Gates of Paradise (Blue Bloods 7)

“This is Schuyler Van Alen. Is this the number for Stephen Chase?”

A pause. Then, “This is the home of Mrs. Chase, his widow.”

“Widow?” Schuyler blurted out.

“May I ask why you’re calling?” the butler asked, sounding a little suspicious.

“I’m, uh…Stephen Chase’s daughter.”

The man coughed. “I’m afraid that’s quite impossible,” he said. “Are you certain you are calling for Stephen Ronald Chase?”

Stephen Ronald Chase. Her paternal grandfather. Her heart beat in excitement. This was her grandmother’s house. “My name is Schuyler Van Alen and I’m looking for his son, Stephen Bendix Chase. Ben is my father,” she said quietly.

There was a much longer pause.

“I will relay the message to Mrs. Chase, Miss Van Alen. Where can I say you are calling from?”

Schuyler gave him her room number at Casa del Mar and hung up the phone.

“What happened?” asked Oliver.

She told him. She could barely process the idea before the phone rang. It was the butler calling back, with the Chase home address and instructions. Schuyler thanked him profusely before hanging up.

“So apparently my grandmother wants to meet us tomorrow. She’s in Malibu, not too far.”

“Us? I think he just meant you, babe.”

“Ollie! I’d hate to go alone,” Schuyler said.

“If all goes well, you won’t be alone. You’ll be with family,” he said firmly. “I’m sure your grandmother won’t want an audience. Shall we discuss it over cocktails?”

Schuyler wondered if she should be concerned that Oliver seemed to be a little too carefree, getting to be more like Kingsley than trying to save the vampires. But then she could really use a drink herself.

The lounge at the Casa del Mar looked out over the ocean, and the bartenders were attentive mixologists, who made up special drinks for each of them. Schuyler’s was a bittersweet (appropriate, she thought) mix of orange blossoms and something she couldn’t quite put her finger on—Pimm’s? Oliver’s was some kind of martini made with absinthe.

“Warn me if you start hallucinating,” Schuyler said.

“A snack will take the edge off, just in case,” Oliver replied, and ordered oysters and sushi. “Now, why are you so nervous about meeting these people? Isn’t this what you’ve always wanted?”

“I guess,” Schuyler said. “But I know so little about them, and I don’t think they know anything at all about me. I mean, that butler didn’t really sound surprised that there might be some secret granddaughter roaming around, although maybe that’s just how butlers are supposed to sound. What if my grandmother doesn’t want to have anything to do with me? Don’t you think it’s weird that she agreed to meet with a stranger off the street? And what if this trip turns out to be pointless? We could be wasting valuable time here.”

“Or what if we find exactly what you’ve been searching for all your life?” Oliver said.

“What do you mean? We’re here to find the sangreal, aren’t we? That Blood of the Father thing.”

“That’s what we need, or the vampires need,” he said. “But it’s not the same thing you’ve been missing.”

“What are you talking about?” Schuyler said, annoyed. She pointed her cocktail fork in his direction. “Stop being so cryptic.”

“Let’s take a step back,” he said. “For most of your life you only knew your mother as an unconscious figure in a hospital bed. You were told that your father was dead. The only family member you thought you had in the world was your grandmother, and she’s gone now, as is your grandfather, who you met only a few years ago. But your father’s family is your family too. Your human family. I can imagine why that would be a scary thing to think about. But it could also be awesome.”

“Awesome how?”

“Well, why assume that they’d be such skeptics about you? Why not assume they’d welcome you with open arms, thrilled to have found you? Isn’t that how you’d feel if it turned out your father were alive? Ecstatic?”

“I used to think so,” Schuyler said. “I kept hoping.…But what if I’m wrong? What if he’s awful? Cordelia always intimated that he’d done something terrible. She always told me to stop thinking about him, that he wasn’t worthy of my mother.”