Chapter 224: Chapter Two Hundred and Twenty-four

Chapter Two Hundred and Twenty-four

Alicia’s POV

Tom died two days before Travis’s wedding.

The call came at four in the morning. Malachi’s phone buzzing insistently until he finally answered it, his voice rough with sleep.

"Yes?"

I watched his face change. Saw the grief settle into his features even though he’d been expecting this.

"When?" A pause. "I’ll be there soon."

He hung up and sat on the edge of the bed, his back to me, shoulders tense.

"He’s gone," he said quietly. "Tom died about an hour ago. Peacefully, in his sleep."

I moved closer, put my hand on his back. "I’m so sorry."

"I knew it was coming. The nurse said days. But knowing and experiencing are different things."

"Do you want to go to the hospice? Say goodbye?"

"Travis is already there with Layla. They want me to come. But Alicia, Layla’s going to be there. And she’s never liked you. She’s going to blame you for everything wrong in the family. For the affair, for Travis’s drinking, for me walking away. All of it."

"I can handle Layla."

"You shouldn’t have to. Not while grieving. Not when you’re supposed to be supporting me."

"Then we go together. We face her together. That’s what we do now."

He turned to look at me, his eyes red-rimmed. "I don’t know what I did to deserve you."

"You walked into a dark room at exactly the right time. Everything else followed from that."

We arranged for Signora Moretti to watch Lia. She’d flown in yesterday to help with wedding preparations and had immediately fallen into the role of devoted great-grandmother.

"Go," she said when we explained. "Be with family. Lia will be safe with me."

The hospice was quiet at this early hour. Tom’s room had been cleared of medical equipment, leaving just the bed where he lay, looking smaller in death than he had in life.

Travis sat in a chair beside the bed, his face buried in his hands. Emily stood behind him, her hand on his shoulder.

And Layla stood on the other side of the bed, ramrod straight, her face a mask of controlled grief that cracked the moment she saw me.

"You," she said, her voice sharp as glass. "You have a lot of nerve showing up here."

"Layla," Malachi warned. "Not now."

"When then? When is it appropriate to address the fact that your whore destroyed this family? That she seduced you away from your duty, convinced you to abandon the business, made you choose her over everything your father built?"

"Alicia didn’t make me do anything. I chose to walk away. I chose her. And I’d do it again without hesitation."

"Of course you would. She’s got her claws in you so deep you can’t see straight. Just like she had them in Travis."

Travis finally looked up. "Mom, stop. Alicia didn’t seduce anyone. I was a drunk and an abuser and she was my victim. Malachi saved her from me. That’s the truth whether you want to accept it or not."

"You wouldn’t have been drinking if she’d been a proper wife. If she’d supported you instead of sneaking around with your brother—"

"That’s enough," Malachi said, his voice dropping to that dangerous tone I recognized. The one that meant he was done being patient. "My father is dead. Travis just lost his father. This is not the time or place for your bitterness."

"My husband is dead because his sons abandoned him. Because you walked away and Travis chose sobriety over family and nobody was here to support him when he got sick."

"I was here," Travis said quietly. "Every week for the past six months. Taking him to appointments. Sitting with him during treatments. Having actual conversations for the first time in my life. Don’t you dare say nobody was here."

"You were here physically. But your heart was with her." Layla pointed at Emily. "Another woman who nearly destroyed this family."

"I am this family," Emily said, her voice steady. "Whether you like it or not. Travis and I are getting married tomorrow. We’re building something new. Something better than what came before."

"Better? You think sleeping with my son while plotting to destroy us is better?"

"I was grieving and broken and wrong about so many things. But I’m different now. We all are. The question is whether you can accept that or whether you’re going to stay stuck in the past."

Layla’s composure finally cracked. She started crying, harsh sobs that shook her whole body. "I lost my husband. My sons are strangers. My family is falling apart. And everyone acts like I’m the problem for noticing."

Travis stood, crossed to his mother, pulled her into his arms. "You didn’t lose us, Mom. We’re right here. We just changed. The family changed. And change isn’t the same as loss."

"It feels like loss."

"I know. But it’s not. We’re still here. We still love you. We’re just loving you from healthier places now."

She cried into his shoulder while the rest of us stood in awkward witness. Eventually she pulled back, wiped her eyes, looked at me directly.

"I don’t like you. I probably never will. You represent everything I lost when this family changed."

"I understand," I said quietly. "And I’m not asking you to like me. I’m just asking you to accept that I’m part of this family now. That Malachi chose me and I chose him and we have a daughter who deserves to know her grandmother."

"You have a daughter?"

"Lia. She’s seven months old. She’s beautiful and brilliant and she’s Malachi’s whole world."

Something shifted in Layla’s face. "I have a granddaughter?"

"You have a granddaughter," Malachi confirmed. "She’s at the hotel with Alicia’s grandmother. You can meet her if you want. After we’ve handled the funeral arrangements. After we’ve said goodbye to Tom properly."

Layla looked at Tom’s body, her face crumpling again. "He wanted to meet her. Kept talking about it. About how he hoped he’d live long enough to see her grow up."

"He did meet her. Three days ago. He held her and talked to her and told her he loved her. Those were his last good moments."

"He did?"

"He did. And he died knowing his family was healing. That we were all trying to be better. That’s not nothing, Layla. That’s everything."

She nodded slowly, then turned and left the room without another word.

Travis exhaled heavily. "I’m sorry about her. She’s grieving and scared and lashing out at whoever’s closest."

"It’s okay," I said. "She’s right about some things. I did change the family. I did pull Malachi away from the life she knew."

"You saved him from that life. There’s a difference."

We spent the next hour making arrangements. Tom had wanted a simple funeral. Family only. No big production. No speeches about what a great man he’d been because he’d admitted at the end that he hadn’t been.

"Just something honest," he’d told Travis. "Something that acknowledges what I was and what I failed to be."

The funeral was scheduled for the day after Travis’s wedding. Layla had wanted it sooner, but Travis convinced her that Tom would want the wedding to happen as planned.

"He was trying to build bridges at the end," Travis said. "He’d want us to celebrate new beginnings even while we mourn endings."

We went back to the hotel as the sun was rising. Found Lia awake and playing with Signora Moretti, both of them content.

"How is the family?" Signora Moretti asked.

"Grieving. Complicated. But together."

"That’s what matters. In grief, being together is all that matters."

Malachi held Lia, burying his face in her baby-soft hair. "I want her to know her grandfather. Want to tell her stories about Tom. Not the man he was most of my life, but the man he tried to become at the end."

"Then tell her those stories. That’s how we keep people alive. Through the stories we tell."

The rest of the day was a blur. Meetings with funeral directors. Calls to family members. Preparations for both a wedding and a funeral in the span of forty-eight hours.

That evening, Layla appeared at our hotel room door.

"May I come in?" she asked stiffly.

"Of course."

She entered cautiously, her eyes immediately finding Lia, who was on a play mat surrounded by toys.

"She’s beautiful," Layla breathed. "She looks like Malachi. Like his mother. Like me when I was young."

"Would you like to hold her?"

"May I?"

I picked up Lia, handed her to Layla. Watched this woman who hated me hold my daughter with tears streaming down her face.

"Hello, little one. I’m your grandmother. Your other grandmother. The difficult one who doesn’t know how to accept change gracefully." She looked at me. "I’m sorry. For what I said at the hospice. For blaming you for things that weren’t your fault."

"You’re grieving. I understand."

"Grief isn’t an excuse for cruelty. Tom would be ashamed of how I acted." She looked back at Lia. "He talked about you constantly at the end. About how Malachi had found real happiness. About how you’d given him a family worth protecting. About how you were exactly what he needed even if you weren’t what I wanted for him."

"I love your son. More than I knew it was possible to love anyone."

"I can see that. And I can see he loves you just as much. That should be enough for me. Will be enough eventually. I just need time."

"Take all the time you need. I’m not going anywhere."

Layla stayed for an hour, holding Lia, asking questions about her development and personality and all the grandmother things she’d missed.

When she finally left, Malachi pulled me close.

"Thank you for that. For giving her a chance when she didn’t deserve it."

"She’s your mother. She’s Lia’s grandmother. She deserves chances just like everyone else."

"You’re too forgiving."

"I’m exactly forgiving enough. For people who are trying. For people who want to be better. Layla’s trying. I can see it."

"What about Pa? He’s going to be at the funeral. And the wedding. And he’s going to have opinions about all of this."

I’d forgotten about Pa Wood. The patriarch. The man who’d built the empire Malachi had walked away from.

"What does he think about us?"

"I don’t know. We haven’t spoken since I left. Since I told him I was done with the family business."

"Maybe it’s time you did. Before the funeral. Before the wedding. Clear the air."

"Maybe." He looked at Lia, sleeping peacefully in her bassinet. "Or maybe I just show up with my family and make it clear that this is who I am now. Let him accept it or not."

"Whatever you think is best."

"What I think is best is protecting you and Lia from any ugliness. From Pa’s judgment and the family’s opinions and all the politics I walked away from."

"Then protect us. But also let us be there for you. Let us support you. That’s what family does."

He kissed me softly. "How did I get so lucky?"

"You walked into a dark room three years ago."

"Best decision I ever made."

"Best decision we both made. You staying. Me staying. All of it."