“Well, not much,” Liam added quickly when he saw the impact his words had on the frail man. “I suppose that’s natural.”
“Yes,” DuBois said sadly. “She’s a married woman, with children of her own.”
“You never had children, Mr. DuBois?” Natalie asked.
“Please…call me Linc. No, I never did. One of the biggest regrets of my life,” DuBois said with a sad smile. “I’ve built an empire, but I was too stupid to ever pause and build a family—although Nick is practically a son to me. Still…don’t either of you hesitate to start a family if you haven’t already. What’s the use of all this—” he waved vaguely at the luxurious room “—if you have no one to share it with?”
A pause ensued in which Dubois stared into space blankly. Natalie glanced at Liam.
“Mr. DuBois?” Liam asked gently.
DuBois blinked and refocused on them. For a few seconds, Natalie was quite sure he didn’t have any memory of who they were. His illness had clearly affected his mind as well as his body.
“I’m here to ask you about a car crash that occurred sixteen years ago. My father caused that crash. Do you know anything about that?”
DuBois looked completely blank. “Car crash?” he asked slowly. “What car crash? On the lake road?”
Liam inhaled and leaned forward, his elbows on his knees. Natalie thought she understood his cautiousness. DuBois suddenly seemed fatigued and less sharp than he had been previously.
“My father—Derry Kavanaugh—caused the accident. The crash occurred in Michigan, not here in Tahoe. It happened sixteen years ago. Did you ever meet Derry Kavanaugh?”
DuBois just stared back at him, his pale blue eyes blank.
Liam cast a wary glance her way before he continued. “Mr. DuBois…when is the last time you saw my mother, Brigit Kavanaugh? Brigit Darien,” Liam added his mother’s maiden name quickly when DuBois’ expression remained uncomprehending. Although he’d recalled the name Kavanaugh earlier, and seemed to understand who Liam was, the name seemed to mean nothing to him at present.
The name Darien, however, had the effect of hitting a light switch.
Dubois beamed. “On the New Year—1976.”
For a few seconds, both Natalie and Brigit stared. The precise, quick response hadn’t been what they’d expected.
“You…you remember so well,” Liam commented.
“Of course I do,” DuBois said matter-of-factly. “How could I forget such a special night with my beautiful Brigit. She came back to me, on that night. I knew that husband of hers couldn’t be faithful to her. I knew it,”
Natalie’s mouth had gone bone-dry. She glanced anxiously at Liam, who appeared to have been frozen by DuBois’ words.
“Mr. DuBois,” she began. “I think we’ve taken enough of your time. You must be very tired—”
“1976?” Liam interrupted her. “Are you saying my mother—Brigit Darien—was with you in 1976? Are you certain?”
“Of course I am, do you think I’d forget a night like that?” DuBois asked. “Brigit was torn to pieces by what her husband had done. Maybe some would say she was just as unfaithful on that night with me, but they’d be wrong. They’d be dead wrong,” he said so firmly, so fiercely that Natalie had a glimpse of the decisive, charismatic man DuBois must once have been. She stared, anxiety, confusion and horror rising in her in equal measure.
She’d worried they might discover something that would further damage Liam’s opinion of his father. Now it seemed this investigation might make him question his mother, as well. Natalie had never felt so helpless in her life. There was nothing they could do to stop it. It was like standing beneath a gigantic avalanche, with nowhere to run.
The truth just kept spilling out of DuBois’ mouth.
“Brigit was mine before she was ever that fool’s from Chicago. Maybe we only had one night together, but who did she come to in her distress? Me.”
DuBois’ fierceness seemed to leak out of him as quickly as it had come. He sat slumped in his chair, staring at the table where the young, beautiful girl sat smiling on the horse, her image frozen in time.
“Brigit had a baby nine months after that. A mutual friend who lived in Chicago told me the news,” DuBois said feebly. Natalie cast a wild glance at Liam—the man was obviously failing—but Liam just stared at DuBois, a glazed, fixed expression on his face, as if he was watching a car wreck and couldn’t turn away from the spectacle.
“I asked her if the baby was mine,” DuBois continued weakly, “but she denied it…said the baby came following her reunion with her husband. She told me we couldn’t see each other after that, and we never did. It broke my heart when she told me that, just like it did when she told me that baby was her husband’s. I’d hoped so much she was mine…” he said, his voice trailing off as though he were musing to himself as he sat alone in the enormous room. “Both Brigit and that little girl. I’ll always remember what Brigit named her… Deidre Jean…”
It took Natalie a moment to realize that Nick Malone had entered the room and stood behind DuBois’ wheelchair.
“I think you two had better go.”