2
“Sir! You can’t charge through here—sir!”
Ian Campbell didn’t slow for the hospital auxiliary, dodging around the man and racing past. The guy was no doubt on the radio to security, but it didn’t matter who he called: no one would stop Ian getting to his son.
The call from the high school to say that Gavin had had a seizure and was in an ambulance on his way to hospital had Ian’s heart thudding in a way no SEAL mission had.
Thank God—the doors were right there. Ian burst through into the ER. “Gavin Campbell,” he snapped at the receptionist. “My son. He was brought here.” He took a deep breath, forcefully calling on his honed control and steadiness. He’d need them now, even if most matters concerning his son tended to challenge them.
“The seizure. Fourteen-year-old male,” a nurse passing behind the desk informed the receptionist, pointing to something on her computer screen. Good. He was in favor of anything that sped this process along.
“How is he?” he demanded of the nurse.
“He’s being checked out right now. We’ll know more after that.” Her half-smile expressed compassion and sympathy. “When the tests are done, your son will be brought back to his room—I’ll walk you there now. This way.”
Ian focused on slowing his steps, walking at her side. “Thank you,” he said when she stopped at a door.
“Oh, the teacher who rode with him is in there too,” the nurse said as she swung open the door.
“Right. That’s…” Any air left in his lungs was forced from them by the punch to the gut he got when he saw the dark-eyed, dark-haired woman sitting in the visitor’s chair. “You!”
Sofia. That small, delicate-looking woman who’d haunted his waking thoughts and nightly dreams since that night they’d spent together.
Ian closed his eyes in case she read his thoughts there. His desire. “Sofia? What are you doing here?”
Sofia’s eyes were wide, and she stuttered a little when she replied, “I—I met Allison, his mother, at the welcome event, but are you Gavin Campbell’s father?”
Ian nodded. “His mother and I are divorced. Five years now. We share custody. Gavin usually lives primarily with her, but he’s currently staying with me while Allison’s overseas. And yes, I missed the welcome evening. But I still don’t understand—”
“I’m Gavin’s chemistry teacher.”
“Shit.” Ian sank onto the plastic chair opposite Sofia, then his sense of propriety caught up to what he’d said. He was horrified. “Excuse me.”
“Please. I teach in a high school. I hear worse than that every day. And that’s just in the faculty lounge.” The smile she gave didn’t reach her eyes, but he appreciated her trying to dispel the acute awkwardness that was filling the sterile room.
He scrubbed his hands over his face. “I know Gavin had a seizure. Can you tell me what happened?”
“Gavin asked to be excused to use the bathroom, and when he came back, he was…acting strangely.”
Ian’s lips thinned. He was in no mood for vague language, not when his son was sick, probably getting hooked up to machines and being prodded by doctors. Before he could give voice to the half-a-dozen questions rattling around his brain, fighting to get loose, Sofia spoke again, her tone low.
“I believe he was getting high.”
“Absolutely not. My son does not do drugs.”
“Ian…” Sofia saying his name, her voice breathy, would under other circumstances have stroked a thrill down his spine. But judging from her frown, she didn’t like what else she had to tell him, and so neither would he. “While Gavin was on the floor, a half-smoked joint fell out of his pocket.”
“But—”
“And no kid who’s trying drugs for the first time does it alone in a school bathroom in the middle of the day.”
He leaned forward, wanting to deny her charge again, but couldn’t. What she said made a horrible kind of sense, even if it had his stomach in knots. He stood and paced the few steps the room allowed, needing to do something rather than face his guilt.
Guilt at failing as a father, one who was too busy trying to get his new life started and hadn’t paid enough attention to the son who’d come to live with him. Guilt at knowing the son he loved was falling into dangerous choices and destructive behavior while Ian, his father, had failed to notice anything was wrong.
“I have the joint here.” Sofia fished in her purse and pulled out a Ziploc bag.
If she intended it as further proof, Ian didn’t need it. Why would she lie? He nodded dully.