The Secret Heir

He wasn’t so sure himself. Laurel seemed like a stranger to him these days. So different from the laughing, playful, passionate woman he had swept into marriage.

God, he missed that earlier Laurel. He would give anything to understand what had become of her.

And then Carl spoke, typically uncomfortable with the strong emotions surging around him. “Everything’s going to be fine.”

That simple. And that certain. Carl Reiss would do anything in his power to keep his family out of harm’s way. Unfortunately, when it came to this particular emergency, Carl was powerless. Jackson didn’t have the heart to point that out. It was the first time he had been faced so incontrovertibly with the proof that his wise, calm, mechanical-genius father couldn’t fix everything.

The remainder of his appetite evaporating, he set his fork down and reached for his water glass.

“You should eat, Jay,” Carl said gruffly. “Keep up your strength.”

“Yeah. In a minute.” He figured it was time to change the subject. “You know what’s been bugging me all day?”

“What’s that, dear?” Donna inquired.

“The doctor said Tyler’s condition is hereditary. That Laurel or I carry a recessive gene that causes it. Yet Laurel insists there’s no history of sudden cardiac failure in young males on either side of her family. Though she and her mother were estranged from most of their family, Laurel said she would have known about something like that. Apparently, both of her parents bragged about what strong and healthy families they came from—people who tend to live to ripe old ages. It’s ironic, of course, that Laurel’s mother was only in her thirties when she died in a car accident.”

He watched his parents exchange a quick, grave look.

“Dad, are you sure you don’t remember hearing about any young uncles or cousins who died unexpectedly? You lost a younger brother, didn’t you? You told me he drowned, but it is possible he suffered heart failure first?”

“My kid brother drowned when the old fishing boat he and his friends were in sank in the middle of a lake,” Carl answered without looking up from his food. “Had nothing to do with his heart.”

Something in Carl’s tone let Jackson know that he found this line of questioning disturbing, perhaps because of the painful memories of his long-lost brother. Jackson regretted bringing that old pain to the surface, but for some reason this question had been nagging at him since the first conversation with Dr. Rutledge. “Okay, so that was an unconnected tragedy. But what about—”

“Really, Jackson, there’s nothing to be gained by fretting about this, is there?” Donna’s voice sounded unusually sharp. “What does it matter whether you or Laurel carry the gene—unless you’re worried that you have the condition?”

“I don’t,” he assured her. He still hadn’t confirmed that with his own physician, but he felt confident in that respect. “Still, if I carry the gene—if the Reiss family carries the gene—we should probably let Uncle Bill’s boys know about it. They’re still in college now, but they’ll want to be screened, and they’ll want to know about this recessive-gene thing when they have kids of their own.”

Donna and Carl looked at each other again, and this time Jackson was puzzled by their expressions. As Jackson watched, Carl reached out to place a hand reassuringly over Donna’s. “We’ll think about that another time. Let’s just concentrate on getting Tyler well, okay?”

There was something there, Jackson thought with a frown, his intuition ringing warning bells. Something that blanched his mother’s face and deepened the fine lines around her eyes and mouth. What the hell?

He decided to let it go for now. “I stopped by the blood bank on the way back from the job site and gave blood, since they said that’s a standard request when a family member is having surgery. They won’t actually use my blood for Tyler, of course, but having family members donate keeps the blood supplies healthy. Maybe you want to stop by sometime tomorrow, Dad? Have you ever given blood before?”

Jackson had always considered his dad the bravest, strongest man he knew, so it was with some amusement that he watched a bit of the color drain from Carl’s tanned, weathered face. “Um, no. I haven’t ever gotten around to it.”

“It wasn’t bad, really. Didn’t hurt at all. I’ll probably donate again when enough time has passed. I’ll get a card in the mail in a couple of weeks that designates me as a donor and tells me my blood type. Funny, I don’t even know my blood type. I assume it’s the same as yours or Mom’s,” he added, glancing with a smile at Donna.

His smile faded when he saw her expression. “Mom, are you okay? You’ve gone as white as a sheet. It’s okay, you don’t have to give blood if you can’t bear the thought of it. It won’t affect Tyler.”

“I’m—” Donna looked to Carl.

“Your mother’s tired,” Carl said. “And worried about the surgery tomorrow. Maybe I should take her home to rest.”

“Maybe you should.” Jackson didn’t like seeing his mother in this condition. She had seemed fine earlier. Maybe it was just all catching up with her.

He felt suddenly guilty for unburdening his problems with his marriage on her at this stressful time. “Take a sleeping pill if you have to tonight, Mom. Get some rest. Everything will be fine tomorrow, just like Dad said.”

She nodded and whispered, “Yes, I’m sure it will.”

Jackson was startled to see a glimmer of tears in her eyes as she looked away from him. He might have pressed for a better explanation of her distress then, but Carl put an end to the discussion by gathering plates and trays and escorting Donna out of the cafeteria.

Jackson followed with a puzzled frown, wondering what, exactly, had been going on beneath the surface of that odd conversation.

Laurel accidentally overheard a snippet of disturbing dialogue a short while after Jackson and his parents returned to Tyler’s room after dinner. Donna and Carl had said they were on their way home as soon as they’d had a chance to kiss Tyler goodnight. While they did so, Laurel slipped out of the room for a few minutes to walk down to the soda machine in the waiting room.

Jackson used to tease her about what he called her addiction to diet soft drinks, she remembered as she fed quarters into the machine and pressed the selection button. He didn’t tease her about much of anything anymore.