Too Much At Stake

‘Good, I’m glad. And it’s good news you can eat properly tomorrow, but you should be resting now. Why don’t we leave you to sleep, and Uncle Nick and I—’

She broke off, hesitating over the Uncle Nick thing, and looked at him in mute distress, but he just smiled and said, ‘We’ll go and grab some food while you have a bit of a zizz, and we’ll be back. OK, Jem?’

‘OK,’ he said, and he held the game out to Kate, his eyelids drooping. ‘Can you stick that in my locker so it’s safe? I don’t want it to fall on the floor. I promised Lucy I’d look after it.’

‘Sure. Sleep well,’ she murmured, and bent over and brushed her lips over his forehead, her stumble over Nick’s name reminding her all too forcibly of the conversation that was to come.

‘I don’t care if you both still call me Uncle Nick,’ he said quietly as they walked down to the cafe. ‘I don’t care what he calls me. It’s not what matters.’

Kate felt a little stab of pain for him. ‘I know. I’m sorry, it’s just—you’ve been Uncle Nick for years, and—’

‘Kate, it’s all right,’ he said, squeezing her fingers with his free hand. ‘I don’t need to be anything else. I was happy being a surrogate uncle, and if that’s what he wants when we’ve told him, I’ll carry on. All I ask is the chance to be part of his life.’

‘You are part of his life, Nick. You always have been, I’ve made sure of it. And you always will be.’

She heard him sigh softly, and paused on the stairs, her hand on his arm. ‘Nick, it’ll be all right. We’ll get there.’

‘Will we?’ he asked doubtfully. ‘I hope you’re right, Kate, because I’ve suddenly realised how much I want it, and the thought of losing it all now is untenable.’

The day dragged slowly by.

Jem slept for most of it, still not allowed any visitors apart from family, and Jack and Ben came in turn during the afternoon, when they had a moment.

He was sleeping when Jack arrived, and Kate excused herself for a moment and left the men to talk. God knows, they had enough to say to each other, she thought.

‘I’ll be back in a few minutes, I just want to make a few phone calls,’ she said, and slipped out of the door, pulling it ßbehind her.

Jack met his father’s eyes, his own guarded, and Nick sighed quietly. It had taken him a while to rebuild his relationship with Jack once he’d returned to Cornwall, and he was desperately sad that it now seemed in peril again.

‘Jack, I—’

‘I’m not stopping. I’ve just come to tell you we want to see you. Tonight, Lucy’s house, eight o’clock. Be there—and no excuses.’

And without giving him a chance to argue, he walked out, and Nick sat down heavily on the awful pink vinyl armchair beside the bed and stared unseeingly at his son’s face until Kate came back.

‘He didn’t stay long.’

‘Long enough to say what he came for. I’ve been summoned,’ he told Kate softly, standing up again and giving her the chair. ‘Eight o’clock tonight, Lucy’s. Will you be all right if I leave you to go there?’

She smiled sadly. ‘Of course I’ll be all right. I’ve just heard Gemma’s been admitted. I might take a walk up there and see how she’s doing. You go and see them, Nick, and try and build some bridges.’

He nodded, wondering how he could be in two places at once and only really wanting to be here, by this injured child he was beginning to realise he loved more than life itself…

Ben came by on his way home after his shift finished, by which time Jem had woken up in pain again.

‘I’ve got the most amazing bruises,’ he told Ben, but although he was trying to sound as if he was showing off, Kate could tell he was frightened by them, and she wasn’t surprised. When he turned back the blankets and showed his side to Ben, she winced yet again, the sight making her curl up inside.

‘That’s impressive. I’m not surprised you’re hurting. I’ll go and find someone.’

He went out, coming back a few moments later with Megan Phillips. They consulted the chart together, and she chatted to Jem about his pain, and then she turned to Kate.

‘We want to get the pain under control because we don’t like him hurting, but also because we’d like to get him up soon. We might start sitting him up on the side of the bed tomorrow and see how it goes, and if he tolerates that we’ll move to the chair, and so on. It’ll be slow, but you’ll be in control of what you can manage, Jem. We’ll let you guide us. And Mr Bradley wants your physio to start properly from tomorrow, so all your muscles don’t forget how to work, but very gently at first, so nothing to worry about. Anyway, I’ll talk to you in the morning, and I’m on all night if you’re worried about anything, Mrs Althorp. Just get them to call me.’

‘Thank you,’ she said, smiling at the lovely young woman, her dark hair held back in a clip out of the way, the thick curls trying hard to escape. She was kindness itself, but there was something lurking in the back of her eyes today, Kate thought, that hadn’t been there yesterday. Something sad and desperate and a little lost. Her heart went out to her.

‘I’ll go and update your notes right now, Jem, and get someone to come and give you the extra pain relief shortly, OK? And if you’re still really uncomfortable, press the bell and they’ll get me and we’ll have another look at things.’

‘Thanks,’ he said, looking relieved, and after she’d gone out he looked up at Ben again. ‘Thanks for asking her, Ben.’

‘Any time. Right, I’d better go home. Apparently I’m cooking tonight. I’ll see you later, Nick?’

‘Yes. I’ll be there.’

Ben gave him a fleeting smile, murmured, ‘Don’t worry,’ and left them alone with their son.

‘Here you go, my gorgeous—jelly and ice cream,’ a nurse said, putting it down on his bed table with a smile and helping him sit up a little.

Nick glanced at his watch, and realised it was sup-pertime. He looked at Kate. ‘Why don’t you go and have a rest for an hour or so while I sit here with Jem?’ he suggested gently. ‘Or you could go and get something to eat, as I’m eating at Lucy’s.’

For a moment he thought she was going to argue, but then she smiled slightly and went out, and he settled himself on the edge of the pink chair and looked at the instructions for the games console while Jem ate the jelly and ice cream and told him how to work it.

‘I don’t know how you guys work these things out,’ Nick said, frowning at it, and Jem laughed and took it from him.

‘It’s easy, Uncle Nick, but don’t worry, Rob couldn’t work out how to use Matt’s, either. It’s because you’re too old for this kind of thing,’ he explained innocently.

‘Is that right?’ he asked, taking the machine back and having another go. So Rob couldn’t work it? He ignored the voice that mocked him for his childish urge to be better than the other man, and got Jem to show him once again. And finally, finally, he cracked it.

After that, dealing with Lucy and Jack didn’t seem nearly so daunting…

He left Jem’s bedside at seven-thirty, just after Kate came back to sit with him. She’d had a rest, and something to eat, and she looked more like herself.

‘I’ll come back later and update you,’ he promised. ‘And I could stay, if you like—take turns, like we did last night.’

‘We’ll see. Have a lovely time,’ she said, but her eyes were saying, Good luck, and he gave her a fleeting smile and left.

It took fifteen minutes to get there, and he parked the car outside and went in through the kitchen door, the way he’d always gone into his family home. He braced himself for the reception committee, but it was only Ben in the kitchen and he greeted him with a smile and a glass of wine. ‘Here—I thought you might need this.’

‘I’m driving.’

‘Not for a while, and it’s only a small glass. They’re in the sitting room, go on through. And, Nick? Don’t worry. They aren’t going to skin you, they just want to understand.’

He nodded, and, taking the wine with him, he walked through the familiar house, feeling like a condemned man going to the gallows. Crazy, because in many ways this was none of their business, it was between him and Kate and Jem, and the only other person he owed an explanation to was Annabel, and she was dead.

But he supposed they felt they were acting as her representatives, and of course there were financial implications. Jeremiah, as his son, was entitled to an equal share of his estate, so each of them would lose a percentage of their stake. Maybe that was what they wanted to discuss. Although he doubted it. His children weren’t like that.

Shaking his head slowly, he straightened his shoulders and went through into the sitting room, and the conversation stopped dead.

‘Well, don’t mind me,’ he murmured, and Lucy coloured.