Page 119 of Between Now & Heartbreak

“Making my choice. Breaking the fingers on the trigger. Getting the fuck away fromyou.”

Instead of responding, his eyes move to something over my shoulder. They widen, and his mouth falls open. The surprise there isn’t feigned.

I turn slowly, afraid to see what, after everything else that’s happened tonight, could make him look like that.

I see my father first.

He’s sitting slumped in a chair, his hair disheveled and his face as white as a ghost’s as he looks up at his prodigal son. I haven’t seen Phil since I was fifteen, but I would know the back of that blonde head anywhere.

It’s so like James’ and my father’s.

I walk toward them, and have the strangest sensation of wading through a graveyard.

Phil turns to face me and I am struck with a strange sense of déjà vu. He’d still been a young man when he left. But, he’s grown up and he looks so much like my father. But there is something in the shape of his jaw, the cleft of his chin that reminds me of…someone else.

“Clover?” he says and looks me over from head to toe with wonder in his eyes too, but not for the same reasons as me. “You’re a woman.”

My father surges to his feet and comes to stand between us. His composure is restored, yet I get the distinct feeling that he’s nervous.

I glance at him.

He’s blinking rapidly, his face ashen, and there’s a bead of sweat on his ruthlessly clean shaven upper lip.

No. He’s not nervous.

He’s afraid.

I glance back at Phil and he’s watching him, too. His expression is distinctly satisfied.

“What’s going on?” I demand of both of them.

“Let’s go to my office.” My father commands imperiously.

Phil scoffs in disgust.

“I see nothing has changed. I’m not here to see you. I’m here because my brother has been looking for me.”

“Yourbrother?”My father and I exclaim at the same time.

I move to stand in front of him. I grab his arm and try to say this as gently as I can.

“Phil, James is dead.”I say, horrified that he doesn’t know.

He closes his eyes in anguish but not in surprise.

“I’m not talking about him.”

I take a step away from him.

“What do you mean?”

“Carter Bosh. He’s my biological brother.”

I let go of his arm, stupefied.

Before I can utter a word, my father strides up to Phil, his expression scarily fierce, his voice lowered so that I have to crane to hear him. “That is alie. That woman didn’t have any more children.”

“What woman?” I demand.

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