63

CHAUTAUQUA INSTITUTION

The sun was slipping into the horizon when Bill Worthington, clothed in walking attire, approached the house.

Sean spotted him, stepped out the screen door, and waited with tensed muscles. On the drive to Chautauqua, he’d run every potential scenario of this meeting through his mind. Now his head ached. He and Will had already agreed that tonight was not the time to inform Bill about the photos with the Polar Bear Bomber.

Sean’s heart ached at how old his father suddenly appeared. At that moment, Bill looked up. Seeing Sean standing only feet away, he halted.

Sean’s heart sank. Was that it? The end? Would his father not even greet him? Would he turn away?

Bill tottered for a minute, as if uncertain. Then he stumbled forward, his face a torment of emotions. “Sean!” he called and reached out tentatively to hug him.

The two men stood in an awkward embrace as the tension drained from Sean’s body.

All is not lost. Perhaps we can rebuild. Or maybe we can build for the first time. Sean could never remember his father hugging him. Showing any physical affection was rare.

“I understand now—what I hadn’t understood as I was growing up,” Sean began when his father stepped back. “I know who my birth father is, and that explains a lot. About me. About you. It must have been hard for you, wondering and not knowing until now.”

“But—”

“You treated me differently. Well, I am different. I didn’t know how much so until now. I didn’t understand you or why you were so hard on me. But I’m beginning to.”

“I’m so sorry, Sean. I have already apologized to your mother for that, but I want to apologize to—”

Sean plunged on. “But Thomas Rich is not my father. He’s not the one who raised me. You are. We haven’t often seen eye to eye. But Dad, I still love you and will always love you.”

“My son!” It was a strangled cry of anguish and love. This time he wrapped his arms around his son with passion, as if he never wanted to let Sean go.

For the first time ever, Sean felt accepted by his father. He returned the embrace, standing on equal footing at last with the man he respected more than any other. The man who had been the solid backdrop of his life, prompting him to stay on the path. The man he’d butted heads with, even avoided at times, but whom he now understood.

What would it be like, for over three decades, to not know if one of your children was truly your biological child or your best friend’s? And still to treat that child as one of your own? The depth of his father’s sacrifice was unfathomable when Sean glimpsed it from that perspective.

The screen door creaked, and Ava stepped out. Bill gathered her close until the trio formed a circle, standing in the embrace of a dazzling Chautauqua sunset.

The man watched the reunion from his boat on the lake. No matter what the end would be, he had to allow time for this scene to play out. Focusing the binoculars on the two men’s faces, he saw the tension between them. He couldn’t hear the words exchanged, and that grated on him. There hadn’t been enough time or advance warning to tap into the Worthingtons’ extensive security system to get a listening device planted.

He saw the flutter of the screen door opening, and then a woman stepped out. Ava. The man refocused the binoculars on her as she moved toward her husband and child. When Bill reached out to include her in the circle, the man decided he’d seen enough.

He powered up the boat to head for shore.

The three Worthingtons stood together, watching the last of the brilliant sunset before retiring inside.

“I have something to give you,” Ava told Sean after Bill headed for the shower. She crooked a finger toward her green room.

Sean followed. It had always been his favorite place in their summer house—the palms, the koi pond, the waterfall. Perhaps someday he’d give up city life, work from the tropics. With the kind of work he did for Worthington Shares, his base could be anywhere. Strange how he’d never thought of that before. It was as if the time on the mountain had torn off the veil covering his mind. Now the possibilities seemed broader. Even the colors of the green room were more vibrant.

Ava moved toward the corner and her beloved sea chest, the weathered antique that had belonged to her grandmother. Since she’d been a girl, Ava had adorned it with shells and other sea treasures from Ireland and other countries where she’d traveled. It was a work in progress, she said, and a good reminder that life was an odd assortment of experiences found along the way, not a perfect masterpiece whose pattern was distinguishable from the beginning.

She opened the chest, removed a small item, and handed it to Sean. It was a baby shoe that didn’t even fill the palm of his hand.

“Turn it over,” she murmured.

On the back of the shoe was handwriting he recognized as his mother’s. The shoe was inscribed with “Sean,” and then below it, “A Gift.”

“When you outgrew this first pair of walking shoes,” she said, “I turned them upside down and wrote on them ‘Sean Thomas, A Gift of Love.’ I wanted you to know, no matter what, that you are a gift of love and that you are very loved. I want you to have it now.”

He nodded. “I understand.”

Pain flickered over her regal face. “I no longer have the other shoe. I wish I did.”