I dug my feet into the sand. The last time I was here everything was perfect. Now it was all falling apart. Waves crashed against the sand, but there was no Gemma, no Amelia to giggle and dance at the water’s edge as it tickled her toes. Instead, light refracted off the waves and blurred my vision.
I rubbed the tightness I felt in my chest. I lifted my elbows back, stretching the muscles. The tightness wasn’t in my pecs, but underneath. My heart, my lungs, the tools I needed to breathe and pump blood didn’t want to work because of some emotions.
They weren’t stupid emotions. They were, however, inconvenient now that I didn’t need or want them any longer. That wasn’t true. I wanted them, I wanted Gemma. I wanted my family.
I took a pull from the beer in my hand, emptying it. I dropped it in the sand next to other empty cans. I found a fresh can and popped it open and took another long drink. I thought about covering up, or at last slathering up in sunscreen.
Damn it. Everything made me think about those two. How my daughter— my god, I had a little girl and I didn’t even know it— would giggle and squirm as I rubbed sunscreen into her skin. I wanted to be her protector when I didn’t even know who her father was. I hadn’t cared because I wanted to fill that role for her.
My heart pounded as if to say it wasn’t willing to give up just yet. Unfortunately, the rest of me was at a loss. I had no idea how to find Gemma. I couldn’t ask John, who was being a complete dickhead. I swear he was running CP Manhattan into the ground so that it wouldn’t be worth anything when I demanded he buy me out.
Under momentum that didn’t feel like my own, I stood up and began walking. The balmy ocean breeze mitigated the feel of the sun’s heat. I had nothing but questions, and Gemma was the only person with answers. I don’t know how far I walked, but getting back to the house, now that I wanted my phone, seemed to take a long time. The sun was setting by the time I walked into the courtyard.
The cook had come and gone. Grilled fish, fresh caught that day, stank up the kitchen. Funny, the fresh fish was one of the things I loved about this place. Now everything I looked at was tainted by memories of Gemma.
I threw the food into the bin and pulled another beer out of the fridge. The can popped open with a satisfying snap and release. The liquid was cool and refreshing going down my throat into my empty stomach. When was the last time I ate? I rummaged in the fridge, settling on frying up some eggs. I ate them straight from the pan.
The smell of the fish was overpowering, so I carried the garbage out. I was an adult man, I could fend for myself. So why did I feel like a lost little boy? How had I gotten to this barely functional state?
I sank onto the couch and tried to call Gemma. My number was blocked, had been for a week. I pressed call on another number. By the time the phone was ringing, I had forgotten who I was calling.
“My God, Chase, where the hell have you been?”
“Tanner?” I couldn’t remember why I called him.
“People have been calling me all week frantic about you. You haven’t returned a single call, text, or email from me.”
“Did Gemma call? Was she one of the frantic people?” I wanted her to be worried.
“No, but your admin at CP Manhattan has been beside herself with worry. And Mr. Peters’s assistant checks in several times a day seeing if you have shown up.”
“She doesn’t care,” I said.
“Who? Oh, shit, the girlfriend.”
“Did you know that asshole John Peters has a little sister? No, of course, you don’t. I still think of her as a little girl running after us, wanting to play, to be included. Whenever John talked about his sister, I always pictured her that way,” I rambled on.
“What way?” Tanner asked. He really should have known better than to encourage me. Maybe he was glad I was talking.
My thoughts got fuzzy, and I think my speech did too. “A pudgy little girl with long strawberry blonde braids, freckles on her nose, and a big gaping hole where her front teeth should be. She picked flowers by the stables and gave them to me.”
“Chase…” Tanner started.
“But she’s not five or six anymore. She’s not even seven, or eight. She’s hot, smoking sexy hot. With an ass like—”
“Chase!” Tanner interrupted. “Do you need me to call her for you?”
“She won’t talk to me.”
“Okay, so no phone call. Do you need me to find her for you?”
“You’d do that?”
“You’re too drunk to think clearly. When was the last time you had food? Real food, chips don’t count. And do not try to tell me about monks who made thick beer to survive in medieval Europe. You are neither a monk nor is the local beer that substantial.”
“I had eggs.”
“When?”
“Dinner, tonight. I’m a functional adult.”
“You’re a drunk adult. Look, Chase, I am glad you are alive. I’d hate to try to find a new job. You need to go sleep this bender off.” He ended the call with promises of calling me in the morning to remind me of all the embarrassing things I said to him that I wouldn’t remember.
Okay, I needed to sleep. But didn’t Tanner realize that not even beer kept me from thinking about Gemma? Little Gemma with her braces and awkward inability to talk to me at the funeral. Grown-up Gemma whose body was perfect in every way, with round hips and breasts that could bring me to my knees. And at some point, we made a baby together.
I did the math. That would have been the summer after I broke up with Nicole. I didn’t remember every woman I slept with, not something I was exactly proud of. After Nicole, I went a little overboard on my libertine ways, a different woman every weekend. Sometimes more than one.
Closing my eyes I tried to force my brain to focus. I wasn’t going to remember names, but I should be able to remember faces. I’d known Gemma for years; how could I have missed recognizing her features and her hair?
John’s house party. Fuck. She was that redhead, in a red dress. Her hair was shorter. I should have remembered that ass the next time I saw her. Of course, the next time, she was in a sassy business skirt and had long strawberry blonde hair again.
She should have told me about the baby. John was pissed off when she stopped coming home. Said she had abandoned him. Funny words coming from him, he had never given her a second thought when she was around, only to blame her for choosing to stay away.
Damn, he was such a dick to her when she was little. All she wanted was his attention, to be included when his friends were over. I wasn’t much better. Never once told him to stop until he’d gone too far. Like the time he splashed her so hard in the pool she slipped out of her inner tube. I fished her out of the pool and carried her back to the house. She was crying and coughing the whole way, and John and the guys laughed about it.
I would have protected her from John’s vitriol like I always had. I would have been there for her. She wouldn’t have had to go through the pregnancy alone and scared.
But she kept it from her family. From me. Gemma hid my daughter from me, only to tease me with her. Did Gemma want me to bond with my own kid without ever telling me? She kept the birth of my child from me. I missed out on her round pregnant belly and telling her to breathe during labor.
“Fuck!” I threw the beer in my hand. It hit the television, knocking it askew in its mount, and fracturing the screen.
I wasn’t going to let her keep Amelia from me. And damn it, I wasn’t going to let her keep herself from me. We were a family and we belonged together. I picked up my phone and dialed.
“Chase?” Tanner asked.
“Find out where John Peters’ estate is located upstate. That’s where she’ll be. Have my plane ready first thing in the morning. No change that, I’m drunk. Tomorrow morning is going to be a bitch. Late morning, ten am.”
“Consider it done. Good to have you back boss.”
