by Kira Blakely
“Belle?” I asked, even though I could figure out what was happening. I knew that “oh shit” look well enough. I’d seen it not that well-hidden on commanding officers back in Iraq when things went balls up.
She shook her head and focused on the call. “I’ll be there right away. Love you, Dad. Tell Mom to hang on, please.”
“What’s going on?”
“Mom collapsed. She was rushed to the E.R. and has some brain bleeding that might be a side effect of the treatment she’s on. I have to get home… they’re not even sure…” She burst into tears, and I reached over to hug her. I was shocked when she pulled away. “Don’t.”
“What?” I asked, feeling like a fucking Mack truck had just hit me.
“I can’t. All the pretty words in the world don’t matter. We can’t… I was here when she got sick. I wasn’t working fast enough on the deal. She’s possibly dying in a hospital in California, and I’m here having sex on the beach.” She bolted up to her feet, and I did the same. “I have to go.”
“Of course, you do. My plane can be ready by the time you get to the airport. I’ll come, too.”
“Don’t.”
“What?”
“I said don’t.”
“What?”
She yanked up her purse and hesitated over the collar on the table. “I can’t think around you. I let myself be selfish and focus too much on only what I want. I need to be clearheaded to help Mom, if I even can. I… maybe I was lying to myself this whole time. Maybe you’re just an escape.”
I fisted my hands at my side, and when I replied my voice was low. Dangerous. “So I’m just convenient for you?”
“Maybe. I just make all the wrong choices with you. I thought it was love, but maybe it’s just the first freedom I’ve had in years. I have to go!” she shouted, turning to head back to the house.
The darkness was trying to pull me under. For the first time in weeks, another flashback was haunting me, that pain in Martinez’s eyes as he died in my arms. That was better than my best friend, than Jimmy, who’d already been in pieces due to the IED. For a moment, the humidity of the beach could have been the damn arid desert.
But I fought my way back, clawed my way to the here and now.
Reaching out, I grabbed both of her shoulders but not tightly. I wasn’t going to scare her, never again. “You can go, Belle, but don’t throw away everything we had. We meant something... mean something.”
“I don’t make the right choices when I’m with you.”
“You don’t act like a martyr with me,” I corrected. “You have a choice to live your life, too, or always beat yourself up over things you can’t control. Please, we can help your family together.”
“I can’t. Carol was right,” she said, ducking out of my grasp.
I swallowed and it felt like shattered glass lined my throat. “If that’s how you feel.”
“It’s how it has to be,” she said. Tears streamed down her face, but she was the one doing this to herself. And to us.
To me.
Shaking my head, I picked up the collar and handed it to her. “Take it. It’s yours and it’s worth a lot of money. I should know. You’re free now, Belle, like you wanted. All I ask is you take that to remember me by. Is that too distracting?”
That seemed to shake her out of her spiral just for a minute. She reached up to stroke my cheek, but I stepped out of her grasp. I didn’t need to be blown off by her. She’d said too fucking much already.
“I didn’t mean that.”
“I think you did, Belle. All this time, I bet you thought I was using you, that it was all about not getting too close to the playboy. But we were both wrong, weren’t we? You were using me, and I’m done with it. Goodbye, Belle, and have a good life.”
With that, I turned and headed out to the shore.
Chapter Sixteen
Belle
My heart was pounding as I ran through the halls of the hospital. I had gotten lost trying to get to the ICU and ended up in emergency instead. Every part of the damn hospital looked like every other part, and all I wanted was to find my mom. I could have slept on the flight, theoretically, but the only thing I could really do was sit there and hold a glass of water in my shaking hands.
Mom.
I hadn’t taken care of my mom well enough.
I should have been here all along.
And now I might be too late…
I skidded into a nurse’s desk and set my hands on the counter. “Please, I’m looking for Angelique Fontaine. I’m her daughter. Please, which room?”
The nurse nodded and flipped through her clipboard with the speed of a turtle. I understood she was going through a regular day for her and trying to be efficient, but each second felt like a century.
“Please, there has to be some information. Something,” I said, pulling out my license in case she needed proof of who I was.
“Yes, yes, I see now. Ms. Fontaine is in room 332, just down the hall and to your left.”
“Can you tell me anything about her condition?”
“It’s best if you head down there. The doctor should be in shortly with an update for the family, miss.”
I nodded and tried to keep my head held high. If I fell over or collapsed into tears I’d never get back up, never struggle to the room.
Mom, oh, Mom…
When I got there, I found George and Carol sitting just outside the door in some chairs. He was patting her hand and trying to be sympathetic. I turned to my sister, quite aware I was still in mussed makeup but at least in jeans and a light sweater. I didn’t know if she could tell how recently I’d had sex with Drake. I wanted to take her aside and beg for forgiveness, to tell her that she was right and I’d been too selfish.
I’d say anything if I could save my mom.
Carol eyed me and then nodded. “The medication caused a brain bleed. She fainted with Dad and they rushed her here. She’s stable and they caught it in time, but she’ll have to be here for a couple of weeks of rehab and observation.”
“Thank God,” I said, clutching her hand, hoping some of what I’d done was at least behind us until Mom was better. We could fight later, but we both had to be here together for her. “Can I see her? Is she awake?”
Carol nodded and stood, but then pulled me down the hall away from George. Lowering her voice, she added, “I wanted to tell you this first, though. Drake McManus’s lawyers called when you were en route. He’s offering ninety cents on the dollar and all he wants to secure the deal is to have Dad named the newest CEO and chairman of his kids’ charity. You and I can have any post we want or nothing at all, depending on what we prefer. He’s even called ahead to Hopkins and UCLA to get the best specialists over to Mom on his dime. I... I don’t understand everything you did, and I don’t think I want to know…”
I blushed and looked down at my hands, ashamed of everything I’d done, of the fact I’d forgotten how sad my family was, how desperate and alone so far away. I just hadn’t been here, and I should have been. I knew better and look what had happened.
Rationally, Mom’s sudden reaction wasn’t my fault, but guilt wasn’t rational.
It felt like I’d done it, like I’d tempted fate by finally being happy for the first time in years.
“You don’t have to say anything. I had no idea Drake was going to be that generous or that he’d been contacting doctors. To be honest, the second I heard, I ran for the suitcases and hurried to get to the jet.”
“Well, you need to thank him once he’s back in town for sure. He really went beyond.”
“We’re not… it’s over.”
Carol’s face stiffened. “Did he dump you? What a creep!”
“No,” I said, my voice wavering. “I mean, it was a bit more mutual. I dunno… there was just fighting and I realized you were right. I need to help my family, and I can’t just do whatever I want. I’m just glad he delivered on the deal.” I held my head up higher. “But I won’t be in negotiations with him anymore
.”
“I’m sorry,” Carol said, gathering me up into her arms for a hug. “I’m glad you’re back. I missed you.”
She had a funny way of showing it while I was gone.
Pulling away from her, I headed back to room 332. “We can catch up after I see Mom and Dad.”
Carol smiled. “I’d like that.”
It would make one of us.
***
“Mom!” I shouted, hurrying to her bedside and taking her hand. She had the leads from a heart monitor on, tangling her up in a bed like the arms of an octopus, and an oxygen tube dangling from her nose. Her skin was pale and thin as paper, but she was alive and she was still here. It was a start. “Oh, God, are you okay?”
Dad stood up and kissed me on the temple. “Baby, we’ve missed you. I didn’t know you were coming back.”
“I tried to get back as fast as I could. I tried to call from the plane but it didn’t have reception. I’m so sorry. Then I was calling at LAX but the cell signal in here sucks. I just… I’m so sorry I wasn’t here.”
Mom shook her head, as best as she could manage with all the tubes on. “Baby, you didn’t do anything, and you’re here now.”
I nodded and sat down at her side. “I just should have been here anyway.”
Mom looked back to my dad and smiled. “Honey, can you see if they have any more of the apple juice I like? I want to catch up with Belle privately. Is that okay?”
“Of course, darling,” he said, kissing her cheek.
It was a gesture so gentle that it almost broke my heart. My parents lived for each other, always had. I thought for a moment I could have had that with Drake, but that was gone now. Dad paused just a moment longer to give her shoulder a squeeze before walking out the door.
Mom turned to me then and sighed. “Sweet girl, what am I going to do with you?”
“I don’t know what you mean? I just got back from doing business for over three weeks. My head is full of figures and I’m beat, but there’s nothing more exciting going on. Wait… did Carol say there was?”
My mom chuckled. “Baby, I can see everything written on your face. I was worried when you went off with Drake McManus. I might have been sick these last few years, but I have the news and I know his reputation. I was scared about what you were even thinking of doing for me because I would never ask that.”
“Mom, we didn’t…”
“But I can see how sad you are right now. You’re trying hard and maybe your father is too out of it to see it, but he’s always been a little obtuse with certain things. I can see you now, and something happened. Did he hurt you?”
I shook my head and curled up in the chair, drawing my knees into my chest like I was a little girl all over again. “Mom, I think I made a huge mistake. We weren’t supposed to fall in love, and maybe we didn’t, but we were so close. Then I did things and said awful stuff to him. If he never calls me again, I can hardly blame him.”
“Sweetie.”
“Mom, I shouldn’t have even been gone. You needed me. For three years, I’ve been here because you needed me. Then you have one of the biggest health scares of your life, and I’m off playing in the Bahamas, well, a lot more than I should be. I swear I did business.”
Mom squeezed my hand tightly. “But you had fun. I haven’t seen you smile in so long, but if you went off with him and really enjoyed your life, then that means something, too. Sweetie, I am going to beat this, but you’ve put your life on hold for me for too long. It’s not fair to you, and I’d never want you to do that. You have to understand.”
“The only thing I understand is that you all need me, and I promise never to leave again. Besides, you weren’t there. I said horrible things… did horrible things. He’s never going to forgive me,” I said.
Then the tears seemed to fall their own accord.
Shaking, I put my head on my Mom’s shoulder and let her comfort me, barely noticing when Dad and Carol came back into the room.
***
“You’re doing great!” I said, sitting down next to my sister at Mom’s therapy appointment. I kept my focus on Mom and grinned wide. “You’re blowing them away. I swear next week we’re getting you into one of those walk-run 3ks. You’re unstoppable.”
Mom chuckled and gripped the beams harder to keep herself from falling. The tech braced her back with his hands. “I think I’d settle for just walking around the department without my walker. I’m so sick of going to the bathroom for two, me and my walker buddy.”
“Well, keep kicking ass like this and you will be!” I said, grinning and setting my basket of blueberry muffins down by my feet. “So,” I continued, turning my attention to Carol as Mom worked on her next round of exercises. “How’s she really doing?”
“The specialist from UCLA, well, the oncologist one, thinks that she does have a medication that she’ll be responsive to without the side effects. Once the neurologist clears her, Mom will be starting on that.” Carol shook her head. “I don’t know what you did to Drake to reform such a famous bad boy.”
“I think we both have an idea.”
Carol waved her hand and lowered her voice. “I’m not talking about that. You must have done something more than the usual.”
“Gee, thanks,” I said, feeling my heart break when I thought about how much more experience Drake had than me. I had been the blushing virgin under his tutelage. The dreamy-eyed girl who had no idea what I was doing. Had he resented my naiveté? “We were there and, well, you can guess much of it,” I said, my fingers coming to my neck almost on their own. It was as if they expected to feel the diamonds and stones of my collar under them still. Maybe in some ways, it felt as if I could never truly take it off. “I don’t think I was anything special.”
Yes, I’d left it very badly. Torn his heart out and run, but he must not have cared that much. In the almost ten days since I’d left for L.A., he’d sent envoys to my father and sister. He’d even started orienting my dad about all the ins and outs of the kids’ charity. But he hadn’t called. There’d been no texts or emails. There’d been nothing.
I’d done it to myself with my own big mouth, but he hadn’t fought for me either so maybe he was glad I was gone. Maybe what we had wasn’t built to last back in the real world and off a tropical island.
“I think that you must have mattered to him,” Carol said, pulling out her phone. “He’s really pulling out every stop he can think of for Mom, and I’m glad he is. I don’t understand why you don’t call him.”
This was the most casual conversation that Carol and I had had in years. We’d fallen so long into the roles of caring for our parents. When we spoke, it was about Mom’s medication schedule or fourth-quarter profits. I didn’t remember the last time we’d felt like sisters gossiping, let alone friends. It was nice to feel an easier rhythm between us.
She was trying.
“I did,” I admitted, my voice low and mournful. “I’ve tried talking to him a few times, leaving voice messages. I stopped calling after the third try because I didn’t want to seem like a pathetic stalker. I mean, the merger went through better than we could have ever hoped for. Mom has the pick of any treatment she wants. Hell, Dad’s in better shape. He doesn’t get Tweets and Instagram posts, but he loves working one-on-one with people, and he loves kids. I think being CEO there is going to be just the second career he’s been looking for.”
“Then it’s all happily-ever-after, then?” Carol asked.
I traced my fingers over my bare throat. My collar was still here. I’d brought it with me back to the States and hidden it under my pillow at home. At night, like the pathetic loser I was, I’d pull it out and hug it to my chest and cry. Drake was right. For right now, it was the only piece I had left of him, almost the only proof that anything that had happened in the Bahamas had been real at all and not just a fairy tale.
Of course, it wasn’t a fairy tale, right?
Those ended in everyone being happy. Well, I mean, not the Grimm original
ones. More like a Disney one where the bad guys were always vanquished and everything ended in a song and dance number. The curtains closed on a kiss. That kind of fairy tale was the furthest thing for my life.
“I think it ended up as well as it could,” I said, focusing on Mom, who was making her next lap, her steps seeming stronger with every pass. So much was changing, so much hope after years of pain. It should have been enough. It wasn’t. “This is right, you know? I’ll find someone else.”
Carol shrugged. “You could still call him and… oh, my God! No way!”
I frowned and craned my neck to her so quickly I almost got a case of whiplash. “Whoa, that was a fast change of tune. And what?” I asked, my tone growing frantic.
My sister looked at me and handed her phone into my hands. “Don’t shoot the messenger, sis. I was just trolling the usual industry sites to keep up with the news of the day and I came on this.”
My heart was in my throat as I scrolled down her phone screen. It wasn’t possible. It just wasn’t. It was Drake from last night’s opening of a club downtown. He had a reed-thin blonde on his arm, some girl barely out of her teens who was the lead on the latest Freeform show, some vampire drama. She was leaning in close to him and whispering in his ear, her hand firmly on his chest.
“‘Rose Pearson steps out after her wrap party with PR Guru Drake McManus for a steamy night!’ Ugh, I hate TMZ,” I said, handing the phone back to my sister and fighting my first inclination to throw the thing across the room as hard as I could.
Only the fact that I didn’t want to spend eight hundred dollars on a new one kept me from doing something totally nuts.
Carol slipped the phone into her purse and took my hand. “Sis, forget about him. You can do better anyway.”
“I wish that were true.”
Chapter Seventeen
Belle
The next week passed in a blur. I tried not to pay attention to anything Drake McManus did. It was easy when I was at the hospital, but once Mom was released home into round-the-clock professional nursing care, my excuse for staying home and not helping with some of the key points in the merger fell apart, since she had professional care and support long enough for me to get a few hours at the company. I knew the company better than anyone, except maybe Carol, so I needed to make sure everything dovetailed. But after that, I was out of here. I could go back to my life and plans from before the company started to die. I could apply to graduate school and get out of L.A., where I felt so trapped. I could leave the world of false glamor behind and do something real in my life; something that mattered. Instead of handling PR four-alarm fires, I could help save the environment or get an advanced degree in conservation like I’d always planned.