“Hey, you’ve always wanted to belong somewhere. Now you do.”
“But what about Pops?”
“What about him? He has to figure out his own path. You can’t make the decisions for him. You’re a grown woman about to marry the man of your dreams. Maddy, too. The both of you are set. He has to figure out what he wants in life and work toward it. Let’s just hope to hell he’s learned a lesson from this trip down Coma Lane and uses it to stay sober. For himself. Not just for you and Maddy. Though I have my own opinions about that.”
I pouted. “I know. I know. He says he’s going to do right by us. Be a better man.”
She huffed. “I’ll believe it when I see it. In the meantime, I’ll hope for the best, and I think that’s how you need to approach it too.”
“You know, you’re right. He’s a grown man who needs to take care of himself for once. I can’t plan my life around him or anyone else from now on.”
“Atta girl. That’s what I want to hear from you. Now what I want to hear for me is a big, buff tatted Samoan cry out to some Hawaiian gods while I drain his cock so I can get a little shut eye. Damn, I keep telling the hulk that I need some beauty sleep. Does he listen? No.”
I snickered. “Okay skank-a-lot-a-mas, go get your freak on. Say Aloha to Tao for me.”
“Will do. Love you. Catch you later, sleaze-bag.”
“Love you more, Slutty Slutterton.”
Chapter Ten
Pops was sitting up in his bed when I arrived first thing in the morning. Wes, God love him, stayed back at the hotel to work on editing more of the film we did for some of the December shows for Dr. Hoffman’s Christmas special. I was ahead of the game and extremely thankful now that I had my dad to deal with.
“Hey, b-baby girl, come s-sit.” He patted the side of his bed with his fingers, his voice and movement still hit and miss. According to the doctor, it would be a long while before movement and his speech were perfect.
I went over and sat down, grabbed his hand, and lifted it to my lips for a kiss. His skin was paper-thin but still a brighter color than it had been when he was filled to the gills will booze. “Spoke with the doctor this morning. They said you know you’ve been out for the past eleven months.”
Pops nodded solemnly. I couldn’t imagine what he must be feeling, knowing that almost a year of his life passed him by.
“What happened, Pops? How did it get so bad with Blaine?”
He closed his eyes and squeezed my hand. “Mia, I’ve been a v-very s-selfish man.”
Sure, I could agree with him, but it still didn’t make sense in the context of the question I’d asked. “How so?”
He shrugged. “I didn’t care a-anymore. About m-my life, about m-my d-debt, about a-anything but the emptiness.” Each word was said with a strange foreboding, as though he was preparing me for a harsh reality.
I tilted my head to the side and focused on his eyes. “Dad, did you purposely borrow and lose that much money?” In my mind, I went back to the conversation where Ginelle suggested he’d tried suicide by way of overextending his line of credit with a psychotic loan shark.
He shook his head. “Not e-exactly. Maybe. I d-don’t know. I w-was so t-tired. Done with w-wondering w-why she left. Done with b-being a d-drunk. Done with b-being the w-worst thing for you g-girls. Just d-done. So I didn’t care that I owed Blaine all that m-money and n-no w-way to pay it b-back. I knew he’d take care of me, and that w-would be that. I-Insurance w-would cover you.” He closed his eyes and took a slow breath. “M-More than I c-could give you a-alive.”
I choked back a sob, stood, and backed against the wall. “You mean, you wanted to die?”
He looked at me, and the truth was written clear as day in his dark gaze. “I didn’t w-want to l-live the w-way I had been l-living a-anymore.” It was as much of an admission of guilt as I was apparently going to get.
“Jesus, Pops. I can’t even…” I sucked in a huge breath, bent forward, and calmed my rattled nerves with slow, even breaths. “You have no idea what I’ve given up for you all these months to pay your debts!”
His eyebrows rose in surprise. “What? The debt is p-paid?”
I closed my eyes and leaned my head back against the wall. “Blaine and his goons were going to kill you and then come after Maddy and me about what they called 'survivors‘ debt.’ You didn’t think he’d let you get off with being killed without some way of getting his money, did you?”
Pops eyes widened on his sunken in face making them look darker, more hollow. “No.” He shook his head. “They never said t-that. I…I just…”
“You what?” I roared. “Figured you’d offer up yourself and all would be forgiven?”
His gaze shot to where I’d started pacing. “Yes, exactly.”
“Unbelievable.” I shook all over and tugged at my hair, desperately trying to relieve the tension. I wanted to scream out like a banshee. “I went to work for Millie as an escort to pay off your debt!” The words were scathing and dipped in poison.
All the blood seemed to leave my father’s face, making him ghostly pale. “You w-whored yourself out f-for m-me?” A tear slipped down his cheek, and his entire body seemed to crumble inward as sobs overtook him. “God, no. No. Not my g-girl.” He cried into his hands.
I ran over to him. “Pops, it wasn’t like that. I didn’t have to sleep with them. I just had to be what they needed for a month. Made a hundred thousand a month and paid Blaine in installments. I should have told him about what happened with Blaine in September and how Max saved the day, but I didn’t think he could handle the full truth.
My father’s body trembled as I held him. “I’m so s-sorry. God, I’m s-sorry for s-so much. I’ll never be able to make it up to y-you and y-your sister. Never.”
I slid my hand up and down his back. He was so thin I could feel each bump in his spine. “You can start by being alive. Being our dad again. Staying sober,” I added, hoping he wouldn’t fly off the handle the way he usually did when I mentioned his sobriety.
He held me for a long time, whispering apologies into my hair, telling me how proud of me he was, how much he loved me. In the end, that’s really all I ever wanted from my dad. His love, acceptance, and pride. I realized, in that moment, I did have all that. Yes, he’d screwed up big time when we were children, but we both had a lot of life left in us, and I for one wanted to spend that time making new memories, living life to the fullest.
My cell phone blared in my back pocket. I let it ring and continued holding my dad. It didn’t stop. The second the message would pick up, the phone would start ringing again. Someone was definitely trying to get hold of me.
“Sorry, Pops.” I pulled back, got off the bed, and pulled out my phone. The display said Maximus Calling.
I smiled and put the phone to my ear. “Hello, brother of mine,” I said flippantly.
“You were supposed to call me today.” He sounded like a big, growly bear.
“Don’t you have your wife and my niece and nephew to go all alpha cowboy family on?” I laughed and looked at my dad. His face was contorted into a shocked expression.
“How many times do I need to tell you I take care of what’s mine?”
I rolled my eyes. “Whatever. I’m fine. You can relax. Go back to little Jack, and kiss Isabel for me.”
“You okay?”
Once again, I glanced at my father. “Better than okay. My dad is on the path to healing, I’m marrying the man of my dreams, and life is amazing.”
Max chuckled into my ear. “All right, sugar. You take care of yourself, and I’ll call you in a day or two.” A day or two for Max meant he’d call me first thing tomorrow morning. Internally, I giggled, loving that I had a brother at all, one who was crazy protective and ridiculously overbearing with his adult sisters. “Love you, Sis.”
“Love you too, Max.”
I clicked off the phone and turned around.
“Who was that?” Pops asked.
“My brother,
Max,” I said automatically, completely forgetting that my father had not been awake the past year. He didn’t know about Maxwell Cunningham or about Maddy and the truth of her paternity. “Shit,” I whispered, staring at his confused face.
“What brother?”
I closed my eyes and sat on the bed. “Pops, it’s a really long, screwed up story that ultimately has a happy ending, but not really something you should probably be hearing when you’ve just woken up from the better part of a year-long sleep.” I sighed, hating that I'd spilled the beans before he’d had time to adjust to knowing that he’d been out for a year.
“Y-Young l-lady, you sit your bum down and t-tell y-your father all about this b-brother of yours and how you came about finding out about him. Have y-you b-been in contact with your m-mother?”
“No, Pops, I haven’t.” Just a mention of my mother sent an icy chill rippling through my veins.
Maddy arrived shortly after I started in on the story of meeting Maxwell Cunningham and how I was hired to pretend to be his long lost sister, when in reality he already knew I was related. Then when he found out about Madison, we did blood tests that confirmed he was indeed our brother genetically.
“So that’s it? Y-Your m-mother was in a relationship b-before she m-met me, had a child and abandoned him. Is that a-all?”
Maddy bit her lip and looked out the small window, her eyes brimming with unshed tears.
“What aren’t you t-telling me?” His brows lowered, and he frowned.
I sighed. “I think that’s enough for today, Dad. You’ve been through a lot. We’ve been through a lot. Maybe we need to take a break.”
Pops shook his head adamantly. “No. We’re going to end a-any s-secrets right here, right n-now.” He pointed a thin finger into the waffle thread hospital blanket.
My shoulders slumped, and the tears ran down Maddy’s face.
Just rip the Band-Aid off, Mia. Get it done so that you can be free of this burden.
“Mia…Maddy…” Pops said in warning.
Madison’s entire body looked like it was going to cave inward. I went over to her and wrapped my arms around her chest from behind. She leaned back against me, lifted her hands to her face, and cried.
“Good Lord, what is wrong?”
“Pops, when we had the blood tests done, the test proved that Maxwell Cunningham and Maddy shared the same mother and father.”
He closed his eyes and rubbed at his forehead. “So it’s true. Genetically, I’m n-not y-your father.”
Maddy cried hard and shook her head.
“Oh, honey, come here.” He opened his arms, and she fell into them crying against his chest.
“B-But, b-but, you’re my dad!” she moaned as though she were in pain. I would have done anything to take her pain away, but it wasn’t mine to bear.
He petted her hair. “Yes. And I always w-will b-be. No t-test can take m-my girls away from me.”
“Not me, Pops. The paternity test confirmed that I only shared the same mother with Maxwell and Maddy.”
Pops shook his head and continued to run his fingers through her honey gold hair, the hair she’d gotten from her real father. “Always suspected your mom was p-playing around on m-me. There were times where I thought I’d seen her s-standing too close to t-this tall blond c-cowboy-looking f-fella. I can’t recall his n-name.”
“Jackson Cunningham. He would come to Vegas when I was a kid. She’d see her son, and I’d see the brother I never knew I had. Until she got pregnant with Maddy. Then those visits stopped,” I answered before he could ask.
Pops licked his lips and kissed the crown of Maddy’s head. “Yeah, after Maddy, she started acting s-strange.” He smiled sadly. “More s-strange than n-normal, that is. It was l-like she c-couldn’t keep still or stay in o-one p-place long enough. She constantly c-changed jobs in the s-shows, moved from casino to casino, c-complaining that this one or t-that had some t-type of p-problem. And then one day it w-was Vegas w-was the p-problem. And then I w-was the p-problem. The rest, as they say, is history.”
Then she left. I remember that part very clearly.
* * *
Wes and I spent the rest of November with my Father. Physically, he was doing really well. Mentally, not so much. Over the two weeks I’d updated him as much as possible about what had gone down in our lives, explained what I did each month, and then finally admitted what had happened when he contracted that virus and the allergy that almost killed him. He said he was blissfully ignorant the entire time. Claimed that one day he was black-and-blue and closing his eyes against the black asphalt, wishing for death, and the next he opened them to the white convalescent hospital room. He couldn't recall anything in between.
The therapist said that was normal and that he might later recall us talking to him or remember voices in his dreams, but for the most part, his brain and body were healthy. Now he just needed to work hard through physical therapy, attend counseling about his addictions, and join an AA chapter in his area. For now, the psychologist set him up on one visit and two phone calls per week until he felt he was ready to be more independent.
Wes set up my dad with two nurses to care for him in alternating twelve-hour shifts, get him to his appointments, and keep him company. Maddy quit one of her extra classes so she’d have more time to visit with Pops each day. Though I felt bad that I wouldn’t be around, I reminded myself that I’d spent the entire year giving up my life for him. It was time for me to go home, back to Malibu where Wes and I could plan our wedding and rejoice in all the many things we had to be thankful for.
* * *
Sitting on the back patio, staring out over the ocean, I imagined our wedding day. I knew where we’d put the chairs for the guests, where the aisle would go, and the exact backdrop of where I’d say “I do” to the man I loved.
I sipped on the cool glass of Chardonnay and crossed my legs under the fluffy throw blanket Mrs. Croft handed me. It wasn’t really cold in Malibu, even though it had just turned into December.
My phone rang, and I cringed. I should have tossed the damn thing into the sand so that I could sit and enjoy my home in peace. Wes was out surfing, catching some waves. I could see his lone form riding a wave in the distance. Sexy as all get out the way he commanded that board. Damn, I was a lucky woman.
I answered the phone without even looking at the display, too focused on my man tearing up the waves on his surfboard. “Hello?”
“Ms. Saunders, this is Shandi, Dr. Hoffman’s assistant.”
She always did that. Announced herself as Dr. Hoffman’s assistant, as though I didn’t already know that, having worked with him the last two months.
“Yes, Shandi. Hello. What can I do for you?”
“Dr. Hoffman has your next assignment.”
I crinkled my eyes. “Oh? Usually I pick the subject matter.”
Her voice took on an overconfident, cocky demeanor. “Not this time. He wants you to go to Aspen, Colorado to interview and film the local artists there. A man contacted the station and offered the show a lot of money to do a segment on his wife.”
“Who’s his wife?”
“Some mountain woman who paints hokey dokey pictures of the mountains and trees. I don’t really know. Your assistant will compile the details. He figured while you were there collecting a mint for the show, you could do your segment on beautiful art next week.”
“Next week? He wants me there next week? You’re kidding. I just got home.”
Shandi groaned annoyingly. “Not our problem that you spent your time gallivanting with your family during the holiday. Now it’s time to get some work done. Should I tell Drew you have a problem with doing the job, because I’m sure he knows plenty of buxom brunettes that he could call on in a pinch…” she threatened.
“No! No. It’s fine. I’ll do it. Can I have the same crew from New York?”
“You want the goth girl, Kathy?”
Goth girl. The woman had dark hair, wore black-rimmed glasses a
nd was automatically stereotyped as “the goth girl.” Sometimes I really hated Hollywood. Mostly, I just despised Drew’s assistant.
I sighed. “Yes, I’d like Kathy Rowlinski please. As a matter of fact, is there a way that Century can make her my official production assistant?”
“You’ll have to talk to Drew or Leona about that.”
“Fine. Thank you, Shandi, for calling. I’ll look forward to receiving the details of the segment.”
I groaned, pressed the off button on the phone, threw my arm back, and chucked the phone out toward the sand.
Wes’s arm came out of nowhere and caught the phone midair. “Lose something, sweetheart?” He laughed and made his way over the sandy hill and up the stairs. His wet suit was hanging down around his hips, his chest soaked with water trails. He turned on the water spout at the top of the steps and rinsed off his sandy feet.
Without even thinking, fully clothed, I went right up to him, leaned over, found one of those water trails, and dragged my tongue from the fantastic V over his hips, up his rock hard abs, and over his chiseled pecs until I got up to his mouth where I took his lips in a blistering kiss. I plastered my body against his, letting the freezing cold water from the ocean soak into my clothes. I didn’t care. Right then, I needed to be with him and drown my mind and body in the man I loved and get over the fact that I was going to have to leave in a week.
He lifted me up and palmed my ass before he walked through the house to our bedroom where he proceeded to welcome me home in the best possible way.
* * *
Wes played with my hair as I lay breathless across his chest. “Did she say what kind of money we’re talking? Why would this mountain man pay the show to come film there? It would have to be a lot of money.”
I nodded against his skin and propped my chin on my hands where they rested over his heart. “It is weird, but Aspen, Colorado is beautiful, I hear. I’ve never been there. Have you?”
Calendar Girl: November: Book 11 Page 11