Page 66 of Redemption
None of us truly wants to sleep and allow this initial stage of our family reunion to end, but I know that I can’t stay conscious for much longer.
I’ve been running on fumes for hours. It’s a wonder that I didn’t fall asleep on the flight, like Keira and Aurora. But then again, it’s not. I had the first opportunity of my life to talk to my brother, and even more than that, I couldn’t rest until my family was safe. My body wouldn’t let me sleep.
Now though, it’s as if a biological cue has been triggered and my body knows that it can release its typical hyperawareness and vigilance and take refuge in much-needed rest.
I barely managed to eat. It wasn’t important. Feeding my daughter was. And the fact that it was happening during the first meal that my family had ever shared together … priceless.
Not for all the riches and treasures in the world would I have missed this moment.
Even though my mother and father hadn’t been in each other’s company for many, many years, I could not tell. It seemed like they were together just yesterday. I can’t imagine what this is like for my brother, for whom so much has changed so quickly. It seems change is in the air though.
Only days ago, I was in despair. On the floor of my library, I hit rock bottom. I felt myself break.
How is it that after giving myself over to such torment and accepting the reality of what I had done that life lifted me into a totally different dimension?
I will never understand the mysteries and perfection of my life, but I will not question them either.
I have been saved over and over again, when I did not deserve it. I used to wonder why. Why me? What did I do to deserve this?
But there were never any answers, so I quit asking.
When Keira came into my life, I didn’t hesitate. Something deep in my soul knew that she was important to my continued existence. I couldn’t take a chance that she wouldn’t understand, so I took her instead.
Only through a miracle could she have fallen in love with me—another gift I didn’t question because I was afraid questioning it would make it disappear.
But her love never disappeared. It only grew. And then with Aurora, a completely different world opened to us, and it changed everything for me.
I tried to continue being the same man I’d been before, but I couldn’t. I feared I was growing soft. But even then, I couldn’t make the same decisions anymore. I couldn’t treat life so callously. Her birth changed me at the most basic biological level. It was something I had no control over. Something I thought I could escape, unchanged. But I was wrong. I felt myself losing my grip on my empire. I couldn’t rule with an iron fist the way I used to. I couldn’t crush people and problems the same way.
It felt like the end of me. The end of life as I knew it.
I understand now—there are no endings. Only new beginnings.
I’ve been gifted with a precious new life that I will not squander. For myself, for my family, for my future, I will cherish this gift and nurture it into all it can become.
As I fall asleep tonight, it will be as a new man.
No longer the old Lachlan Mount, but not Luca Giordano yet either.
I’m somewhere in between, in the unknown. I have no idea who or what I am becoming, but I have never been more grateful to be alive so that I can find out.
Chapter Thirty-Five
Lachlan
Sunlight filters into my awareness, bringing me out of the depths of sleep. My body, exhausted when I lay down, feels lighter and restored as I yawn and stretch.
I can’t remember the last time I slept so soundly or woke feeling so rested. Another yawn and stretch clear the remaining fog of sleep, and my mind switches on. My first thoughts, as usual upon waking, are of Keira and Aurora.
My chin jerks to one side and then the other before I realize that I’m alone on the white sheets in the antique wooden four-poster bed. Levering up to a seated position, I scan the room. There’s no sign of either of them within these cream-plastered walls, decorated with garden scenes painted on canvas.
I swing my legs around, and my feet hit the floor as I see the note on the heavy wooden nightstand.
We’re at breakfast. We love you.
—K
As if my senses are coming online one by one, the scent of food and the sound of clinking plates and silverware enter my awareness.
