Dad hasn’t really explained to Lizzy yet how and why he’s her father. I’m sure that conversation will happen, but not until the dust settles. Who knows if it ever will?
“So pretty,” he says, touching the charms. He’s calmer around her. His anger has dissipated, as if someone threw a bucket of ice water over his head. And his eyes light up when he looks at her. It’s beautiful.
“I think we still have a few more things to discuss,” Dad says, casually walking back into the room.
“Can you make it quick? There’s somewhere I have to be,” Sylas says. I know exactly what he’s going to do if we let him go now.
“You mean California?” Dad says. There’s a reason we got him today, because if we waited, he would have been gone and retrieving him would be a little more difficult.
Sylas’ eyes narrow as Dad continues.
“Yes, we’re going to have to talk about that as well. You should probably get in contact with your friends and tell them to come back.”
“Why would I do that?” I notice there’s a distinct lack of swearing when he’s around Lizzy. If she wasn’t here, I’m sure there would be a few more “fucks” sprinkled in with his speech.
“Because I have an offer that you’re not going to want to refuse,” Dad says and I can’t help but raise my eyebrows. He doesn’t have to be so cheesy, but he just can’t help himself sometimes.
“He’s obsessed with The Godfather,” I say to Sylas, because he definitely looks confused.
I watch his face as he wages an inner battle. He’s normally so good at hiding his emotions (for the most part), but he’s almost completely stripped bare right now. He takes a deep breath and lets it out.
“Okay. I’ll listen to what you have to say, but if I don’t like it, you’re going to let me walk out this door with Lizzy and go about my life,” he says.
That’s not going to go over well. The plan is to not let him go. Dad wants him. I want him too, but for different reasons. We both want Lizzy.
Dad shakes his head. “I’m afraid I can’t let you take her. She’s my daughter and I intend to take care of her.”
This does not go over well with Sylas. His face turns red and I sense another impending explosion.
“You have no right,” he says. “I’m her legal guardian.”
True, but that’s not what’s in play here. Dad can do whatever he wants. Sylas may have resources, but he doesn’t have the kind of power my father does. That my family does.
“I know you are, and I don’t want to fight with you. I really don’t. I just want to be part of her life,” Dad says.
“You’re not going to stop me.”
“I know. That’s why I’m hoping to convince you.”
Lizzy is watching both of them with a knot forming between her eyebrows. She’s confused, I can tell, so approach her and ask her if she wants to go finish the movie.
“Why is my brother mad?” she whispers, which is a little bit louder than your average whisper.
I am reminded, again, that this girl is my half-sister. I always thought I was an only child and here she is.
“It’s okay,” I say. I wasn’t happy with Dad dropping that bomb on her, but I’m not even sure she knows what it means. He hasn’t told her that he’s her father. She just calls him “the man” for now. He seems to be fine with it as long as she’s here.
Dad used to disappear sometimes when I was a kid. And then when he’d come back, he’d be distant and stare off into space a lot. I always wondered why and now I know it’s because of her. He was looking for the daughter he lost.
“Let’s go back upstairs,” I say and start leading Lizzy away. Sylas and Dad don’t even notice me as we go.
“Your mother and I met in high school,” Dad says as I walk out of the room and start walking Lizzy up the stairs. No doubt he’s filling Sylas in on the rest of the story. I’d heard it only recently.
They’d met in school and been sweethearts. Typical young love. They’d wanted to be together, but Dad had bowed to parental pressure and married my mother instead. I don’t have to ask him if that’s his biggest regret. I know it is. He doesn’t love her. He never did.
But he married her and started work as a forensic accountant and that got him interested in working with fraud, money laundering and other financial crimes. He’d kept in touch with Marina and knew she’d married someone else and that he wasn’t a good man. Dad started his own investigation and found out a lot of the illegal things her husband was up to. He collected evidence over the years and finally had enough to show Marina so she could get out of the marriage.
He got uncomfortable with the next part of the story, because the night he went to tell her what her husband was up to was when Lizzy was conceived. He swears to me it was just the one time and he didn’t mean for it to happen and so forth. I honestly don’t blame him.
After that night, he lost touch with her. She wouldn’t take his calls and he couldn’t get in touch with her. He tried, but he didn’t want to make her husband suspicious and cause her harm, so he watched her from a distance.
Over the years, he found little ways to take care of Lizzy. Sending money, birthday cards, that sort of thing. He made sure to be discreet about it.
I asked him how he knew for sure Lizzy was his daughter.
“Because she told me. I don’t know how she knew, but she knew, beyond the shadow of a doubt,” he told me and even though I still had doubts, when I saw Lizzy for the first time, it was undeniable (at least to me) that she was his daughter.
The features they share are subtle. I’ve seen pictures of Marina, and Lizzy got most of her looks from her maternal side. She was a beautiful woman and her death left a hole in three hearts that can never be filled.
I have no idea how this is going to turn out, but I know that my life will never be the same.
Well, it changed the minute Sylas Carter walked into it. I should have known. I should have known.
Once again, I keep my ears trained downstairs for any sounds of fighting, or of gunshots. I wouldn’t put it past either of them. Both Sylas and my father have the potential to kill. I know my father has before.
Lizzy focuses on the movie and is quickly lost in it. I envy her for a moment. Her ability to forget the present and get completely wrapped up in a movie. To let your mind float for a while, unencumbered by heavy thoughts, it would be wonderful.
I’m doing my best to watch the movie when I hear a thud downstairs and I’m up and nearly tripping over my own feet as I run down the stairs as fast as possible. I shouldn’t have left them alone.
All kinds of worst-case scenarios race through my mind. What I find is Sylas on the floor and Dad leaning over him, taking his pulse.
“What did you do?!” I scream, throwing myself down beside Sylas.
“Nothing, he blacked out. I tried to catch him, but missed.” I narrow my eyes and look into his eyes, but he’s telling me the truth. Dad doesn’t lie to me, and even if he tried, I’d know.
“Why did he black out?” I ask.
“Not sure. I… I might have told him too much.” You think? I reach down and stroke his forehead. He’s still out.
“Let’s take him upstairs,” Dad says and the two of us drag Sylas’ prone body upstairs as Lizzy jumps around, offering suggestions. Anything from slapping him to dunking him in the pool to tickling his feet.
It’s all chaos and Sylas is still down for the count. He finally comes to when we drop him on my bed. Dad has taken Lizzy back downstairs because she’s a little too hyped up and left me alone to deal with Sylas.
His eyelids flutter and I see the confusion on his face before he realizes where he is.
“I didn’t peg you as a fainter,” I say as I sit next to him on my bed.
“I didn’t faint,” he growls, trying to be all alpha. Nice try, buddy.
I lean over and drag one finger down the middle of his forehead. He flinches away from me and I stop.
“Well, then, I don’t know what you would call it. Your brain spontaneously shutting down for a moment?” I say, trying to be playful.