Road to Recovery (22 page)

Walking down the hall to her office, he
heard her on the phone and paused outside her door, not wanting to
interrupt. He tried not to think of it as eavesdropping. But when
he heard her say her brother’s name, he held on to the hope that he
could get a clue as to what was really going on with
her.

***

“
I’m doing good, Mac. There
was no need for you to call me in the middle of the day. I know
you’re busy,” she scolded him.

“
It’s been almost a week
since we last talked. I miss my baby sister.” He laughed into the
phone.

She rolled her eyes, returned his
laugh. “Who are you kidding? You wanted to check up on me. Admit
it.”

He sighed guiltily. “So what’s wrong
with that? In all seriousness, Brooke, I know what today is. I
needed to hear from you directly. I needed to know how you were
handling it.”

“
I’m handling it. I’ve had a
few moments the last couple of days. I’ve been trying to forget
about it, and I was doing a good job of it. But the closer today
got, the harder it became.”

She paused for a moment and swallowed
the lump in her throat. “On the bright side, the doctors told me in
one year I would be good as new, and they were right. I actually
think I’m better than before. So that’s a plus, right?” she asked
lightly.

Mac ignored her question, instead asked
one of his own. “How much does Lucas know about your accident? And
don’t try to put me off. I’ll keep calling you back. And then you
can feel guilty about making all my patients wait while I badger
you.”

“
You’re stubborn, you know
that?” she asked in exasperation.

“
No more than you are. So, I
repeat. How much does Lucas know?”

Laying her head on the back of the
chair and closing her eyes, she took a deep breath. “Not much. The
basics. Just the accident and my injuries, nothing
more.”

Clearly shocked at her answer, he
berated her. “Are you telling me he knows nothing at all about
Robbie? Who he was or that he was in the car with you? You are
playing with fire here and you’re the one that’s going to get
burned. I thought things were getting serious between the two of
you.”

Brooke’s breathing grew heavy, but he
didn’t stop. “You owe it to him to be upfront. And more
importantly, you owe it to yourself,” he added softly.

She knew Mac hated lecturing her. She
got enough of that from their parents. But he always told her there
was a time to be a supportive big brother and a time to be a stern
one. Brooke guessed this was one of those stern times.

Blinking back tears before they could
fall, she composed herself while Mac patiently waited for her to
respond. “I don’t know what to say now. I don’t know how to even
start. I didn’t expect this to happen. It’s all moving so fast. I
could never find the right time or opening, and now it seems like
that time has passed.”

His voice held firm. “Just do it and
get it over with. There will never be a good time, but the longer
you wait, the harder it will be. Brooke, you need to do this to
move on. It will be better for you to get it off your
chest.”

He stopped for a moment. Brooke assumed
he was gathering his thoughts. “You don’t have to tell him
everything. No one knows the whole truth but you. I’m convinced you
haven’t even told me everything. That’s for you to decide, if and
when you tell anyone. But he needs to know what he could easily
read on the Internet.” She inhaled sharply, but he ignored her. “It
will only be worse if he found out that way. It only takes a few
clicks and part of the story is right there for him online. Don’t
you think it would be better if he heard it from you?”

Brooke never thought of all that. Mac
was getting through to her. It scared her, but he was right. “I
didn’t think of it that way.” She sat up straighter in the chair.
“I guess you gave me the push I needed. Tonight would have been
perfect, on the one-year anniversary. What better way to put it all
behind me? Too bad Lucas has a late meeting. Not the best
conversation to have on the phone,” she said as an
afterthought.

Feeling a little bit better, she opened
her eyes and forced a smile. “Mac? Thanks. I’m terrified, but I
know you’re right.”

“
Of course I’m right. I’m
the older brother. Older brothers are always right. And you’re
welcome. I’ll even do one better for you. I’ll hold off Mom because
I know she will be calling you soon. I’ll send her a message that
we spoke and you were unavailable until tomorrow.”

“
Now I really owe you.” A
genuine laugh escaped her mouth.

“
I’ll be collecting soon.
And Brooke? Good luck. I’ll check in on you in a few days.” He hung
up the phone before she could tell him he didn’t need
to.

***

The one-year anniversary of her
accident, Lucas thought to himself. He knew it had been close to a
year, but she never talked about it. And he never wanted to push
her. Maybe he should have. Maybe he should have brought it up. But
she always had it all together. Nothing ever seemed to bother her.
She seemed to have a handle on everything going on around her. He
hated that he took that for granted.

There was one thing to do, really the
only thing he could do at this point. Turning on his heel he walked
back to his office.

“
Hi.” She leaned in for a
quick kiss when he walked through her front door hours later. “Did
you eat? I was getting ready to throw something together for
myself. Your meeting ended earlier than I thought, so I didn’t
expect to see you tonight,” she explained when he followed her into
the kitchen.

She didn’t need to know he bumped the
meeting up an hour so that he could leave at a reasonable time.
“No, not yet. But don’t to go to any trouble. I know it wasn’t
planned. We can order something if you want.”

He pulled her forward and
wrapped his arms around her, placed her head against his heart. His
favorite position, and he continued to hold her quietly for a
minute. Lifting his hand under her chin, he brought her face up to
his and leaned in for a soft kiss, then whispered against her lips.
“I needed to see you tonight.” She leaned into him.
It’s going to be alright
,
he thought to himself. Or so he hoped.

“
I’m glad you’re here,” she
said as she looked up with a quick smile and then snuggled in
closer to his chest.

Seeing the first genuine smile on her
face in days, he realized he’d made the right decision
tonight.

Pulling back from his embrace, she
asked, “If you aren’t too hungry, can we wait a bit and have a
talk?”

He nodded. She led him back into the
living room. Following him to the couch, she chose to sit a bit
farther away and turned to curl one leg under her while she gripped
her hands together in her lap. Finding a comfortable position, this
had to be hard for her.

She looked at him for a moment while he
sat there patiently waiting for her to start. He’d let her take her
time, knew it was important to her.

Brooke took a deep breath and started.
“I don’t know how to say this, or how to begin. I should start by
apologizing.” She ignored his frown. “I was talking to Mac earlier,
and he made me realize there are things I should have told you
before now. Things you should have known. My only excuse is I
wanted to forget about them—and that I was afraid. Afraid to talk
about them. It’s not easy. Much easier to forget any of it happened
at all.”

He reached over, laid his hand on top
of hers, much like he did weeks ago during another one of her
difficult conversations. He tried to comfort her, as he always did
when she needed it. Right there for her, like he always wanted to
be.

Threading her fingers through his, she
laid her head back and shut her eyes. It seemed the only way she
could say what needed to be said. As if she needed to feel she was
alone, so speaking out loud somehow seemed easier. He didn’t care
how she did it, as long as she talked to him.

“
One year ago today I was in
a car accident. You know that much. What you don’t know is that I
was a passenger in the car. There was someone else driving that
night.” Even though her head was still resting on the back of the
couch, she opened her eyes and turned to look into his. “He didn’t
survive.”

A ton of questions raced through his
mind. So many things he wanted to ask, but he held his
tongue.

“
His name was Robbie. We had
been dating for about a year at that point. We worked together.
Actually you could say I worked for him. His parents own the firm I
worked for. He was being groomed to take it over. But that never
happened. I walked away, barely, but he didn’t walk away at
all.”

Of all the things Lucas
thought she would tell him, that wasn’t it. He was fighting every
urge to not be angry right now. She’d had plenty of time to tell
him about Robbie, plenty of time to mention his name in some form.
But all she ever said in the beginning was that she had gotten out
of a relationship. Having that person die wasn’t
getting out
of a
relationship.

What happened to her wasn’t her choice.
And he couldn’t help but feel jealous on one hand that she had been
with someone for over a year, and guilty over the happiness he felt
on how it ended, because otherwise he would have never met her if
Robbie hadn’t died. She would belong to someone else and still be
living in Vermont.

There were so many things he wanted to
say and ask, but he needed to tread carefully. He knew she had
struggled with this, but he felt cheated that she had never shared
something that important with him. Something that personal. And as
hard as he tried, he couldn’t keep the hurt out of his voice. “It
never occurred to you to tell me that someone you had been involved
with for a year died in the same accident that could have left you
crippled? Why would you omit that? You never thought that was
important?”

He knew she saw the hurt in his eyes,
but she ignored it as she avoided his glance and looked around the
room. “I didn’t want your pity,” she said. “Like when you found out
about my accident. I told you it’s not something you blurt out.
This is the same thing. I’ve moved on. I’ve made another life for
myself. It’s what I needed to do to move on.”

He watched her face, knew something
more was going on. Knew she was holding something more back. He let
go of her hand and stood up to pace, agitation clear on his face.
“What is it about you and pity? Just because someone feels bad for
you, you assume they pity you. And so what if they do? Brooke, what
happened to you was tragic. But you survived. Some might even say
you thrived.”

He kept pacing and then stopped to look
her in the eye. “You asked me for honesty in the beginning. You
said it was important to you. But you didn’t follow your own rules.
How do you think that makes me feel?” He saw the guilt on her face,
watched her hold her emotions in check and block everything
out.

“
Omission isn’t lying,” she
told him bluntly. Her faced turned red as his eyes narrowed in on
hers.

“
What?” he roared. “Are you
kidding me? You know how stupid that sounds, right? Omission
is
lying. If you know what
you’re omitting is important. If it’s important enough that you
have to hide it, then you know it’s wrong.”

The conversation was going nowhere
fast. He watched the range of emotions race over Brooke’s face,
from shock, to guilt, to embarrassment and now fear. She had never
seen him angry before, but right now he was beyond anger. It was
total disbelief that she could blow off something so important in
her life, hide some that monumental from him.

She shrank back from his words. He
watched the guilt pile on. Saw the tears forming in her eyes. She
took a deep breath and stood up stiffly, moved a few feet from him.
“I’m sorry. I made a judgment call. It was a poor one. I’m trying
to rectify that now. I didn’t mean to lie to you.”

Astonished at how she could shut down
all her emotions, he saw that switch flip off when she stood up,
turning her into the person who always stayed in control, who
always said the right rehearsed words.

“
No, you didn’t mean to lie
to me. But that doesn’t mean you wouldn’t have done it any
different, right?” he asked her, hating that he knew how she would
answer.

“
No. If I went back in time,
I would have most likely done the same thing.”

“
You can’t see it from my
side, can you?” he asked, hurt and disappointment in his eyes, the
anger gone. He hadn’t meant to frighten her.

“
You’re upset I didn’t tell
you the details of my accident. I understand that. I didn’t mean to
hurt you,” she repeated stonily.

“
Is that all you think it
is? That I’m hurt I didn’t know the details of your accident? Well,
you are wrong!” She couldn’t be this naïve. All the anger was
coming back. “I’m hurt that you were in a relationship for over a
year. And knowing you the way I do, that means it was serious. So
you had a serious long-term relationship with someone
else.”