Chapter 25
Garrett
I’m sitting in the waiting room, thinking about going in search of a coffee, when I get a text message from my cousin Owen, who I saw briefly yesterday when I dropped off presents for his kids.
Owen
Hey bud, are you around today?
Garrett
I might be later. Currently in town with Rory.
In town means any town bigger than Pine Harbour. It means off the peninsula, running an errand or shopping or doing something important. And that’s as specific as I’m going to get right now.
Owen
When you get back, come by my place. I have an interesting surprise for you.
I drop a thumbs up on that, and then go back to bouncing my leg nervously.
I’m just about to text Rory and let her know I’m going to find out if the cafeteria is open on Christmas Day when she pushes through the waiting room door and rushes to my side.
“Hi,” she says breathlessly, as if the last thing she didn’t pretty much say to me was that we were done. Or she was done, which is the same thing.
“Hi,” I say back guardedly. “How’s Dani?”
“She’s being admitted, but there’s a good fetal heartbeat. Listen, I’m going to stay here for the rest of the day. And I need to be here tomorrow, too, so I might just crash in one of the on-call rooms.”
I stare at her.
“What?” She brushes a wild curl off her forehead.
“Rory, it’s Christmas and you’re on vacation.”
“Dani needs me.”
“She needs you to sleep in an on-call room?”
“No, but I need to do some research—”
I hold up my hand, cutting her off. Standing, I gesture for her to follow me.
At least she actually does follow, that’s something. We step outside. It’s started snowing, finally. Fat, wet flakes float lazily to the sidewalk, but where we’re standing under the overhang, it’s not too cold.
I search her face. She stares back at me, wild-eyed.
“What research do you need to do?”
“The OB on call was open to a suggestion of mine, but he wants me to back it up.” She juts her chin up. “And I want to do that.”
“You do.” When she doesn’t say anything, I laugh under my breath.
“Got it. Research is easier than going back to face your mom and deal with the fact that she heard us break up again. What do you want me to do, pack up your things? Deal with Carmen and Dante? Say my goodbyes and then just wait in the parking lot here until you’re done playing The Good Doctor and we can drive back to Ottawa in stony silence? ”
It all comes pouring out of me.
Fucking fuck.
She stares at me, her eyes narrowing, turning steely and determined instead of wild and desperate. Nothing like a good rage to focus Dr. Aurora Minelli.
“Sure, make me the bad guy, Garrett. Couldn’t ever be you. Couldn’t ever be Mr. Tells Himself a Story So He Doesn’t Need to Communicate.”
“What story do I tell myself?”
“That I hate my job.”
Ah. I guess we’re doing this now. That’s what the angry jut of her chin is all about.
“I don’t hate my job,” she repeats, as if it wasn’t fucking obvious that’s her opinion. “You shouldn’t have said that.”
“No? Why not? Did it hit too close to home? And now you’re…what, working pro bono on your cousin’s case to prove that point? You love being a doctor so much you’ll leap at the first opportunity?”
“I’m just observing,” she snaps. “It’s an interesting case.”
“It’s your cousin! Don’t you think for a second you should just feel something here? Worry?”
“Of course I’m worried! I’m not going to actually treat her. I’m just talking to her physician.”
“Instead of talking to your mother.”
“Whoa. Offside. And have you tried talking to my mother? She’ll just find a way to spin it to where I should be grateful to you for giving me a parting gift.”
“This is good, Roar. Get it all out. Tell me how much you hate the—” The door opens and an elderly couple comes out, moving slowly.
Rory grabs my arm and pulls me around the corner, to the empty ambulance bay. I think she means for us to keep arguing, but as soon as her back collides with the concrete wall, my hands are in her hair, holding her head, and my mouth is on hers.
She tastes like adrenalin and too-sweet coffee. She kisses me back like she’s fucking mad that we don’t kiss more often, and I share that bittersweet opinion.
I drag her up against my body, filling my arms with all of her fight. She sinks her fingers into my hair, making little fists, and I don’t think she realizes just how tight she’s holding on to me as she kisses me back with everything she has.
I love you, you hellion, I want to say. But she doesn’t want to hear that.
Instead, I let her take what she needs from me, and when she finally sags back, I hold her close and just keep breathing.
“If you want to stay here and do research,” I finally whisper. “Stay and do that. I could go have some Kincaid family time anyway. My cousin texted me. But I’ll drive back down and collect you tonight.”
“You don’t need to do that.”
But I want to. I need to. “We have two more nights, Rory. I want to spend them together.”
I’m not going to get another chance at these last moments of us. I know how I fucked things up the first time, by letting her retreat. No more of that.
Her fingers tighten on my jacket. “Weather is rolling in.”
“Weather is always rolling in. And sometimes it actually does. But I’ve got big tires on my truck, and I’m not letting you sleep in an on-call room unless Dani’s life literally depends on it.”
She’s forced to admit that it does not.
I kiss her again, and send her back inside.
Then I hit the highway and head north.
There’s a pile of cars in front of my cousin’s place when I pull up.
We’ve never done Christmas together, except one year when I was a young teenager and my dad was in the hospital.
Owen had a young daughter at the time, and his brothers were all young adults.
I was an awkward in between age, and an extra burden on a stressed single dad.
Now that daughter, Becca, is all grown up, and she has a little boy with her high school boyfriend, who now plays pro hockey. And Owen is remarried, and he has two little girls with his new wife. Most of his brothers have kids now, too.
And once again, I’m the odd guy out, stuck in between the generations.
But I trudge up his walk anyway, because the other two options—staying at the hospital all day, or going back to the tree farm—are even less appealing right now.
At least nobody here has talked about my dick so far today.
Of course, it is Pine Harbour, and the day is not over.
I knock at the door, and it opens immediately.
A large man in a cowboy hat gives me a big grin. “Is this Garrett?”
“It is,” I say cautiously, glancing past him.
The living room is full of Kincaids. Every brother waves back at me, and a bunch of kids are playing on the floor in between them.
“I’m Zane.” He grins, like he’s barely containing the punchline to a joke. “Zane Kincaid.”
Four hours later, I pull my truck to a stop in front of Rory’s parents’ house.
I turn off the engine, but I don’t get out right away.
I’m reeling.
Part of me wants to still be at Owen’s place, learning everything I can about Zane and his brothers and their mother.
I have an aunt.
Holy fuck.
Life hasn’t been easy for her, and we’re going to have to take it slow, but…I have a whole other side of my family that I had no clue about.
My heart hurts as I think about my dad, and the grief he never got out from under about his sister running away from home as a teenager.
There’s a rap at my passenger side window, making me jump.
Cassie opens the door and climbs up.
“I’m coming in,” I say. “Rory’s at the hospital. She’s, uh, throwing herself into making sure Dani has the best obstetrical care possible.”
“Maybe she should stay there,” Cass mutters.
“Oh, no.” I gesture to the key. “Should I start this thing up? Make a great escape?”
She shakes her head—but then bursts into tears.
Fucking hell. I find some Tim Horton’s napkins, which don’t really help that much, but they’re possibly better than nothing. “What’s going on?”
“Are you and Rory breaking up?”
I close my eyes and exhale. “It’s complicated.”
“I don’t recommend a Christmas breakup.”
“How are you doing?”
“Terribly. I miss Nate.”
“Have you talked to him?”
“We’ve texted a little.”
“That’s good.”
“Is it?” She shrugs and hunkers down in her coat. “I want to move back home and make him move out.”
“You need help with that?”
She shakes her head. “He’s agreed.”
“Okay, good.”
“I can’t live with my parents, you know?”
“Yeah.”
“I love them.”
“Of course. We all love them.”
“Rory’s better with the boundaries.”
I laugh. “Maybe too much for her own good, though.”
“What does that mean?”
I sigh. “Let’s go inside.”
The kids are nowhere to be heard, and Allan is missing, too, so hopefully they’re napping, because Carmen is standing at the sink with red-rimmed eyes and a dish towel twisted in her hands. Tabitha and Mara are at the table, and everyone falls silent as soon as I step into the kitchen.
Crap.
Behind me, Cassie slinks past us and disappears up the stairs, but there’s furious whispering, and she quickly returns with Jules.
The silence stretches uncomfortably. No one’s looking at me directly, which means they’re all thinking about this morning.
“So I guess we should talk about it,” I say.
Carmen’s face turns neon pink. “We don’t need to.”
“Actually, we do.” I cross my arms. “Let’s just get it out there. That was awkward, right? Slightly embarrassing for me that you all know more about my anatomy than I thought you ever would. But it was mortifying for Rory.”
The silence that follows is telling.
“Most of the blame for that obviously lies with me. I thought—wrongly—that it would be a private gift between Rory and myself. My mistake was amplified by the teasing, though. Were you all oblivious to her distress?”
Mara looks at Tabitha, uneasy.
So maybe not completely oblivious.