What did you tell them, Dad?He obviously hadn’t called the police. I turned to Franklin and looked into his old, kind face, which in its gentleness, reminded me for a few seconds of Pan, of Kjertan. My heart clenched. “It’s a surprise visit,” I explained evasively.
Franklin looked over the sparkling marble slab of the reception, behind which a dozen cameras and the latest surveillance technology surpassed the next. “Your father will be delighted.” Nothing on his face told me that he knew where I supposedly was back from. “Should I call him for you? He’s in his midtown office.”
Without knowing why, I almost burst into tears. Maybe because all this modern technology hadn’t helped me or maybe because the child in me thought Dad had been sitting here waiting for me to return for over a year. I had hoped his life had stopped that day, but obviously, that was an idiotic notion. My father was Mr. Nicholas Hampton, a god and benefactor, a larger-than-life figure in business and world politics. Maybe also an environmental criminal, rapist, and liar.
I forced a smile onto my face. “Yes, please let him know. That would be nice, Franklin.” Then I hurried to the bank of golden elevators where a line of elevator operators were waiting. I recognized some of them from before.
“Glad you’re back, Miss Hampton. To the penthouse?” the first person asked who was unknown to me. He looked at me with interest and a familiar fear crept across my neck, whispering a warning ofcautionin my mind. Involuntarily, I wrapped my arms around myself but managed to nod. For a moment, it felt as if I was an open book to him as if he could see everything that had happened to me.
Heat rose to my face, but I assured myself as I waited silently beside him that it was impossible.
When the doors slid silently open, the elevator operator showed me inside and followed.
“No!” I said a little too forcefully. “I’m going alone.”
He stared at me in surprise. “But, Miss Hampton… We have strict instructions…”
“I’m going alone!” Perhaps my tone was a bit too sharp because his face darkened as if I was one of those arrogant IT girls who treat every employee like dirt. In fact, my emotions were so agitated that I didn’t care, but part of me was sorry.
As I rode up the thirty-plus floors, the last thoughts faded and I was completely focused on myself. Tired, I leaned against the polished wall and avoided looking in the mirror, which Ihad done since my imprisonment with Isaac. I felt empty and hollow like a vessel. The trip alone from Louisiana to here had been exhausting and upsetting; I hadn’t expected that leaving my safe place in the swamp would affect me so much. One part of me wondered what I was doing here, but the other knew. Without the truth, I would not be able to go on living. I needed to be certain that Isaac hadn’t lied and I needed to understand the hatred in order to be able to sort his cruel deeds in my life. Because it still seemed to me as if they were a silent horror haunting me, ready to erupt repeatedly without warning. It was as if my life had taken an unexpected turn and I wouldn’t be able to get back on track if I didn’t understand it.
The elevator door slid open and I nodded at two more security men. I knew them well. Maybe too well for them not to ask questions.
The beefy man with the high forehead smiled promptly. “Miss Hampton. Nice to see you.” He seemed genuinely pleased.
“Yes. Earlier than planned,” I replied vaguely. Then something occurred to me. “Staff?” It sounded incoherent. “Who’s here?”
“Ruth, Andrew, Ruby, and Jane, Miss Hampton.”
“Send them home,” I said, suddenly feeling weak on my feet.
“But your father…”
I raised my head and there must have been an unmistakable plea in my eyes. “Send them home, please… It’s…it’s important to me, Mr. Cox.” Luckily, I remembered his name.
Then I waited, secluded in an open elevator until the second security guard had spoken to my father on the phone and escorted all the employees downstairs.
Only then did I enter my home.
Everything I had imagined in my mind over the last few days was now happening so quickly that I could hardly keep up. As I walked through our lavish foyer toward the living room, it felt surreal. I smelled the old lemon wood and the bitter polish, looked at the mirror-polished marble floors, and Dad’s rarities from all over the world. As if in a dream, I walked through the largest living room in New York, past the display case with Marie Antoinette’s antique brooch, the sealing wax box from the renowned court jeweler of Tsar Alexander III, the first golf ball, and the Imperial red wine bottle of Cabernet Sauvignon that Dad had bought at an auction for over four hundred thousand dollars. And last, the Heart of the Sea necklace, the perfect replica of Kate Winslet’s Heart of the Ocean necklace fromTitanic, which had cost Dad a measly seventeen million dollars. It was his most expensive piece and he had bought it anonymously at an auction shortly after Mom’s death. A memento of her. Because her heart, like the film chain, rested forever on the sea floor. On my twelfth birthday, he had said it was mine now, but I had never wanted to wear it, not even at home.
I continued walking through the party lounge, Dad’s wine bar, and my studio. My unfinished paintings were still there on the easels, neatly dusted, of course. As if on autopilot, I walked toward my last work: a blurry, chaotic depiction of a wild ocean in which a ghostly creature was sinking.
The picture suddenly seemed ridiculous to me, like the absurd painting of a naive girl.
I had been a naive girl.
Naive.
And so innocent.
My heart suddenly felt heavy. When I touched the dried paints with my fingertips, tears welled up in my eyes. I wondered who Willa Nevaeh Rae had been when she was lured away fromher party. What dreams had she followed and where did she think life would take her?
The banal answer was: I had no idea. I had centered my life around Dad, he had been my god and benefactor. My savior who had sacrificed his great love for me. I existed then only as a vague notion as blurry as my painting. Today, I saw myself more clearly even though it hurt. I saw myself not only through Dad’s eyes but through the eyes of many others who had told me how brave and courageous I had been and that I had a good heart.
For a moment, my fingers burned with the desire to destroy the paintings, like the moonshine, but then the double doors in the entrance foyer burst open.
A voice echoed through the penthouse, almost knocking me off my feet. “Willa? Willa Rae, dearest, where are you?”
