April
It was sunny out—well, kind of. Between the flight and the time change and what had happened in London, I was so discombobulated that I felt as though I was walking around in a daze.
Willa had woken up on the plane, and I spent most of the flight watching nature documentaries with her, trying to keep her mind off nearly being kidnapped. She was still shaken, but she was tough like her dad—nothing seemed to stick to her.
It was evening when we arrived back at the house.
“Dad,” asked Willa, already sleepy again. “Are those men going to come here?”
Jason froze in place and turned, his expression hard. He stepped over to Willa and dropped down to her level.
“No. None of those men will ever come here. I’ll keep you safe, Sprout—I promise.”
He was serious as a heart attack. All Willa could do was nod.
“I’m hungry,” she said.
Jason turned to me, rising and stepping over. “This place is secure—you don’t need to worry about anything while you’re here.”
“Sure.”
“And I’m going to get to the bottom of what happened. Until then, try to keep everything as normal for her as possible. Get her whatever she wants for dinner, and then ready for bed.”
“Sure, no problem.”
“Good. And, I’m sorry, April.”
He didn’t wait for me to respond before turning and heading up the stairs.
I was still processing everything he’d told me. He’d laid it all out, let me know he trying to get on the straight and narrow.
But what he didn’t know was that I’d already known it all, and I sat there pretending he’d been dropping some grand revelation on top of me.
He’d tried to open up, and I’d answered him with more lies. There was nothing but deceit between us, but at the very least he was trying to come clean.
“Those guys were scary,” said Willa as she plopped herself onto one of the kitchen barstools. “And Dad just beat them up.”
“They were just some drunk jerks,” I said. What was another lie on top of the rest? “You’re lucky your dad’s so tough. He really knocked their butts out.”
“What did they want?”
“Probably just to rob us. It’s scary, but that’s life in the big city sometimes. And I should’ve known better than to trust a stranger like that.”
“I’m hungry. Can we get some hamburgers?”
I couldn’t help but smile at how quickly she’d been able to snap back from everything.
“Sure, Will. Whatever you want.” I ran my hand through her hair, Willa smiling up at me as I did.
Eating was the last thing on my mind. But Jason wanted to keep things normal, so I ordered some burgers and fries for me and Willa.
When it came, I barely touched it. Thankfully, Willa was all about food, happily chomping down on her burger and cleaning her plate.
“Are you sick?” she asked, pointing to my food.
“No. I think I’m all weird-feeling from the flight.”
“Can I have some?”