Book 23 Blackout After Dark #7
She’s right. He knows it and even agrees with her.
But the possibility of that worst-case scenario was playing out as a nightmare for him.
Losing the boys he and Carolina had poured their hearts and souls into would break him.
Losing them would break her, too, even though she’s trying to be brave for both of them.
A sharp knock on the door precedes Dan Torrington’s entrance. “I got here as fast as I could after I got your call, Carolina. Had to drop Kara at Sarah and Charlie’s.” He stops short when he sees them sitting at the table, probably looking like two disaster survivors. “What’s going on?”
Carolina holds out the letter to him, and he sits at the table to read it.
Watching his posture become more rigid as he reads does nothing to help Seamus’s shattered nerves.
“Well, that’s an interesting development.
I don’t think you have anything to worry about.
Before Lisa died, she made you guys the boys’ legal guardians.
She had sole custody, which made it completely her decision. ”
“So he can’t come in now and upend the custody arrangement?” Seamus asks the only question that matters.
“I can’t see how. Lisa was very clear and very specific. The custody agreement is airtight. I made sure of that.”
Dan will reach out to the lawyer and see what’s what. He tells them it may be as simple as the father wanting to know the children are safe and happy. He promises to tell them as soon as he hears anything. Until then, Seamus will worry, but what else can he do but wait?
Shortly after Dan leaves, Hope brings the boys and their dog Burpy home, along with their best friend Ethan. The boys are filthy after a hard day of playing outside in the heat, so Seamus supervises the bath, using flashlights and candles to light the room.
“You’re like a couple of nasty tea bags,” he says, as he does every night, making them laugh.
He’d had to demonstrate what a tea bag is and how it makes tea before they got his joke, and now they think it’s hilarious.
They think everything he says and does is funny or interesting, which only makes him love them that much more.
It’s a tremendous responsibility, this job of shaping boys into men, and one he relishes with everything he has.
Raising them to be decent men is the most important thing he’ll ever do, and he intends to give it his all.
“Dirt tea,” they say together, echoing the term he uses to describe the kind of tea they make.
He helps them wash behind their ears, which is another thing they find endlessly hysterical. Who got dirty behind their ears? They ask every night. Boys who roll around in the dirt all day, he’d say.
Tears sting his eyes at the thought of anyone taking them away from him. He’ll fight for them until his dying breath, if that’s what it comes to.
But God, he hopes it doesn’t come to that.
Adam, Abby and Liam arrive at the housewarming party at Sarah and Charlie’s.
Victoria and David came over to congratulate them on the quadruplets after hearing the news from the hospital in Providence.
Adam and Abby haven’t told anyone else yet.
Victoria insists that Abby get off her feet and walks her over to a group of their family and closest friends.
Her sister-in-law, Maddie, is sitting on the lounge chair that goes with her everywhere while she’s on bed rest.
It occurs to Abby that she’ll probably be on bed rest before her pregnancy is over, too. Ugh.
“Abby!” Stephanie jumps up—or what passes for jumping in her pregnant state—and hugs her. “We’ve been so worried! Not a word from you guys after the appointment.”
Seeing them there, Adam’s brothers, parents, cousins and brother-in-law, Joe, come over to see them, along with their friend, Slim Jackson, and his wife, Erin.
“Tell us.” Linda McCarthy kisses them and Liam. “Is everything all right?”
“Everything is a little too all right,” Adam says, smiling at Abby and giving her the floor to share their news with his family.
“One of you had better start talking,” Linda says, “before I expire from needing to know!”
“You’re okay, aren’t you, sweetheart?” Big Mac asks.
“I’m okay. In fact, it seems I’m expecting quadruplets.”
After a second of complete, shocked silence, the group erupts into laughter and congratulations and more than a few tears as they hug Abby and Adam.
Big Mac and Linda congratulate Charlie and Sarah on their beautiful home and leave to check on the new lighthouse keepers.
When they arrive, they find the Watsons suffering in the heat and offer their house as a respite.
Big Mac tells Oliver they’re the ultimate empty nesters with a whole-home generator that has enough juice to include air conditioning.
He tells Dara they have a working coffee maker too, which seals the deal for her.
They ask the McCarthys to let them know when they overstay their welcome.
Linda says it’s nice to have their company.
Caught up in a conversation with his father, uncles and cousins about the abandoned alpaca farm Mac wants to buy as their next family project, Shane realizes he hasn’t seen Katie in quite some time.
Listening to Mac talk about what they could do with the old farm has sparked excitement in Shane, who’d love to renovate another island property that’s fallen into disrepair. Mac’s enthusiasm is contagious, and they plan to get everyone out to look at it soon.
He goes to find Katie and locates her in a bathroom upstairs.
At first, she won’t let him in, but when she does, she says she thinks she’s had a miscarriage.
He helps her into the shower and gets her cleaned up.
“I’m heartbroken.” Her chin wobbles as her eyes fill. “We were going to have a baby, Shane.”
“We’ll have others. The good news is that now we know we can.” They’d been trying for a while, so it’s a bit of good news mixed in with the sorrow. “This one wasn’t meant to be for whatever reason, but we’ll have babies, sweet Katie.”
He holds her while she sobs, and when she finally calms, they find a bedroom to rest for a bit. Shane texts Julia to tell their mom that Katie isn’t feeling well, so she won’t worry. Shane puts his arms around her. “How do you feel?”
She sniffles. “Sad, empty, achy.”
“I’m so sorry, sweetheart.”
“I’ve helped so many patients through this very thing, but until it happens to you…” She takes a shuddering deep breath.
“As soon as it’s safe to try again, we will.”
Alex drives home from the senior care center with tears running down his face.
Of course, it couldn’t have lasted. He’d known that but held out hope, nonetheless.
They’d gotten four hours of complete lucidity before Marion had once again retreated into the cruel bitch of dementia, asking where she was, who they were and when her husband, George, would be home.
He’s so thankful for the time they’ve gotten, but losing her again has knocked the wind out of them all.
He’d taken her “home” to the center, which had been dreadful.
She’d been confused and disoriented and screaming for his late father.
The very capable staff had encouraged him to leave, assuring him they’d take good care of her.
He takes a few minutes to vent his frustration in the car until Jenny comes to rescue him and takes him into the house. When she asks him what he needs, he wants to recreate their first week together, which was during another heat wave.
Luke brings Sydney and their daughter Lily home from the party.
After he puts Lily to bed, he decides it’s time to talk about what happened the day she accidentally drove her car off the pier at the marina with Lily strapped into her car seat.
“Sweetheart, we need to talk about it.” Sydney has been in distress ever since, and he can’t bear to see her so upset.
She covers her ears and lowers her head. “I can’t.”
Luke puts his arms around her. “We have to. Nothing has been right since that day, and I can tell you’re suffering. I can’t bear that for you. Or me, or Lily. We need to talk about it and figure out what we have to do to get past it.”
“I’ll never get past it. Ever.”
“You will, but first, you have to deal with it.”
“How do I do that when every time I close my eyes, I see the water rushing in and Lily trapped in her seat and no way out, all because I wasn’t paying attention to what I was doing while my child was in the car? How do you suppose I deal with that?”
“By talking about it. By confronting what happened and why it happened and forgiving yourself the way everyone else has.”
“I’ll never forgive myself for nearly killing my child. In a car. After what’s already happened to me in a car, you’d think I’d know better.”
Luke convinces her to make an appointment to talk to Kevin McCarthy. They can go together, which she agrees to.
Paul Martinez can’t believe the extraordinary afternoon they had with Marion.
It still felt surreal, even hours later, that his mom had been almost completely herself for those few hours.
If he hadn’t seen it with his own eyes, he wouldn’t have believed it was possible.
And then, with dementia being such an unrelenting bitch, Marion had left them just as quickly, lost again to the confusion, as if someone had flipped a switch.
He isn’t sure if he’s thankful for the brief respite or resentful. His emotions are a jumbled mess.
When he hears Scarlett stirring, he tends to her so Hope won’t be disturbed. He changes her and gives her a bottle of the milk Hope had pumped earlier.
Paul loves being a father to Scarlett and Hope’s son, Ethan, and is so grateful his mother got to meet his family, to know he and Alex are happily settled with wives they love and children they adore.
He hopes she’s taken that knowledge with her to wherever it is she goes when she’s lost to them.
He hopes it gives her comfort to know they’re doing well and living happy, productive lives.