Fake Empire(96)

I throw the covers back. “Let’s go.”





CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE





SCARLETT





Less than twenty-four hours after leaving and days before I was supposed to return, I end up back in New York. I’m sleep-deprived and stressed, to the point the watercolor print I’m staring at has turned into a meaningless blur of pastel. I wonder who decorates hospital waiting rooms. Who gets to choose the framed artwork you’ll stare at and the color of the chairs you’ll sit in during the worst hours of your life?

The trip back to New York was a blur. I watched it unfold like a movie, not as a participant. And I was able to because Crew handled everything. Our luggage, his family, chartering the flight back, the car waiting at the airport to bring us to New York General in record time. I found out my father was in surgery while I was thousands of miles away. Now I’m in the same building, and he’s still cut open on an operating table.

I’m exhausted, but this plastic chair is too uncomfortable to fall asleep in. My mother is sitting next to me, pale and silent. The only reaction I’ve gotten out of her since I arrived was when she saw Crew came back with me. She was surprised. My parents’ marriage doesn’t show up during the best of times. Seeing mine do so in the worst of them was clearly a shock.

It didn’t even occur to me to fight Crew on coming back with me, but her stunned expression made me think I should have. Made me realize how much I rely upon him now. If he hadn’t been next to me when my mother called, he would have been the first person I told about my father’s heart attack.

My relationship with my father is complicated. It always has been. He wanted a son, not a daughter. A dutiful child, not the rebel I turned into. I love him, but it’s mostly an obligatory sort of affection. I resent him for how he treats my mother—how he treats me. For being embarrassed by my ambition instead of encouraging it. If I’d refused to marry a Kensington, I’m not sure we’d still have any sort of relationship.

He might die. I’m no doctor, but the fact the surgery is taking so long doesn’t seem like a good sign. And if he dies, he’ll never meet my child. My motivations for not telling my parents about the pregnancy are mostly petty. I wanted my father to see this baby as a grandchild, not an heir. He would have been thrilled to hear his bloodline is continuing. Now he may never know.

My mother keeps checking her watch. It’s annoying, the small motion that catches my attention every time she does it. But I don’t ask her to stop; I don’t have a better way to distract her. The only way I can think of is blurting news that shouldn’t be delivered in a somber, impersonal waiting room while she’s waiting to learn if she’s a widow.

I wish Crew was still here. He went to take Teddy and our luggage back to the penthouse.

A man wearing a set of scrubs appears in the open doorway and heads our way. We both stand in tandem as he approaches. “Mrs. Ellsworth?”

“Yes,” my mother replies. Her voice is tight and tense, pulled taut.

The surgeon looks to me. “Are you a relative?”

“I’m his daughter.”

He nods. “Well, I’m pleased to report Hanson pulled through the surgery. He’s got a long road of recovery ahead, but there’s no reason to think he won’t make a complete one. He’s lucky the ambulance arrived so quickly and we were able to get him in the OR immediately. He’s being transferred to recovery right now. I’ll have a nurse let you know when you can see him. All right?”

My mother’s sigh of relief is audible. “Thank you so much, doctor.”

The man smiles before he leaves. My mother sinks back down into her seat. She was cagey on the phone—and when I arrived—on details about what exactly happened. The surgeon’s comments—about details my mother didn’t already know—clarifies things some. She wasn’t there when he had the heart attack.

“He was with another woman, wasn’t he? She’s the one who made sure the ambulance arrived so quickly?”

My mother holds my gaze. Doesn’t look away or fiddle with anything or make excuses. “Yes.”

I sigh. Shake my head. “Why do you stay with him, Mom? Why do you put up with it?”

“It’s how things are, Scarlett. You know that.”

“But it’s not how they have to be. Dad isn’t worth it. Let him go.”

“And do what?”

Get a life sounds too harsh. “I don’t know… Be happy?” I hear a younger Scarlett in the suggestion. One less jaded. One who believed in happy endings.

She laughs. “Oh, sweetheart. This life is what makes me happy. Being

Josephine Ellsworth is who I want to be. Your father is far from perfect, but he’s a good man. I knew exactly what we’d be when I met him for the first time. Everything that we would never be. I made my peace with it before we got married.”

“What do you mean?”

“We wanted the same things. He needed a wife. I wanted a husband. Our fathers agreed, and that was that.”

“I’m aware how an arranged marriage works,” I say, tone dry. She used to tell me their marriage hadn’t been arranged, that they were in love, and it was just another lie. Part of the perfect family façade to try on when it suited. I pretend I don’t care. “I’m in one, remember?”