Finding Our Forever: (A Defining Moments Novel) (4 page)

WHEN MY PHONE
blares the next morning, I roll over, ready to pound the damn thing into the nightstand to get it to shut up, but I smell coffee, and the day before floods into my sleepy mind.

Mom!

I jump up, pull my phone from the charger, and throw on some shorts. I called Cord after I spoke to Sara last night and told him she’d woken up, and we could all be back up there at 7:00 a.m. He said he’d meet us there.

I rush into the living room and find Ben sitting at our breakfast bar with a cup of coffee in one hand and his phone pressed to his ear with the other.

“All right, Cord. We’ll meet you there in a half hour,” he barks into the phone before hanging up and tossing his phone on the bar in frustration. I know Ben is having a hard time dealing with the knowledge that our mom is into another guy. She doesn’t have to tell us. We can see it. I mean, what does he think she should do? Be alone for the rest of her life because our dad is a pansy-ass cheater?

“What’s your problem this morning, sunshine?” I ask him with no humor.

“Don’t screw with me right now! I’m not in the mood,” he yells. Ben doesn’t yell. Something is wrong. He takes a deep breath before he continues. “Apparently, Cord is already at the hospital, and so is Dad. Let’s just say it didn’t go well, and Cord asked if we could meet him at the little coffee place beside the hospital. Said he needed to talk to us about something.”

“How the hell has he already been to the hospital? Visiting hours don’t start until seven,” I respond.

“It’s almost eight. I heard your alarm go off at least five times before you actually got out of bed,” he replies with irritation. I swing my eyes over to the microwave, and sure as hell, it says 7:49 a.m. Shit. “Why didn’t you wake me up?”

“I tried, twice. I was going to leave you here if you weren’t up by eight. Don’t worry, I already called the hospital and talked to the not-very-nice nurse, and she informed me that Mom did great last night, and she’s been awake this morning already and doing fine,” he tells me, a little more gently this time.

I jump up, pour myself a cup of coffee, and rush toward the bathroom to take a quick shower so we can head to meet Cord. I’m not sure why he wants us to meet him there, but it has to be for a good reason. He’s got to know we want to be at the hospital with Mom.

BY THE TIME WE
make it to the coffee shop, I’m nervous as hell because, for some strange reason, the very idea that Cord wants to talk to us away from Mom while she is still in the hospital doesn’t sit well. Something is wrong.

We spot him as soon as we step inside, sitting in the back with his phone pressed to his ear, talking ninety miles an hour. When we approach him, he looks up from his laptop and gives us a tight smile before telling whoever he’s talking to that he’ll call them back.

“Hey, guys, thanks for meeting me here,” he tells us with a very noticeable edge of nervousness.

“What’s going on, Cord? We want to get over to the hospital to see Mom,” Ben mutters with frustration.

“First thing this morning, I made arrangements for Destry to be on the earliest flight out of Boise. He’s already on his way and should be here in about an hour, so I need you guys to pick him up.” Cord pauses and looks at his phone that just chimed with an incoming message. He frowns even harder. “Look, guys, I know this is weird, but I need you to trust me. I saw your mom this morning and she looks good. She’s going to be okay.” He types something into his phone, and I can tell Ben is starting to lose his patience.

“Cord, we just want to go over to the hospital real quick before we go pick Dez up at the airport. We appreciate you getting him here, but you could have just told us that at the hospital,” Ben grinds out.

“That’s not all,” Cord deadpans. “Once you’ve picked up Destry, let’s all meet at your apartment. I’ll make sure your dad comes too. I think it’s probably the safest place for us to all meet.” He pauses, waiting for our reaction.

“Quit skirting around whatever bullshit is going on. Just tell us what the hell is happening!” Ben growls.

“I can’t, but your dad will as soon as you’re all together. I’ll make damn sure of it,” he retorts, anger in his voice. “I know this all seems strange, but I promise you’ll understand as soon as we can all meet. It’s not my place to tell you guys. Your dad needs to tell you himself.”

Cord is dead serious about this. The more he talks about our dad, the angrier he gets.

“We’ll pick him up at the airport, but we’re going over to see Mom before that. We haven’t seen her since she woke up,” I argue with him. I understand there’s a discussion that needs to happen, but we need to see her first.

“I need you guys to trust me. If you go there, she’ll tell you what happened and that’s not fair to her. She needs to rest and take care of herself and not worry about how to tell you guys. As a man, I’m actually pissed for you that he expects your mom to be the one to break it to you,” he responds sternly.

“Why don’t you just tell us, because this waiting bullshit is pissing me off,” Ben barks out.

“It’s not my place to tell you, but I care deeply for your mom, and I want what’s best for her and for you boys. You are her world, and the idea that he is going to leave this to her to explain makes me want to beat the living shit out of him.” He pauses, closes his eyes, and takes a deep breath.

“I just need you guys to trust me. I promise, the moment he tells you, I’ll rush to the hospital with you.”

“Fine. We’ll head to the airport to get Destry and meet you at our apartment,” Ben says firmly.

“Just one more thing before you guys head out.” He pauses, looking at me and Ben before he continues. “I need you to give me your dad’s phone number. I have to talk to him before we all meet.”

Ben smirks a little, as if he thinks this is a good idea, and I know immediately it isn’t. I think Ben still has this unrealistic view of our dad.

“Do you think that’s a good idea?” I ask Cord, trying to figure out what the hell he would need to talk to Dad about.

“Actually, I do,” he replies sternly without hesitation, and this makes the smirk disappear from Ben’s face.

Ben nods stiffly and gives Cord Dad’s number.

“We’ll see you shortly at our apartment. Let’s make it quick, please. We really want to see Mom,” I tell him, before putting my hand on Ben’s shoulder and pushing him gently toward the door. Thankfully, he doesn’t resist.

When we reach the door and I pull it open to leave, I look back and lock eyes with Cord, who has his phone up to his ear again, his jaw set tight.

THE MOMENT DESTRY
steps out of the security gates and his eyes lock on us, I see his hard exterior crumble. He’s been trying to hold it together every time I talk to him, but he’s seventeen years old for Christ’s sake and was 900 miles away while this whole nightmare unfolded. The three of us stand together, arms around each other for several minutes, all of us trying to keep our shit together.

When we pull apart, Destry’s old soul kicks in and he immediately tries to take control of the situation. “So, Cord called me right before I boarded the plane and said we’re all meeting at your apartment to have a discussion with Dad. Someone want to tell me what the hell that’s about?”

“We don’t know either, Dez. Cord just asked us to pick you up and meet him and Dad at our apartment. Dad is supposed to be giving us some answers, to what we have no idea,” Ben gripes.

We get to my truck and head toward our apartment, all of us quiet and trying to internally figure out what the hell this meeting is all about. Once we get there, I immediately see Dad and Cord, each standing beside their own vehicles, not near each other.

When I’m parked, Dad cautiously lumbers over to us and hugs Destry tight, giving both Ben and I the typical head nod.

“Well, I guess we should get this over with, huh?” Dad asks with a trembling voice. He never even looks at Cord as we make our way up to the apartment.

Inside, we take seats in the living room/breakfast bar area, and then it’s too quiet.

“All right, we’re all here. Someone tell us what the hell is going on so we can go see Mom,” I blurt out.

Cord looks at my Dad, who has his head in his hands with his elbows resting on his knees. That was the same position he was sitting in while in the waiting room when he was breaking down while Mom was in surgery.

“Justin, tell them,” Cord sneers.

Dad shoots to standing and stomps toward Cord, pointing in his face. “They are
my
kids, Cord, not yours! I will tell them, but this doesn’t concern you and you need to leave.”

Destry takes a step toward Dad, putting his hand on the arm connected to the finger in Cord’s face. When Dad takes a step back, Destry shocks us all when he replies, “Well, we want him here, seeing as how he is the one who orchestrated this whole meeting. It obviously means something to him.”

“Let’s hear it, Dad. What could be so important that you two have us away from the hospital? Away from Mom!” Ben bellows.

Dad sits back down, takes a deep breath, and begins to speak. Over the course of the next few hours, we listen as our father explains to us that he’s been having affairs since just a few years after they were married. He sobs, he gets angry, and he apologizes. According to him, once Mom started treating him like one of her kids, he basically checked out of their relationship and started looking for excitement elsewhere. Most of the affairs were with women he met through his work, but not all. He lays it all out for us, and I watch as Ben’s face goes from crushed, to pissed, to a level of angry I’ve never seen my twin show. Several times, Ben holds up his hand to stop the conversation and storms outside, slamming the door so hard that I’m afraid someone will call the cops. Ben returns, his face red with anger, and Dad continues.

I’m actually surprised he’s being so honest. He admits that the affairs made him feel young and important, something he didn’t feel in his own home. Then he tells us about going to a therapist who diagnosed him with a sex addiction. When he says those words, I actually can’t help but laugh out loud. He glares at me, but I can’t help it. He’s using an addiction to get out of the shitty things he did to our mother. It’s completely laughable, and I immediately realize I have zero respect left for this man. Yes, he will always be my father, but I will never look at him the same. Ever.

After hours of discussions, fights, and even a moment where Ben gets in his face—surprise, surprise—and basically calls him a pussy, we finally decide we are doing nothing more than beating a dead horse. We’ve all been over the details, and then some, of what he’d done.

When Ben tries to stop the conversation so we can get to the hospital to see Mom, our pathetic father has to throw one more log on the fire.

“Look, guys, there is one more confession I need to make,” he says gently, like he’s preparing us for a surprise. I don’t think anything he says could surprise us after that shitshow.

I look at Ben and Destry, both of whom have their full attention on our father’s face, and wait for the bomb he is about to drop. If he waited until the end to tell us whatever this is, it must be bad.

“Yesterday, your mom was out shopping. She ran into my secretary, Ashley, and they had some sort of discussion about my affair with her. Your mom ran out of the store, obviously upset,” he says, his voice trailing off.

“You motherfucker!” Ben roars as he lunges for him. “You did this! She’s in the hospital because of you, isn’t she?” Ben’s fist connects with Dad’s ribs before I can get to him, and Dad crumbles, immediately curling into himself. Destry and I wrestle Ben to the ground, not giving two shits about how that punch affected our dad.

“I will never forgive you for this! Do you hear me? You did this! She could’ve died because you couldn’t keep it in your pants! I hate you!” Ben screams at the top of his lungs as Destry and I hold him down.

Dad eventually rights himself, apologizes, and then scurries out of our apartment before we let Ben up. His face is contorted in the deepest pain I’ve ever seen, and I’m afraid he’s going to have a heart attack his heart is beating so fast. Destry stands and backs away from us, moving over to stand beside Cord.