The Wayward Son (15 page)

She wished she could turn her feelings off as easily as Judd had appeared to do. He’d come into the office this Monday morning with nothing but a professional attitude and a driving work ethic. She should be grateful for that, at least, she thought as she brought his mail in to him.

He was on the phone and she made to put the opened correspondence on the desk in front of him and walk away, but when she did, he reached out and clasped her hand in his, preventing her from walking away. The instant he touched her she flinched, and saw the corresponding frown that crept between his brows as she did so. Anna gave an experimental tug but he continued to hold her firm.

The touch of his fingers on her skin was torture. How many times had those same fingers traversed the length of her body and wrought pleasure from her such as she had never known before? She bit back the sound that threatened to rise in her chest at the memory. The memory of the passion and the betrayal.

Finally, Judd finished his call and relinquished his hold on her.

“Get your bag, we’re going to the hospital,” he said in a voice that brooked no argument.

“Is Charles all right?” she asked, fear clawing at her throat at the serious expression on Judd’s face.

“He’s come out of the coma and he’s asking for us. Both of us.”

The journey to the hospital seemed to take forever, or maybe it just seemed that way because she was bound in this small space inside Judd’s car. She was intensely aware of him, from the grip of his hands on the steering wheel to the set of his jaw. And his scent—the scent that insidiously reminded her of dark nights when all she knew was the feel and smell of him, and the sensation of her own pleasure, as he made love to her all through those nights.

She let out a sigh of relief as they pulled into the hospital parking lot and strived to keep her distance from Judd as they walked together to the elevator bank that would take them to the intensive-care unit.

“Only one at a time and only for five minutes,” the nurse instructed.

“You go first,” Judd said to Anna. “I know how important he is to you, how worried you’ve been.”

She silently examined his words, searching for a hidden meaning behind them, but there was nothing about his expression that suggested his words meant anything other than what was said. She nodded her acquiescence and went into the room where Charles was hooked up to all manner of equipment. He opened his eyes as she entered, a shaky smile on his lips.

“Oh, Charles,” she said, sinking onto the visitor’s chair beside his bed, tears filling her eyes, “we’ve been so worried about you.”

“Ah, Anna, still fussing?”

He reached for her and she gave him her hand, surprised at the strength she felt in his fingers as he squeezed tight.

“Of course I’m still fussing. I wouldn’t be me if I didn’t, right?”

He sighed and smiled a little wider. “That’s my girl. How are things between you and my boy? Before this little incident I was beginning to hope there was something special growing between you.”

Anna didn’t want to talk about her and Judd, not now. “Hardly a little incident, Charles. You have to take better care of yourself. In fact, when you go home I’ve arranged for nursing care for you until you’re back on your feet.”

Her voice trailed away as she realized what she’d just said. If Cynthia Wilson had her way, Charles wouldn’t be returning to the home he knew and loved. In fact, if what she’d said last Friday night held any truth to it, Charles had nowhere to call home at all. The news would shatter his chances at recovery. Somehow she had to persuade Judd to allow his father to live out his years under the roof that had been his home for over thirty years. She felt sick at the prospect but fought to keep her fears from her face. As ill as Charles was, he’d always been pretty astute. He’d know something was wrong if she didn’t control herself.

“Pshaw!” he scoffed. “Nurses. I’ve only been awake a few hours and I’ve already had my fill of them. But you’re not answering my question. You and Judd. What’s happening there?”

“We’re working well together,” Anna hedged.

“Working well together.” He said the words as if they tasted like something nasty. “Sounds like you’ve had a lovers’ spat, hmm? You know, I hope you two can work out whatever it is that’s keeping you apart. I know you haven’t exactly had the best of role models for long-term commitment—Lord only knows I didn’t treat your mother as well as I ought to have. She stood by me, you know. She held me together and loved me even when I didn’t deserve it. I owed her more than companionship, but I wasn’t capable of offering her more.”

“Mum was happy, Charles, really.” Tears pricked at Anna’s eyes.

“Ah, always the mediator. You deserve more than I gave her, Anna. It’s your due. Remember that.”

Out the corner of her eye she saw the nurse gesture to her. “Look, my five minutes is up and I don’t want to use up Judd’s time with you, too. We can talk about this later.”

Much later, like never, she hoped as she leaned forward to give him a chaste kiss on his cheek.

“Seemed like a very quick five minutes to me,” Charles grumbled.

“I’ll be back tomorrow, okay?”

“Tonight. Come back tonight.”

“If I can,” she promised. “Now do as you’re told while you’re here. Promise me?”

He merely grunted. As she passed Judd in the doorway she took care not to brush against him, a fact that wasn’t totally lost on Judd, judging by the expression on his face.

“I’ll wait for you downstairs,” she said, desperate for some air.

“Sit, sit.” Charles gestured to the chair beside his bed.

Judd did as he was told. His relief at seeing Charles alert again was palpable, but even he couldn’t answer himself as to why. Was it because he wanted his father to be fully aware of the payback he had coming to him, or was it something else?

“What, nothing to say?” Charles asked with a bark of laughter.

“I’m glad to see you’re feeling better,” Judd said stiffly.

Charles snorted. “I’ll accept that, it’s probably all I deserve. There’s one thing about facing your own mortality. It makes you want to clear away the messes you’ve made of your life—and believe me, I’ve made a few.”

“It’s how we deal with the messes that’s most important,” Judd replied, fighting to keep his voice neutral. Did his father plan to apologize? Did he think that saying “sorry” would make everything okay?

“That’s why I needed to speak to you now. You need to know the truth about your mother and me.”

“I think I know enough,” Judd said, stonewalling.

“No, you don’t know the half of it. I will admit it was my fault our marriage failed. I knew what I was getting into by marrying someone so much younger than me, I knew she deserved more than an older man could offer.” Charles sighed and lapsed into silence.

Judd shifted uncomfortably on his chair, waiting for the older man to finish what he wanted to say. He didn’t have to wait too long.

“I won’t beat around the bush, my boy. I wasn’t man enough for her. Now don’t go getting all embarrassed. I know kids don’t want to hear about their parents’ sex lives.” He made a self-conscious grimace. “I promise to keep it PG. Do you know much about diabetes?”

“Not a huge amount, no.”

“Mine went undiagnosed for many years—part of the reason I’m here now. But one of the issues I suffer with the disease is impotence. I was thirty-five when I married your mother and I was already beginning to have problems. She was only nineteen when I met her and such a beauty. I wanted to offer her the moon and the stars. I was prepared to give her anything just to keep her. But when I started having problems in the bedroom I was ashamed. I didn’t want to talk to anyone about it—not her, not my best friend, not my doctor, no one. I just threw myself into work. By the time Nicole came along we were barely sleeping together anymore.

“I just kept on working, kept on providing for Cynthia. She had the house, she had you and your sister. I just went on, hoping against hope it would be enough to keep her. She wasn’t happy, but I didn’t know what I could do to change that anymore. Your mother and my best friend always did get on, and Thomas seemed to be hell-bent on cheering Cynthia up. I got jealous. Started to suspect them of having an affair, of both of them cheating on me.

“One day I came home from work early. Thomas had already left the office and I found him in your mother’s room, holding her, as if they were about to make love. I accused them of all sorts of things. I didn’t listen when they tried to explain. Turns out she was desperately unhappy and he was consoling her, but I didn’t see it that way at the time. I lost a helluva lot that day. My wife, my best friend, my son.”

“You didn’t have to send us away,” Judd said bitterly. “She wasn’t unfaithful to you, was she?”

“No,” Charles acknowledged, his voice so soft Judd had to lean forward to hear him clearly. “She wasn’t. But she let me believe she had been. She told me you were Thomas’s child. That she and Thomas had been having an affair for years and how much he satisfied her. She knew exactly how to hit me where it would hurt the most.

“You know the rest. I could barely see, I was so angry. I told her she could go and take you with her. I never wanted to see either of you again. When Thomas heard what I’d done, he tried to reason with me, to get me to believe the truth, but Cynthia’s lies were already rotting my heart and my mind. I wouldn’t listen and we never spoke again.

“He died just over a year ago. He’d arranged for his lawyers to pass on a letter to me, should he predecease me. A letter where he told me what an idiot I’d been and how he’d never touched Cynthia, ever. I knew that if he was telling the truth I’d wasted twenty-five years on a hatred I’d had no right to feel. I had to know the truth, but it took a warning from my doctors about my health before I actually found the courage to reach out to you—to admit I was wrong. It wasn’t an easy thing.”

Judd didn’t know what to say. Everything his father told him made sense. Instinctively he knew, even though he didn’t want to believe it was the truth, that Cynthia was quite capable of being so spiteful as to spin out a lie of such enormous proportions. But why had she allowed it to go on for so long? Why had she been prepared to walk away from her marriage? And had she never considered, ever, what it had meant to him to be rejected by his father—for his sister to grow up without a mother?

“Judd.” Charles shifted and reached a hand toward him. Judd took it, intensely aware of the papery texture of his father’s hand and remembering a time when it was strong and warm as it guided him the first time he’d ridden his bike without training wheels. “I want you to know I’m sorry, son. So very sorry for everything I put you through. I was an inflexible, prideful fool. I can’t get back what I threw away, but I hope that now you know the truth you can find it in your heart to forgive me and that maybe we can start anew from here.”

Judd felt unexpected moisture prick at his eyes. Every wish he’d ever had was here before him. His father was reaching out, wanting to make amends for the past. Charles had talked about his own bitterness being a waste of the last twenty-five years, but what of Judd’s own? Channeling his own anger against his father for so long had been just as destructive as his father’s toward Cynthia and Thomas Jackson.

“Is that why you offered me the controlling share in the company as well as the house? To make it up to me? Did you really think that would be enough?”

Charles nodded. “I hoped so. I knew you were already successfully running The Masters’. I had to sweeten the bait to bring you home—where you belong. I thought that once you were here that we could start to build a bridge between the past and now. To learn to be father and son again.”

He’d come so close to throwing it all away. To destroying everything his father had worked so hard to build.

“Thank you for telling me. It’s a lot to take in after all this time. I’ve been very angry at you for most of my life.”

“I deserved that. Are you still angry?”

“Yes, but it’s different now—there’s more regret than anger. Frustration, too. I just wish things could have been different.”

“They can be. We can make it so.”

“Yes,” Judd said, squeezing his father’s hand gently. “Yes, Dad. We can.”

By the time Judd joined Anna downstairs she felt as if she had herself back under control, externally at least. He’d been with his father for quite a while longer than she’d expected.

“What did you think?” she asked as they walked back to the car.

“He’s a tough old bird. I reckon he’ll be around for a few more years yet.”

“Did the nurse say anything to you about when he could go home? Supposing he has a home to go to, of course.”

Darn, she could probably have handled that better, she thought. But it was too late now. The words hung between them like an invisible challenge.

“What makes you think he doesn’t?”

She looked at him in disbelief. “You’re kidding me, right? Cynthia and Charles under one roof? She’ll never allow it.”

“What she will and won’t allow isn’t an issue,” Judd said firmly as they reached the car.

“She seems to believe it is.”

“Well, there’s a lot that people believe at the moment. Not all of it is true,” he said.