Page 34 of The Promises We Broke
I nodded, not trusting my voice. Whatever he'd come to say, it was important enough that he'd driven out here despite knowing I might refuse to see him.
"I heard about the accident," he said after settling into the chair. "About your injuries. I'm glad you're recovering well."
"Getting there."
The silence stretched between us, loaded with everything we'd never said to each other. I could see him struggling with where to start, how to bridge eleven years of estrangement and mutual disappointment.
"I came to apologize," he said finally. "For failing you as a father. For not protecting you from Regina's manipulations. For letting you carry guilt that should have been mine."
The words hit me like physical blows. This wasn't what I'd expected. I'd thought he might lecture me about familyresponsibility, or maybe try to convince me to stay for the sake of appearances. I hadn't expected... accountability.
"Dad..."
"Let me finish," he said quietly. "I know what Regina did to you. How she used your need for approval to turn you into her weapon against Trace and Delaney. I know she threatened our family's destruction if you didn't cooperate. And I know that I failed to protect my seventeen-year-old son from a master manipulator. I failed to protect you all, but you had the worst of it. You suffered through her abuse because I wasn't enough of a man to stand against her, I wasn't enough of a father to protect you."
My throat felt tight with emotions I couldn't name. This wasn't the man who'd enabled Regina's cruelty for decades, who'd stood by while she destroyed her children's sense of self-worth. This was someone who seemed to understand the full scope of what had happened.
"You were a child," he continued. "A scared child trying to protect the people you loved from someone who held all the power. But Gage, there's something else you need to know. Something about why Regina became so vengeful toward our family."
I looked up, seeing something in his expression that looked almost like shame.
"I had an affair," he said quietly, the words coming out like they were being torn from his chest. "When Trace was a baby. With a woman named Caroline. I... I fell in love with her. Loved her more than I ever knew it was possible to love another person."
The confession hit me like a physical blow. My father, who I'd seen as weak but fundamentally decent, had betrayed his family in the most fundamental way possible.
"Why?" The question came out harsher than I'd intended, but I couldn't process this revelation without understanding it.
"Because I was young and stupid and I thought love was enough to justify anything." He ran his hands through his graying hair. "Caroline was everything Regina wasn't. Warm, gentle, genuine. When I was with her, I remembered what it felt like to be happy."
"But you came back."
"Because Regina found out. And she made it very clear that if I left her, she'd take my sons and disappear. She'd make sure I never saw any of you again, and she'd destroy everything she could get her hands on out of spite." His voice broke slightly. "So I ended it. Came home. And in my depression and guilt, I shut myself away, threw myself into work, and let Regina's anger consume our family."
I stared at him, trying to process this new understanding of our family's destruction. Regina's cruelty hadn't been random or inexplicable. It had been revenge for a betrayal that had cost her the only thing she'd ever truly valued—control over her husband's loyalty.
"She made you all pay for my choices," Jasper continued. "Made your lives hell because she couldn't hurt the person who'd actually betrayed her. And I let it happen because confronting it would have meant admitting I'd been too weak to choose love when it mattered."
"You were protecting us," I said, the words feeling strange in my mouth.
"I was protecting myself from losing my children. But in trying to keep you safe from her immediate wrath, I condemned you to years of her slow, systematic destruction." He leaned forward, his expression tortured. "Everything she did to you boys... the manipulation, the emotional abuse, the way she turned you against each other, it was all revenge for something I did. I don'tthink I even realized it when it was happening. I was so blind to so many things."
I could hear the guilt in his voice. It was impossible to miss when I was so intimately connected with it myself. Apparently the guilt of your failures was a Farrington man's trait. Maybe we were all cursed.
The weight of his revelation settled over me like a blanket. Our childhood hadn't been destroyed by random cruelty or Regina's inherent evil. It had been collateral damage in a war between my parents, with us caught in the crossfire.
"I should have been braver," Jasper said quietly. "I should have seen what she was doing and stood up for my boys. I should have been the father you all deserved. I should have fought for Caroline, fought for a life where my children could grow up in a house filled with love instead of vengeance. Instead, I came home like a coward and all my fears came true anyway."
I could see the parallel he was drawing, the lesson he was trying to impart without saying it directly. That choosing fear over love, protection over risk, often led to losing everything you'd tried to save.
"There's something else I need to tell you," he said, reaching into his jacket pocket and pulling out a thick envelope before passing it to me. "I kept track of you, Gage. All these years. You were never really alone, even though I gave you the space you clearly wanted."
My hands stilled on the envelope. "What do you mean?"
"I had people watching out for you. Not invasive, not controlling, but... making sure you were safe. Making sure you had work when you needed it, that you weren't completely isolated." His voice grew thick with emotion. "I couldn't bring you home against your will, but I couldn't bear not knowing if you were okay."
The revelation that I'd never been truly alone, that someone had been quietly ensuring my survival even when I'd convinced myself I was completely cut off, made my throat tight.
"I lost track of you six months ago," he continued, guilt heavy in his voice. "The last reports I had were from Oregon, and then... nothing. I'm sorry you were alone when you got hurt. Sorry I couldn't prevent this accident like I tried to prevent everything else."
