She Was Never Just the Billionaire’s Wife (Natasha and Chase) novel Chapter 173

(Eleanor)

The tea is wretched.

The kind of beige insult that makes me wonder if anyone in the supply chain has ever tasted anything.

I carry both paper cups down the corridor at a measured pace.

I saw Nathanial Morton earlier and he very briefly told me some things that have left me reeling.

I have already been past my granddaughter's door once this morning.

Lily is asleep, attached to too many wires for any reasonable person to look at without something turning over in their chest.

Natasha is in the chair next to the cot, her mother sitting quietly by her side.

Martha Kelly is, by every available measure, the only adult in this family functioning at full capacity for the past twenty-four hours.

I have given the matter considerable thought between the cafeteria and the lift.

My son and I need to have a heart-to-heart.

I locate Chase on a bench outside Lily’s room.

Elbows on knees, hands clasped loosely between them, head down.

His jacket is on the floor beside him.

His hair is a mess from the way he’s clearly been tugging at it.

His face is covered in stubble, which is upsetting on a man who normally takes his appearance more seriously than I do.

It is very obvious that he’s been kicked out of the hospital room.

I sit beside him and set one cup in his hand and the other between us.

He doesn't drink.

Doesn't even look at the tea, or acknowledge my presence.

He looks defeated in a way I never expected to see him.

I don't speak immediately.

The corridor stays mostly quiet around us for a minute.

A long minute.

"Chase."

"Mother."

"I have been considering how best to open this conversation. I cannot, for the life of me, conjure a polite version."

He doesn't lift his head.

"You are being remarkably stupid for a man who has had every conceivable advantage."

He goes very still.

"You have your father's habit of brooding in places designed for foot traffic. If you intend to fall apart, I would suggest you consider doing so somewhere with better acoustics and fewer onlookers."

He makes a small sound which could possibly be construed as a laugh.

He finally lifts his head.

The view is rough.

His eyes are red-rimmed.

There is a long smear of brown on his right cuff, coffee, by the look of it, dried in.

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