Page 185 of The Otherworld

She presses her eyes shut, forcing more tears to stream down. “Oh, Adam. I want you more than anything—you know that. But I’m so afraid of losing Papa. The doctor said another attack could kill him, and I don’t want to be the cause of that. My leaving has already broken his heart, and I’d never forgive myself if… well, if the worst happened. All because I was too selfish to give up what I wanted for him.”

I fall silent, circling my thumb against her shoulder. “I understand how you feel, Orca. But I know nothing would make your father happier than to see you happy.”

“I can’t think about my own happiness right now.” Orca takes my hand in hers, squeezing my fingers with the reluctance of a person reaching out the window of a departing train, not ready to say goodbye. “I need to go home with Papa. I need to nurse him back to health; I need to give him that peaceful life we used to have together. And if that means giving you up… that’s what I’ll do.”

She releases my hand and turns away, walking down the hallway toward her father’s hospital room. I stand there watching, waiting for her to look back.

But she vanishes around the corner.

She doesn’t look back.

Not once.

* * *

“Cheer up,” Jack says from the passenger seat of my truck on the drive home. “It’s not like her dad is dead or something.”

I haven’t said a word since we left the hospital. My eyes are on the road, but my thoughts are miles away. The rain has let up, weakening to a post-storm mist blowing in from the coast. Just enough drizzle to make the windshield wipers squeak over the glass. Lucius has managed to climb onto the center console between Jack and me, whimpering for attention.

“Seriously, Adam. You’re starting to worry me.” Jack scratches the dog’s ears, shooting me a look. “If I didn’t know any better, I’d think Orca broke up with you.”

A pained, miserable laugh comes out on my next breath. “I think she might have.”

“What?”

“I said, I think she might have broken up with me.”

“No, I mean, why? How—what happened?”

I blow out a sigh, rubbing my forehead. “She blames herself for her father’s heart attack and doesn’t want to take a chance of it happening again. She thinks it would be too much for him to face any changes right now… and she wants to be there for him, even if that means we can’t be together.”

“She said all that?”

I nod, tapping on the directional and turning down our street. Jack falls into stunned silence for a full minute before he finally speaks.

“What are you going to do?”

I shrug. “I don’t know. Give her some time to think, and then… I don’t know.”

“Time? You can’t give her time—that’s stupid. You gotta strike while the iron is hot.”

“What do you mean?”

“Just do what you were gonna do before. Ask her dad’s permission to marry her. Act like nothing’s wrong—”

“I can’t do that, Jack. It’s not what she wants.”

“How do you know?”

“Because she asked me to leave,” I fire back, my voice rough with cold, hard finality. “She told me not to make this any harder for her.”

Jack squints at me as though it gives him a headache to see things from my point of view. Then he bursts out laughing.

“What’s funny?”

“You,” he says, leaning back and shaking his head. “A couple of weeks ago, you accused me of not knowing when to back off. And you were right. But you know your problem, Adam? You don’t know when to push your luck.”

“Jack—”

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