exactly what they’d said they would and breaking free from their parents’ hold.
Although, her father would’ve been appalled by her murder of the English language after paying for her elocution lessons. That was exactly why she’d relished doing it so frequently during her adolescence. Credit where it was due though, those hours spent improving her pronunciation had probably made her transition to London easier than sounding like a Northern Irish Eliza Doolittle. Perhaps she owed the old man some credit even if it had felt as if he was trying to force her to be someone she wasn’t at the time.
‘And yet here we are...’
She knew he was trying to get her to focus back on what was happening here and now but the words held a different meaning for her. No matter how hard she tried, she would never be able to completely separate her world from her father’s.
‘Okay, give it to me straight. Is he going to make it?’ At some point she was going to have to apologise for running out on him but that would mean having to explain why she’d done it. It wasn’t the time or place for that intense personal conversation, given the reason they were both here.
The scowl marring Nate’s brow was further indication that her father was as bad as she’d feared. ‘As you know, your father has suffered a myocardial infarction—a heart attack. He was unresponsive when the paramedics arrived and they had to resuscitate him on scene.’
It was no wonder Mr Taylor’s message had been so fragmented and frantic. Technically, her father had died. She really didn’t know how to feel about that. Since her mother had passed away Violet had resented him—for the way he’d treated her and for not being the one to have gone in her place. Now she was faced with the possibility of losing him too, things didn’t seem so clear-cut. When you stripped away the bad memories and anger, he was still her father. She was starting to understand why her mother hadn’t been able to simply walk away when the going got too rough. Sometimes having a conscience could be a terrible thing.
‘A heart attack,’ she repeated. Even though she’d heard it from others, coming from Nate somehow made it more real.
He nodded. ‘It’s been confirmed by blood tests. The increased levels of cardiac enzymes have indicated the presence of damage to the heart muscle. We’ll continue taking bloods every six to eight hours as well as running electrocardiograms, ECGs, to monitor his heart’s electrical activity and make sure there are no further complications. The next twenty-four to forty-eight hours will be crucial. Our first line of treatment would usually be emergency angioplasty to widen the arteries and allow easier blood flow to the heart. Unfortunately your father has proved...opposed to that idea.’
Nate didn’t sugar-coat it. He didn’t need to. They both knew she preferred straight talking to well-meaning platitudes. That way she wouldn’t get hurt by hidden truths further down the line. Such as finding out her mother’s overdose hadn’t been as accidental as she’d first been led to believe.
It was a typical response from her father to ignore advice and insist he knew better than everyone. This time it could cause his own death instead of someone else’s.
She closed her eyes and took a deep breath, batting away those old feelings flooding back and that helplessness at not being able to shake her father into facing facts. It hadn’t worked for her mother so her chances after all this time were slim.
‘Do we know what caused it?’ She knew nothing of his lifestyle these days but she doubted his love of whiskey and cigars had diminished since she’d last seen him. He was a man who did as he pleased and sod the consequences.
‘There’s no family history of heart disease that we know of and no current health problems, I understand. We’ll know more after we run a few tests. For now, our priority is limiting the damage to the heart.’
‘I’m sorry I couldn’t give the nurses any more information.’ She grimaced, imagining the low opinion the staff were already forming of the absent daughter who couldn’t give them any insight into her own father.
‘It’s all right. I understand things have been...tricky between you both. We’ve pieced together what we could in the meantime.’
No doubt the Taylors’ close relationship with her father had played a part in gathering that information. Violet didn’t begrudge the bond the families had, but it sometimes made her feel inadequate, superfluous to requirements. Indeed, no one had ever needed her until now. Even now she wasn’t sure how her presence would be received by either side of the class divide.
‘Can I see him?’ No matter how fractured their relationship had been since her mother’s death, or how frustrating he was, he was the only family she had left. Just because she wasn’t the daughter he wanted didn’t mean she’d stopped caring about him. It simply made it more difficult.
Nate bounced back up onto his feet. ‘I might be able to pull a few strings and get you a couple of minutes with him.’
The way he’d been reacting to her she was surprised he was willing to do anything other than list the facts of her father’s condition. She figured this one must be for old times’ sake—the days before things had got complicated and she’d made him despise her.
Determined to make the most of this breakthrough, she followed him into CCU, bobbing up and down like a meerkat keeping watch for predators as she tried to locate the patient. Nate strode through the ward with an air of confidence and authority she’d never seen in him before. It suited him. She had a sense of pride in him as patients and staff alike sat up straighter as he walked by. Finally people other than her had realised his worth in this world.
She zoned out the blue flashes of nurses zipping by and the hospital beds occupied by ill strangers to hone in on her father. He was in the top left-hand corner of the room, by the window. At least he’d only have one immediate neighbour to complain about when he was back to his grouchy self. The Earl Dempsey would not be happy to find himself on an NHS ward surrounded by the great unwashed when he woke instead of some private hospital he’d happily pay through the nose for. Tough. When all was said and done, Nate and his colleagues were all that was keeping him alive.
‘He’s a little out of it at the moment due to the morphine we’ve given him to reduce the pain.’ Nate led her to the bedside and for the first time in her life Violet felt sorry for her father. The man who’d virtually driven her mother to death in the pursuit of gaining a higher status in society now looked like any other old man lying there in his hospital gown, his white hair matted to his head and tubes and wires covering every inch of him.
She couldn’t miss the monitors charting his vital signs, the IVs pumping life-saving drugs into his system, or the oxygen mask keeping him breathing, but she didn’t cry. Nate’s shoulder was safe from her tears these days. That display of emotion was reserved for the privacy of her own home where no one could witness her weakness. There was no way she was going to end up like her vulnerable mother, letting others take advantage of her. She was stronger than that. She’d had to be.
* * *
‘What are his chances?’ Violet was so matter-of-fact, so devoid of emotion, Nate was concerned she might be in shock and he’d have to treat her too. Then this night really would be complete.
Until now, he’d only seen her act this coldly once before. He knew she hadn’t visited home since leaving for university but this was still her father lying here on the brink of death. The girl he’d grown up with had years of fear and hurt built up inside her because of this man, whether she loved him or not. There ought to be some sort of reaction to finding he could die without ever resolving the past.
He’d held back from saying those things that had sprung to mind the minute he’d known she was in the building, all of them prefaced with ‘why?’. He’d had no choice but to pick himself back up and get on with life after her disappearing act but that didn’t mean he’d stopped asking himself what he’d done to drive her away.
Seeing her again brought conflicting emotions to the fore. That broken-hearted teenager who still haunted his relationships would probably