Page 88 of Fake Dark Vows
Ruby greets us outside Harry’s room in Mount Sinai Hospital, New York. She still looks glamorous in ivory lounge pants, coordinating sweater, and a string of perfect pearls around her neck, but there are cracks showing that were not there before.
She hugs Brandon when he arrives, her cheek barely grazing her son’s before she pulls away. I notice the lines criss-crossing her eyelids and fanning from the corners of her eyes. Were they always there, unnoticeable behind the polished façade and the permanent smile, or have they only appeared since she realized her husband’s mortality?
“Rose. Thank you for coming.”
She embraces me, gripping my upper arms tightly. To Brandon, it must look like a perfunctory hug for her new and unexpected daughter-in-law, but I sense her fragility through the slender fingers.
“How is he?” I ask.
“Impatient.” The smile is back, her gaze jumping between me and Brandon. “Grumpy. Angry with himself for being weak.”
“A heart attack isn’t a sign of weakness,” I blurt out. “It can happen to anyone.”
“Not to Harry Weiss, Rose. He has always believed that he is invincible.”
“What are the doctors saying?” Brandon looks tired.
He hasn’t fully recovered from the concussion and the semi-permanent hangover that is a vacation in Las Vegas, and I want to rest his head on my shoulder and soothe away the pain so that he can sleep.
“High blood pressure.” Ruby inhales deeply. “Stress.”
“Why didn’t the doctors pick up on this sooner? If they’d been monitoring it this wouldn’t have happened.”
“Brandon.” I touch his arm, and he doesn’t pull away, even though his mom is watching. “There’s no point worrying about what-if’s. Your dad is in the best place.”
He nods his agreement, but I’m not sure that he’ll let it drop.
Harry is sitting up in bed when we enter his room, propped up against the pillows, tubes inserted into his nose and the back of his hand, monitors attached to his bare chest.
“Have you come to take me home?” he asks Brandon.
“Has the doctor discharged you, Dad?” Brandon takes a seat beside his mom, the plastic squeaking beneath him while he tries to achieve a position that won’t send him sliding towards the floor.
“I feel fine.”
Brandon glances at the monitor standing close to the bed, the green line blipping slowly across the screen. “Then it won’t be long until they send you home. Rest. Be patient.”
“Being patient never got anyone anywhere.”
“Where do you need to be, Dad?”
Brandon hasn’t touched his father. There were no hugs when we entered the room, and Harry doesn’t look like a man who missed out on being comforted by his eldest son. Now, it’s almost like watching them play a game of chess, and I wonder if that’s how their relationship thrives, on moves and countermoves, until they reach checkmate.
But for once, I can hear the silent clock ticking on the wall behind the bed.
Time is running out. I have less than twenty-four hours to convince Brandon to pull out of the deal with Ron Valentine, and now that we’re back in New York City, I already feel as if I’ve lost him.
“How was Vegas, Rose?”
I shake myself back to the present when I realize that Harry is talking to me. “Busy. Loud. We saw Rod Stewart.”
Harry’s gaze slides sideways to his son, lingering a beat, before drifting back to me. “How did you manage that?” He doesn’t look at the rings on my finger, but somehow, I know that he has seen them.
“It was Rod or Mariah Carey.” I chew my bottom lip. “He promised me that he would wear a pair of leopard-print pants.”
“Did he fulfill that promise, Rose?” Harry asks.
“Not yet, but I’m still hopeful.”