Total pages in book: 138
Estimated words: 139147 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 696(@200wpm)___ 557(@250wpm)___ 464(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 139147 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 696(@200wpm)___ 557(@250wpm)___ 464(@300wpm)
I felt Cap at my back, and a lot of other people, both physically and emotionally, when my father made it to me.
“Can I have a word in private with you?” he asked me tautly.
“You can say no, Raye,” Luna, at my side, reminded me.
“What’s going on?” I heard Ryan ask somebody.
“Quiet,” Martha, who was unsurprisingly close, shushed him.
I thought about Luke’s lesson to Cap and I suggested, “Maybe we need some space to cool down. We can have dinner on Saturday before you leave.”
Luna’s body jerked.
Whoops.
That was her birthday party.
“Friday, sorry,” I corrected. “I have important plans I can’t miss on Saturday.”
“We’re in Phoenix to see you, Rachel,” Dad pointed out.
“The fact that’s a we, and it wasn’t shared you’ve had a wife for three years and longer is the issue, Dad,” I reminded him.
Dad shook his head and pulled his hand through his graying blond hair.
It was then I saw how thick it was. What a nice haircut he had. That it looked like he’d lost weight, firmed up. He was in a spot, but he was still standing taller. And when his eyes fell on mine, the same color of my own, they were bright and clear and…
Engaged.
I took a small step back and hit Cap’s body.
He put a hand to my hip.
Right.
Better.
Dad watched this.
“I’m gla—” He cleared his throat. “I’m glad you have so many good people in your life, Rachel.”
“So am I.”
“You need to know, Deb told me, a long time ago, when we met again, when things sparked between us, that I should tell you. She said it often, and she was upset about the fact I didn’t. She was upset you weren’t at our wedding.”
“She was right about that, and she was right to feel that way.”
“I thought…” he shook his head and looked away.
I said nothing.
He came back to me. “I thought, with the way we lost your mom, your sister, that…” He shook his head again. “Dammit, Rachel, I thought you blamed me. Blamed me for not protecting Macy from being snatched from our lives. Blamed me for not looking after your mother so her grief drained the life from her so there was none to take when she hung herself.”
I heard gasps, Linda and Alexis, and a sharp hiss, my guess, Martha.
I ignored those.
So now they knew.
They belonged in my Citadel with me.
Not the denial.
The fortification of my well-being.
“I didn’t blame you, Dad. You blamed yourself.”
“You escaped me the minute you could,” he accused.
“I escaped the loneliness. You left me alone.” I swung my arm wide to my side, nearly hitting Luna, and Cap wrapped his around my belly. “You left me alone in dealing with all the shit around Macy. All the fear and hope and devastation and worry. You left me alone when Mom had already drifted away from me. And then when she finalized that. I was sick of being alone. Look at me. I’m not alone.”
“I lost my baby.” His voice cracked. “I lost my wife.”
“I lost my sister. I lost my mother. I lost my father.”
“I’m right here,” he said in a pleading voice.
“You’ve been married for three years and I didn’t even know you were seeing somebody,” I snapped.
Another couple gasps and hisses.
“Rachel—”
Martha stepped between us. “Enough.”
“Martha, now is not—” I began.
She looked over her shoulder at me.
“Quiet, my lovely,” she said softly.
I shut my mouth because she’d never called me an endearment (or anyone, even her grandchildren, not that I’d heard), and I’d never heard her talk quietly.
Ever.
She turned back to my father.
“I don’t know what’s going on, but the little I’ve heard, it’s not good. It seems you got some shit to deal with, sir. So I encourage you to give your daughter some space and deal with it. But before you go, know this about the girl you left behind. This place,”—she indicated the Oasis with a flap of both arms—“it’s a community. And Raye is the heart of it. I’m sure we’d all get along all right, but she doesn’t walk out of her unit without calling, ‘hey.’ She looks after our pets. She’s the ringleader of our shindigs. She organized us all to make sure Linda got fed and her sheets changed when she was down with Covid. I got a million different examples for you of how she unites us, and in my case, ’cause I’m ornery, puts up with us. But that’s her too, she’s a leader, so people look to her, and they follow that lead.”
She took a sharp breath…
And kept going.
“But I’m not gonna get into all that, because I’m so damned mad to learn that she does all of it because she was hungry for a family. But I guess I got you to thank for what she gives us. Though, I’m not feelin’ real thankful at the mo’. So you go away and you think on that, and you sit down to dinner with your daughter on Friday and figure out a way to fix this. Because let me assure you, you are missing out. We got her, so we’re good. And it sounds like you lost a lot, but you had a diamond in your hands and you threw it away. It’s up to you to figure out how to get it back. But now, she wants you to go, so you’re leaving.”