“Look,” she said, taking mercy on him because this was painful. “Let’s just stop with this small-talk crap, okay? I assume you’re here because you realized at some point last night that you’d just let a perfectly good kidney go walking out the door. Let’s just focus on that.”
That seemed to shake him out of his stupor. “That’s not why I’m here.”
“If you expect me to believe you drove two hours at the crack of dawn just to get to know me, then you’re an idiot.”
“I drove two hours to apologize.”
“Yeah, don’t believe that either.”
“Either way, thank you for agreeing to talk to me.”
“Can’t have your death on my conscience. I have enough to feel guilty about in my life.”
“If you’re talking about that situation with Royce Preston, you have nothing to feel guilty about with that.”
Alexis snorted. “Thanks, Dad.”
Jessica suddenly knocked and poked her head in. “I, um, brought you guys some water.” Her eyes darted to Elliott with unmasked curiosity. “Can I get you anything else?”
Alexis was dying for her daily chai latte, but her stomach was already nearing a revolt from an overdose of suppressed rage and betrayal. Caffeine would simply send her darting for the bathroom. “The water is fine. Thank you.”
Jessica set both bottles on the desk, took another quick glance at Elliott, and then backed out.
Elliott twisted off the top of his bottle and took a long drink with an aggressiveness that suggested he wished for something stronger.
His fingers tightened on his water bottle. “I think it’s really great what you’re doing here, opening up your café for other survivors.”
Alexis crossed her arms over her chest. “The transplant team gave me a bunch of information yesterday about how this all works. I haven’t had a chance to absorb it all yet, but we should find out soon if I’m an initial match.”
He held up a hand. “Please. I really don’t care about that right now.”
“Well, I really don’t want to talk to you about anything else.” She stood. “So you just wasted a trip. Do I need to walk you out or—”
“Just wait. I have things I need to tell you. Things I need you to understand about what happened back then between your mother and me.”
The words your mother sliced through her. “Is this the part where you feed me some bullshit story about how you cared about my mom and never forgot her and—”
“I did. And I didn’t.”
Alexis rolled her eyes. Yet she stood there. Silently begging him to say more. Wishing it could possibly be true. That her mom hadn’t just been that woman, because dear God, what would that make her?
Elliott must have sensed her weakening because he surged forward. “I need you to know she wasn’t just some summer fling back then.”
“Really? Because it sounded like you were just on a brief break from your wife.”
“It’s true. When I met her, I—” He squirmed as if this was embarrassing to talk about. And it was. Alexis wanted him to shut up more than she’d ever wanted anything.
“When I met your mom,” he started again, “I was in a weird place in my life. Lauren and I had been together for four years, but she broke up with me just before I moved to San Francisco for a summer internship. She was pressing to get married, and I wasn’t ready yet.”
Alexis almost felt sorry for Lauren. Almost.
“Your mom was . . .” He exhaled with a nostalgic smile that Alexis might have found endearing if it wasn’t obvious bullshit.
“I fell hard for her,” Elliott said. “I cared about her.”
Alexis snorted. “Oh, please.”
“It’s true. She was vibrant and funny and—”
“I get it. She was the manic pixie dream girl to your stuffed suit, and your feelings for her caught you entirely by surprise and made you question everything you thought you wanted out of life.”
“Yes,” he breathed without a hint of irony.
“So why did you leave her?” The question was out before she could stop it. She didn’t want him to think she cared, that his abandonment meant anything or mattered.
“I had to go back to Pasadena. The summer was over.”
“Why did she call you? Was it to tell you that she was pregnant?”
“No. I swear.”
“Then why?”
“She wanted to know if it was true that I . . . had a girlfriend. When I told her I did, she said she never wanted to talk to me again.” He leaned forward, a beseeching look in his eyes. “Alexis, please, you have to believe me. If I’d known about you, I would have—”
“What? Married her instead of Lauren? Or maybe you would have married Lauren and just sent me money and birthday cards?”
“I don’t know. I don’t know what I would’ve done, but I would not have just abandoned you.”
His words mattered more than they should have, which meant they hurt more than they should have. And that meant she was careening toward a dangerous waterfall, the kind where she would open her mouth and let words spill out until she slipped over the edge. But he wasn’t worth the emotional risk. Not after yesterday. She’d tested the waters—first by agreeing to meet the Vanderpools and then when she threw herself at Noah—and look at how both of those turned out.
“It doesn’t matter now,” she finally said, forcing her voice into a calm, steady cadence, the one she used with Karen. “It was a long time ago. I survived without you then, and I will survive without you again. This is a transaction. Nothing more. And once it’s over, you can go back to your life and I’ll go back to mine. Deal?”
A pained expression tightened his features. “What do I have to do to prove how sorry I am, Alexis? Just tell me, and I’ll do it.”
Alexis shook her head, tried to say the safe thing, which was nothing at all. But when she opened her mouth, a question came out. “If you found out about me three years ago, why didn’t you reach out then?”
A
