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She nodded.
I moved to the door.
I didn’t move through it, turning back when Melly called my name.
“I knew it wouldn’t last,” she said.
“What?” I asked, tensing for more information about Guillaume, Colette and Estelle.
“Remy’s and your breakup.”
A gust of air escaped my lips.
“You’re his life,” she went on. “I worried for him a lot. So did his dad, even Mrs. Gastineau. He can breathe without you, but he can’t breathe without you. Do you know what I mean?”
I nodded, having trouble breathing myself.
“You feel the same way,” she said. “So we all worried about you too, I think, even Mrs. Gastineau.”
“It’s been hell,” I replied softly.
“I’m so happy it’s over.”
“Me too, honey,” I said with feeling. “Me too.”
“Yves will want the biscuits,” she declared.
She knew us so well.
Part of the family.
“I’ll make sure there’s plenty left for Sabre and Remy too. And a waffle. For Manon,” she finished.
Yes.
Perfect.
I smiled at her.
Part of the family.
CHAPTER 26
Soit Dit en Passant
Remy
When he drove into the back drive of the graceful, oppressively beautiful mansion that was his childhood home and stopped, having given the kids the plan while the staff were assessing his father at the hospital, Remy had barely put the car into park before both Manon and Sah peeled out.
Remy turned immediately to his father in the passenger seat.
“Hang on a second, Dad,” he said.
Guillaume had his hand on the door handle ready to step out, but he twisted to Remy, still holding the ice pack they gave him at the hospital on his face. No broken bones, which with that orb and at his age was a miracle. But they told him to keep that pack on as long as he could take it.
And apparently, his father had developed a high threshold for pain, because it had to be cold as fuck, but he hadn’t stopped icing it since he sat in the kitchen with Manon.
Remy felt his lips thin.
Guillaume looked to the back of the Denali, noticed the kids were long gone, and his eyes darted to Remy.
“Son—”
“I’d like to ask Sah to bunk with Yves for the rest of our trip. Wyn and I’ll move into my old room. And we’ll move you into the guest suite.”
Guillaume took the pack from his face and turned fully to his son.
“Remy, please—”
“I’m not telling you to do that, I’m asking you to think on it. And when I say that, I mean please consider it.”
“Your mother and I have been together for a very long time, fiston,” Guillaume said quietly.
“She’s not too old, or too sick, to learn there are consequences to her actions,” Remy replied.
A warmth swept into his father’s face, along with a sadness, and Remy’s stomach plummeted.
“It is who we are, Remy,” Guillaume whispered.
“By protecting her, she took you from me,” Remy announced.
Guillaume’s body ticked.
“I want you back,” Remy decreed.
Wet hit is father’s eyes, sparkling there, and that was when Remy’s throat closed.
He had to clear it before he went on, “We’ll move her to Phoenix. We’ll look after her. We’ll make sure she has company. Is comfortable. She won’t be alone at her end, I promise you that, Dad. I vow that to you. You can come visit. You can be with her when her time draws near. In the meantime, you find happiness in your life. And I want to meet Estelle again before we leave. I want Wyn to meet her. If she’s up to it, the kids. And I want us seeing each other more. I want my children to get to know their grandfather. Their real grandfather. Not who you had to be because of the way she is.”
It took a second and some clearing of his own throat before Guillaume responded.
“You must know that, although these things you say are most beautiful, I cannot abandon your mother this way. Not now.”
“And I can’t leave you to what’s happening in that house,” Remy retorted.
“Today was bad. She’s distraught. Not herself. She’s dying, Remy.”
“It’s a goddamn miracle she didn’t do worse damage, Dad,” Remy shot back. “I threw that sphere at a bird bath and the concrete broke apart. If she’d hit you two inches up, caught you on your temple…”
He couldn’t finish.
“As I said, today was bad, Remy. I’m usually far more careful so she can’t do such damage.”
Wrong thing to say.
And Remy communicated that in the only way he could, considering he was so angry he wasn’t able to speak, so he growled.
“Son, I’ll be fine,” Guillaume assured.
“I’m not leaving you to that,” Remy repeated.
His dad shook his head. “You have to go back to your life. Reuniting it with your wife. Your concern touches me, fiston, but the dramatics of this are not the norm. I will be fine. She will be fine. It all will be fine.”
“Then we’re coming back far more often.”
