I sit down on the couch, hard. Did he just ask me to give a presentation?
“Why would I…? I mean, I don’t… Speeches aren’t really my, um… What would you want me to talk about?”
“How to achieve success in a world that’s, shall we say, inhospitable to the disabled.” His tight voice, his rhythm staccato, give away his own bout with nerves and I realize that asking the question has cost him.
Which signifies the importance of the gesture.
I wonder how to gracefully decline without feeling like even more of an asshole. “That’s not something I enjoy talking about. I don’t like the idea of people defining me based on that, you know?”
“I do know. And I feel the same way, believe me. Every time I do it, it makes me feel hideously self-conscious, like I’m exploiting my disability for attention. But every year, I grit my teeth and do it anyway, because it gets results in the form of millions of dollars in donations. If that money has a chance of giving someone else what I’ve been lucky enough to have, it’s worth swallowing my ego for one night. I know I have no right to ask this of you, and it’s a huge imposition, and of course, you can refuse without any hard feelings. If you agree to do it, though, it would mean a lot to me.”
I desperately want to say no. But he’s right, isn’t he? That would be selfish and cruel to people who do deserve the chance to put their disabilities behind them. Maybe such a selfless act will help bolster my atonement for my own sins.
Even if standing up there acting like some kind of hero would make me feel like a fraud, not to mention a rotten coward.
I pause, taking time to form my thoughts into meaningful sentences. “If it really does bring in that much money, you should be very proud of all you’ve accomplished through the charity.”
He chuckles, and I can picture his lush lips turned upward into that charming smile that trips my heart. “When we have speakers like you, it does. Every time.”
I surrender. “Then how can I say no, right?”
He breathes a sigh of relief. “Thank you, Chloe. I appreciate this more than you know. I realize it’s short notice. Would you like me to provide a speech? If you’re not comfortable writing one yourself, we have people who can put something together for you.”
I look down at my free hand, still clenched so tightly that my nails have dug into the palm with knuckles as white as paper. With great effort, I relax it.
“There’s no need,” I tell him. “I’ve got it covered.”
Chapter Twenty
Lincoln
I stand near the entrance of The Armónico’s grand ballroom, fidgeting in my tuxedo. I never donned formal wear during my time in the chair – it was too difficult to put on, even with help. Now that I can wear it, I despise it.
Tight. Constrictive. Unwelcome.
But my name litters every available surface of this lavish event, so I can’t show up in anything less than custom Veneta.
When it comes to these things, appearances mean everything. They can be the difference between five million dollars and fifty million – which, in turn, can be the difference between helping a few people and a dozen or two. I dread it every damn year, but I take the responsibility too seriously to step back from it.
I meant every word I said to Chloe to get her to come tonight. But there’s another reason tugging at my mind and heart more than her help. I simply want to see her. I want to look into her eyes and see how she’s dealing with what I told her earlier. Is she frightened? Does she resent me for dragging her into this?
Or does she still care about me? Will she still have that look in her eyes that says she wants what we’ve had so far to become something more?
As the guests start to enter, I see Chloe, and my heart flutters in my throat like a trapped bird.
She looks magnificent.
A flowing gold off-the-shoulder gown, with black rhinestone trim and a plunging neckline fits her to perfection. The silken fabric swirls around her legs like a caress of fabric, long enough to conceal her legs, and her usual limp seems much less pronounced than usual. But her expressive eyes reveal her exhaustion – that I probably caused – but they still soften when she sees me. She crosses the room, and I exhale, realizing that my breath has been trapped inside my lungs since the moment I saw her.
Right now, in this moment, I feel like I’ve been holding my breath since I met her.
Attempting my most assured smile, I hold out my arms for a hug. “Chloe. Thank you so much for coming. You look–”
“Repulsive, I know.” She grins playfully, but the darkness hovering around her eyes lingers. I haven’t done enough to chase it away. She seems glad to see me, but it also seems like the truth weighs on her quite heavily since I told her the bitter truth about the Italian super douche. It had seemed an easy solution, but now I feel the whole thing slipping away from me.
“Yes,” I deadpan. “Absolutely. If this charity didn’t need the money so badly, I’d call Casino Security and have you arrested for vagrancy.”
“Well, it’s a good thing I’m indispensable then.” She throws two fingers up in the air like taking an oath. “So, how are we doing this?”
My answer doesn’t come easily – I’m still taking her in. She seems preoccupied, but she still exudes a strength, confidence, and radiance I haven’t seen in her before. I know better than most how an insidious form of self-doubt can burrow beneath the skin, never to be chased away.
I regard her with my eyes, already feeling the loss of her body heat. My own screams at me to take her in my arms again. “It’s fairly straightforward. I’ll go up to the podium and give a brief introduction, and then you’ll come up and deliver your speech. Do you have it?”
Chloe hesitates. “I know what I’m going to say, yes.”
I nod. “Good. Just relax and breathe. You’ll do fine.”
Am I telling her, or myself?
The guests take their seats, and the doors close. As I walk to the stage, Nixon appears next to me, keeping pace for a few steps.
“Is that her?” he asks under his breath. “The one.”
It’s easy to ignore him. “Who?”
Nixon rolls his eyes. “Fine. Play it cool. I just wanted to say it looks like you’ve done well for yourself…she’s a stunner.” He claps me on the shoulder once, then peels off, taking his place in the audience.
A voice over the PA system booms, “Ladies and gentlemen, thank you for attending Helping Hearts and Hands. Now, the man without whom none of this would be possible…Lincoln Caldwell.”
As I ascend to the podium, the guests applaud. I sneak a sideways glance at Chloe. She doesn’t seem anxious. Just…resigned, somehow. Like a death row inmate who’s made her peace with her fate at the eleventh hour. If she’d grace me with a smile, it would go a long way toward easing the dread squeezing my chest cavity.
“Thank you all,” I begin. “Most of you already know my story. I was born with cerebral palsy, and I was lucky enough to have the support and resources to overcome it, and I set up this charity to help others who are less fortunate. That’s why you’ve all generously bought tickets to tonight’s event…well, that and the food, of course. I hear the crab puffs are exquisite. Let’s have a round of applause for my brother Carter and my sister-in-law, Pepper. Just wait until you taste dessert.”
Polite laughter and a smattering of applause. Just like every year, when I tell the obligatory corny joke at the start of these speeches. I don’t write them myself, and I’ve told the people we hire to do them that these jokes are silly and unnecessary, but they always insist on some kind of ridiculous icebreaker. They say potential donors need to know it’s okay to laugh, or they’ll feel too depressed and guilty about the whole thing and just stop coming.
“But tonight, I’d like you to listen to someone else’s story. She’s a remarkable woman and a successful pillar of the Las Vegas real estate community, and she’s achieved so much in life…all while dealing with a handicap that might just as easily have left her too
depressed and discouraged to try. She’s an inspiration to me, and I hope she will be to you as well. It’s my great honor to introduce Chloe Sanderson.”
The audience applauds, and Chloe steps up to the podium. I take my seat in the front row, waiting for the clapping to fade.
Once the room falls silent again, Chloe looks at me with a tired smile. “Wow. Not that I don’t appreciate the kind words, Lincoln, but…laying it on a little thick, weren’t you? I mean, ‘inspiration?’ Jeez, that’s a lot of pressure. I’m just some chick missing a gam.”
This time, genuine laughter fills the room. I have to admit, I’m impressed. She seems comfortable in front of a crowd, and she does self-deprecating well without coming off as disingenuous.
“Actually,” she continues, “I do want to tell you a story tonight, but it’s not mine. It’s the story of a sixteen-year-old girl named Benelisa Moorhead.”
My eyes narrow in confusion at the interesting opener. I wait in suspense for what happens next.
“Benelisa lived in Wisconsin, in Milwaukee. She attended Theodore Roosevelt High School. She liked math class but hated history. She liked drawing stars in the margins of her notebooks. She ran track and field, and won a lot of state and national awards for her athletic talent.”
Chloe pauses, swallowing hard, and I wanted to jump up and hold her, tell her she didn’t have to continue. But in truth, I was as transfixed by her as the rest of the audience, so I just sat there, frozen.
“Every day, she’d run laps after school,” Chloe said after a moment. “She was so fast. So tireless, she seemed like an unstoppable force. Everyone said she’d be a gold medalist someday. And she wasn’t some perfect little princess, you know? She did mean things sometimes. She sometimes said things that hurt people. Just like every girl in high school. But she had a bright, athletic future ahead of her.
I lean forward and place my elbows on my knees.
“Instead of pursuing those dreams, though, her brilliant light became extinguished when someone confined Benelisa to a wheelchair. Paralyzed the incredible young lady from the neck down. She’s unable to feed herself, or bathe herself, or dress herself. And the person who did that to her…was me.”
A gasp travels through the audience. I hear a high-pitched whine like a mosquito in my brain, and realize it’s my ears ringing. I’m stunned.
What the hell is she talking about?
“I was sixteen.” Her voice shakes, but I can’t mistake the dogged determination in her eyes. They no longer reflect tiredness but something else. They shine with a regret I know all about. It mirrors my own. “I’d been partying with some seniors that night, including a boy I had a crush on. Caleb. I wanted to impress him, so every time he took a shot of vodka, I took one too. And by the end of the night…well, I’d been drunk a handful of times before, but never like this. Caleb got into his car and left, and I figured I may as well leave too, since he was the main reason I’d gone to the party in the first place. And, hey, Caleb was cool enough to still be able to drive after drinking so much, so why not me, right? I could show him I’m that cool too. I could show everyone.”
The room quiets enough to hear a mouse walking on cotton. I can’t believe what I’m hearing. With each word releasing the weight from her shoulders, Chloe seems to grow taller.
“I lost my leg in the accident that horribly – predictably – followed my stupidity, but Benelisa lost so much more. Her neck was broken, and she was rendered a quadriplegic. My mother used most of our savings to hire a good lawyer, who kept me from serving time as a juvenile offender. I was sentenced to time served, plus a year of community service and parole.
The thought of Chloe languishing away in prison breaks my heart.
“My mother and I moved to Sioux Falls, in South Dakota. She was so ashamed of me, of what I’d done, that she told people I lost the leg due to bone cancer. But she never let me forget what really happened, and I’m glad she didn’t because that’s something I should carry with me every day for the rest of my life. My mother’s lies became my own. I didn’t have the courage to stand up to her, to take accountability for my own actions so I could begin the healing process. That starts right now.”
As Chloe unloads her burden, things about her start to make more sense. Why she seems so closed off to me. Even to her own life. Why she submerges herself in work. Just like I do.
“What happened to me was my fault. But Benelisa didn’t do anything to deserve what happened to her. There’s nothing I can do, no amount of money I can possibly donate to Helping Hearts and Hands that can undo what I’ve done. Nevertheless, I will donate tonight, and I hope that knowing what I’ve done – what I’ve caused Benelisa to endure – this worthy charity will accept that donation, to give hope and opportunity to people like Lincoln, who are braver and stronger and better than I am. They’re the inspirations, not me.”
Chloe steps off the stage and limps to the door, her head erect, her eyes forward, clearly shaken, but not crying. She almost seems like she’s in a state of shock.
I want to call out to her, to follow her, but what can I say? I’m still trying to process her story.
She put someone in a wheelchair for life. All those years, decades, I spent depending on my brother, my nurses, just to get through each day – all the pain and humiliation, all the frustration and suffering and hopelessness and indignity – and she did that to someone.
But youth and stupidity sneak up on all of us. Some walk away unscathed during the learning curve. Some don’t.
But no matter Chloe’s age, the result still matters. Someone has been sentenced to spend the rest of her life unable to take care of herself because of Chloe. How can there be a statute of limitations on that? How can I forgive that?
But it was an accident, Lincoln. Not intentional.
But she was drunk and chose to get behind the wheel, so lack of bad intentions doesn’t forgive her actions. Doesn’t set her free from judgment. My judgment. The brakes didn’t suddenly fail. No, the devastating outcome resulted from her actions, it was her fault.
But I care about her too much to blame her or hate her. I of all people should be the first one to forgive another.
That final thought echoes through my mind and no others rise up to challenge it. It seems I feel even more for her than I was willing to admit to myself before. I’ve never felt this way about anyone, and now that I do, I can’t just discard it because I’ve learned something bad about her.
The intensity of this realization frightens me – and the rash of conflicting emotions I’m going to need to work through. But the idea of being in the grip of such a powerful and undeniable force quickly becomes something I can’t shake.
Chapter Twenty-One
Chloe
When I meet Lincoln at the house the day after the charity gala, I keep my chin tilted downward, afraid to meet his eyes. On the phone, he said he wanted me here so we could both speak with Herb about his preliminary findings.
But I can’t avoid the other conversation no matter how badly I want to run. He must think I’m despicable. With as much as I know how he hated being confined to his wheelchair, the fact that I doomed a vital, talented person to a lifetime inside the steel trap must trigger his emotions like nothing else.
It feels like someone wired my jaw shut, so I work the hinges, hoping I’ll be able to spit the words out through the tightness. Still, it seems like I should be the first one to say something, to acknowledge what I said and did. It’ll be awkward, but not as awkward as stony silence or icy comments limited to the state of the house. Somehow, I don’t think I can deal with his indifference. I’d rather have his anger, his disgust…anything but having him look right through me. Because he’s the first man in my life who’s never done that to me.
“I’m sorry if what I said negatively affected your event last night,” I start off. I see surprise flash in his eyes as he regards me, to be replaced by cool calm. I struggle to inhale and continue, the resignation and dread riot
ing through me. “But I’m not sorry for saying it. When you asked me to write a speech about my personal story, I thought it would be the perfect time to come clean.”
“Why did you decide to do it in such a public forum?” He doesn’t sound angry – just curious. “You had plenty of chances to tell me before then.”
No sense in continuing the lie. A relationship built on a shaky foundation will never withstand life’s winds. Just like the house we’re standing inside right now. I just created my own personal sinkhole. But it doesn’t necessarily follow that I can’t fill it up and make things right. I’m a different person. A better person.
“It was Dante. He found out about my past and threatened to expose me publicly if I didn’t get you to stop the inspection.”
Lincoln’s eyes widen. “He knows about that? How?”
I throw my hands up in the air, finding no rational explanation for Dante or his actions. “He didn’t say. My guess is, he probably had a spy or two at the county records office who tipped him off that Herb was asking around off the record.”
He pauses, then asks softly, “Was that the only reason you finally told me? Because of Dante?”
I sigh, baring my heart. My soul. I hear a sense of urgency in his question and the way it tugs me away from logical thought. This situation is enveloped in extreme emotion.
“No. It was also because…I don’t know what this thing between us is, or where it’s going to go. But it feels important to me, and whatever it is, my heart’s telling me it needs to be built on honesty, or it won’t work. Ever since I was sixteen, I’ve had to wake up every morning and go to bed every night with the horror of what I did. And if you can’t deal with that knowledge, believe me, I understand. If I were you, I’d hate me too.”
I’m not you, and I’m ashamed of myself.
“I don’t hate you.”
And there it was. My forgiveness and redemption all in one simple sentence. As though I’d never bared my soul with the ugliest of sins. As though my downfall had never existed. The words feel like a surprise ray of warm sunshine on cold skin, and I smile. Before I can say anything, Lincoln’s phone blips with an incoming call.
On The House (Caldwell Brothers Book 7) Page 15
