Total pages in book: 76
Estimated words: 75243 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 376(@200wpm)___ 301(@250wpm)___ 251(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 75243 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 376(@200wpm)___ 301(@250wpm)___ 251(@300wpm)
That sends her back a step. Her gaze drops to the floor. “It’s a secret.”
I grab hold of her chin and gently inch her head back up so we can lock eyes. “No secrets, remember?”
It has been our pact since her mom died three years ago.
Layna, my late wife, promised me the same on our wedding day. We swore to not only love, honor, and cherish each other, but we added a line to our vows about not keeping secrets.
“Auntie Sinclair got me a secret gift for my birthday,” Stevie confesses with a sniffle. “She gave it to me when we had our special birthday lunch.”
My sister, Sinclair, and my sister-in-law, Maren, are both close to my daughter. They make a point of spending as much time with her as they can. I’m appreciative of that.
“This secret gift has got you pretty torn up,” I say softly. “I think it’s time to tell me what it is.”
“You’re too old to understand.”
I hold back a grin. “I’m only thirty-five, sweetheart. Try me.”
She nods slowly. “I will if you promise to remember that I’m nine now. I’m not your little girl anymore.”
She’ll always be my little girl, but I’ve come to recognize that not only is she getting taller by the day, but she’s also maturing at the same rate.
She still loves to cuddle on the couch when we watch a movie, and innocence surrounds her, but she’s growing up, and I’m begrudgingly accepting it.
“I promise,” I whisper.
Her pinkie finger juts out. “Swear to it, Dad.”
Dad.
That’s another shift for us. My days as Daddy are slowly coming to an end. I’m becoming Dad more frequently.
I wrap my finger around hers. “I swear to it.”
She wipes both hands over her face to chase away any lingering tears. “Auntie Sinclair bought me a diary for my birthday.”
That’s not news to me.
I saw it tucked inside a drawer when I put Stevie’s laundry away the day after her birthday.
I assumed that’s why two days later, she requested that I leave all of her clean clothing in a basket on her bed to put away herself.
“Is there a problem with the diary, Stevie?”
Big tears with heart-breaking volume fill her eyes. She bats her eyelashes, sending them streaming down her cheeks. “I lost the key. It’s gone.”
To accentuate that, her hands drift out to her sides. She turns her palms up to reveal they’re empty.
There is little in life that is better than being a hero to my daughter. I can do that now.
“I think I found it,” I confess.
“What?” She jumps up and down. “Where? When?”
“Yesterday. I found it on the floor in my bedroom.” I tap the tip of her nose. “Were you in there?”
Her head bobs up and down. “I was looking for Budley. I left him on the chair in your room when I was reading.”
Budley is the stuffed toy my brother, Keats, gave her last year after one of his frequent business trips. The well-loved toy is the inanimate equal to Dudley, my sister’s Yorkie.
“That chair is my favorite place to read, Daddy.”
My chest aches at that. It’s the chair that Layna sat in to read. I’ve offered to move the rust-colored armchair into Stevie’s room, but she prefers it where it is.
Even though her mother died just days before Stevie’s sixth birthday, she’s been able to cling to some memories. I’ve nourished that by answering any questions she has about Layna and telling her story after story about the short time the two of them had together.
My daughter rests a hand on my cheek. “Where’s the key?”
“In the pocket of the jeans I wore yesterday.” I scoop her up into my arms. “Let’s go grab it, and then you need to get dressed for school.”
“Deal.” She presses a kiss on my cheek. “You always save the day.”
I close my eyes as I dive my hand into the pocket of my jeans for the third time and come up empty.
“Daddy?” Stevie asks from behind me. “Do you have it?”
I mentally trace back my steps since I found the key yesterday morning.
I stepped on it as I was stalking across the floor on my way out of my bedroom.
I picked it up, shoved it into my pocket, and raced out of the room to wake my daughter.
“It has to be here,” I mutter.
Stevie rounds me. “It’s not in your hand?”
I do a quick check of every pocket of the jeans again, but there’s nothing.
“Where is it?” she questions, concern knitting her brow. “Daddy, where is it?”
I have no clue, so I steer this train wreck onto another track with the hope that it’ll be enough to get Stevie dressed, fed, and to school on time.
“I can pry the lock open,” I suggest. “We can get a pretty ribbon for you to tie around it to keep it closed.”