Chapter 46
Chapter Forty-Six
Remy
Isat on the dock behind Artemis's cabin—our cabin now, I reminded myself—and stared at the phone in my hand like it was a live grenade. The number was still there. My father's private line. The one he'd given me when I turned eighteen, the one he'd said I could use if I ever needed anything.
I hadn't called it in two years. Not since I walked out of the hospital after his remission news, got in my truck, and drove straight to the houseboat without looking back.
Maman had called for months after that. Jean-Pierre too.
Eventually they'd stopped, and the silence had been a relief and a punishment all at once.
The bayou stretched out before me, golden in the late afternoon light, and somewhere in the water I could hear Gumbo's occasional rumble as he patrolled his territory.
Behind me, through the cabin's open windows, I could hear Artemis laughing at something Harper said, could hear the low murmur of Silas's voice joining in.
My pack. My family. The people I'd do anything for.
Even this.
I took a deep breath and pressed the call button before I could talk myself out of it.
It rang twice. Three times. I was almost hoping it would go to voicemail—
"Remy?" My father's voice hit me like a punch to the gut. Older than I remembered, rougher around the edges, but still unmistakably him. Still carrying that particular blend of authority and cautious hope that made my chest ache.
"Papa," I said, and my voice came out steadier than I expected, though my hand was shaking so hard I had to grip the phone with both hands to keep from dropping it. "It's me."
A long pause. I could hear him breathing, could almost see him sitting in his study with the leather chairs and the wall of law books, the portrait of Luc hanging over the fireplace.
"Two years," he said finally, his Cajun accent thicker than I remembered, emotion roughening the words. "Two years since you walked out of the hospital after I got my remission news and never came back."
The words hit like a slap, but I deserved them.
I'd come back when Jean-Pierre called, when Papa was dying.
I'd stayed through the chemo, the surgery, the long weeks of recovery.
I'd sat by his hospital bed and read him the fishing reports and pretended everything was fine.
But once he was in remission—once the crisis was over—I couldn't handle it anymore.
Couldn't sit in that house with Luc's portrait on the wall and pretend everything was fine.
So I'd retreated to my houseboat and stopped answering calls.
"I know," I said, my voice rough, scraping over the words like sandpaper. I pressed my free hand to my eyes, trying to stop the tears that were already starting to fall. "I know, Papa. I'm sorry."
"Your mother cries every time she passes your room.
" His voice cracked on the words, the bitterness giving way to something rawer, more broken, and I could picture him in his study, the phone pressed to his ear, his free hand gripping the arm of his chair until his knuckles went white.
"She keeps it exactly how you left it. Won't let anyone touch anything.
She lights a candle for you every Sunday at mass, Remy. Every Sunday. Like you're dead too."
The words carved into my chest like a knife. I pressed my free hand against my sternum, trying to hold myself together.
"And Jean-Pierre—" Papa's voice broke, and I heard him take a shuddering breath.
"He blames himself. Says he should have tried harder to find you.
Should have driven to that houseboat and dragged you home.
He sits in the study some nights, looking at the old photos of you and Luc, and I can hear him crying through the wall. "
"Papa, stop—" I couldn't breathe. Couldn't think. The guilt was crushing me, pressing down on my chest until I thought my ribs would crack. I bent forward, phone pressed to my ear, my free hand clutching the edge of the dock so hard the weathered wood bit into my palm.
"No." His voice hardened, fierce and broken all at once, and I could hear him pushing through his own tears to say what needed to be said.
"You need to hear this. You need to know what your running has cost us.
Not to punish you—" His voice cracked again, splintering like old wood.
"But because I need you to understand that we never stopped loving you.
Not for one single day. Even when you wouldn't answer our calls.
Even when you disappeared. We never stopped. "
I was crying now, tears streaming down my face, my whole body shaking with sobs I couldn't control.
"I didn't know how to come back," I whispered, the words scraped raw from somewhere deep inside me, pulled up from a place I'd kept locked for over a decade.
"Every time I thought about it, I saw Luc's face.
I saw the way you looked at me at the funeral.
I thought—I thought you'd never forgive me. "
"The way I looked at you?" Papa sounded confused, wounded, his voice catching on the question. I could hear him shift in his chair, could picture the furrow between his brows. "Remy, what are you talking about?"
"At the funeral." The memory was seared into my brain, sharp and poisonous, and speaking it out loud felt like reopening a wound that had never healed.
"You looked at me across the grave, and there was something in your eyes—I thought it was blame.
I thought you hated me for what I did. For leaving him alone.
For being the reason he—" I couldn't finish.
Couldn't say the words out loud. My throat closed up, and I pressed my fist against my mouth to hold back the sob.
The silence stretched out between us, heavy and terrible.
"Oh, mon Dieu." Papa's voice was barely a whisper, shattered and small. "Remy. Mon fils. That wasn't blame. That was—" He broke off, and I heard a sound that made my heart stop.
My father was crying.
In all my years, I had never heard my father cry. Not when his own father died. Not when Luc drowned. Not even during the worst of the chemo when he was so sick he couldn't lift his head. But now, through the phone, I could hear the sobs tearing out of him—raw and broken and decades overdue.
"I was looking at you because I was terrified I was going to lose you too," he choked out.
"You were standing there so still, so empty, and I could see you slipping away from us.
I wanted to go to you, to hold you, but your mother was falling apart and I didn't know how to—" He broke off, his breathing ragged.
"I failed you, Remy. We both did. We were so lost in our own grief that we didn't see you drowning right in front of us. "
"Papa—" The word came out strangled, barely recognizable as my own voice. I bent forward on the dock, pressing my free hand against my chest where my heart was threatening to beat right out of my ribs.
"And then you were gone." The words came out in a rush, like a dam breaking.
"Eighteen years old, and you just vanished.
Left a note that said 'I'm sorry' and nothing else.
We didn't know if you were alive or dead for months.
Your mother didn't sleep. She'd walk the floors at night, calling your phone over and over, just to hear your voice on the voicemail.
" His voice cracked into a sob. "Do you know what that did to her?
To lose one son and then have the other disappear? "
I couldn't speak. Couldn't breathe. The phone was slick with tears and sweat in my shaking hands.
"I should have chased you," Papa continued, his voice wrecked and raw.
"I should have hired every investigator in Louisiana.
I should have tracked you down and dragged you home and told you every single day that we loved you, that we didn't blame you, that you were still our son and nothing would ever change that.
" He let out a sound that was half-laugh, half-sob.
"But I was too proud. Too stubborn. I told myself you needed space.
Told myself you'd come back when you were ready.
And the years kept passing, and the silence kept growing, and somewhere along the way I stopped believing you'd ever come home. "
"I'm sorry," I whispered, and the words felt pathetically inadequate for the weight of what I'd done. "Papa, I'm so sorry. I didn't know. I didn't—"
"I know you didn't." His voice gentled, exhaustion and love bleeding through the cracks. "That's what kills me, Remy. You've been carrying this guilt for over a decade, and we never found a way to tell you the truth."
I closed my eyes, guilt washing over me like a wave. "I couldn't—I didn't know how to—"
"What's changed now, son?" he asked, his voice hoarse but steadier now. "Why are you calling?"
I took a shaky breath, gripping the phone so tight my knuckles ached. "I need help. Real help. Not for me. For someone I love. For my pack."
A pause, longer this time. "Pack," he repeated, and there was something strange in his voice—surprise, maybe, or the first fragile spark of hope. "You have a pack now?"
"Yeah, Papa." I closed my eyes, pictured Artemis's face, her fierce smile, the way she looked at me like I was worth something. "I have a pack. An Omega. Two Alpha brothers. A home." I swallowed hard. "Something worth fighting for."
The silence stretched out between us, heavy with years of unsaid things. I could hear the creak of leather as he shifted in his chair, could imagine him reaching for the glass of bourbon that was always at his elbow.
"Tell me," he said finally, his voice softer now, the sharp edges worn down by something that might have been hope.
So I told him.