Frayed (Connections, #4)(70)

“Daddy, Daddy, I did it,” he says as he comes to a stop next to me.

I look down at his flushed face and brush his blond hair from his eyes. “What did you do, champ?”

“I roared. I roared,” he says with a gleam in his eye.

With a huge grin on my face, I bend down to pick him up. “You scored, little lion, you scored.”

The little boy’s laughter morphs into mine. His eyes look just like mine. His voice sounds like mine. Then all of a sudden, I become my father and the little boy becomes me.

Fuck, I wake up with sweat pouring from my brow. I look out into the ocean in an attempt to calm down. I couldn’t sleep, so I moved out to the deck early this morning to listen to the sound of the water crashing against the rocks.

“Ben?” a voice calls from somewhere below me.

My head thunders in pain as I quickly sit up in the lounge chair and look into the sky, assessing the time. The sun is overhead. Looks to be around noon.

“Ben?” the voice says again.

“Up here, Serena.”

I can hear the thumping of her sneakers against the weathered wood of the stairs and I see her dirty blond hair, much shorter than the last time I saw her, blowing in the wind. “Are you ignoring my calls?” she asks, taking the last step.

I shade my eyes with my hand. “No, I just have a lot going on. You cut your hair?”

She looks down at me in the lounge chair. “Yes, I did, and don’t change the subject. Do the words let’s have lunch tomorrow ring a bell?”

I throw my head back against the chaise. “Sorry.” I grimace. “Your hair looks nice.”

She kicks my leg off the lounge. “Thanks. Now come on, let’s go for a walk.”

I stare at her a beat, but don’t move. “Could you turn the volume down a notch?”

Her eyes widen in disbelief. “Are you hungover?”

I slowly sit back up, still squinting to see her through the brightness of the sun. My head feels as if someone is pounding a hammer right in the middle of it. “Yeah.”

“Get up. I’m not leaving until you talk to me.” There’s an angry edge to her voice.

I shake my head and another crack of thunder explodes inside it.

She stretches out her hand with disappointment more than evident on her face. “Come on.”

“Let me brush my teeth first at least.”

She crosses to the glass doors. “I’ll make us a cup of coffee.”

“Thanks.” I grimace as I stand.

Water gushes from the faucet as I try to scrub last’s night drunken encounter from my mouth. I hop in the shower, hoping that will make me feel better. When I head to the kitchen the smell of freshly brewed coffee assaults me, turning my stomach. I’ll pass on a cup this morning.

My sister rinses her empty cup and places it in the sink. She turns around. “Are you drinking again?”

“No, not really. I needed a release, so I went out last night.”

Her eyes glisten with tears.

“Serena, I’m doing okay. I’m not going down that road again. I promise.”

“I hope not,” she says, handing me a coffee and heading for the door.

I take a gulp and follow her. The heat burns my tongue and I leave the cup on the deck, taking two steps at a time to catch up with her. We walk the beach for a long while without conversation until she turns to look at me.

She finally breaks the silence. “I went to the cemetery yesterday and saw the seashells you put on Mom’s gravestone.” I glance over at her. “Yeah, I’ve been thinking about her a lot lately.”

She takes a deep breath and inhales the fresh sea air. “Me too.”

“I’m sure she must miss the beach.”

She nods.

I stare out into the distance and catch sight of a sailboat going by. I point to it. “Do you ever wonder what life would be like if you could go back and change things?”

She bends down in the sand to pick up a seashell. “No, I don’t. There’s no sense in doing that.”

“Sometimes I do. I think it’s the littlest things that could make the biggest changes.”

She makes a face of contemplation but doesn’t answer. We walk for a bit and then I decide to just tell her. “I started seeing S’belle while you were gone,” I blurt out.

She stops to pick up another shell and when she rises she hands it to me. “That doesn’t surprise me.”

Brushing the sand from it, I examine its beauty and think about its uniqueness. No two seashells are ever the same. I look at my sister. “She told me something yesterday that caught me completely off guard.”

“Would you like to tell me what it was?”

I’ve gone over in my mind who must know about the baby. I’m guessing S’belle’s family and more than likely Dahlia. What I’m not certain about is if Dahlia would have told Serena. I turn toward her. “Did you know about the baby?”

Her eyes widen. A look of shock crosses her face. “Do I know about what baby?”

I toss the shell I’m holding into the ocean and watch it hit the water.

She grabs my arms. “What are you talking about, Ben?”

I feel my throat tightening. “My baby.”

She stares in disbelief, her mouth open. “Your—your ba-a-b-b-by?” she stutters.