sure she stays put.”

  “Well, what am I supposed to tell her?” she asked, sounding a little annoyed.

  “Stella, you can think on your feet faster than anyone else I know. You’ll come up with something.” Neil hung up and slid behind the wheel. Emily was shaking her head, and he could feel her eyes on him as he backed out. “Call your husband. We’re going to Seattle,” Neil said, tossing Emily his cell phone as he backed out of the stall.

  “Seattle? Are we driving? That will take hours,” Emily sputtered.

  “No choice, Emily. There are two flights a day to Seattle—six in the morning and seven at night. Besides, it takes two and a half hours at the speed limit. Should be able to shave a fair bit off that,” Neil said. He saw her worry, but she nodded and called Brad.

  Chapter 32

  How do you begin to explain to someone how you feel when you don’t understand yourself? Neil had been driving almost an hour in relative silence with Emily. He knew she was trying to absorb what he’d shared, the reason why Candy had left the hospital, but what she hadn’t asked was why he had deserted Candy to begin with.

  “Emily, I’m not a bad person,” he said.

  She rustled in her seat and sighed. “I know that, Neil.”

  “Do you know what it was like with Candy during the storm? Even before that, I had always wanted her.” He glanced across the open space of the truck to Emily, who was watching him, listening to what he had to say.

  “She would cross the street to get away from me, give me that ‘Eat shit and die’ look, but that was because that worthless father of hers had messed with her head. It was always about that piece of land her father owned. Yes, I wanted it. Did you know that her father offered her to me for a price in exchange for that property?”

  Emily appeared shocked, and her eyes widened.

  “He wanted to be linked with the Friessen name, but there was no way Dad and I would allow that; not with the shady things we were pretty sure he was into.”

  “Did Candy know?” Emily asked.

  “Not until later. She thought her dad walked on water. He was all she had, but he drank himself to death, letting her believe I was responsible for their plight.”

  “Why would she think that?” Emily asked.

  “Because he told her so, and he warned me he would make sure she’d never have anything to do with me, not ever, if I refused to give him what he wanted. That old bastard did it, too.” Neil would have spit on his grave if he could. All of Candy’s worries, her fear, and her insecurity in standing up for herself, he knew her father had done that to her.

  “That’s horrible, Neil.”

  “I knew she was drowning in bills. She was going to lose her place, but she wouldn’t take anything from me. She’d go to the devil himself before coming to me. When the storm hit, it was Stella who called me, told me to go and get her, that she wouldn’t leave her property. The hurricane was heading right for us, and I didn’t think she was reckless enough to stay, but I was wrong. My heart damn near stopped when I drove in there and saw her beat-up old truck still parked in front of the house. When I finally found her, pinned down and injured… Well, you already know we didn’t get out in time,” he finished. Just thinking about it again had his stomach in knots.

  “Brad and I worried about you during that storm. When we found out you didn’t make it out before it hit, Brad was on the phone with anyone he could call for information: shelters, hospitals, the Red Cross. The TV was on constantly as he waited for updates, trying to find out whether you were okay. He was about to head down there to find you himself,” Emily said.

  “I didn’t know that,” Neil said, touched that his brother would have done that.

  “He loves you, Neil.”

  He had to clear his throat. He loved his brothers, both of them. His family was so important to him, even though he was sure Brad was ready to kick his ass across the county.

  “So tell me, Neil, why did you turn your back on Candy?” Emily asked. It was the one question he’d been asking himself over
and over.

  “I felt betrayed,” he said.

  “What?” Emily said in disbelief.

  “It’s a matter of trust, Emily. I know it was a rough week, but it’s always been something. She’s always holding something back, and I thought we had finally gotten to a place where she could talk to me. When I heard of the symptoms, that she had been spotting and said nothing to me—I was hurt because she didn’t trust me enough to tell me.”

  “Oh, Neil, it’s not as simple as that,” Emily said. “Sometimes when you have such thick walls up to protect your heart, it isn’t just a matter of trusting and sharing. She has to know that you’ll be patient enough that no matter how hard she pushes or hides, you’ll be there and you won’t go anywhere. Then she’ll let the walls down and trust you completely. But you just showed her that she was right,” Emily said, her voice calm.

  “How did I do that?” Neil asked.

  “You weren’t there for her,” she replied.

  “I didn’t want to hurt her. That’s why I wasn’t there. I didn’t know what I would say to her. I wanted to shake her, to yell at her,” Neil said, wondering why Emily couldn’t get that.

  “You hurt her by not being there. You should have stayed. You should have gotten mad at her, told her how hurt you were that she wouldn’t say anything. You should have told her that even though you were furious, you weren’t leaving,” Emily said. “You want children, Neil, badly. She knows that—we all do, but you shouldn’t have let her think she was of no use to you, that children were more important.”

  “Emily, that’s not fair. I didn’t know what I felt, but when I heard that doctor say ‘hysterectomy,’ the idea of not having children… My dreams had just been shattered. Yes, I want children, my own children, and when someone suddenly takes something so real from you, it sucker punches you. It took everything I had just to breathe. I blamed her, you’re right, but I didn’t want to hurt her, too.” He stopped talking and rested his elbow on the edge of the door.