Passion on Park Avenue (Central Park Pact #1)(73)

“Claire and Audrey are here?” Naomi asked, feeling a little guilty that her heart sank that Deena hadn’t mentioned Oliver.

Deena nodded. “They’ll be back any minute. It was their turn for a Starbucks run, and I hope they got my order right. What’s the point of a Frappuccino if there’s no extra whip?”

“Deena,” Naomi asked softly. “Have you seen a guy here? A—”

She was interrupted by a knock on the door as a woman in aqua scrubs walked in without waiting for a response. “Hi, Naomi, I’m Dr. Estrada. Rumor has it you got quite the bump on the noggin.”

Yay, one of those doctors.

Deena squeezed her hand in reassurance and then backed out of the room so Naomi could speak with the doctor in private.

Dr. Estrada checked something on the IV, jotted something on her clipboard, and then pulled a small flashlight out of her pocket.

Several annoying minutes later, after having the light shone in her eyes and being instructed to follow the finger and do basic math and describe her pain level on a scale of one to ten, the doctor announced that she wasn’t showing any signs of a concussion, but that they wanted to do a CT scan to be sure.

“When can I leave?” Naomi asked.

Dr. Estrada gave an impersonal smile as she scribbled on her clipboard. “Depends what that CT scan says. I’ll have someone in shortly. You need anything?”

An escape route. Oliver. Answers.

“No, I’m good.”

Dr. Estrada nodded and left. There was another knock, and Naomi resisted the urge to tell whoever it was to go away so she could think for a minute, but her protest died when she saw who it was.

“Oliver.”

She smiled, but he didn’t smile back. In fact, he looked . . . different. Not just because of the jeans and sweater in lieu of the usual suit, but he looked . . . cold. Removed.

“Oliver, I’m so sorry,” she said, trying to sit up. “Walter—is he?”

Oliver gently pushed her back to the pillows, though it was an impersonal, don’t-do-that sort of touch, not a lingering touch of a loved one.

“He’s fine. I found him at the Central Park dog park.”

“Oh, good,” she said, a little confused by the anger in his tone. “He does love that place.”

Oliver didn’t nod in acknowledgment. Didn’t smile. It was like dealing with a robot.

“Do you remember what happened?” he asked, crossing his arms.

Naomi hesitated. How did you tell someone that you were in a hospital bed because their sick father had gotten violent?

“Not exactly. He got mad, and pushed—hit? I’m not sure.”

Oliver sighed and his arms dropped. “I figured it was something like that. Walter couldn’t tell us anything, but—I apologize.”

“You apologize,” she said, mimicking his frosty tone. “It wasn’t your fault. It wasn’t even Walter’s fault, he didn’t know—”

“No, it was his fault,” Oliver interrupted. “And mine, I suppose, for not recognizing sooner that someone of his size, in his condition, needed more than home care.”

“What do you mean?” She searched his face, trying to read him.

He swallowed, the motion so awkward and strained that she heard it.

“I dropped him off at a facility this morning.”

“Oliver,” she said, reaching for his hand.

He didn’t reach back. “It’s up near Westchester. A little further than some of the places in the city, but it’s nicer. More outdoor space. He didn’t—” He swallowed again. “He didn’t seem to hate it.”

“You didn’t have to do that just because of this—it was a onetime thing—”

“No, it was a first-time thing,” he said quietly. “I’ve known for a while it would come to this. Sooner than I thought, but . . . it’s better this way.”

“No, it’s not. You’re obviously upset, you—”

“I came here as soon as I found my dad,” Oliver interrupted. “And my neighbor Ruth was with you the entire time up until then.”

“Oh. Okay. Thank you—”

“They couldn’t get ahold of your emergency contact. I was the first one here, before your assistant or your friends. They asked if I knew how to get in touch with her.”

“With who?” she asked, her head pounding harder, knowing she was missing something but too disoriented to figure out what.

“The name on your emergency contact. Your mother.”

“Oh,” Naomi said, wincing. “I guess I never updated . . .”

She went still, her hand falling away from where it had been exploring the bandage on the side of her head.

Her mother. Oliver had heard her mother’s name . . .

“Danica Fields,” he said, his voice cold. “I knew that I knew it as soon as I heard it, but it took me a while to place it. Took a while for the memories of my mother spitting that name like it was an epithet to come screaming back.”

Naomi closed her eyes. “Oliver.”

“I had no idea you were that Naomi, but you knew I was that Oliver, didn’t you? Carrots?”

His use of her childhood nickname might have made her smile in other circumstances, but not now. Now she was merely the Carrots to his Ollie, and he hated her every bit as much now as he had back then.