The Invisible Thread (The Unbreakable Thread Book 2)

by Lisa Suzanne

  I knock on the door, and a minute later, a woman I’ve never seen before answers. She’s short with nearly black hair and dark eyes. I feel a rush of hot air come at me from inside and I just want to go in to get out of the cold.

  “You’re Daniella,” she says softly, her eyes warming.

  I nod.

  “Did you get my email?” she asks.

  The email.

  The one I hemmed and hawed over and finally deleted without reading.

  It was from her?

  I shake my head.

  “Come on in,” she says. She opens the door a little wider and I step in first. Ethan follows with a hand on the small of my back.

  “Is, um...is my dad here?” I ask.

  She shakes her head. “He’s at work, but I expect him home around six.”

  Who are you? I want to ask the question, but I’m not quite sure how to do it without sounding rude.

  “He loves what he does,” she says, clearly trying to make conversation. He was a human resources coordinator who worked to live, as I recall, so I wonder what it is he does now.

  She answers my question before I ask it. “He gave up HR years ago and followed his passion for aeronautics. He works in air traffic control now.”

  I think of all the posters of airplanes that decorated the garage—the one place where my mom would allow him to hang them. I think of the bookcases with model airplanes. I wonder why he didn’t give up his job in HR for something he was passionate about sooner, and it just makes me realize how little I ever knew my dad as a person.

  “Can I get you anything?” she asks. “A drink or something to eat...” she trails off, and I glance around at the house where I lived the first eighteen years of my life. It’s exactly the same, but the details are wrong. Where a family vacation photo of Mom, Dad, and me at the beach used to hang on the wall now hangs a wooden pallet with flowers painted on it. I notice the abstract airplane painted in the sky and the initials KM on the bottom of the painting. I wonder if this woman painted it. And we’re just in the entryway.

  “No thank you,” I say.

  “Let’s sit in the living room,” she says.

  Ethan and I follow her into the house. I can’t help but look around at all those tiny, insignificant, but totally changed details.

  The night of my mom’s funeral comes flooding back to me as we step into the family room, and with it comes the reason why I’ve stayed away so long. It’s like I blocked what happened from my mind even though it’s the one event I could never forget. It’s at the very core of why I couldn’t face my dad. I let him think it was because I was hurt over my mom, but there was so much more to it.

  It was the reason I ignored his calls, his letters, and his emails. It was the reason I isolated myself from him and struck out on my own, even getting married, albeit briefly, without him there to walk me down the aisle.

  As I look at this woman in front of me, I can’t help but think she isn’t my mom. She never will be. My mom is irreplaceable.

  But this woman also isn’t my mom’s best friend—the woman who stuck her tongue down my dad’s throat the night of the funeral, the woman my dad didn’t push away, the very one who might’ve done so much more than just kiss my father that night after I walked out of the room.

  It’s ancient, and it shouldn’t matter anymore, but if my grudge against Ethan has taught me anything, it’s that I hold grudges, too. Just as bad as Ethan, if not a thousand times worse.

  I held that damn grudge against Ethan for half my life, and it was only in falling in love with him that I was able to let it go. The difference between the grudges we hold is that eventually he was willing to go to his dad and try to work it out. I was forced here as a bargaining chip to get him to see his own father, and even though I’m here right now, I’m not totally sure I have it in me to forgive and leave it in the past.

  In fact, I’m pretty sure I don’t have that power.

  “I’m Kathy,” she finally says. “Your dad’s wife.”

  I don’t mask my surprise at her words as my eyes widen and a soft gasp falls out of my mouth. Ethan squeezes my hand in his and I clear my throat as I struggle to find words. “His...his wife?” Am I supposed to call her mom?

  “We were married a few weeks ago at the courthouse. I sent you an email about the ceremony in case you wanted to attend.”

  The air seems to leave my body, and I grip more tightly onto Ethan’s hand. “Oh,” is the only thing I can think of to say. Is this where I welcome her to the family, where I congratulate her for trying to replace someone who’s irreplaceable?

  I’m well beyond the years where I want my mommy and daddy to be together. They can’t be, not anymore, and surely my father just wants to be loved and to love in return. I can’t fault him for that, not after fifteen years. I just assumed my dad would never move on. I assumed Mom had been the one holding his thread, and when she died, she took that thread with her.

  But maybe not. Maybe this Kathy woman holds his thread. What the fuck do I know?

  “He misses you, Daniella.”

  My name isn’t Daniella.

  I want to scream the words at her. I want to tell her she’s not allowed to call me that. There’s a lot I want right now, actually, but instead of any of that, I stand. I can’t sit here and play house with daddy’s new wife. I need to get out of this hot room. I need a burst of cold air across my face. I need to be able to breathe again, and I need to protect the baby from my suddenly skyrocketing heart rate. “Well, Kathy, it was, um, nice to meet you. We need to get going. Ethan here is a musician and he has a gig tonight.” I step over Ethan’s feet to move faster toward the door, and he doesn’t try to stop me.

  “Should I tell your dad you stopped by?” Kathy asks. She scurries toward me to try to fit in a few last words before I walk out the door.

  “Don’t bother,” I say. I throw open the door, the refreshing blast of cold air hitting me right in the face, and I practically run toward the waiting car.

  Ethan hangs behind a minute. I have no idea what he’s doing, what he’s saying to this Kathy woman, what he’s thinking about me just running like a bat out of hell to get out of there, but none of it matters.

  All that matters is my dad kissed my mom’s best friend the night of her funeral and now he’s married to another woman. He moved on with his life without both of us in it, and I don’t see any reason to step back in now.

  “I don’t need to be at Sevens until ten, Mace,” Ethan says once we’re both back in the car.

  “It’s okay. I guess I was too late, too.”

  He shakes his head. “It’s not fair to say that. He’s still alive. That means you’re not too late.”

  “He’s clearly moved on with his life.” I wring my hands together in my lap. “I’m not going to step in to fuck it all up again.”

  “Did you ever think about how much better it would be with you in it?”

  I lift a shoulder. “I tried. He wasn’t home.”

  “God, you’re frustrating.”

  I glare at him. “Why? I kept up my end of the bargain.”

  “It’s not a bargain, Mace. It’s life. It’s you forgiving him for whatever it is you’re holding against him.”

  “I walked in on him,” I blurt. “Okay? I walked in on him kissing my mom’s best friend the night of my mom’s funeral.”

  “Jesus.” He scrubs a hand down his jawline and puts his sunglasses back on. “Is that what you’ve been holding onto all these years?”

  I cross my arms over my chest in part because I’m cold, but it’s also a reflex to try to protect my heart. I don’t answer.

  “We all hurt in different ways, babe.”

  My jaw drops as I turn toward him at those words. “Are you excusing what he did?”

  “No. It was wrong.” I wait for him to continue—wait for him to say something that’ll make me feel like he’s not just saying that to appease me. “But he lost a wife too young through a tragic accident, a
nd he probably lost a big part of himself with that. You don’t know what he was dealing with. You don’t know what caused him to turn to her. And in the same way, you don’t know what she was going through. She lost her best friend. Can you honestly say you’ve never turned to a friend for comfort and ended up with more than you bargained for?”

  I run through my mental catalog and come up with more than one example. When I returned to school after my mom’s funeral, a dark cloud followed me everywhere I went. My friend Nate was there for me—strictly as a friend—but that didn’t stop me from trying to kiss him one night. Sometimes comfort turns into something else, sometimes signals are misinterpreted, and beyond that, I suppose it’s possible I’ve distorted an event that happened fifteen years ago.

  “None of that matters,” I say. “I always say we lost touch, but the truth of the matter is I avoided him until he eventually gave up. What hurts the most is that he gave up. A father should never, never give up on his child,” I say.

  Ethan presses his lips together as he processes my words, and then he finally brushes a gentle kiss across my temple. His big, strong hand presses softly to my belly. “You’re right,” he says, and we drive on toward Mark’s condo.

  CHAPTER THIRTY-EIGHT

  MACI

  “So we’re done?” Kevin, my drummer asks.

  I nod as I look around the group gathered. “I’m so sorry. If you want to stay on the road and watch from backstage, you’re more than welcome, but the doctor advised me not to perform. Mark said there might be an opportunity for you guys to play with my replacement, but you can work the details out with him.”

  “What’s really going on, Maci?” Trevor asks. “Are you sick?”

  I shrug. Leave it to Trev to bug me for the truth. We’ve been together long enough that he’s comfortable asking, but I’m not ready to tell just yet. “Sort of. I’ll be okay, though. I just need to take it easy for a while.”

  He looks disappointed but nods knowingly. I all but told them I’m pregnant without announcing the happy news. I can’t, not yet. I’m not ready for it to be public.

  “It’s here,” Griff says, interrupting our meeting on the crew bus.

  I glance over at him and nod. “Thanks.” I turn back to my band. “Any questions?”

  “Yeah. Is the new album still on?” Carlos asks.

  I nod. “Yes. We’re still set for our time in the studio. Griff will confirm the schedule with you in a couple weeks. If anything changes, I’ll let you know.”

  Trevor stands and pulls me into a hug. “Take care of yourself.”

  I look up to try to ward off the tears. “You too.”

  I step off the crew bus and head back to mine.

  “I already wrapped it,” Griff says, nodding to the large package in the middle of the table. It’s wrapped in black paper with white polka dots.

  “Perfect.” I wanted to see it before I brought it over to Ethan, but that’s okay. I have a feeling it will hang in a place of honor that will allow me to catch a glance any time I want to.

  “I’ll carry it over for you,” he says.

  Ethan’s on his bus prepping for Vail’s Chicago show. It starts in just a few hours, and I’ll be watching from backstage.

  Griff heads over first with the package and I realize I left my cell phone on my dresser. I don’t need it, but I feel naked without it. “I’ll be right there,” I yell out to Griff, and then I run to my bedroom and grab my phone. When I emerge into the forward cabin, a man I never expected to see stands there.

  He’s so familiar, a little thinner than the last time I saw him with sharper angles to his face and salt peppered into his dark hair, but he still looks like my dad.

  I freeze in the little doorway outside the bunks and glance around. “How’d you get in here?”

  “Those aren’t the first words I figured you’d have for me after all this time.” His voice is the same.

  I raise my brows pointedly, telling him without words I want the answer to my question.

  “Your boyfriend left his number with my wife. I got in touch with him.”

  I lean on the doorway and cross my arms over my chest. “Ah. Nice of him to blindside me.”

  “Same way you blindsided me after fifteen years, Dani.”

  I press my lips together and try not to glare. “I go by Maci now.”

  He clears this throat. “I know. But you’ll always be my Dani.”

  “You lost that right when you wrote me off.”

  He flinches like he received an actual blow. “I never wrote you off. You ignored me for so long I figured it was what you wanted. All I ever wanted was for you to be happy, and you seemed much happier without me.”

  I clear my throat and stand up straight. “I have to go.” I move to walk through the bus, but I’ll have to pass by him on my way out, and he’s currently blocking my path.

  “Why’d you come see me after all this time has passed?” he asks.

  Because Ethan made me. “I was trying to let go of some things.”

  “What things?” he presses.

  I shrug. “Anger. I made a deal with Ethan. He said he’d go talk to his dad if I went to talk to mine.”

  “How’d it pan out for him?”

  I debate how much to tell him, but in the end, I decide it isn’t his business. “Not well.”

  “Can we put the past behind us?”

  “It’s not that easy,” I say. I slide into my chair at the little table and realize I’m sort of going to miss this bus once I’m back home.

  “Why?”

  “Because I saw you kissing Judy Myer and Mom wasn’t even cold yet.”

  He reels back and I can’t help but wonder how he never knew I saw them. He blows out a mirthless chuckle as he averts his gaze to the floor then sits on one of the bench seats along the wall. He rests his elbows on his knees and rubs his hands together. “I wish you’d have told me. I wish you’d have given me a chance to explain instead of cutting and running.”

  “Not much to explain, Dad. It was a kiss. I don’t know if it led to more, and I don’t want to know. Even now. I don’t want to know.”

  He lets out a long breath. “I’m not a great man, Dani, but I always did my best to protect you from that.”

  “What does that even mean?”

  “We were weak. We were both sliced open from the tragedy of losing your mother. We ended up turning to each other for a long time to get through the pain of the loss.”

  His words stab at my chest. “You hooked up with Mom’s best friend after she died?”

  His shoulders hunch in shame. His focus is on his hands, not on me. “If there’s one thing in life I regret, it’s that. Your mother was the best thing that ever happened to me. She gave me you.”

  I wonder if someday Ethan will look at our child and say the same thing. Your mother was the best thing that ever happened to me. I wonder if he feels that way—or if, given enough time, he eventually will.

  I used to think he was the worst thing that could ever happen to me, and even as I sit here during this painfully candid talk with my father, I feel the start of a song. Pieces of lyrics are already seeping their way into my bones, and I wonder if Ethan and I should start over with the song we planned to record together. I want to record a whole album together like he’s already mentioned to me. We’ve already got one baby on the way...why not an album baby, too? Our short and long history together could easily provide the marrow for multiple records.

  “This is a lot to take in,” I finally say, locking the thoughts of Ethan away for later.

  “I know.” He rubs his hands together again, a nervous habit I don’t remember from my childhood...but, then, that was a long time ago. I can’t help but wonder again whether I ever knew this man at all.

  “Your mother’s passing changed me. It made me realize how the things most important to us can be taken away at any time, without warning. I still have guilt over what I did, Dan. Still, even all these years later. But Kathy
understands that.”

  I fiddle with a blank piece of paper on the table, folding it in half and pressing my finger along the seam, then folding it in half again, just something to keep my hands busy, something to look at so I don’t have to look at him. “How’d you meet this Kathy lady?” I ask the question almost hypnotically as I continue folding and pressing, folding and pressing.

  “She was my grief counselor.”

  “So you just sleep with anyone who comes your way?” My tone is nasty, but I can’t handle where he’s going with this.

  “That’s inappropriate, Daniella.”

  “Oh, drop the act. You have no right to show up uninvited to my tour bus and tell me what’s appropriate or not given what you just confessed to me.”

  “Not that I owe you an explanation, but she got me through the hardest time of my life. I lost a wife and a daughter all in the span of a few days. I became better and stronger every time I saw her in a professional setting. I stopped going after a few years, and I lost touch with her. I ran into her at the grocery store, of all places, two or so years ago and we got to talking. She’d lost her husband, and I asked her to dinner. Just as friends, just to be an ear for her since she was there for me.”

  I roll my eyes. “Because you paid her to be.”

  He stares at his hands rather than looking at me. “Irrelevant and I wasn’t paying her when we fell in love. The point is that we bonded over our losses.”

  “I thought you loved Mom,” I point out.

  “I will love your mother for the rest of my life. But I need to be happy, too. I can’t live in the past.”

  “Is that something Kathy told you?” I ask snidely.

  “As a matter of fact, it’s something I learned on my own.” He glances up at me. “When I was immersed in the past, I was sad all the time. Your mom wouldn’t have wanted that.”

  “Like you know what she wanted.” I toss what’s now a tiny square of paper in front of me. “You think she would’ve wanted you screwing her best friend?”

  He gives me a sharp look, but that’s it. He doesn’t respond to my cutting words. “I can only control my own actions and reactions. If you tell me you don’t want me in your life, I’ll respect it. I won’t like it, just like I haven’t liked watching your success proudly from the back row for the last fifteen years, but I’ll do it if it’s what you want.”