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He steps up to Luca and whispers something in his ear, and Luca nods and gives him a tight smile, his already dark eyes darkening more than usual.
They approach Angie, and Savage motions toward the bedrooms. “Angelina and I will check the house.” His gaze darts to Luca and Byron. “You two check outside and ask the other kids out there if anyone has seen them.”
Everyone nods their agreement, and Byron and Luca beeline for the front and back doors while Savage follows Angie down the hall toward the bedrooms.
I start to pull away. “I should go after them, help them look for Allie.”
Landon reaches out and grabs my arm. “No.” He shakes his head. “Too many people he doesn’t know descending on them. Leave him be.”
Worry eats a pit in my stomach, but I release a heavy sigh as Landon’s grip tightens around my arm. “If he’s with Allie, he’s fine, and I’m sure they’ll find them. They can’t have gone far.”
“I know. I just…”
Landon’s soft-green eyes—the ones that dragged me out of the abyss—meet mine, and he tugs me down onto his lap, wrapping his arm around me. Gabe watches us from across the table but doesn’t say anything as Landon feathers his lips against my ear.
“You, of all people, should know that this family can bring anyone back from what they think is unlivable, right?”
His words claw at that old scar, the one from losing Ben that can never be erased, and he tightens his grip on me. “The boy will be okay. I promise. Hawkes always rise, right?”
I nod. “Hawkes always rise.”
He presses a kiss to my lips, and I slide off his lap. He smacks my ass. “Now, get back to the kitchen where you belong.”
I laugh and roll my eyes at him.
That man can always break the tension.
He brought me back from the brink of losing myself, and now, hopefully our daughters will do the same for Jude.
* * *
LANDON
Angelina carefully scoops out a little bit of each dish from the table onto two plates while the rest of us slowly pick at our food. Everything is just as delicious as always, but the empty chair where Alessandra usually sits and the one next to hers that Nana put out for Jude are giant elephants in the room.
Storm’s gaze remains locked on her eldest daughter. I know she wants to jump in and offer to help her making the plates for Allie and Jude, but Angie has already made it very clear that she thinks no one else should go back to interrupt them.
I’m not entirely sure how I feel about them eating in a dark closet, but if that’s what it takes to make Jude comfortable, then that’s what is going to happen.
Ang finishes by adding a piece of garlic bread to each plate, then lifts them from the table.
I push my chair back and hold a hand out to stop Storm from doing the same. She’s too emotional about Jude to go back there. “I’ll grab a couple of sodas, so they have something to drink.”
It will save a trip, and I want to check on Allie—even if I keep telling Storm she’s fine and not to.
Angie hesitates for a moment. “That’s a great idea. Thanks, Landon.”
That little pang that always hits me square in the chest when she doesn’t call me “Dad” after all these years returns, but I brush it aside, the same way I always do.
Because I understand why.
I may have stepped in and taken over that role after she lost her father, but I’ll never replace him and would never even try. Ben became a Hawke the moment Storm saw him and fell in love with him, and Angelina is the best of both of them.
She may not be my flesh and blood, but she’s mine in every way that matters, even if she can never think of me as “Dad.”
I move to the kitchen and grab a couple of Cokes, then head down the short hallway to the bedroom that used to belong to Storm. Angie’s soft voice floats out the cracked door, and I slip in to find her on her knees in front of the open closet door, talking quietly with Allie and Jude.
For a moment, I lean against the jamb and watch her, pride swelling in my heart for the strong, thoughtful woman she’s become. She hands the plates to them, and I clear my throat.
