She shrugs with a grin. “Just lucky, I guess.”
As she dashes up the stairs, I’m left with a gnawing feeling in the pit of my stomach. I am lucky. Of all the ways this parenting thing could have gone, I somehow ended up with a well-rounded, intelligent daughter. Maybe I was always meant to take her and give her that chance. The alternative was leaving her destined for the upbringing I had, and my heart hurts thinking of her spirit being squashed if she grew up in that place.
I reach for my phone, thinking of texting Royal, but instead I scroll to my chat with Westley. There’s already a message waiting in response to my earlier good morning.
THIEF:
I’m holding you to that, baby. Are you free Thursday for our first date?
ME:
I can make that work. Will Callie be home? Do you think it would be alright for Aurora to hang with her?
THIEF:
She’ll be home. Be ready at 5 x
ME:
Yes, sir.
I hesitate for a moment, the smile on my face at war with the doubt in my mind.
ME:
Have you ever kept a secret from someone important?
Dots bounce on my screen, then stop, so I take my mocha upstairs with me so I can start getting ready for work.
I manage to finish my shower, hair, and makeup before I check my phone again.
THIEF:
Don’t ever tell her this but… I hate my mother’s mashed potatoes.
My grin is unstoppable as I keep reading his next text.
THIEF:
I think if you truly love and care for someone, you wouldn’t need to keep secrets because you know they’d always be understanding of your point of view. Even if they didn’t agree with it. Sometimes we’re so terrified of disappointing or hurting someone, we forget the love and care they have for us too.
I’m both soothed and terrified by Westley’s advice. My mind is on an endless loop as I think back to Royal. My parents. My past. I do want to protect Aurora, that’s why I’ve done everything I have since the moment I took her.
At what point did my actions stop being for my daughter and start being for me?
Have they been that way all along?
Maybe it’s time to set myself free from the past, so we can both move into the future. But how the fuck do I do that? How can I be sure the past isn’t going to come back and take everything from me again?
I walk over to the bed, still wrapped in my towel as I sit down and pick up the notebook from the bedside table. I flick past the first few pages with my spicy thoughts and start a new page for the other thoughts West told me to get down.
I’m scared Aurora will feel like I took the choice away from her when we left our parents. I’m scared she won’t understand I was only trying to save her from a life I was in the middle of escaping before she came along, and I didn’t want her going through the same thing.
I’m scared she won’t want me to be her mum when she learns I’m really her sister.
33
It’s five o’clock on the dot when I’m knocking on Maevyn’s front door. A few seconds pass before I’m greeted by the sight of Aurora’s smiling face.
