Page 47 of Natalie's Nighthawk

Natalie sat between Graham and his mother. The fathers had the heads of the table. Maddie was across from Natalie between David and Debra.Sorry,Maddie. Graham was currently telling Mary about the day that Natalie had asked for his help in searching for the O’Donnoll kids. She was hanging on every word, fascinated with the story of the two of them reuniting after all these years.

“So, you just walked into his office,” Mary was clarifying, “And as soon as my boys saw you, they agreed to help you immediately?”

“Yup,” Natalie grinned at Mary. “I only had to say the words ‘missing kids’, and the two of them were printing out maps and grabbing supplies.”

“That’s my boys,” Tim said, obviously very proud of all his sons had accomplished.

This conversation seemed to pique William’s interest. He began to ask all kinds of questions about the Nighthawks and their SAR missions. Graham went into great detail to describe the intricacies of a rescue.

“Each rescue is unique.” Graham was telling William. “We never know what we are going to face when we get there. That’s why we train so hard.”

“You’re the group who saved that actor a while back!” William excitedly remarked. “What was his name?’

“Marcus Rayne,” Maddie supplied.

“That’s right. Wasn’t he trapped on some sort of cliff or something? How did you get him down?”

“We had to climb down to him,” Graham began to explain.

William’s eyes went wide. “You mean like mountain climbing. That stuff people do with just the tips of their fingers and their toes?”

Graham smiled at the description and nodded his head. William was in awe.

Debra finally chimed in to the conversation, her tone icy. “That sounds awfully dangerous.”

“That’s why we train. David and I built several climbing walls at Nighthawk to keep our skills current. And of course, we train our clients on the walls as well.”

“Your lifestyle doesn’t sound very steady,” Debra said baldly. “You do dangerous work. Gone all the time on these so-called missions. How could you ever provide a steady future for anybody? For my daughter?”

“Mother!” Natalie gasped. How could she say something so rude? Natalie was outraged. She could feel her face flushing as her anger built.

But Debra wasn’t finished. “Don’t get me wrong, Graham, what you do is,” she paused, “nice.”Nice? Everybody stared at Debra in shock. Natalie wanted to crawl in a hole. Or better yet, push her mother into that hole to shut her up.

Maddie was outraged as well. “Nice? Do you even understand what they do?”

“I understand perfectly,” Debra replied in that ‘don’t sass me” tone. “I just don’t thinkmydaughters should be subjected to that type of … lifestyle.” Natalie hadn’t any idea that her mother still had the power to hurt her, she’d thought that had died out years ago, but she was wrong. Debra wasn’t finished though, as she asked the one question they had avoided for four and a half years. “Whatever happened to that other man you were dating, Natalie? The lawyer?”

Everybody around the table was quiet. Equally incensed at her outrageous opinions and confused by her current line of interrogation. “Umm …” Natalie stammered. “We broke up. A long time ago.” Her parents didn’t know the whole story of what happened to her. She and Maddie had agreed it would be better not to tell them. Especially their mother who would have found a way to blame Natalie for it.

“That’s a shame. He was very successful. He would have provided a suitable home for you.” Natalie was mortified. How could her mother be so harsh? Her heart pounded as her embarrassment threatened to drown her. She felt sixteen again, waiting for her parents to show up to the first art show her teacher had set up for her. They never came.

Debra had met Erik only once. He must have put the charm on for her. Erik was good at that. He hid his flaws well. “Why did you break up? What did you do to chase that man away?”

“What didIdo?” she asked, incredulous. “Why would you assume I did something.”

“That’s just your usual way. You’ve always been an … unusual girl. That can be off-putting for some. You have a habit of chasing people away.”

Natalie’s jaw dropped.Tell me what you really think of me, Mother. Suddenly, she’d had enough of her mother’s bullshit. “You’re right, Mother. I did chase him away. But that was after I found the drugs he’d been hiding in my house!”

“And you kicked him out for that?” Debra gasped. “A better person would have tried to help him. Would havewantedto help him get clean. He needed that support from you, and you turned your back on him,” she admonished.

“Mother, you don’t know what you are saying,” Maddie tried to intervene.

“I know exactly what I’m saying. You were engaged. Your job was to take care of him. Not abandon him in his time of need!”

The sisters were shocked. It was exactly what she had done to them, to Maddie after her injury. The doctors, at their mother’s insistence, tried to save Maddie’s leg. She lived in agony for nearly a year as her leg practically rotted from the inside out. They’d had no choice but to amputate it before it killed her. It wasn’t long after that that their parents had moved to Florida, leaving Natalie to deal with helping in her sister’s recovery alone. They’d paid the bills, paid for anything they required, but it was their parents they had needed.

“I think you need to stop, Mother, before you say something you might regret,” Maddie said quietly. It took everything they both had not to lash out at their mother for her insensitive words.

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