This Side of the Grave

Chapter Thirty--one

 

I knew how critical Don’s condition was. Understood that, if not for my mother’s intervention earlier, he’d already be dead now. But somehow, I hadn’t truly accepted that he was dying until I walked into his room and the final shreds of my denial were ripped away from me.

 

It wasn’t the bluish paleness of Don’s features as he lay, eyes closed, on the bed. Not the hospital gown he’d previously refused to wear, the EKG machine that showed his shockingly low blood pressure, or the heavy scent of what I now knew was cancer. It wasn’t even his erratic heartbeats that drove home the reality that this would be the last time I would ever see my uncle. No, it was the rolling tray pushed into the corner of the room—naked of a phone, laptop, or any files—that tore through my heart with all the pain of a thousand silver blades.

 

You just talked to him a few days ago! a voice screamed inside me. How could it come to this so fast?

 

I shoved back the sob that threatened to break free and went over to his bedside, very softly running my hand over his arm. I was afraid to disturb him by letting him know I was here, and afraid not to. He was hooked up to an EKG, but aside from the tubes in his nose, he breathed on his own in small, shallow puffs that didn’t give him enough oxygen, judging from his pallor.

 

I sat there in silence for half an hour, watching him, thinking back to the first time I met Don, all the way to the last time I saw him before now. We had both good and bad history between us, but the mistakes of the past faded underneath my belief that Don had always tried to do what he thought was right. That hadn’t always made him a good uncle, but it made him what we all were—flawed people who tried to do their best under rough circumstances. I had no grudges over our past. Only gratitude that he’d been in my life at all, and a wish that he didn’t have to leave it now.

 

“Cat.” The faintest smile ghosted across Don’s mouth as he woke up and saw me next to his bed. “Didn’t think I’d get to see you again.”

 

I took in a deep breath. It was that or I’d lose the fragile hold over my emotions that kept me from breaking into uncontrollable tears.

 

“Yeah, well, you wouldn’t, except I hear you’re having obedience problems with your new recruit,” I said, managing a smile even though it felt like my face would splinter.

 

Don let out a small, pained laugh. “Turns out your mother obeys orders just as well as you did.”

 

His wry comment served to underscore our history, intensifying my grief at the thought of losing him. The only emotion my father and I shared for each other was mutual loathing, but Don had found his way into my heart even before I knew I was related to him.

 

“You know what they say about the acorn and the tree,” I replied. Then my composure cracked and a few tears slipped out despite my best effort to hold them back.

 

Oh, Cat, don’t cry.

 

Don didn’t say it out loud, but I heard in from his thoughts as clearly as if the words were shouted. His hand drifted over, patting mine before his eyes closed.

 

“It’ll be okay,” he whispered.

 

And I heard the other thing he didn’t say, but it echoed across my mind with more clarity than I thought I could stand.

 

So glad the pain will be over soon . . .

 

“Don.” I leaned forward, stroking his hand pleadingly. “You said no before, but it’s not too late if you’ve changed your mind. I can still—”

 

“No,” he interrupted, opening his eyes. “I’ve lived longer than I should have as it is. Promise me you’ll let me go, and that you won’t bring me back.” I’m tired, so very tired, his thoughts sighed.

 

A piece of my heart broke, but I held his gaze and nodded as I forced the words out, whisking away another tear that slipped down my cheek.

 

“I promise.”

 

Good girl. Proud of you. So proud.

 

I got up and began to pace so he couldn’t see that more tears rushed out at hearing that from him. I’d been in countless battles before, but letting him go would take the kind of strength I didn’t know if I had.

 

“You don’t know how much I’m going to miss you,” I whispered, keeping my back to him, trying to wipe away the tears that wouldn’t stop flowing no matter how hard I tried to stuff them back.

 

He grunted softly. “I’ll miss you, too.” Love you, niece. Wish I would have gotten to know you sooner. Shouldn’t have waited so long . . .

 

A choked noise escaped me hearing that. I stabbed my fingernails into my palms, hoping the slight physical pain would distract me enough to control my raging emotional anguish. It didn’t. My heart constricted, aching from an injury that no amount of supernatural healing abilities could soothe.

 

Moments later, I heard a familiar booted stride and felt power in the air that I’d recognize anywhere. God, Bones had gotten here fast. That only further hammered away at my fragile control. He’d come quickly because he knew how devastated I’d be, and I loved him more for it even as it reminded me of how much I’d hurt when Don was gone.

 

Then Bones was beside me, his dark gaze raking the room to take in everything in an instant, hard arms reaching out to pull me to him. I allowed myself a few precious seconds to sag in his embrace, not needing to pretend I was strong with him, before turning around to give Don a forced cheerful smile.

 

“Look who else made it.”

 

“I see that.” Then a pained cough came over my uncle. Bones took my hand as his heart had several ominous pauses in between beats. “You turned out to be a better man than I expected,” Don rasped once he’d regained control.

 

Bones stared at my uncle, his gaze steady and serious. “So did you, old chap.”

 

“Bones and I talked,” I said, trying to smile so I wouldn’t burst into tears at the knowledge that this was their way of saying goodbye. “Remember your offer to give me away as a bride? Well, we’d like to take you up on it.”

 

Don’s mouth twitched in a wistful smile before his features tightened, his thoughts revealing that more pain flared in his chest. I glanced at the EKG machine even though I knew what it would say. My mother’s blood had brought him back, but it wouldn’t be for long. His heart was failing right in front of my eyes.

 

“ ’Fraid I won’t be around for your wedding, Cat,” he murmured, eyes fluttering closed.

 

“Yes you will,” I said, so strongly that Don’s eyes reopened and stayed open. “Because we’re going to renew our vows here and now.”

 

“Cat.” His face pinched with sadness. “You were planning a big wedding once things were . . . settled down. You don’t have to ruin those plans . . .”

 

He paused to close his eyes, his breathing and heart rate dipping for a moment. I bit my lip, squeezing Bones’s hand until a cracking noise let me know to loosen my grip.

 

“These are hardly the right circumstances,” my uncle finished a few moments later, waving vaguely at the machines by his bed.

 

I thought back to when I was a little girl and how I’d imagined what my wedding day would be like. I’d pictured wearing a white dress, of course. Imagined my grandfather fussing over his tie like he always did when he was forced to wear one, and my grandmother replying that yes, it was straight, with that little roll of her eyes. My mother would be there, smiling because she was so happy for me, and I’d have friends who would be helping me get ready to walk down the aisle. My bouquet would be roses and wildflowers, my hair would be up, and I would look at my husband-to-be through a filmy white veil that would only be lifted once we were pronounced man and wife.

 

Of course, I’d imagined all that back when I didn’t believe in vampires, let alone realize I was half one. Bones had wanted to give me a close version of that dream, somehow knowing I’d still held on to it, but the lives we led kept interfering with making that white wedding fantasy a reality.

 

My wedding would never play out like that dream from when I was a child. It wouldn’t be now, either, in the hospital wing of a secret government facility that policed the activities of the undead. My wedding had been on a blood-spattered arena, witnessed not by friends or family, but by hundreds of vampires I’d never met before. My bridegroom hadn’t lifted a white veil from my face at the pronouncement from a minister that we were married. Instead, he’d cut his hand and held it out to me, swearing by his blood that I would forever be his wife, should I choose to accept him as my husband.

 

That was my wedding day. Pretty much the exact opposite of everything I’d ever dreamed, but I wouldn’t try to substitute it with something else. The image I’d had of myself as a child was someone I’d never be, and it was only recently that I realized it was okay to be who I was. That bride might have worn a slutty black dress instead of a beautiful white one, or had blood in her hands instead of holding a bouquet, but no woman had ever been as lucky as I was the day Bones held out his hand and declared me to be his wife.

 

“This isn’t about circumstances,” I replied, continuing to fight back tears as I tried to sum up everything I’d only recently learned. “It’s about family.”

 

Don hadn’t been there on that day. Neither had my mother, and my grandparents had been dead for years by then. But both of them could be here for this. It wasn’t a new ceremony for my sake, but a reenactment of the previous one for theirs.

 

“Will you do it?” I went on.

 

Don’s eyes misted. Through his thoughts, I heard how much the request meant to him even though he only spoke a single word in reply. “Yes.”

 

“Tate.” I turned toward the doorway, knowing he’d lingered in the hall this whole time. “You think you could bend the rules to let that disobedient new recruit back up on the floor for a little while?”

 

A grunt escaped him; half laugh, half disbelief as he filled the door frame. “Jesus, Cat.”

 

“Actually this won’t be a religious ceremony,” I replied with a faint smile, “but feel free to offer blessings anyway.”

 

Tate’s gaze moved over Bones and then down to our clasped hands. “Since when have you two ever cared about my blessing?” he asked dryly.

 

“I never asked for it and I don’t need it,” I replied in an even tone. “But you’re my friend, Tate, so I do care.”

 

I watched his face, waiting to see if he’d take the olive branch I’d extended, or throw it back at me like he had so many times in the past. Those dark blue eyes met mine, emotions skipping across his expressive features like waves on a pond. First regret, then resolve, and at last, acceptance.

 

“I hope you’re very happy,” Tate said, the words quiet but sounding sincere. Then, to my surprise, he walked over and held out his hand, but not to me. To Bones.

 

Bones accepted Tate’s hand and shook it without letting go of mine; easy enough since I held his left hand with my right one. When they let go, Tate glanced at me, smiled slightly, and said, “Don’t worry. I won’t bother asking to kiss the bride.”

 

Then he looked over to Don, whose eyes had closed during this exchange even though I could hear from his thoughts that he wasn’t asleep. His chest hurt too much for him to sleep, and he had a new pain radiating down his arm that he recognized from a few hours ago. Still, I knew what his answer would be even before Tate asked, “You up for this?”

 

My uncle didn’t know I could hear his thoughts. Didn’t know that I picked up on every word of his thinking this was a far better way to die than before, when he’d been alone, hearing only the steady flat line of the EKG machine before everything had gone black, then awoke to Tate screaming at my mother for what she’d done. I heard all of this, and though my throat burned from stuffing back the tears that relentlessly came, I said nothing. Did nothing even though the very blood running through my veins could possibly prevent the next heart attack that I knew was coming.

 

This was his choice. I hated it—oh, so much!—because it was taking from me the only real father I’d ever known, but Tate was right. I had to respect it.

 

“Let’s do this,” Don replied. His voice was raspy with pain, but the smile he flashed me was genuine despite that.

 

Tate picked up the phone by Don’s bed, telling whoever was on the other line to “get Crawfield, now, and bring her up here.”

 

To distract myself from falling all to pieces as I heard Don’s heartbeat become more erratic and listened to his mind try to shelter him from the increased squeezing in his chest, I began to explain the intricacies of a vampire marriage ceremony.

 

“So, if a vampire couple wants to get married—which they’d better be damn sure about, because with vampires, it’s till death do you part or nothing—it’s kinda like those old handfasting ceremonies. One of them, usually the guy first, gets a knife, slices it across his palm, and then says . . .”

 

By the time my mother arrived, I’d repeated all the words and described my prior wedding to Bones, leaving out the more grisly details. She looked at the four of us with slight confusion, but Tate didn’t give her a chance to say anything. He grasped her arm and took her into the hall, telling her in a voice too low for Don to overhear what was about to happen.

 

I was glad Don’s eyes were closed again, because that meant I didn’t have to fight the tears that burst out of me. Tate liked the idea of witnessing my rededication of vows to Bones even less than my mother would. Yet here he was, sternly telling her to act pleasant, dammit, and not ruin this for Don because he didn’t have much time left.

 

That was excruciatingly evident. My uncle’s breathing was increasingly labored and he was thinking that it felt like he had a car pressed on his chest, but he was fierce in his will to last long enough to do this one final thing. The EKG machine began to make warning noises, as if I couldn’t tell from his thoughts and his skipped heartbeats what was happening. More tears coursed down my cheeks in a steady stream that wet my top and stained the floor an ever darkening pink where they fell.

 

I took my uncle’s hand, hating how much cooler it felt with his rapidly decreasing circulation, and squeezed his fingers gently.

 

Bones covered my hand with his own, his strength feeling like it overflowed from him to permeate into my flesh. Such a stark contrast to my uncle’s rapidly fading mortality and the approaching chill in Don’s fingers.

 

“Donald Bartholomew Williams,” Bones said formally. I startled at the “Bartholomew” part. I’d never heard Don’s full name before. Figures Bones knows it, a part of me thought hazily as I tried to suppress my sob over the increased skips in my uncle’s heartbeat. Bones extensively researched Don after finding out he was the man who’d blackmailed me into working for him all those years ago.

 

“Do you give your niece, Catherine, to be my wife?” Bones went on, brushing his fingers over Don’s.

 

My uncle’s eyes opened, lingering on me, Bones, and then Tate, who still stood in the doorway. Even though I knew how much pain he was in and the effort that it took was palpable, Don managed to smile.

 

Then his hand clenched around mine, agony blasting through him that I heard in the sudden scream of his thoughts. His whole body stiffened and his mouth opened in a short, harsh gasp—the last one he’d make. Don’s eyes, the same gray color as mine, rolled back in his head as the EKG machine’s beeps became one horrible, continuous sound.

 

Tate crossed the room in a blink, gripping the bed rail so hard that it crushed under his hands. That was the last thing I saw before everything blurred into reddish pink as the sobs I’d held back broke free to overwhelm me.

 

Yet even in the throes of the fatal heart attack, my uncle’s will proved stronger than the frailty of his body. He’d sworn to himself that he would live long enough to give me away, and he would not be denied, even if Bones and I were the only ones who knew it.

 

Don’s dying thought was one single, protracted word.

 

Yesssss.

 

 

 

 

 

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