“Maybe—maybe we can help each other be happy again.”
The lump in my throat explodes like shrapnel.
“I’m happy to help,” I choke out. “And I’ll personally help you choose your permanent nanny too. Things will get better, Seren.”
She doesn’t reply, so I stand and place the notebook on her nightstand. I’m at the doorway and turning off her light when she speaks.
“I’m sorry,” she whispers into the darkness.
“I know.” Seren doesn’t elaborate, she doesn’t need to. I think I understand her more thoroughly than anyone else in my life.
Quietly, I pull her door shut and then nearly run to my room with my heart in my throat. I can’t get into my own bed fast enough. I’m running even though I haven’t left the house because the love lines of this family are slowly tying me to them one thread at a time, and I don’t know how to get free—or even if I want to.
I’m almost asleep when a tear falls down my face, startling me awake, and Seren’s words ring loud in the silence.
Maybe we can help each other be happy again.
The fucking noose I’ve been running from pulls tighter against my throat, and this little girl might be the one holding the rope.
“Single Dad Hotline,I’m your helper, how can I help you?” I ask, then gasp as my foot hits a slippery patch of grass and I’m forced to slow my run to a steady walk. Without my music blasting in my ears, the sounds of the forest accentuate the dark shadows caused by the early morning light hitting branches far above my head.
“Hi, did I wake you?” Seb’s tone is husky. Did he just wake up?
“Ah, no. I had a daddy emergency at four forty-five, so I decided to get up and work out. But I happen to know that allof your children are still sleeping peacefully and nothing has changed since we spoke last night, so what can I do for you?”
“I’m not sure. I just, I needed to call.”
Danger. Danger.
Keep us on task, Rowan. Do not go off the rails.
“Are you okay?” There go my fucking rails.
“Yes,” he says too sharply. “Yes, thank you.” He’s not fooling anyone with his forced softer tone.
“Is there anything I can do?”
“No. Not really. My ex-VP made a thinly veiled threat against the kids. I haven’t been able to sleep since.”
I ran into Leo on the trail this morning. He told me a little more about Sebastian’s situation. That conversation also taught me that I shouldn’t tell Leo anything important. The man is a bigger gossip than TMZ.
Sweat dots my skin. This damn family makes me so freaking uncomfortable, but Sebastian especially.
“I can promise you that they’re safe, and they will be safe here. They’re in their own little bubble for now—it’s good for them.”
“Logically, I understand that. But not being there with them, it’s hard. I’m all they’ve had since their mother left—maybe even before that. I tried to do it all, I really did. I wanted the perfect family for them.”
The hair on my arms stands on end. “You know that perfection isn’t something tangible in a family, right? Families, the way families should be anyway, are full of imperfections that are applauded and revered. It’s the unconditional love in the face of those imperfections that make a family perfect.”
Or so I’ve been told. Thank you, Family Psych 101.
I swear I hear him swallow over the line. “I’ve spent most of my life trying to create the family I never had but always wanted.I wanted so badly to give my children a childhood without the trauma that shaped me, and I failed. Miserably failed.”
A crack of thunder sounds overhead, drawing my attention to the dark clouds that rolled in while I was solely focused on the timbre of Sebastian’s voice.
“Being aware of what you want to give them, in spite of whatever you’ve gone through, is already doing better than your past.”
“What about you?” he asks. A drop of rain hits my forehead, so I turn around on the trail that will lead me to the house.
