Indivisible Line (34 page)

Sarah decided to come clean. If her father wanted to hear about it, she’d tell him. Who was she fooling, anyway? Greg wasn’t there because there wasn’t anything for him in their tiny town. His rich blood wouldn’t last a day here, away from all the comforts money could buy.

“Greg was shot by his wife’s—” Sarah floundered and tried again. “He’s going through a divorce. His wife’s lover was the man who shot him here. This same man shot Greg again in New York, and he was in the hospital when Lily called for me to come home.”

Sarah watched her father’s reaction, knowing he’d have something to say about it. Ahila’s face turned grim, and he stared straight ahead. Sarah held her breath.

“It sounds to me like your friend got the short end of the stick.”
 

His reflective tone gave her the courage to bare her soul even further.

“I haven’t heard from him since I left. His father is very prejudiced and was angry that I was involved with his son. I’m beginning to think his influence changed Greg’s mind.” She shook her head. As much as Greg had given her no reason to doubt him, the lack of recent communication began to tear apart her belief in his words.

Ahila watched her with those keen, intelligent eyes. Deep in her bones, she believed he could read her mind. “Don’t let anyone lead you to believe that you’re less than they are. If this Greg is worthy of you, he’d be here if he were able.”

She had no reason not to trust her father’s advice, but her insecurity clouded her judgment. Everything pointed to Greg having realized that he was better off without her.
 

When she didn’t answer, her father continued. “I can’t believe you left his bedside to be with me.” He sounded surprised, and Sarah stared at him.

“Why wouldn’t I come back for you? You needed me.”

“And so does Greg. Remember, Dotson’Sa said that we leave our nest to be with our beloved. Our allegiance changes, and this applies to our priorities, too. I can’t say this often enough, but I’m glad you’re here, because it gave me the opportunity to fix my mistakes. I get a chance to tell you how wrong I’ve been about many things.”

“But, Papa—”

He raised his hand to stop her from talking. “Hear me out first. I was mistaken to force you into an arranged marriage, which I now realize was doomed from the start. Trimble and I had a long talk after you left, and he told me about his feelings for Lily. At first, I refused to accept his sentiments, but after I thought about it, I saw that I haven’t been fair to you and Trimble. After the heart attack, I called him and released him from the arrangement.”

Ahila rested his head against the cushion of the chair and glanced upward. “I also stepped down as the tribe’s chief and handed the reins to Trimble. As they say, ‘out with the old and in with the new.’ ” He laughed and rubbed his hand across his face.

Sarah hadn’t realized she had been holding her breath until she blew it out in a relieved sigh. Giving her father a wistful smile, she wondered why she still didn’t feel happy. She had been accepted back into the tribe, and her marriage betrothal had been dissolved. Why did she feel no sense of victory?

“Papa, are you sure this is what’s best for all of us?”

“Trimble is a good man. I’m sure he is capable of leading our tribe in a new direction. I trust him to make the best decisions for our people.”

Words escaped her while she stared at her father. The realization hit her that Ahila had been giving up, giving in, and getting ready to accept his eventual fate.
Dotson’Sa, please give me more time with him. He’s all I’ve got.
Out of nowhere, tears came in a furious rush, and before she knew it, she was crying in her father’s arms again. She wept for the too-short time she had with him, as well as for the loss of the one man she’d ever loved other than her father.

“Shh . . . don’t cry, my precious child. This is all for the best. I’m happy for this opportunity to hold you again. And I’m thankful for the chance to ask for forgiveness and make peace with you.”

“I love you, Papa.” Sarah burrowed her face in his neck.

He rubbed her back in slow, gentle strokes, and she knew that she meant more to him than anything. “I love you, Sarah. Don’t ever forget that,” he murmured in a soft voice.

As the weeks passed by, Sarah spent most of her time with her father, watching him with close attention that drove him up the wall. She dreaded losing him, and she often found herself checking on him every few minutes to make sure he was breathing.

Many times, Ahila forced her out of the house to check out the new hospital, which would soon be ready for its grand opening. One ordinary day, Sarah wandered around the building, waving to several people she recognized and stopping for an occasional, short conversation before resuming her survey.

She walked the corridors with their new, painted walls and tiled surfaces, and she smiled to herself. This was what their small town needed—a hospital geared to serve the increasing needs of the people.

The structure was small in comparison to the bigger cities’ trauma hospitals, but it came complete with a triage desk, brand-new computers, an in-house lab, and an emergency room, as well as several in-patient rooms. It was a far cry from the little clinic it would be replacing.

When she reached the end of the long hallway, the automatic double doors opened, leading her to the trauma section. She gasped at the small but prominent sign, which read SARAH JONES—TRAUMA DEPARTMENT.

Her breath hitched, and her throat closed against her tears. Cupping her mouth to hold in her cry, she rested her head on the wall that bore her name. Greg, she thought, couldn’t have given her a better gift. If she could have him, as well, her life would be complete.

But she couldn’t have her cake and eat it, too.

With heavy footsteps, she continued to wander around the building. Sarah walked out of the hospital and covered the quarter mile to Lily’s house. There, she not only found her best friend but Trimble, as well.

As soon as Lily spotted her at the door, she squealed so loudly that Sarah’s ear drums almost shattered. They hugged and jumped up and down, to Trimble’s amusement. After greetings were exchanged, Lily pulled Sarah toward the kitchen, leaving Trimble to his own devices. The scent of
Dinjik
wafted throughout the room, and Sarah closed her eyes and inhaled deeply, taking in the aroma of one of her favorite dishes.
Dinjik
was the local name for the moose, a popular fare in Gwich’in gatherings. Lily planted her on a chair and rushed to check the pot on the stove.

“Why are you visiting me just now?” Lily’s tone, though accusing, made Sarah smile in understanding.

Sighing, she stood and walked over to her friend. “I’m spending as much time with my father as I can.”

Lily replaced the pot cover and turned to look at Sarah with sympathetic eyes. She nodded. “I understand. I figured you needed every minute you could have with him.”

“I hate it, Lily. It’s like watching a ticking time bomb, waiting for the inevitable explosion. Thing is, I can force him to go for the surgery because it’s what I think is best for him . . . but that just takes us back to the issue of making a decision for another person, regardless of their feelings.” Ahila had expressed his wishes, and no matter how wrong she believed his choice to be, she must respect it.

Lily pulled her down onto a chair. She took Sarah’s hands in hers and squeezed them. “Your father is at peace with himself now that you have returned.”

Sarah nodded. He’d found his peace, but here she was, still tied in a tight knot of worry and filled with fear about his health, her future, and life in general.

The following weeks rushed by with the same crush of activities. These preoccupations gave Sarah a shallow respite from her fears. There hadn’t been a call from Greg. After a month of waiting, Sarah had shut off her cell phone for good. With a terrible ache in her heart, she went through her new routine of watching and spending time with her father. She tried to forget Greg, banning all thoughts of him from her mind.

Sarah often caught her father watching her in silence or glancing in her direction with a worried expression during their short walks around the neighborhood. She’d hold his hand, and he kept her close with his arm around her shoulder. Even if her longing for Greg still filled her with emptiness, she cherished this time with her father.

Ahila hadn’t brought up Greg again, and she was thankful for his sensitivity. She’d called Columbia, and they had granted her a leave of absence for two months before they would have to give her spot to another student on the waiting list. Thankful for their understanding, Sarah realized there was no way she’d ever get back to New York anyway. Aside from her duties in her father’s home, funds were also a concern. The decision to ask for extra time from the university had more to do with her hope that she and Greg could be together again.

It had been a delaying tactic on her part—her way to end the beautiful and unforgettable chapter of her life on her own terms.

The more time passed without word from Greg, the more Sarah believed that everything that had happened between them had been a dream. Maybe it had been a nightmare instead, considering the pain each memory of him gave her.

Snap out of it, Sarah!
her small, inner voice scolded with authority. Saying was easier than doing it, though. She knew that from experience. No matter how often she reminded herself to move on, each step forward proved difficult. Leaving behind the good memories she’d shared with Greg was just as painful as the spear of longing that had been lodged in her heart since the day she’d left him.

Chapter 24
 

Greg’s life for the minutes, hours, days, and weeks that followed Sarah’s departure from the hospital had been hell on earth. When he thought he’d hit rock bottom, more problems came his way.
 

When Sarah left his hospital room, his life had turned into a nightmare—except he had been awake through it all.
 

“I’m not putting up with your attitude anymore!” Greg Jr. shouted at the top of his lungs before he pushed Greg onto the floor, without considering his injury or that his mother was trying to support his weight. When they fell to the ground, Greg screamed one obscenity after another at the hellish pain that radiated everywhere. “You bastard.” Greg lashed out, his voice dripping with hatred. “Get out of my room.”

“Stop fighting!” Chelsea cried. They continued their tirade as if she didn’t speak.

“You’re calling
me
a bastard? Haven’t you looked in the mirror and wondered why you and I bear no resemblance to each other?”

“What the hell are you talking about?” With of the little energy he had left, Greg crawled to his mother and held her in his arms.
 

“Your whore of a mother had an affair with a loser and came home pregnant with you. That makes you a bastard in the fullest definition of the word, don’t you think?”

Greg glanced at his mother and saw the answer in her eyes. “It’s true,” she said in a small voice.
 

The shocking disclosure was like a falling domino, setting off a chain reaction that toppled the rest in succession. With startling clarity, Greg found the answers to the questions that had haunted him all his life. He wasn’t his father’s son. No wonder love had been hard to come by. His father couldn’t find it in his heart to forgive his wife for her indiscretion, but he’d loved her enough to give her bastard son a name.