Chapter 23
Chapter Twenty-Three
Wade
They’d never been together.
I could hardly process that my little brother had come out of his coma because the entire ride to the hospital, I was too busy picking up all my memories of the past month, the truth having knocked them all askew like a wrecking ball through a Jenga tower.
“Oh, Wade, he’s awake.” Mom broke from her conversation with a nurse to rush toward me, wrapping her arms tight around me. “He’s awake.”
I hugged her back but couldn’t say anything. When she moved from the embrace, the pure elation on her face dimmed. I knew why.
“Where’s Lou?”
My haggard voice replied, “I told her there was no reason to come.”
“What?” She gasped, her hand to her chest. “Wade?—”
“I’m going to see Blaze.” I didn’t give her a chance to stop me or ask any more questions, moving to Blaze’s room and letting myself inside, closing Mom and all of her heavy questions out in the hall.
For a second, he looked no different than he had the past several weeks, peacefully resting in the hospital bed, the monitors softly signaling he was still alive in there. And then he opened his eyes, his groggy gaze focusing on me slowly as I approached the bed.
“Wade.” His whispered voice cracked.
“Blaze.” The emotion in my own voice surprised me as I went to the side of his bed, sitting on the edge even though there was a chair pulled close. In that moment, he wasn’t a famous actor or a reckless degenerate. He was my little brother who I almost lost.
“I’m sorry?—”
“Don’t.” My ears grated on the words. First from Lou and now from Blaze. Suddenly, I couldn’t stand another apology. “Don’t apologize, Blaze.” I took his limp hand and squeezed. “I’m just glad you’re alright. You had us worried.”
“How… long?”
I reached for the cup on the bedside table. Carefully bringing it to my brother’s lips, I held it even when he lifted his hand to support it himself.
“Mom didn’t tell you?” I said after he’d drank what was left in the cup.
“Crying,” he answered, his voice a little less rough.
I nodded. “Just over three weeks.”
I stood and went to the table on the other side of the bed where there was a pitcher of filtered water, stopping when I saw there was also a familiar purple box. I couldn’t stop myself from lifting the lid and seeing the fresh pastries inside. Kifli . Lou must’ve sent them to the hospital this morning for Mom.
How many other mornings had Lou done that—looked after Mom when we couldn’t be here? The way my chest tightened told me I already knew the answer.
No, she’d been looking after herself. Protecting herself .
I poured more water for Blaze and wished there was something stronger for me.
“I guess I took a pretty good fall down a flight of steps,” Blaze said when I returned and handed him the cup. Even now, he attempted a smile. Like being at death’s door hadn’t fazed him.
“You’d been drinking,” I said and found myself holding back the reason why. It wasn’t like me. Normally when Blaze fucked up, I’d confront him with everything I knew…which was usually everything to know about the situation, and then tell him how I was going to handle it. How I was going to fix it for him.
Suddenly, I saw myself and how I’d been treating him our entire lives: like he wasn’t capable of fixing anything on his own. My intentions were good, but my execution was misguided.
Kind of like Lou? I shoved the thought aside.
Blaze let out a heavy breath. “I’m sorry, Wade?—”
“No,” I cut him off and shook my head. “I’m sorry. I’ve been messing things up between us for a long time.”
He stared at me. “Are you… apologizing?” He lifted his hand to the back of his head. “How hard did I hit my head? Am I still in a coma?”
I firmed my mouth and rolled my eyes. “Be careful, or you’ll miss this opportunity.”
His grin cracked wider, and there was my brother, the kid who even a coma couldn’t hold down. Well, almost all of him. I saw the sadness buried underneath the brightness of his eyes—the shadows that Lou said were haunting him. I turned away, hating how she’d infiltrated every part of this moment—hating that I didn’t hate her at all.
“What is it?”
I looked back at Blaze and smiled. “Nothing. Just glad you’re awake.”
He relaxed back into the bed. “So, about this apology.”
Nodding, I went on. “I want things to be different between us, Blaze. I don’t want you to think… I need you to know I’m not like him. I’m not like Dad. ”
“Wade—”
“Let me finish. Please.” I sank into the chair Mom had pulled beside the bed and clasped my hands in front of me. “When we were younger, I always stepped in with Dad because I wanted to protect you, and I hate that he turned that into a wedge between us.
“I realized there’s not much difference between Dad assuming you were going to make mistakes and me assuming you didn’t know how to fix them, and I’m sorry for not realizing that sooner.”
Blaze sagged into the pillows, his head swaying. “You were only trying to help me.”
“Didn’t mean I was doing the right thing.”
“Well, in your defense, I was doing a lot of wrong things, and I honestly can’t say I would’ve known how to fix them…”
“Are you defending me now?” I teased hoarsely.
“Be careful, or you’ll miss this opportunity,” he muttered, and we both chuckled. “We could both do better. Actually, I have to do better.”
“Blaze—”
We both turned when the door opened.
Mom .
“I’m sorry, I was just talking to Dr. Cooper. He said if your scans look good, they will release you in a few days.” Mom stopped as she walked by the table where I’d refilled his water and reached for the box. “Oh, Blaze, do you want to try a pastry? Lou?—”
“I think he might want to rest,” I interrupted.
There were a hundred other things to talk about right now. When Blaze would be discharged. Where he was going to go. What he was going to do. If he was going to tell me about his kid… and who the mom was. But now wasn’t the time.
“Well, if you want a snack, these kifli are excellent.” She set the box next to his water with a decided thump, glaring right back at me. “They’re Hungarian crescents with apricots in the center. ”
“Oh, I love those,” he murmured and reached for the box.
Smiling victoriously, Mom opened it and let him take his pick.
“I just had these yester—” Blaze grimaced. “I guess it was a few weeks ago now. I had these for breakfast at the inn where I’m staying. The owner is a pastry aficionado.”
My blood started to hum, and I felt like an asshole. My brother had just woken from a coma, and still, I didn’t want him talking about Lou. Not until my brain settled the score with my heart.
“I’m just… I’m so glad you’re awake.” Mom sniffled and sat on the edge of his bed, and I realized the three of us were closer to each other right now than we’d been in the last decade.
“Me too.” Blaze smiled at her, his eyes growing heavy.
“You rest, sweetie. We’ll be right here.” Mom took his hand, and we sat in silence as Blaze drifted off to sleep. “Dr. Cooper said he’ll be pretty tired for the next day or so because of the meds they had him on.”
I grunted.
“When he’s discharged, I was thinking he’d come stay with me for a little?—”
“Mom,” I stopped her.
Her shoulders slumped, resigned. “I know. I just… I worry.”
“So do I,” I told her. “But it’s his choice. His life.”
“Did he mention…”
“No.” I sat forward, resting my elbows on my knees. “Also, his choice.”
I stared at my younger brother, feeling for the first time a kind of peace. There was still a lot to talk about, a lot to overcome, but now I had the right tools.
It takes a brave heart to tell someone how you need to be loved.
I breathed out heavily. This whole time… the only reason I’d met Lou was because of her lie. The way I’d fallen in love with her, it was like fruit of the poisoned tree.
“I’m worried,” Mom said quietly, her chin lowering .
“He’s going to be fine?—”
“Not about Blaze.” She looked at me.
“Me?” I stared.
“Lou told you, didn’t she?” Mom’s lip quivered. “She told you the truth. I see it all over your face.”
My spine zipped straight. “You knew?” I said, my voice lowering a notch.
Mom nodded slowly. “After Lou told me about the… report, she confessed they’d never been together.”
I reeled. Mom had known. Not only had she known and not told me—she’d known and still treated Lou like family.
How?
“And you were okay with that? You let her think that lying to you about who she was was okay?”
“Oh, Wade. She didn’t lie about who she was. She lied about dating Blaze.”
I recognized the look on her face: disappointment. The strange thing was, I was never on the receiving end of this look, only Blaze. She always looked at my brother like this—like she loved him so much, and she couldn’t stand to see the way he continued to jeopardize all the good things he had in his life.
But that wasn’t me. I hadn’t jeopardized anything. Lou was the one who’d lied.
“She lied, Mom.” I repeated it like I was treading water, trying to keep my head afloat above my heart that wanted to drag me under.
“That’s like saying the sun lied about being bright just because one day she was hidden by a cloud.” Mom set Blaze’s hand on the bed and faced me fully, bundling her arms over her chest. “She fibbed because she was afraid. For the things she cared about. For Blaze and me. For you?—”
“No.” I waved my hand to stop her, shaking my head. “She lied to save herself.”
“Tell me, Wade, what part of the lie has benefited her?”
I stilled. “The whole part where she was trying not to get sued.”
“Oh please,” Mom snapped, her patience starting to wear. “Your brother had enough alcohol in his system to topple the Leaning Tower of Pisa. You never would’ve sued her. You would’ve lost miserably. And I know your father taught you to never take a fight you couldn’t win.”
I stood. “I’m not going to argue with you?—”
“Because of her lie, she’s taken time away from her new business and her guests to be here. To visit with me and your brother,” Mom continued, her voice sure. “Because of her lie, she was scrutinized and then targeted by the media, putting her guests in discomfort, at best, and at risk, at worse?—”
“Mom—”
“And for your brother—for you—she lied to her own family.”
The ball of nails dropped to my stomach, wrecking a fresh path of havoc in my gut as I recalled her argument with Harper where I’d learned all this in the first place. Lou had lied to her mom, Gigi, her brothers… people she’d spent her life putting first. And because of Blaze… because of me… she’d put them second. For me.
It was getting harder to breathe. I tried to focus on Blaze, the slow and easy rise and fall of his chest where he slept in the bed, and for the first time in my life, I wished I could be him.
“She said she tried to tell you the truth.”
“She should’ve tried harder,” I ground out, anger, pain, and ache rolling around in my chest like a ball of nails and spikes.
We weren’t together. How many times had she said that to me? How many times had I assumed it meant something else instead of listening to her?
“Life isn’t like the law, Wade. It’s not either innocent or guilty and nothing in between.”
I couldn’t listen anymore. I surged toward the door, surprised to hear Mom’s footsteps coming after me. She’d always run after Blaze, never me .
“She lied because she was afraid. It doesn’t change who she is… or that she’s in love with you.”
My fists balled. Knowing she loved me—knowing I loved her—knowing this was all fucked up made me want to punch something.
“Loving someone isn’t an excuse for lying.”
“No? How many times did you lie to protect your brother?”
I stopped short, her words like chains over my back.
“Even though it pushed you apart, you still lied to protect him.”
“It’s not the same,” was all I could manage.
“Isn’t it?” she asked softly. “You can be upset, Wade, but if you think this changes how that girl feels about you, how she felt about you even when she knew how risky it was… then the only one lying here is you.”
Three days later…
“I have all your stuff moved into my apartment in the city. You’re welcome to stay as long as you want.”
I’d been back and forth between Boston and Stonebar for days, giving myself task after task to complete for my brother so I didn’t have to think about Lou.
It didn’t work.
“We haven’t lived in the same house for over a decade,” Blaze drawled. “I’d be careful making blanket statements like that until you see how much of a mess I make cooking and hear how loud I snore.”
I chuckled and handed him a stack of clothes, which he took with a grateful smile, and headed for the bathroom in his hospital room, leaving the door cracked as he changed.
“All your scans good?”
Because of the head trauma, initial brain swelling, and subsequent coma, the doctors had kept him the last several days to do several cognitive tests as well as repeats of all the original scans they did when he was admitted. At every checkpoint, he passed with flying colors.
“Cleared for take-off.”
My laugh died when I thought about how much of a mess they’d see if the doctors scanned my brain right now. Or maybe they would just see her.
I couldn’t stop thinking about Lou. The soft brown of her eyes. The shades of pink in her cheeks. The way she’d had her hair down that morning and hung the painting of her behind the desk. A small detail I’d noticed but hadn’t processed until I went from seeing her all day to not at all.
I was the one who told her not to be afraid to be seen. I was the one who told her that no one would love her less for being who she was. And then, I’d been the first to walk away when she’d brought that final piece into the light.
The way her glasses made the tears in her eyes look larger as I walked away. God, I was an asshole, and I was paying the price.
Loving her… that fruit of the poisoned tree… well, it poisoned me. Every breath. Every thought. Every moment. Every dream. I loved her, and it was killing me how I’d hurt her.
And now I was the one living the lie, pretending as though I could figure out a way to go on without her.
There was some shuffling from the bathroom. “So, I guess I missed a lot while I was out.”
“What do you mean?” I rested my hips back against the table.
“Apparently, I got a girlfriend who I then skipped town with, but not before the paps got some nice juicy make-out shots in my car, and then who came back to town and cheated on me… with my own brother. ”
Dammit. “You know your name is clickbait. They’ll write anything to make a buck.”
The bathroom door swung open, and Blaze stood there in jeans and a tee.
“Is that my jacket?”
I looked down to where I clutched the leather in my hands. It was his jacket. I’d just been wearing it the last couple of weeks, and it was the only thing I had left that still smelled like Lou.
“Yeah,” my voice came out like a frog as I handed it to him and he took it, looking at me suspiciously.
“You’re right. They will write anything. Mom, on the other hand… Apparently, the real story is you got a girlfriend, pretended to be me, and then fell in love.”
I ground my teeth together. “Mom talks too much.” I led the way out of Blaze’s room, not sorry to put the hospital behind me.
While I’d been between here and Boston, I knew Mom had gone back to the inn. Blaze mentioned she’d gone to let them know how I was doing. Because I hadn’t. Because I hadn’t gone back.
“Wade, hold up.” Blaze reached for my arm, slowing my punishing stride toward his car. “We need to talk.”
“There’s nothing to talk about. This isn’t your problem?—”
“I’m not coming back to Boston with you.”
“What?” I stopped and faced him. This wasn’t where I thought he was going with the conversation. “I asked what I could do, and you said you needed a place to stay—you said it might be good to stay with me for a little?—”
“I know I did. This is all on me. I’m sorry.” He hung his head sheepishly for a second. “Hopefully, you can forgive me for it though. The reason I can’t come with you is because I enrolled in a six-month rehab program instead.”
“You… did?” I blanked. My mind became a full white canvas of no response I was so shocked by the revelation. I was glad. Christ, I was more than glad, and it took a second to let the magnitude of that sink in .
“Yeah,” he said with a slow nod.
“Wow, Blaze. That’s great.” I found my voice and reached to pull him in for a hug. “I mean, of course, it’s not a problem?—”
“You should hold on to the hug. I’m not done.” Blaze strolled forward to the cement block at the end of the empty parking spot and then turned and sat on the low beam.
I knew where this was going. I’d assumed he’d already told Mom about the baby, but he hadn’t said anything to me. I wanted to ask. Of course, I did. But this was his life—his story to tell. And God knew, we’d been estranged for long enough that I wouldn’t blame him if he didn’t think I deserved to know.
“Six years ago, I was seeing this girl on and off.” He pinched the bridge of his nose and blew out a breath. “You wouldn’t know her. I didn’t have her sign… anything.”
I made a low sound to acknowledge him.
“It was before my career was… where it is now, and she was this cute waitress at a diner I used to visit right off set. She was wholesome. Thought I was an extra in the show. Anyway, it wasn’t anything serious—I made it clear I didn’t want anything serious, as I usually do. When I finished filming, we went our separate ways, and I… I can’t say I ever thought of her again. Horrible, right?” He laughed bitterly.
“Blaze—”
“Don’t,” he stopped me. “I know the image I created for myself. No point in sugar coating it.”
My lips pulled into a tight line, but I did as he asked and didn’t protest any further.
“Fast forward to three months ago. I get a letter forwarded to me from a law office in California. I assumed it was from, well, something else. Anything else, at that point. But when I opened it… it was from Megan’s parents. The waitress, her name was Megan,” he spoke, the facts coming in fractured. “She’d suffered an aneurysm and died unexpectedly, leaving behind a young daughter.”
Our eyes connected .
“I guess Megan’s sister is fighting them for custody, and while they were going through Megan’s things, they found references to my name.” His voice grew more rasped. “They said they believed I was the father. The timeline and everything…”
“You have a daughter.”
He smiled and made a sound that was part laugh and part pure disbelief. “She’s five. Her name is Paisley.”
“Blaze—”
“Before you say… whatever you’re going to say. I’ve thought a lot about this. For two months, I thought about how it was possible for me to be a father. Was it even true? What would I do if it was? What could I do? Did I even want to?”
In a former life, those questions would’ve been for me. Questions for me to ask—for me to answer. For me to jump in quietly and fix this entire thing for him. Not anymore.
“Everyone wanted a paternity test. Me. Her family. So, I took one, and when I got the letter confirming the match… I lost my mind a little. Drank too much. Fell down a bunch of steps and landed in a coma…” He trailed off and looked at me. “Sound familiar?”
“Vaguely,” I murmured.
“I didn’t know what I was going to do. Didn’t know what I should do. Five years. I’d been a father for five years, and I’d had no idea. I was starting out a failure…” He paused and drew a deep breath. “But when I woke from the coma, I don’t know. It was like the fog of the last thirty years of my life had cleared. I’ve spent so long hating Dad, and now, I have a chance to do the thing he never could—to be the father he could never be.”
“You’ll be a great father,” I said without hesitation.
His eyes flicked up. “How do you know that, big brother?”
“Because you’re nothing like Dad.”
He smiled tight, turning his head to the side and blowing emotion from his chest with a loud exhale. “Anyway, the family—Megan’s sister is fighting my custody. She doesn’t think I’m… fit. ”
“Fuck her.”
That got a small laugh out of him. “Apparently, she hired some investigators to spy on me… out here. Tried to fuel bad press so she’d have a better argument in front of the judge.”
My muscles pulled tight. Mikey still hadn’t found an answer to how or who had leaked the information about Blaze and Lou to the press, but now, it looked like I had my answer. It didn’t matter who specifically it was, what mattered was it was someone with ill will toward my brother.
“I don’t want to fight her,” he said, knowing I would do it if he said the word. “I just want a chance with my daughter. I want a chance to be her dad. So, I told Megan’s parents I’d go through therapy first. I feel good—better—but I’ve felt better before. I don’t want to fuck this up, Wade. I can’t. I won’t.”
“I know,” I choked out.
“Megan’s parents agreed to take care of Paisley while I complete the program. During that time, I’ll meet her and have visits with her and calls so she can get to know me before she comes to live with me. Somewhere. I haven’t figured that out yet.”
Again, he wasn’t asking me to figure it out for him.
“Whatever you need, Blaze. I’m here.”
He smiled up at me. “I actually do need something?—”
“Name it.”
Blaze rose and came to stand in front of me, his gaze determined as it met mine. “My whole life, all you’ve done is save me from my mistakes. Picked up the pieces. Tried to put them back together?—”
“I’m sor?—”
“No.” He shook his head and grabbed my shoulder. “My point is now it’s my turn to return the favor.”
My brows knitted together. “What?”
“You messed up, big brother,” he informed me with a sad smile. “You know it. I know it. Everyone who’s interacted with you in the last couple of days knows it.”
“Blaze—”
“I know you’ve never made a mistake in your entire life, but I’m here to tell you, it’s going to be okay.” He now held both my shoulders. “You fell in love with her, Wade, and yeah, Lou lied a little, and it spiraled, but the lie was always about me. Not you.”
“You don’t?—”
“I heard everything you and Mom said when you thought I was asleep.”
I frowned. “Eavesdropping?”
“I was the one in the hospital bed. If you didn’t want me to hear, you should’ve taken your conversation somewhere else,” he quipped and then added more quietly, “Mom filled in all the details. Everything that happened with Lou.”
I let out a deep sigh and shook my head. “So, you’re giving me advice now?”
“Well, I am the expert on fucking up.”
I shot him a glare.
“I’m serious, Wade.” He shook my shoulder. “Why are you doing this? You obviously love her, just forgive her?—”
“It’s not about forgiving her,” I said low, meeting his eyes. I’d forgiven Lou before the door to the inn had closed behind me. “I can’t forgive myself, and she shouldn’t forgive me either.”
I’d walked away from her. I didn’t feel like I deserved to have her back.
“You’re a lawyer, Wade, not judge and jury. You don’t get to make that call. Shouldn’t Lou get to decide what she wants?”
I drew a pained breath. What Lou wants. That was all I ever wanted to give her—what she wanted—and now, I was the one living in fear that after how I’d acted, what she wanted wasn’t me.
My throat tightened. “Do you think she’ll forgive me?”
“Yes.”
I exhaled. “How do you know?”
“First, you only have to meet Lou Kinkade to know that girl couldn’t hold a grudge if her life depended on it,” Blaze said, releasing me. “And second, she loves you. She wouldn’t have done what she did if she didn’t love you. And when you love someone, you forgive them. Just like you’ve forgiven me more times than either of us probably care to count.”
He sighed and stepped back. We stood there for one long second, finally seeing a path forward for the both of us.
His hand lifted, his keys dangling from his fingers. “Now, are we going to go get your woman or not?”
I snatched the keys from him and unlocked the doors. “Not with you driving.”
He laughed and followed me to his car. “Fine. You can thank me later.”
I shook my head, grinning. “For what? Bringing me to my senses?”
Blaze winked. “For falling down a staircase so you could fall in love while I was asleep.”