He tilts his head to study me for a second. “You don’t want to go down there and talk to him? This is your dad, Ella.”
My panic returns in full force. “No. He’s just a guy who knocked up my mom. I can’t deal with him right now. I…” I gulp again. “I don’t think he realizes I’m his daughter.”
“You didn’t tell him?” Sawyer exclaims.
I slowly shake my head. “Can one of you go downstairs and…I don’t know…take him to a guest room or something?”
“I’ll do it,” Seb instantly replies.
“I’m coming with you,” his brother pipes up. “I’ve gotta see this.”
As the twins race for the door, I quickly call out to them. “Guys, don’t say anything about me. Seriously, I’m not ready for that. Let’s wait until Callum gets home.”
The twins exchange another one of those glances where a whole conversation takes place in a second.
“Sure,” says Seb, and then they’re gone, galloping down the stairs to greet their not-dead uncle.
Easton steps closer to me. His gaze lands on the suitcase near the closet, then locks onto my face. In a heartbeat, he grabs my hand and laces his fingers through mine. “You’re not running, little sis. You have to know it’s a stupid idea.”
I stare at our entwined fingers. “I’m a runner, East.”
“No. You’re a fighter.”
“I can fight for other people. Like my mom or Reed or you, but…I’m not good with conflict at my door.” I chew harder on my bottom lip. “Why is Steve here? He’s supposed to be dead. And how could they arrest Reed?” My voice trembles wildly. “What if he actually goes to jail for this?”
“He won’t.” His hand tightens on mine. “Reed’s going to be back, Ella. Dad will take care of everything.”
“What if he can’t?”
“He will.”
But what if he can’t?
3
Ella
After a sleepless night, I find myself in the sitting room that overlooks the front courtyard. There’s a plush bench tucked beneath the enormous expanse of windows that make up the front of the house. I throw myself onto the cushion, fixing my gaze on the circular driveway beyond the windowpane. My phone is in my lap, but it hasn’t made a peep all night or morning. Not a phone call, not a text. Nothing.
My imagination is running wild, conjuring up all kinds of scenarios. He’s in a cell. He’s in an interrogation room. His wrists and ankles are shackled. He’s being beaten by a cop for not answering questions. Does he have to stay in jail until the trial? I don’t know how this whole arrest, charge, trial thing works.
What I do know is that the longer Reed and Callum are gone, the lower my spirits sink.
“Good morning.”
I nearly fall off the bench at the sound of the unfamiliar male voice. For a second I think that someone broke into the house, or that maybe the detectives are back to do a search. But when I glance at the door, I find Steve O’Halloran standing there.
The beard’s shaved off and he’s dressed in a pair of slacks and a polo shirt, looking a lot less like a homeless person and a lot more like the students’ fathers you see around Astor Park, the private school the Royals and I attend.
“Ella, right?” There’s a hesitant smile on his face.
I nod abruptly and place my phone facedown as I turn back to the window. I don’t know how to act around him.
Last night, I hid in my bedroom while Easton and the twins took care of Steve. I don’t know what story they told him about me, but it’s obvious he has no recollection of me or the letter he received from my mom before he left on the hang-gliding trip where he supposedly died.
Easton stopped by before he went to bed and informed me that Steve was in the green guest room. I didn’t even know there was a green guest room or where it was located.
A crippling sense of anxiety makes me want to run and hide. I am hiding. But he found me anyway, and facing my father is more intimidating than beating back a hundred mean girls at school.
“Well. Ella. I’m a tad confused.”
I startle at the nearness of his voice. Looking over my shoulder again, I find him standing only a couple feet away.
I dig my heels into the cushion of the bench, forcing myself not to move. He’s just a man. Two legs, two arms. Just a man who got a letter from a dying woman about a long-lost daughter, and instead of tracking that woman and that child down, he went on an adventure. That kind of man.
“Did you hear me?” He sounds even more bewildered now, as if he can’t figure out if I’m ignoring him, or just hard of hearing.