Page 102 of Crossing the Line
She grumbled but slowly pried her mascara glued eyes open. “What?” she grumbled with iffy enunciation.
Xavier shined the light in first one eye and then the other. “Do you know what day it is, Sylvia?”
She squinted against the light, winced. “The first day of the rest of my life since my husband is a cheating swine.”
Xavier looked wryly at Waverly. “Looks like a mild concussion, but I think she’ll be okay.”
Nestor hustled through the open deck door. He cut a swarthy figure in a pair of gym shorts and a gold chain around his thick neck. When he caught sight of Sylvia, he said something in rapid Greek that Xavier took for a long-winded, Mediterranean version of “fuck.”
“I did a walk through in here at two this morning,” he explained. “Both of them were in their rooms.”
Xavier shook his head. “I don’t think she was here too long. She probably came down for something around three or four,” he estimated.
Nestor approached and Xavier had him take Sylvia’s feet. Together they lifted her from the floor to the sofa that Waverly quickly covered with a colorful throw. It would be easier replacing a blanket than an entire Fendi Casa silk sofa. Sylvia brought her hand to her head and winced. She focused in on Waverly and held out her other hand. “Darling, my pills, please? I’ve got a terrible headache.”
“Hmm. I’ll bet,” Waverly said without sympathy. She dampened a towel from the bar and patted it to her mother’s forehead gently cleaning away the dried blood. “She should probably see a doctor,” she said quietly to Xavier.
He nodded and pulled Nestor aside. When they returned, Nestor approached Sylvia. “Miss Sylvia, I’m going to help you to your cabin, okay?” he asked in thickly accented English.
“Oh, darling. Don’t trouble yourself. I’m perfectly comfortable… here…” She glanced around to determine where exactly here was. “Oh. Well, perhaps I should go to my cabin.”
“You just hang on tight, and I’ll get you there,” Nestor promised. He scooped her up and carried her toward the elevator.
Waverly ignored the departure and set about filling an ice bucket with warm soapy water from the bar sink.
“What are you doing?” Xavier asked.
“Cleaning up,” she said without looking at him. She grabbed a neat stack of white bar towels and carried everything over to the first mess.
She was shut down as she began what was clearly a ritual to her, and it pissed him off. It wasn’t a daughter’s job to clean up the sick and the blood of a parent who refused to get help. But it was someone’s job.
“Angel,” he waited until she lifted her gaze to look at him. “I need to speak with your father. I’ll be back in a few minutes, and we can pack.”
She gave him a brief nod and turned back to her work. There was no hint of the happiness that had lit those eyes last night. Now they were empty.
By the time Xavier arrived at Robert’s lower level stateroom, he was good and pissed. He pounded out a knock on the door and continued until a sleepy and confused Robert answered.
“What’s going on?” he muttered groggily.
He wore rumpled silk pajamas, and there was an open bottle of scotch on his nightstand.
“Do you know where your daughter is?” Xavier’s voice snapped out like a whip.
“Not at the moment. I thought she was with you? Someone said you went ashore last night?”
Xavier resisted the urge to plant his hand on Robert’s face and give him a good shove back into the room. “Your daughter is upstairs in the salon cleaning up puddles of vomit and blood that your wife left seeping into the very nice carpets after she hit her head and passed out.”
“Is she alright?”
“None of you are alright.” Xavier let go of the reins. “Somehow you all think it’s Waverly’s job to clean up after the piss poor job you and your wife do of existing. She’s twenty years old, and you have her scrubbing vomit like an underpaid maid.”
“Now listen here—” Robert began to get his back up, but Xavier wasn’t even close to done.
“No, you listen. You let that girl go live her life. Stop using her to babysit the wife you should be taking care of or divorcing. Make a fucking decision. Send her to rehab or call a divorce lawyer. Either way, leave Waverly out of it. She deserves better than being slapped around by a drunk and ignored by a man who’s trying to fuck himself to relevance.”
Robert opened his mouth and took a breath as if he were going to argue and then deflated like a balloon. He wiped a hand over his face. Exhaustion that went beyond interrupted sleep was evident in the way he held his shoulders.
“I don’t know how to be who they want me to be.”
