Chapter Fifty-Two
Huxley
Grace looks so small and delicate on the hospital bed. The doc said she would be awake after a good night’s sleep, but it’s been four days. He looked utterly flustered when I demanded answers. Dr. Silverman could only tell me the baby is fine, nothing more, but she’s an obstetrician. More specialists examined my wife, but they couldn’t say what was wrong either.
“Maybe the concussion is more serious than we initially thought,” was the only explanation offered.
“Are you kidding me? Didn’t you do enough tests to make sure?” I snarled. Intellectually I understand alienating the doctors isn’t the best course of action, but I have no patience for their incompetence. The possibility that Grace might not wake up is petrifying. I’ve never felt a terror this dark, not even when I landed wrong during that half-pipe stunt that left me in a coma for a few days.
My brothers and their wives have come by. So have my cousins. Mom merely looked at me and Grace with an inscrutable expression, but Uncle Prescott told me there’s been a bloodbath at the firm.
“Nelson’s done. But if Jeremiah doesn’t fuck him up enough to satisfy me, I plan to finish the job.” His tone said there wouldn’t be anything left for me once The Fogeys were done with him.
Ares was less calm. “You’re hiring John Highsmith to go after Nelson, Vivienne and Mick? What the hell, man?” He sounded like I’d just backstabbed him.
“Nelson is a junior partner at the firm,” I said. Besides, John hates Nelson. Apparently, it’s a personal grudge that goes back a few years.
“So? I can still mess him up. And if it’s not enough to give you satisfaction, I’ll call you uncle for the rest of my life. Pietas et unitas , cousin. We were a legal powerhouse before the Webbers, and we’ll continue to be a powerhouse after them.”
“He’s right,” Josh said glumly. Although he wasn’t as expressive as Ares, he didn’t exactly hide how he felt either. “If you can’t trust your own flesh and blood to have your back, who can you trust?”
“Fine,” I told them. “Go ahead and run ’em through the shredder.”
Their eyes glinted. “Awesome,” Josh replied.
I might’ve joined the frenzy to rip Nelson apart, but my entire focus right now is on my wife, who still hasn’t opened her eyes. Every second that passes with her lying on those white sheets singes a sliver off my heart.
How could she have borne this uncertainty and fear for two years after her mother collapsed? Even being right next to Grace isn’t enough to alleviate my anxiety. How did she function with her mother all the way off in Baltimore, three time zones away? I don’t think I’ll be able to go on if Grace doesn’t wake up, and I have to send her somewhere far away. She is so much stronger and more resilient than I could ever be.
I sit by the bed and hold her small hand in mine. But it doesn’t seem enough, so I link our fingers and rest my cheek against her knuckles.
“Come on, Grace. Open your eyes, baby. You can beat this. Don’t let Mick and Karie get away with it.” Fear spikes, and suddenly my pleas turn into a threat. “If you don’t wake up, I’m going to drop my plans for revenge against them, and they’ll walk away scot-free.” My voice cracks a little with desperation. “You don’t want that, do you?”
“No…”
I lift my head, then blink, unsure if it was my imagination or if she really spoke. Her eyelids flutter like little butterflies. Air catches in my throat, forming a hot lump. I don’t dare exhale, too scared that if I breathe wrong, I might jinx the moment. She finally opens her eyes. They’re slightly glassy, then gradually clear and focus on me.
“The baby?” she asks, trembling with trepidation.
Relief shudders through me—she’s not only awake, but I can tell her the good news. “It’s fine,” I manage to choke out, then blink hard to clear the hot tears gathering in my eyes. My wife needs me to be strong. “You protected our child. Thank you.”
She pulls her hand from mine, then strokes my cheek. “You haven’t been sleeping well? You look exhausted.”
“You were in a coma for four days.”
Her eyebrows arch. “That long?”
I nod. “You scared the shit out of me at Nelson’s house…and now this.”
“I’m sorry. But you didn’t really mean it when you said you’d let Mick and Karie go, did you?” Her jaw tightens. “I can never forgive them. His smug face… Her smirk when she spoke of my mom…”
I gather her hand, clasp it in both of mine, then kiss her fingertips. “You don’t have to worry. I won’t forgive them. Nobody in my family will, either. They're done.”
“I know you asked me to wait, but I just couldn’t. The idea that my mom might’ve died alone and I knew nothing about it… I can’t believe she’s been gone all this time, but Dr. Blum kept sending me emails telling me how well she was doing, giving me false hope.” Tears pool in her eyes.
“It was an impersonator. The real doctor was horrified when I contacted him.” And he plans to pursue legal action.
“Did you figure out who did it? Was it Karie?”
I shake my head. “Vivienne.” She was so scared of being found out that she almost peed her pants. Apparently, nobody told her a burner phone wasn’t going to be enough to shield her identity.
Grace gives a long, tired sigh. “I never did anything to her. Why does she hate me so much? Why is she so cruel?”
“Because she’s a horrible human being.”
“Is it because Karie hated my mom?” Grace looks at me, desperate to understand. It breaks my heart that she’s still subconsciously looking for some excuse for Nelson and his family despite claiming she doesn’t like them. She probably doesn’t want to believe her own biological father and his family could be so heartless.
I shake my head. “If Viv were a good person, that wouldn’t have been enough to make her behave like that. Some people are just…” No word seems adequate. “…awful. There’s no reason.”
Grace lets out a shaky breath. “I never got to say goodbye. I never thought I’d have to. The doctor’s updates were always so upbeat. I sent everything he asked for, anything that might help with her treatment. All the audio recordings I made. The flowers. Nothing reached her. It was just entertainment for Viv.” Grief, pain and fury ravage her pale face.
I suppress the rage seething in my belly and hold her tightly, since this moment is for her to grieve and try to find a bit of consolation.
“Is she the one who took my money, too?” she asks.
I close my eyes for a moment, wishing I had better news. “Yes. She created a fake payment site, and you basically deposited two thousand dollars a month into her account.” The urge to beat Vivienne the way I did her brother was overwhelming when I saw the report. She’s lucky she doesn’t have a penis—otherwise, I would’ve put her in the hospital.
“We can get her for that, can’t we? Even if her pretending to be Dr. Blum isn’t a crime?”
“Yes. Impersonating a medical professional, identity theft, fraud, unjust enrichment—the list goes on and on. And Dr. Blum said he’d file suit. Ares is taking the case, pro bono. He’s dying to destroy Vivienne for you.”
“Thank you.” She wipes her tears. “Your family’s been so kind.”
“Not my family. Our family, Grace.” I hold her tighter.
More tears fall from my wife’s wounded eyes, soaking my shirt and sending a searing ache all the way to my heart. “I just wish I’d known sooner. At least early enough that I could’ve taken the ashes. Karie told me they cremated her and scattered her ashes in Baltimore near Johns Hopkins. Why would anybody do that? Why would anybody think Mom would want to be in a place where she was confined by illness? Karie said they didn’t want to tell me Mom passed because it was the day before I was supposed to take the LSAT for Viv.”
“What?”
Grace’s face crumbles. “Karie threatened to withhold payment for Mom’s bills if I refused, and instead of doing the right thing, I said okay. I just feel like I’m being punished. If I’d said no, they wouldn’t have had a reason to not tell me. Then at least Mom’s ashes wouldn’t be scattered all over Baltimore. There aren’t any of her favorite flowers or the green fields she loves—loved so much.”
Hearing her blame herself for others’ wrongdoings shreds my heart. I wish we’d met earlier. I wish I’d been kinder. Perhaps gone with her to the emergency room two years ago. Called and checked up on her periodically to offer to help so she wouldn’t have been blackmailed. Or ended up devastated like this.
“I don’t even know what all the sacrifice was for,” she says, choking on her tears. “Mom said good things happen to people who try hard and do their best, but…”
I run a soothing hand over her back as more of her tears soak my shirt. “I know it sounds whimsical, but I think your mother sent you to me that night two years ago.”
Grace tilts her face to look at me, her cheeks glistening.
“You said she never woke up. But she might’ve known you’d need somebody by your side. Do you know I wouldn’t have been where I was that night if it hadn’t been for a family dinner I was forced to attend? Normally I’m too much of an asshole to give a ride to some girl who looks like a drowned rat. But that day, somehow I felt compelled to make an exception and be nice. Then I ran into you at the bar over a year later. There are nearly four million people in Los Angeles. What are the chances that we’d run into each other again when we didn’t know each other’s names or remember how we looked? What are the chances I would have still kept your number and called you? And there’s the baby. I’m fanatical about birth control, but here we are. What are the chances that all these things happening to one couple?” I wipe the tears from her face. “Probably billions to one, Grace. If this isn’t fate, I don’t know what is.” I kiss away the sorrow and desolation in her eyes. “I was destined to find you and love you.”
She expels a tremulous breath. A fresh wave of tears falls from her puffy, red-rimmed eyes. Her nose is pink, and her cheeks are flushed. And she will always be the most beautiful woman in the world.
“This baby”—I put a protective hand over her belly—“and I will be your family, Grace. We won’t be able to replace your mother—nobody could—but you’ll never be alone. I promise.”
“How can you? No one knows when it’s their time,” she whispers.
“I’ll quit the cigars and alcohol. Exercise more. Cut back on the bacon. I’ll make sure I outlive you.”
A ghost of a smile passes over her teary face. “But then you’ll be alone.”
“Only for a little bit. I don’t think destiny would be cruel enough to keep us apart for long.” I kiss her. “I love you, Grace Lasker, my miracle, my fate.”
“I love you too,” she whispers fiercely, crying harder.
I hold my wife while she lets everything out in tears.