CHAPTER 6 — THE FATHER WHO WAS NEVER HOME
CHAPTER 6 — THE FATHER WHO WAS NEVER HOME
The next Friday began with disaster.
At 8:17 a.m., Victor's assistant rushed into his office carrying a tablet.
"Sir."
"What now?"
"Your appearance at the Veterans Children's Foundation Gala."
"I canceled."
"They moved the announcement."
"I still canceled."
"They're honoring Emily."
Victor looked away.
"I said no."
Before anyone could answer—
Mrs. Alvarez knocked urgently.
"Mr. Ralston..."
"What is it?"
"The boys heard."
Victor's stomach dropped.
By lunchtime, the mansion felt colder than it had all week.
No one was shouting.
No one was running.
The boys barely spoke.
Theo picked at his sandwich.
Oliver folded napkins into tiny boats.
Noah stared out the window.
Only Mason looked directly at his father.
"You canceled Mom again."
Victor's face hardened.
"It isn't about your mother."
"Everything's about Mom."
"Mason."
"You missed the gala last year."
Silence.
"You missed the hospital fundraiser."
Silence.
"You missed her birthday."
Silence.
"And now..."
Mason's voice trembled.
"...you're missing the only night they remember her."
Victor pushed back his chair.
"Enough."
"No."
Mason stood too.
"No, it isn't enough."
The room became painfully still.
"I know why you work."
Victor looked up sharply.
"I know why."
"Do you?"
"You think if you keep building bigger companies..."
Mason's eyes filled with tears.
"...you won't notice she's gone."
Victor couldn't breathe.
The words were too accurate.
Too honest.
Too much like Emily.
He turned and walked out.
Again.
Exactly as he had after the dinner conversation.
Hannah found him an hour later.
Not in his office.
Not in the library.
He stood alone beneath the white oak Noah loved so much.
Hands buried in his coat pockets.
Looking impossibly tired.
"You found me."
"You weren't hiding."
"No."
"I wasn't."
For a long moment, neither spoke.
Finally Victor said,
"I wasn't there."
"Hmm?"
"When Emily died."
Hannah looked at him quietly.
"I was in Washington."
His voice sounded distant.
"Negotiating a defense contract."
"The doctors called."
"I told them I'd make the evening flight."
He laughed bitterly.
"My plane landed forty-three minutes too late."
Silence.
"I never said goodbye."
The confession hung between them.
"I thought..."
He swallowed.
"...if I worked hard enough afterward..."
"You could outrun guilt?"
Victor nodded once.
"It doesn't work."
"No."
"It doesn't."
The wind stirred the branches above them.
Leaves drifted gently onto the lawn.
"I don't know how to be their father anymore."
"You do."
He looked at her.
"You've just been trying to be their provider instead."
That evening, Hannah gathered the boys in the living room.
"I need four volunteers."
Theo raised both hands.
"I volunteer Oliver."
"I object!"
Hannah laughed.
"Tomorrow night is the gala."
Collective silence.
"I thought Dad wasn't coming."
She looked toward the doorway.
"He hasn't decided yet."
Mason crossed his arms.
"He already decided."
Before Hannah could answer—
A familiar voice interrupted.
"I changed my mind."
Every head turned.
Victor stood in the doorway.
Still wearing his work clothes.
Still exhausted.
But holding four neatly wrapped boxes.
Theo gasped.
"Presents?"
Victor shook his head.
"Tuxedos."
Oliver blinked.
"For us?"
"I thought..."
Victor smiled awkwardly.
"...maybe we'd go together."
No one moved.
Not immediately.
Then Noah slowly walked across the room.
He hugged his father.
No words.
Just a hug.
Victor closed his eyes.
After a moment...
Theo joined.
Then Oliver.
Then Mason.
Last.
Reluctantly.
But he joined.
The five of them stood together in the middle of the room.
Mrs. Alvarez quietly wiped away tears from the hallway.
Hannah smiled.
For the first time since arriving...
The Ralston house no longer felt like a mansion haunted by loss.
It felt...
Like a family trying to find its way home.
But upstairs, inside Victor's locked office, the missing medical file was no longer the only thing out of place.
One of the desk drawers stood slightly open.
Inside, a tiny GPS tracking device had been attached beneath the wood.
Someone had entered the office again.
Someone was watching every movement inside the mansion.
And whoever they were...
They now knew that Hannah Brooks had begun changing the Ralston family.
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Which meant...
The real attack was about to begin.
