Chapter 19 #3
Which you would have known if you actually gave a shit.
His father’s eyes widened in shock, and his jaw tensed. It was only for a second, before he quickly recovered, his expression immediately returning to neutral. “I never knew Michael’s… When did you find out?”
Liam tried to steady his breathing. He could still hear the memory—the muffled argument through his mother’s closed bedroom door, his anger, the pleading sound in his mother’s voice, and the words that changed his entire life.
“The night before Mom died,” Liam finally relayed. “I heard you two talking.”
His father’s lips pressed into a thin white line, and he swayed slightly. For a second, Liam thought he was going to pass out. But then his dad took a deep breath, and he was steady once more.
“You never said anything.” It was more accusation than statement.
“There was a lot going on.” Liam kept his tone transactional. He didn’t want to fight, not there, not under the greenhouse haze of hospital humidity.
His father nodded. “So you just decided to go looking for him?”
Liam hesitated. He could lie, but for better or worse, this was the man who’d raised him, and even though they didn’t share DNA, he’d always been able to see through him. “After I got out of the service.”
“Hmm.” The sound was equal parts amusement and disappointment. “You tracked him down.”
Liam nodded.
There was an odd hush, the kind that falls when two people have run out of things to threaten each other with.
His dad shifted his weight, looked over Liam’s shoulder through the window, then met his gaze once again. “And you met him?”
“No.”
The response caught his dad off guard. “You didn’t meet him?”
“No.”
His father’s brow furrowed. “But you…you changed your name?”
“Yes.”
The glass door opened, and Dr. Lange, the chief of surgery appeared. “Dr. Sterling, I’m so sorry I kept you waiting.”
As Dr. Lange held the door open, white coat floating behind her, eyes darting between the two men, the world telescoped in on itself.
That moment brought his father’s visit into excruciating focus.
Liam was transported in a time machine back to his childhood.
He remembered, with humiliating clarity, what it felt like to be a distant second to his dad’s one true love: medicine.
Well, medicine and his ego, which were tied for the top spot.
Liam stared at his dad, a small part of him daring him to say something—some apology, some small acknowledgment of the seismic dislocation he’d just triggered. His silence was both a vacuum and a verdict.
“Thank you for making time, we can use my office.” Dr. Lange, all business and brisk efficiency, cut the tension, her voice pitched to professionalism.
With zero emotion, his father’s priorities reassembled, rigid and clinical. Dr. Edward Sterling III did not so much as look over his shoulder at Liam. He just nodded, tight-lipped, and followed Dr. Lange out.
The solarium door shut with a soft click and the realization that he wasn’t even worth a thirty-minute drive after discovering a change of identity sank in as Liam watched his dad’s retreating back, the familiar slight hitch in the left hip, and the set of his broad shoulders.
How many times had he analyzed that posture, searching for signs of affection, of pride, of anything but impatience and disappointment?
For his dad, the confrontation had been an afterthought, another box to tick before the real meeting.
He had never been priority one. Realizing that at thirty-three was no less embarrassing than it was at thirteen.
Liam gripped the wooden back of a bench, knuckles white, and tried to will his heart rate to slow.
He was counting back from a hundred when he heard a soft persistent whir from the farthest corner of the glass box, followed by a barely perceptible throat-clearing.
He squinted and saw that under the skeletal shadow of the Japanese maple was a wheelchair.
Its occupant was a scarecrow of a man in an olive jacket, with a knit hat pulled down and long, veined hands folded on his lap.
Arthur Santino was positioned in a way that if Liam had been even slightly less distracted, he would have spotted him immediately.
Although Arthur was a pro at blending into the background, at making himself invisible until he decided otherwise.
“Hell of a show,” Arthur rasped, the corner of his mouth twitching as if he was trying to remember how to smile. “Would’ve brought popcorn if I’d known.”
“What are you doing in here?” A Zen garden was the last place he’d expect to find Arthur Santino.
“Couldn’t stare at white walls anymore. Had to see some nature. And there are too many people outside.”
Liam could relate to that. He wasn’t a fan of people either.
“What you heard…” Liam wasn’t sure exactly how to phrase his request. “Can you keep that to yourself?”
Arthur grinned. “I think you’ll find I’m good at keeping a secret.”
He had a point. Arthur was somewhat of a legend in Hope Falls and the surrounding area.
And since taking down a man twice his size at 90 in a Matrix-move and taking a bullet while doing so, his lore continued to grow.
From what Liam heard, no one knew anything about the 90-year-old before he moved to Hope Falls around forty years earlier.
For the first ten to fifteen years he’d lived there, he was a recluse, and barely spoke to anyone.
Then one day two kids were riding their bikes in the woods, and one of them fell in a rattlesnake den and was bitten.
They managed to make it to his cabin, and he saved the boy’s life by, literally, dressing and treating the wound and setting up a rendezvous point with an ambulance, apparently it was impressive.
Over the years, he’d done quite a few crazy MacGyver, James Bond, and special forces hero-type feats but never wanted any recognition and refused to discuss his past.
“Arthur.” Liam figured this might be the only chance he had to ask, and honestly, he figured, what did he have to lose?
“Yes, son.”
“Who are you?”
“I don’t watch much TV, do you?”
“Yeah.” Liam sighed at his change of subject. “Some. Sports.”
Arthur nodded his head, a small smile tugged at the corners of his lips. The deep wrinkles around his eyes giving off a wise and experienced air. “Go Birds.”
Ah, so Arthur was from Philly. Liam thought he had picked up on an East Coast vibe from the man.
“You ever watch that program Homeland?”
The question came so far from left field it took Liam a second for his brain to recall the show that premiered over fifteen years ago. “The one with Mandy Patinkin and Claire Danes?”
“That’s the one.” Arthur touched the side of his nose with his index finger as his eyes twinkled with recognition.
Liam realized then he wasn’t making small talk, he was telling him what or who he was.
Arthur was a spy. Liam would have put money on him being a hitman for the mob. Actually, come to think of it, he had put money on it. Earlier in the year when Arthur came in for a heart murmur, someone started a pool, he’d put a bill on him being a Sammy “The Bull” or James “Whitey” Bulger.
But a spy, that made sense too.
“Well now, the big wigs over there, the money people, they asked me to consult on that show.”
“They did?”
He nodded.
“They wanted an actor named Rupert something to come and stay with me so he could ask me a lot of questions for research. Now he had a funny last name.”
“Friend? Rupert Friend.”
“That’s it.” Arthur nodded. “That’s the one.”
“You were Quinn?”
“I didn’t end up talkin’ to him. Don’t like talkin’ much. But I watched the program, and they got a lot right. A lot wrong, but a lot right.”
Holy shit. “You were a badass, CIA, black ops assassin?”
With each word Liam spoke, Arthur winced, as if each syllable that came out of Liam’s mouth caused him actual physical pain.
“Can you keep that to yourself, Doc?”
Liam had never had the urge to tell anyone’s business before, but he wanted so badly to tell Frankie about Arthur.
The problem was, he knew if he did, she would tell everyone.
As much as he loved the girl, and he did love her, she couldn’t keep a secret to save her life.
And this one, this was a Hope Falls insider secret to beat all secrets.
He hadn’t even started his role as the small-town doctor, and he was already getting drawn in by gossip. He wondered if that was part of the Hope Falls Effect.