Page 25 of Severed Heart (The Ravenhood Legacy #2)

Chapter Seventeen

D ELPHINE

S NOW ACCUMULATES ON the cheap iron table on our squared cement back porch as I run my finger over the scar at the back of my head.

A scar I can remember. Scissors. A permanent reminder of the night Alain had cut my hair to the scalp after accusing me, for the first time, of infidelity.

I light a cigarette as I refuse that memory and its clarity, opting to concentrate on the murkier, much more difficult memories to summon.

At my back, behind the door, the house roars with testosterone, mixed voices chattering around the kitchen table as I do all I can to avoid it.

The sounds and feel of it similar, familiar—so familiar it brings me back to a different time.

To an image of Ormand and Alain at the same table when I first arrived in the States, both animated and in good spirits.

It was the beginning. Years before the haze, before I began my life underwater.

My last memories and perception of both men now far different. Alain’s forever tarnished.

Ormand’s memory now plagued by the way he cried the night I woke in that hospital bed. That memory of him haunting me most. It was the nature of the way he grieved. As if filled with remorse.

The rest of the night is nothing but a hazy mix of images that refuse true clarity—the dim, pale peach light coming from somewhere behind the hospital bed.

Mixed, muted voices drowned out by the pounding in my temple.

The crackling fuzz surrounding my view of the slow drip of the IV, the itch of the fabric of my gown as I searched and searched my mind for the hours before I regained consciousness. As I have year after year.

The only true knowledge I have of what happened after I woke in that bed is the permanent absence of something vital.

As if something that was inside me no longer exists.

Not my heart, which still beats true, but something more substantial.

Something far, far out of reach as my vision doubles, and I blink to clear it as the haze returns.

The fog I gained—which now replaces what was stolen—is merciless, refusing to free me all these years later, to allow me to see what was taken.

It’s as the silent snow falls that I pitch forward, willing my mind to cooperate, to press past that memory the night I woke to the next—to any day after that. Bowing my head as the flakes whirl around me, I again plead with God.

Please, please let it play.

Miraculously, the details of that night began to come to me.

Ormand’s hand grips mine, his features twisted in agony as a blurry Beau stands behind his chair opposite the doctor, who scratches another page on his clipboard.

“... several contusions on the spine, three broken ribs ...”

Loud laughter from inside the house disrupts any more recollection as my eyes burn with frustration. Hands shaking, I uncap the bottle and sip to try and calm my nerves. Desperate to get back to it, I close my eyes as the muddled sounds ring true while the images never fully take shape.

“Please,” I whisper. “Please let me see.”

My prayer remains unanswered as only the doctor’s voice rings through. As it has so many times before.

“... fractured wrist and ulna. Significant damage to her windpipe. The bite marks—”

“ Will heal ,” I speak aloud with the memory of that voice while living the contradiction to his prognosis.

Another burst of loud laughter sounds from behind the sliding door. One of those laughs now familiar, coming from my budding soldier. My chest stretches at the sound of it. Happy for him that he can feel such joy despite what he endures.

His progress during our short time together is astounding.

Of all the men currently inside the house—and aside from Ezekiel—Tyler is the only one who takes anything I say into himself.

When I began to train him, I had hope for the first time in years.

That was until the blanket came back, surrounding me in its bitter embrace, setting the ache into my bones, refusing to allow me any more clarity.

Before the biting cold came back to steal what peace I had, my skin had started to become far more sufferable to live in than the year before. And the year before that. All because of the beautiful boy and his desire to learn. To be the best soldier he can be.

Tipping the bottle back, I mourn the loss of that temporary peace as the snowdrift summons me, and Matis’s words whisper back to me through the snow, through time.

“Je t’aime petite fleur .. . Je suis vraiment désolé. Je suis vraiment désolé. Pardonne-moi.” I love you little flower.. . I’m so sorry. I’m so sorry. Forgive me.

It’s days like this when I cannot control the haze, fear, or shake—that I loathe my inability to stop any of it and the numbing consumption that follows.

Failing. Failing. Failing.

Again.

Every day, failing to recognize the girl who flew to America so young, fearless, and ready to fight—to live her dream.

The glass door slides open, and I don’t bother looking over my shoulder, knowing it’s Tyler. The strong scent of marijuana fills my nose, and to my surprise, black boots come into view next to where I sit.

“You have the whole of the house,” I grumble, knowing no good will come of this interaction because my fear has stolen all my patience today. Breathing deeply, I summon what I can. “Can you not allow me space out here?”

“That maternal instinct inside you is something to behold,” Dominic slings in insult.

His latest sarcastic remark ringing true.

It’s no surprise when I look up to see him staring at me speculatively, armed and ready to spar.

To punish. Though as brilliant as Jean Dominic is, I seem to be the one person he hasn’t fully figured out yet.

“I’m sorry to keep disappointing you,” I reply truthfully, though my tone indicates otherwise, my heart not in the fight.

Silence fills the space, and I rub my trembling hands together to keep him from noticing.

Something I’m sure he’ll attribute to the drink.

When more loud laughter bursts from behind the door, it’s all I can do to keep from flinching.

Needing the distraction, I look up at him from my chair and eye him just as speculatively. “Do you despise me, Jean Dominic?”

So tall now, so angry. Much more than Ezekiel was.

So ready to hurt the world that hurt him—to hurt me.

Celine’s face crosses my mind as I stare at her youngest son.

In it, I see the care she gave me, the tenderness forever there.

Always patiently reaching out to embrace whatever side of me was visible.

I know it as a truth that the same capability resides in both of her sons.

Though when he doesn’t answer, I take his silence as confirmation I have earned his hate.

“Rest well knowing Celine would be disappointed in me much like you because she was so very kind, Dominic. So selfless.”

He stands idly by for a long moment.

“You never talk about them,” he finally says. It’s then I spot the red wings drifting through the snow as the image fills my mind.

The same bird . . .

I stretch forward, leaning into the memory as the cardinal lands on the fence in front of us.

“Beau! Beau, look!” Celine exclaims next to me as Jean Dominic stands again for his second attempt to walk. Nearby, Beau smiles down at his son as he shakily stands in the yard, surrounded by bright green grass. Jean looks up to Beau as I hold out my hands to encourage him forward.

“Come to me, Jean Dominic!” I urge the beautiful baby as he inches toward me.

“Alain, look!” I call over to him, where he sits with Ezekiel, helping him assemble a toy from Dominic’s recent birthday party. Alain lifts his eyes, watching Jean Dominic take his first step, landing into my arms before Celine greedily takes him from me, beaming with pride.

“He did it!”

“Maybe he would have taken another if you hadn’t stopped him,” Beau jokes, his red hair glinting in the sun as his eyes, too, glitter with pride on Jean Dominic.

Shifting my focus back to Alain, I find him looking at me much the way he did when we first began as a couple in France.

We’ve been together now for some time, but only mere weeks of our marriage have truly been good.

Since Beau and Celine joined us in America—not long after I arrived—Alain’s been much less violent.

My suspicion is that Beau has something to do with it.

But it’s Alain’s return stare now which gives me hope. Maybe this year, maybe . . .

“Do you believe in fate, Dominic?” I whisper hoarsely as that sunny day beams through the drifting snow before shuttering out, my eyes misting with the gift of the memory.

Thank you, God. Thank you!

“Really?” he jabs. “ That’s what you’re leading with?”

“With good reason. The day you took your first steps was in the backyard of this house . There, right next to the fence.” The image fresh in my mind, I point toward a brown patch of grass being rapidly dusted with snow.

“Just after, a cardinal landed, and I remember your parents walking you over to it.”

When he further steps into view, I watch him eye the bird without much interest before he speaks. “And that constitutes your tears?”

“Must you humiliate me every fucking day, Dominic?” I whisper before taking a long sip of drink. “You may think me a silly woman for my sentiments. But it was a rare good day. I still miss your mother. Very much.”

And I remembered, I remembered!

An old memory made new, one I pray stays with me. Tears of happiness sting my eyes as I push the emotion down to speak.

“No one ever spoke about my parents or grandparents either,” I offer him. “I wasn’t sure if you wanted that.”

He pinches his brows. “What were they like? My grandparents?”