Jack folded his arms across his chest and slanted her a surly look. She was probably going to appeal to his softer side, as if hehadone of those. “Don’t waste your breath, Alice.”
“I dropped Sebastian off at the airport yesterday.”
“Yeah? He’s finally gone, then?”
“Yeah,” she said with a little laugh. “We had a nice talk in the parking lot. He feels really lousy about everything that happened and did his best to apologize.”
“Kind of the least he could do, isn’t it?”
“Jack, he asked for my forgiveness, and that was nice . . . but letting go of my hurt and anger at Sebastian was a gift to myself. Bitterness can corrode the good inside of a person. By mending fences with Sebastian, I’ve been able to let go of the resentment and reclaim the good memories I have of him.”
The gentle compassion in her face moved him as she sank into the chair beside him and reached for his hand. Hers was cool and soft and felt perfect as he curled his big palm around it.
“Jack, you will never regret seeing him. Don’t let a person’s bad actions stop you from being a good person. Your dad is rightoutside. He’s in a wheelchair with an oxygen tank, and he looks terrible. He’s using a few of his last hours on this earth to come see you.”
He turned his face to the wall and blinked at the pinpricks behind his eyes. The worst thing would be for Alice to see how hard this was.
Her voice was soft as she spoke. “Maybe your dad came here for selfish reasons, but he’s also giving you the chance to speak your piece. Tell him whatever you’ve got festering inside that you’ve been wanting to tell him for years. Getting it off your chest might help. Or perhaps you can forgive him. I don’t know what you’re capable of on such short notice . . . but if you turn him away, I think it’s going to be something you will regret for the rest of your life.”
Cracking open the door into his past was terrifying. He barely survived it the first time and didn’t want to risk opening up the avalanche of painful memories. It would be so much easier to keep on hating Frank Latimer.
He reached for the hospital bed’s remote control, pressing the arrow to raise the back of his bed. He wanted to be sitting up for this, not lying down like an invalid.
“Yeah, you can let him in,” he said.
The first sight of his dad was a shock. It had been twenty-two years, and Frank Latimer had shrunk into a little old man bundled in a nubby wool sweater with a scarf around his neck. He looked barely able to sit up in the wheelchair and was hooked up to an oxygen tank. A strong-jawed woman with chestnut hair pushed the wheelchair.
“I’m Sophie,” she said, extending her hand. She was well-dressed in a sporty blazer and ankle boots. Jack felt underdressed in a hospital smock, but at least he didn’t have to wear the plastic collar around his neck anymore.
He shook Sophie’s hand, but merely looked at his dad.
“Thanks for this,” Frank rasped out.
“Sure thing, Dad.” The words weren’t genuine, but it seemed to set the other two at ease. An awkward pause lengthened and grew.
Frank glanced at the bag of clotting factor hanging on the IV pole. “How are your numbers?”
“They’re good. I’m getting out tomorrow.”
Frank managed a smile. “Good!”
Then another long and torturous silence. Alice had stepped outside to grant them privacy, but he wished she’d stayed because she could always keep a conversation going. He scrambled for something to say.
“How long have you two been married?”
“Eighteen years,” Sophie said.
“And I’ve been sober for nineteen,” Frank added.
It made sense. That was around the time Frank and Sophie started bombarding him with Christmas cards and notes of congratulations each time one of his golf courses opened. They’d always been sent to his lawyer’s office, and he never responded. Why had they kept sending them year after year?
“We’ve got two daughters,” Sophie said. “Want to see? They’re your half-sisters.”
She started scrolling through her phone before he could answer. Jack managed a polite smile as he took the phone from Sophie.
“That was from last summer,” she said. “Jessica is our oldest and volunteers at a rescue center for horses.”
They were nice-looking girls, young women, really … but looking at them made bitterness well up inside, threatening to choke him. Frank raised a second family and shed the problematic sick kid from his first marriage. Those girls had riding lessons and summer camp. When he was their age, he worked pulling weeds on a golf course and visited soup kitchens.
