Torrid Page 21

Tinsley

  September 21, 2015

  When I feel like I can’t breathe, I go for a run.

  The problem with that is that running reminds me of all those previous runs I’ve gone on with Noah.

  The thought of having to marry Connor makes my scalp prickle, and sets my stomach on fire.

  Suddenly I am hypersensitive to the crowds around me, and I want nothing to do with the joy of the day.

  I’ve ruined everything.

  Suddenly, I am no longer twenty-five.

  I’m nineteen, and Noah is leaving me again.

  Never being able to forget having to walk away from him, I feel like this is happening for the second time, and I unwillingly walk right into the waiting arms of my father, standing outside a hotel.

  “Tinsley!” his face is redder than ever, as though he didn’t expect to find me here, but he was searching for me.

  “Oh!”

  I stumble backward, away from him, ready to run but he catches me by the arm before I can even think about my next move.

  “What are you doing here?” I ask.

  “Taking you home,” he turns away from me in disgust, and it is apparent that he knows I am with Noah.

  “What are you even doing here? Running away with someone?” he demands.

  So, he doesn’t know about Noah.

  And, I don’t have an answer for him.

  “Alexander always was foolish,” he mutters under his breath, dragging me towards him, inside the hotel. “Thank god you had your phone!”

  “Dad you can’t just…” I try to protest.

  “I can do whatever I want!” he roars, sending several glances our way, but he pays no attention, his fury at maximum.

  “I am your father! You will listen!” he shouts.

  Then, as though all of this is too much for him, he stops talking.

  That’s when I realize something is wrong, and his face is the shade of purple I associate with trouble.

  My deduction proves to be right, because within seconds he is gasping for breath, grabbing at his chest.

  “Someone call an ambulance!” I scream, watching him collapse on the floor.

  My blood runs cold as several of the guests run to his aid, but all I can do is stand there and watch as his body goes limp, and I’m not entirely sure what’s happening.

  I stand helplessly by as someone performs CPR on my father, and declares that he is still breathing.

  His saviors continue to try to help him until the paramedics arrive.

  Only then there is hope.

  But only barely.

  Unable to think, I stutter through his name and his date of birth.

  I stumble after them into the ambulance.

  On the way to the hospital, one of them tries to examine me, wondering if I am just in shock or if there is something genuinely wrong, and I shrug him off.

  I am not the problem here.

  “I’m okay,” I tell him, watching the heart monitor beep away, wondering if I’ve killed my father.

  With my own heart beating out of my chest, all I can do is follow the paramedics to the hospital, down hallways, until I am told to stop and wait.

  To wait and find out if he is going to survive this?

  What was it?

  A heart attack?

  A stroke?

  I debate calling my mother as I nervously twist a magazine between my hands, but calling her at this point would only worry her.

  Noah.

  Noah is waiting for me.

  But there is entirely no way that I can leave my father. Not in the state he is in.

  Hours later, I wake up to the feeling of a hand on my shoulder, and I look up to see a doctor.

  “Ms. Whittaker?” he asks.

  I shift uncomfortably in my seat, blinking a couple of times to get the sleep out of my eyes. Here I thought this was all just a bad dream, but I am waiting in a hospital, in a foreign country.

  “Your father had a heart attack. He’s going to be okay,” the doctor says as he takes a seat beside me.

  “Oh, my God!” I whisper to no one in particular, completely alone in this.

  A cursory glance out the window tells me it’s late into the night or early morning.

  “He’s okay?” I repeat.

  “He’s survived, and in stable condition. Your father isn’t awake yet, but there were no complications during surgery, so we expect that he will make a full recovery,” the doctor reports.

  “Can I take him home?” I ask. “Can we transport him home? To New York? Or is he too weak?”

  “I would give him a day or two, but we can make arrangements,” he replies.

  All I manage is a nod, unable to comprehend this.

  I gave my father a heart attack!

  He almost died because of me!

  All because I wouldn’t even give him the benefit of the doubt!

  I’m sure if we had sat down and talked about this, my father might even understand.

  He would allow Noah and I to be together.

  He’s not a tyrant.

  “Can I see him?” I ask, with a sob.

  I can feel tears pricking my eyes at the thought of my father gone, without having told him about the man of my dreams.

  We may have had our disagreements over the years, but we are still family.

  I still believe in him.

  “Of course, right this way,” the doctor nods, and leads me towards recovery.

  He doesn’t look like himself.

  My father is pale.

  He’s hooked up to an IV, and there are arcane machines doing their mechanical best to keep him alive.

  I’ve never had a relative in the hospital, that I recall.

  He’s not quite awake, yet.

  I take the chair across from his bed, watching him sleep, all the while knowing that this isn’t the time to tell him about Noah and I.

  Getting out of the engagement will be difficult after this, but I will do it.

  Life is too precious to wander through it blindly listening to other people.

  I see that now.

  The uncomfortable chair lends nothing to how tired I am, and my eyes droop on and off until finally, they open, and I see my father looking at me from across the room.

  “Tinsley,” he croaks around the oxygen mask.

  “Hi, Dad,” I reply, as I rub my eyes.

  “Thirsty,” he whispers in a hoarse voice.

  “I’ll get it,” I say as I jump up within seconds.

  As I get the water, I think that Noah is probably worried.

  Noah will understand. He has to.

  The first person I call after getting a few coherent sentences out of my father is my mother, who cries inconsolably for twenty minutes.

  After I explain that he’s fine, and we will be home shortly, she still is insisting on coming to the Bahamas to help.

  I carefully convince her that we will be home soon enough.

  She charters a private transfer from the hospital two days from now as soon as she has regained her composure.

  She gives me the details.

  Everything I’ve done is forgotten in the midst of our latest tragedy.

  My father isn’t even that old.

  At sixty-two he’s not exactly in the prime of his life, but he’s not what I would call elderly either.

  It’s shocking to me to think that he is mortal after all.

  I take time to leave the hospital and bring him clothes, change, and shower, but I don’t dare go back to Noah.

  I don’t even try to call him out of fear for my father.

  Noah does call, but I only answer neutrally, since I am sitting with my father.

  “Hi Noah,” I try to keep my voice cheerful, “I’m in the Bahamas with my father.”

  “Your father?” he repeats, calmly.

  I can hear the stress in his voice.

  “Did something happen?” he asks.

  I take a deep breath.

  “He had a heart
attack, Noah. We’re on our way home soon. I’m taking him home,” I glance at my father, who just shakes his head, as though I shouldn’t be telling Noah Stone any of this.

  “Dear God,” Noah’s voice is uneven. “Do you need me to come over there? What hospital are you at? I can be there in five minutes.”

  “No, no. We’re fine. My mother wanted to come too; I told her it’s okay,” I glance worriedly at my father, who’s still shaking his head.

  Sick of arguing with me, he just picks up the paper, even though he doesn’t give a lick about what’s going on here.

  “Tinsley, we have to talk,” Noah says.

  “I know…” I pause. “We’ll be back in New York before you know it. He’s fine,” I cover Noah’s request with some patter.

  “Tinsley,” Noah repeats.

  “He’ll call you when he gets home,” I tell Noah, shutting him down.

  Not entirely sure why I’m doing this, I hang up the phone.

  “Noah Stone, always the saint,” says Father, as he shakes his head. “Though I’m sure his private plane is more comfortable than whatever your mother has cobbled together,” he complains.

  He’s almost back to his old self in only a matter of three days.

  Though I can still tell, he’s uncomfortable - and hurting.

  That’s enough for me to sigh with relief.

  “Should I call him back and tell him to come pick us up in a helicopter?” I tease.

  My father laughs.

  “Have you ever been in a helicopter with Noah? He flies like a maniac. I’m surprised they haven’t revoked that license of his!” he says, with feeling.

  For the first time in twenty years, it feels like, I laugh with my father.

  “Are we going to talk about what you were doing here? Or are we going to pretend this is a clean slate?” he asks.

  “Clean slate, please,” I take the easy way out.

  “Are you saying that because you’re worried you’re going to give me another heart attack?”

  I can tell he’s half joking, because the lines underneath his eyes are wrinkled with laughter.

  “Half and half,” I have no choice but to laugh with him.

  How am I to explain what I have done exactly?

  Run away with a man who’s been a friend to him?

  I can see how wrong it is, but that doesn’t stop my heart from tugging at Noah.

  I would marry that man in a heartbeat.

  We’ve belonged together for a long time, we both know that.

  My parents will have to understand.

  “Am I interrupting anything?” Connor’s voice warns over me, and I find my back suddenly rigid against our new intruder.

  “Connor?”

  I am shocked.

  I turn around, to see Connor standing there in the flesh.

  He looks ragged and travel-worn like he’s been wearing the same suit for three days, and I realize that he just might have been.

  “What are you doing here?” I ask defensively; my father looks just as shocked.

  “Your mother told me what happened; I came with the plane to make sure you were both taken care of. Compliments of my father of course,” he adds the last bit at the end, like a company line.

  Everything is compliments of Julian Bradford when it comes to Connor.

  Connor wraps his arms around me before I can protest, and all I can do I wonder how long this breakup will have to wait. I can’t possibly upset my father any further.

  Not like this.

  He’s barely four days out of a heart attack, and I’m not keen on giving him another one.

  “Well, that’s very nice of you Connor,” my father’s eyes narrow, his lips pursed together.

  “Tinsley, thank God you’re okay! When your mother said you were in trouble, I feared for your safety,” he says, smoothly.

  Connor’s sincerity doesn’t move me in the slightest.

  “My dad is the sick one,” I remind him, carefully.

  “I know that, but when she said there was trouble, I thought something happened to you, and I was worried sick about it!” he exclaims.

  “The last time we talked, we got into that stupid fight, and I didn’t want those to be the last words we ever said to each other,” he says.

  Oh god.

  “Connor it’s not a big deal,” I reply, keeping my tone even, glancing at my dad who’s gone paler, his arm stretched out to clutch the rail of his bed.

  “No, it’s not. You deserve the world and…” to my shock, Connor drops down on one knee, and I hear my father suck in a breath, “I want to be the one to give that to you. Will you marry me?” he asks.

  Fuck.

  “Connor…” I look over at my dad, who’s expression is unreadable at the moment, and I realize I don’t have a choice anymore.

  I’m not going to do anything that could further enrage my father, and this is what he’s always wanted.

  I steel myself.

  “Just say the word ‘yes’ Tinsley, just say it,” my inner voice shouts in my ear.

  “Of course,” I say.

  Out loud.

  I get my first ever genuine smile from Connor in six years, as he slips the ring on my finger.

  The sinking feeling in my stomach only deepens.

  I let him kiss me on the cheek before he accepts congratulations from my father.

  Watching the two of them, talking together like old friends, I feel like I’ve done the right by saying yes to him.

  My heart, however, is screaming at me to run away from this debacle.

  Somehow, I’ve managed to wrench Noah and I further apart.

  Again.

  And this wasn’t even at my behest.

  Part III

  21

  Noah

  March 24, 2017

  “I can’t believe you!” I stare at Evan, my eyes wide with rage.

  “We come all the way down here, and the one lead I’ve had on your mother in months turns out to be something you planted! It was you!” I shout.

  Lately, I’ve been shouting a lot.

  No fucking wonder.

  I order a double scotch, neat.

  The bartender delivers it, and I swallow half in one gulp.

  Evan rolls his eyes as he takes a sip of his drink.

  “Dad, relax,” he says.

  He is apparently in no rush to find her.

  “Relax!” I stare at him with wide eyes.

  I feel like crushing the glass into shards.

  Somehow, I manage to refrain from doing so.

  “It was an accident, okay? How was I supposed to know that dropping her name all over the place would come to this?” he asks.

  Evan has been dropping his mother’s name in hopes that she would come out of the woodwork.

  However, he hasn’t been keeping track of just with whom he’s been doing this name dropping.

  When we heard Elizabeth could be in Los Angeles, we rushed down there only to find out that it was Evan’s stupidity we were chasing after.

  The boy isn’t as desperate to find his mother as I am.

  “You’ve been irresponsible. Again,” I tell him in a flat voice. “Why am I not surprised?”

  “Listen!” Evan throws his hands up in his defense. “I thought that maybe if I got her in some trouble, it would help us find her faster,” he explains.

  “Well, then why didn’t you even keep track of where you’d been dropping her name? Or was this one of your idiot plans you came up within a haze of marijuana smoke?” I accuse.

  Evan looks guilty for a moment.

  “Yeah, the second one,” he admits, sheepishly.

  “Let me get this straight,” I say, ticking off my points on my fingers.

  “One. You’ve been jumping all over the world, since you’ve been home from service, dropping your mother’s name, without knowing where exactly you’ve been doing so?” I say.

  “Dad, I thought it made sense at the time,” he tries to defend himsel
f.

  “Two, you are doing this under the influence of weed? In a haze full of marijuana smoke?” I say, trying to shame him.

  “I apologized didn’t I!” Evan whines.

  “That’s not going to change anything, now is it? You need to grow up Evan and realize that drugs and alcohol, are not going to get you through life,” I storm at him.

  “Well, that worked out just dandy for you, now, didn’t it?” he says, sarcastically.

  “Evan!” I snap at him. “You are irresponsible, and your habits are getting in the way of finding your mother, and this concerns me for several reasons. One of them is that you are under the assumption I was a pothead like you at some point!” I yell.

  Evan shrinks back, as he doesn’t enjoy my lectures.

  “You’ve made things worse, with your gallivanting and stupidity,” I rage, asking the bartender for another double whiskey.

  I drain the remaining dregs and slam the glass on the bar.

  The bartender gives me a look, but pours my drink.

  He sets it carefully in front of me.

  He takes my other glass, and slowly wipes the bar with his cloth.

  Then, he makes a show of cleaning the glass, and carefully inspecting it.

  He replaces it with the rest of his glasses, and goes away.

  I feel slightly abashed, but fuck it.

  “Not that you didn’t have a point in what you were doing, but now we have no idea what a true lead is, or if it's you,” I turn my attention back to my idiot son.

  “Maybe you’re just not trying hard enough,” Evan says, and bowls me over with this suggestion.

  I am stunned.

  I refuse to acknowledge his comment.

  “You’re going to end up like Clint Hale, Corban’s business partner. He ran up so much debt on their company cards, and cards that Corban didn’t even know about, he almost bankrupted their company. Corban had to bail him out with his savings,” I say.

  “I’m not a thing like Clint!” Evan yells at me. “I’m a Stone!”

  “Oh, really now?” my sarcasm is thick.

  “I’m smarter than that, and so is my mother. She obviously knows what she’s doing; she could be in New York for all we know! Under our noses the entire time!” he cries.

  “Don’t be stupid,” I roll my eyes.

  We fall into silence.