“So, you’re not coming back?” he asked softly, and my heart twisted at the sound of the sadness in his voice.
I didn’t want him to feel this way about me. I didn’t want him to struggle and suffer, knowing I wasn’t going to be his little girl anymore, but I couldn’t pander to him any longer. I refused to. I had a life to lead, and that life didn’t involve pandering to every one of his insecurities about me leaving him.
“I will eventually, I think,” I assured him. “I just don’t think it’s going to be for a while. I want to set myself up out here. We’ve got some plans about what we’re going to do now that we’re here, and I’m really excited to get started on everything.”
“As long as you’ve got something ready to go,” he said, as though that was the problem.
I knew he was just covering up for how much he was going to miss me. His house was big, and it was usually just me and him in there. Now, it would just be him. My heart ached with sadness, but I stuck to my guns.
“You should move out of that big old house, Dad,” I suggested. “Get somewhere smaller and closer to work.”
“But what if you want to come back?” he blurted out, and his vulnerability took me by surprise.
I wasn’t used to hearing him talk this way. He was usually so carefully and completely closed off to me, but here he was, laying out the truth in a way I couldn’t ignore and didn’t want to.
“Then I’d get a place of my own,” I said firmly. “If Elliott and I split up, I’m not moving back in with you. I’d get a place of my own.”
“Jesus, Aria,” he said, but this time I could hear the smile on his face. “You’re as stubborn as I am.”
“Damn right,” I said, straightening my back. “I’ll take that as a compliment.”
“You should,” he agreed and then paused before he spoke again like he was picking his words carefully. “Honey, I’ve been thinking a lot about the two of us in the last few days.”
“Right,” I prompted him. I wasn’t sure where this was going, but I was more than happy to give him the chance to speak his mind.
“And I’m sorry.” He finally apologized, the word coming out like a gasp of relief, as though he’d been holding onto it for a long time. “I’m sorry for the way I’ve treated you all these years. It’s not right, and I’m not proud of it, and I know there’s nothing I can do to make it up to you or fix what I did, but I just want you to know I’m sorry.”
“Thank you,” I breathed. I never in a million years truly believed I’d ever hear my father admit he was in the wrong and apologize for everything he had done to me.
“That means more to me than you could possibly know,” I said, and he let out a short sigh, as though satisfied by my response.
“So, do you want to get a coffee or something when you’re back in LA?” he suggested.
“How about lunch?” I said, feeling a warmth toward him I hadn’t felt in a long time. He felt like my father for a change, not my captor, not my kidnapper, but my father, a man just trying to do right by his daughter because he was so afraid of losing her.
“That sounds great,” he agreed. “And I guess I’ll give that Marshall guy a call when I get a chance.”
“Yeah, you should,” I said. “It would mean the world to me, and I know Elliott would appreciate it, too.”
“Then, I will,” he said. “I guess I’ll see you later?”
“Yes, you will,” I promised. “Tomorrow.”
After hanging up, I looked down at the phone, and a smile spread across my face. I couldn’t believe the conversation I’d just had. It had been civil and non-accusatory and sweet. He’d acknowledged everything he had done wrong and was looking to make amends any way he could. He was more a father to me in that one phone call than he had been over the last five years. It felt good to have a man in my life again I could look up to and trust. It would take some getting used to, and he was bound to slip up a few times, but this was a start. This was a place for the two of us to build from and, right now, I’d take that.
There was a clattering in the front room, and I got up and headed through to see Elliott returning with Betsy. She was skittering dizzily about his feet, and he was doing his best to untangle himself from her leash. I laughed at the sight of them.
“Good nap?” he asked, and I nodded, stepping toward him and pecking a kiss on his cheek.
“The best,” I said.
Chapter Twenty-Nine
Elliott
I woke up early, blinking a couple of times as I came to, puzzled at unfamiliar noises. Were those voices I heard downstairs?
At first, I thought it was Floundy, or maybe Tucker had come back to visit, but I soon realized whoever was down there; it was an older man.
I grabbed some clothes, got dressed, and headed for the stairs. But before I could even take one step, I froze as I saw who was sitting at the table in the kitchen.
“What the fuck?” I exclaimed, loud enough that all three of them turned around to see me.
Somehow, and I couldn’t imagine how, sitting at the table in Aria’s little beach house, was Aria, her father, and my dad.
Aria greeted me with a nervous smile. “Elliott, you’re awake.” She gestured to the seat next to her. “You want to come join us?”
“Doesn’t look like I have much of a choice,” I muttered as I made my way downstairs to sit next to her. I looked first at her father and then my father and then to Aria for some kind of explanation.
“What the hell is going on?” I demanded.
Aria opened her mouth, but before she could get a word out, my father cut her off.
“I’m here to take you back home,” he announced, getting to his feet and nodding to the door. “Just walk away from all of this, son. I promise you won’t regret it. Come on now. All will be forgiven if you leave with me right now.”
I sat firmly in my seat. I had no intention of giving in to him, just because he bothered to come out and find me after all this time. Aria pointed to him.
“Sit back down,” she ordered. She wasn’t letting him get away with it that easily. “We are here to talk, and that’s what we’re going to do.”
“Don’t talk to me like you own me,” Dad said, snapping at her, and of course, Aria’s father jumped in to defend his daughter.
“Don’t talk to her like that!” he shouted.
Within seconds, the conversation had dissolved into a series of accusations and intense statements, all aimed in different directions as the four of us tried to make sense of what was going on. I had no idea why our two fathers were here or what exactly Aria had thought this would achieve.
This was a stupid idea. I needed her to get my father out of here before I punched him in the face.
Eventually, Aria slammed her fist down on the table in front of her, drawing us all into silence.
“Enough!” She raised her voice high enough to be heard over the racket of the argument. “I got you both here so you could talk about your differences, not fight like a bunch of stupid kids. Is that clear?”
“Differences?” my father said, his eyes burning into Mr. Triton’s. “You think this is about a little squabble? That man robbed me blind.”