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Being a tech mastermind, the room was enough to leave him speechless. This didn’t look like the room of any pre-teen girl he had ever seen. He had expected pink curtains and doll houses. Instead, he saw tin foil lining the only window. He looked back at the Princess sign on the door, the only hint of femininity he could see, and did another once-over of the room.
“You can come out now. I promise you’re safe.”
His eyes darted to beneath the bed, but still no movement. He looked at a dark cubby beneath a desk, and still no sign of her. Then he turned and honed in on the closet. The sliding doors were pulled shut and he could almost sense her presence through the slats he was sure she was watching him through.
Instead of pulling the doors open, he knocked lightly against them. “Is it okay if I come in?” he asked in a gentle, honey-smooth voice.
He waited.
After what seemed like minutes, he could hear something move inside the tiny confines behind the closet door. When they creaked open, he watched as a small, bone-thin, young girl emerged. Thick strands of long, brown hair covered her face, but he could see the dark shadows of a black eye beneath.
Rage and pity flowed through him at once at the sight of the frail, defenseless young girl standing brave and unmoving before him.
SEVENTEEN
“Rayner Technologies, how may I direct your call?” Rita’s southern voice answered.
“Hi, Rita, it’s Farren.”
“Good mornin’! Everything all right? You’re usually here by now.”
“Yeah, that’s why I’m calling. I was up most of the night with Harley. He’s got an ear infection. Will you call me with anything important? I’m not going to make it in today,” Farren explained, obviously leaving out the part about Rogan.
“Sure, hon’. You take care of that precious little baby, and we’ll see you when you get back in.”
Farren hung up the phone feeling even worse than when she’d picked it up if that were possible. She didn’t know how she could keep working there with things as they were between her and Rogan, and she would really miss the friends she had made there, especially Rita.
She wiped the tear stains from her face and tried to strengthen her resolve. She needed to get her mind on something else, but computer work was just going to remind her of Rogan, which was gut-wrenching at the moment, and gaming, her other immersive pastime, was going to remind her of Raphe, and she couldn’t stand the thought of that either.
Sitting on the couch in Rogan’s living room with Harley lying on a pallet on the floor in front of her, she looked down at the slip of paper she had been turning over in her hands for the past half-hour. It was the phone number her father had handed her last night before she had taken Harley to the overnight clinic.
Maybe her curiosity was getting the better of her, or maybe she was just so desperate for even the slightest possibility that he was a changed man and that he would finally be the kind of father she had wished for so many times in her life. As much as what he had done had angered her, it also saddened her deep down, and it was so much easier to be angry than it was sad. One feeling made a person weak and vulnerable while the other made them strong.
But eventually, anger would wane, and Farren found herself asking what was left in its absence. On some level, she missed her father and craved a relationship with him. She craved his love and acceptance, something she didn’t think she had ever gotten even before he had taken off.
She took a reassuring breath and dialed the number.
“Yeah, what’s up?” he answered.
Farren hesitated for a moment. “Um, dad?”
It was quiet for a few seconds. “Princess! You called,” he stated the obvious.
“Yeah… so, how are you?” she asked, not knowing what to say.
“I’m good, I’m good. I’m surprised to hear from you,” he admitted.
Me, too, she thought.
“So what would you say to having dinner with your old man? Tonight, maybe?”
She thought for a moment. Rogan would be getting back into town tonight, and she knew she could use the distraction to keep her mind off him if that were at all possible. She wasn’t ready to face him yet. Even facing her father would be easier than that.
“Um, yeah, okay,” she agreed.
They made arrangements to meet at a restaurant in town later that evening. When she hung up the phone, a whole cocktail of emotions stirred inside her. Hope for what might happen with her father’s reappearance was a minuscule relief to the overwhelming hopelessness she felt with her situation with Rogan.
How had they gotten to this point? She thought about how she had held back after Harley was born and had sat back as a passive spectator when she had started to feel like they were growing apart. She should have fought more for their relationship when she still had the chance, when it still would have mattered. She was angry with herself for not doing something then. Now, she felt it was too late because there was no going back if he had cheated on her. She would never be able to trust him again, and she couldn’t be the weight that held him back simply because they had a baby together.
