Chapter 31
Chapter Thirty-One
NICHOLAS
I haven’t visited Victoria’s family home since we were married, and when I woke up this morning, I had no intention of visiting today. Things changed when I arrived back at Oakleigh from a meeting with Xan and Christian and the Health and Safety Executive to find my wife in floods of tears, with a bunch of leaflets on the coffee table about kidney donation.
Victoria doesn’t know I’m here. She’d have begged me not to come, to leave things be, but despite her mother and father trotting out “We love you,” platitudes, there’s a line in the sand that needs to be drawn, and I’m here to make damned sure it is. In blood if needs be.
Barron waits in the car with Sol while I march to the front door and knock. Phillip answers, and he takes one look at my face and backs up. Without waiting for a formal invitation, I enter the house and beeline for the living room to the right of the hallway. Laura is sitting in a chair, knitting. There’s no sign of Elizabeth.
“Laura.” It’s a curt greeting, and it hits the mark. She drops the knitting needles, and the ball of wool that had been resting on the arm of the chair falls off and rolls across the floor, coming to a stop by the hearth.
“Oh, Nicholas.” She glances past me, and when she sees I’m alone, her face falls. “I guess you’re here to talk about Vicky.”
“No. I’m here to tell you that you’re barred from Oakleigh. The security team have been informed.”
“Barred? You can’t do that,” Phillip blusters.
“I can, and I have. I will not have you pressuring Victoria. I fucking told you last night to back the hell off, and what do I find when I get home from a meeting this afternoon? My wife in tears, and a stack of kidney donation leaflets on my coffee table.”
“We didn’t go to pressure her,” Laura says, pointlessly pleading a case I’m beyond listening to or caring about. “We went to apologize.”
“And just happened to produce those leaflets like a fucking magician pulls a rabbit out of a hat.”
“It wasn’t like that.” She starts biting her nails and looking to Phillip for guidance. The problem with Laura and Phillip, though, is she’s always worn the trousers. Phillip is a decent guy, but he’s spineless. He proves it by dropping his gaze and shuffling his feet.
“Vicky said she didn’t know what it involved, which was why Beth gave her the leaflets.”
“Of course she did.” I snort, sweeping my gaze around the room. “And where is Elizabeth?”
“She’s gone home. I said we’d let her know if we had news.”
It’s lucky Elizabeth isn’t here. I may have throttled her to death and saved Victoria from having to make this decision at all.
“That’s the last time you will see Victoria until she’s made up her mind. I don’t care if it takes a week, a month, a fucking year.”
“Beth doesn’t have a year,” Laura says quietly.
If she’s hoping to engage my compassionate gene, she’s in for a disappointment. I don’t fucking have one. Not for Elizabeth, nor for her parents.
“I don’t care. Knowing there’s a ticking time bomb doesn’t change my decision. I will not have my wife pressured in any way, and as you’ve proven you can’t be trusted, I’ve taken draconian measures to ensure she is protected.”
“Please, can we?—?”
“I’ll see myself out.” I don’t wait to hear the rest of Laura’s appeal. I sweep from the room, slam the front door behind me, and climb into the back seat of the car.
Barron arches a brow. He’s been with me so long, he’s more like family than an employee, but I’m not in the mood. When I glower and snap, “Oakleigh,” at Sol, Barron reads my mood and straightens in his seat, keeping his lip buttoned.
As Sol guides the car through Oakleigh’s main gate, flurries of snow fall. Maybe we’ll get a white Christmas after all, although Christmas Day is still three days away, and this is England. The weather is unpredictable at the best of times.
Female voices drift down the corridor once I reach the top floor, where Xan and I share the space with our wives. I head toward them, finding Victoria and Imogen curled up on the leather couch in the library, nursing steaming mugs of hot chocolate. Victoria brightens when she sees me, all signs of her earlier distress absent.
“You missed out on the hot chocolate run.”
“Too bad.” I steal hers right from her hands and take a big slurp.
“Hey!” She holds out a flat palm. “Give it back, thief.”
I smile, immensely relieved she’s no longer crying, and hand it over. “You look better.”
“Yeah.” She flicks her gaze to Imogen, to me, then back to Imogen. Xan’s wife nods and stands.
“I take cues well.” She squeezes Victoria’s shoulder on her way out, and for the first time, I notice a small baby bump. Hard to believe Xan spent his entire adult life determined never to have a kid, and in a few short months, he’ll be a dad, and he couldn’t be happier about it. Funny how life turns out. Look at Victoria and me. Who’d have thought she’d have become central to my life, my happiness? Not me, that’s for sure.
“What’s Imogen’s view?”
“She doesn’t have one. All she said was that I should make the decision that’s right for me and not to let outside influences push me in either direction.”
I’m not sure if that’s Imogen having a sideswipe at me, but I let it go.
“I have a favor to ask you.”
I arch a brow. “Oh, yeah?”
“Once people find out Beth is alive, questions will be asked. I don’t want Beth, Joel, or his brother to get into trouble for this. Whatever she’s done, I couldn’t bear to bring law enforcement down on her. I know you have the power to make this go away. I’m asking you to do that. For me.”
The thought of having Beth, her beloved Joel, and his dipshit of a brother thrown in prison is so fucking tempting, but I’m learning that refusing a request from my wife is nigh on impossible. Even one the vengeful bastard in me would love to deny.
“I’ll make some calls.”
She takes my hand and squeezes. “Thank you.” Bringing the mug to her lips, she sips her drink, her eyes on me. “I read the leaflets.”
My breath catches in my throat. “And?”
“It doesn’t do any harm to have the tests and see if I’m a match. If I’m not, then it’s all moot anyway.”
Makes sense. I still can’t bear the thought of her going through with it, but at least we’d know whether that’s even on the cards. And if she is a match and decides to donate… God, I don’t know what the fuck I’ll do. The idea of her being cut open makes me want to throw up. There’s no such thing as risk-free surgery.
“Want me to call the doctor? I can have him here within the hour.”
She gives me a wry smile and hitches a shoulder. “Guess there’s no time like the present.”
* * *
The buzz from my phone wakes me. With my eyes closed, I feel around for the damn thing, cursing that I forgot to put it on silent last night. I crank open an eye. My vision is that blurred, it takes a few seconds for it to come into focus.
I bolt upright. “Victoria.” I put my free hand on her shoulder and lightly squeeze.
“Hmm.” She shoves at my hand and burrows farther beneath the covers.
“Your test results are in.”
She doesn’t shoot up like me. Instead, she rolls over, anxiety in her eyes. “What do they say?”
“I don’t know. The doc’s emailed them to you. The message to me was probably out of courtesy.”
Pressing her forearms into the mattress, she pushes herself upright. “Either that, or fear that he’ll end up swimming with the fishes if he doesn’t update you.”
Despite the knot in my stomach, I smile. Victoria has this ability to lighten even the darkest of moments. “You have me and my family all wrong.”
She cocks an eyebrow and tilts her head to one side. “Really?” Rubbing her eyes, she grabs her phone. “Has he emailed them to Beth, too?”
“If he has, then sleeping with the fishes is the least of his worries.” I’d specifically told him that Victoria was to be the first to know what her results were. That’s why I had one of our doctors take the lead on the testing.
She picks up her phone. “There’s a text from Mum.” Frowning, she reads it, then sighs. “Neither she nor Dad is a match. Guess it’s all down to me, now.”
I fucking hate this. I’m powerless to change what’s already happened and what might happen. I almost have to sit on my hands to stop from grabbing the phone from her, deleting the email, and telling her it isn’t happening. I’ll lock her in these rooms if I have to. But it’s a fantasy. There’s nothing I can do but wait.
A few seconds later, she drops the phone into her lap.
“Well?”
Her lips rub together. “It says here it’s a negative crossmatch.”
“What does that mean? Are you compatible or not?” I fucking hate how the medical community loves to over complicate everything. Why can’t they just say you’re a match or you’re not a fucking match? Without the fucking bit, obviously.
“Yes,” she whispers. “I’m compatible.”
Fuck.
Covering my nose and mouth with my hands, I close my eyes and take a few deep breaths. This is the worst possible outcome. I don’t want her to be a match. I don’t want her to put her body through surgery to benefit Elizabeth. And I don’t give a flying fuck what it says about me that I’d happily let her sister die rather than risk my wife’s health.
I’ve read all the material. Hell, over the last couple of days while we waited for the results to come back, I’ve devoured countless articles and reports, and they all say the risks to the living donor are low. But they’re not zero, and that’s the only circumstances under which I could possibly accept this.
But it’s not my decision, and I refuse to be the arsehole who puts a different kind of pressure on her. The last thing she needs is her parents and Elizabeth on one side, pleading with her to donate, and me on the other side, begging her to put herself first and screw her sister.
I’m scared.
Strike that. I’m fucking petrified. Of losing her. Of what I’m capable of if the worst happens.
With her, I barely recognize myself. She’s softened me, smoothed out all my roughened edges, but make no mistake, I can turn that other shit on like flicking a light switch. Losing her would set off a chain reaction. I’d burn the fucking world down, starting with Elizabeth and her parents.
I can’t lose her.
I just can’t.
“—hear me.”
I blink, suddenly cognizant she’s been talking to me, and I haven’t heard a word. “Sorry, miles away. What?”
She straddles me, cupping my face. “I’m scared, too.”
A pained breath forces its way out through a compressed chest. When did she figure me out? I’ve always had a poker face. It’s why my brothers hate playing cards with me, and why I usually come out on top when I do force them into a game or two at De Luxe. Yet Victoria has seen right through me, right to my terrified heart.
“Do you know what you’re going to do?” My voice rasps, like each word is being pushed through a sieve made of razor blades.
“No. I’m going to sleep on it and decide tomorrow.”
On Christmas Day. Happy fucking Christmas.
“Nicholas?”
“Yeah?”
“Will you make love to me, please.”
My chest aches with how fragile this moment feels. “Yes,” I manage, my eyes flitting over her face, memorizing every detail. “I’ve got you, Half-pint. I’ve got you.”