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“This is worse than the Plan B box mistake, H… did you honestly think this through? That guy probably knew you were lying… he at least had to look this place up on the internet if he had a picture of it.”
“Plan B mistake?” Hailey’s gaze widened, snapping to mine as my turmoil rippled across the table, but I shook my head furiously. I had no right to be angry about that; I was pissed off at the current situation, though. “Why didn’t you call me as soon as this happened, Hailey?”
“I wanted to see if he’d follow me to be sure. This is a big city, and there’s more than one Anthony in it.” The excuse stiffened my spine, and her expression wavered as I borderline glared at her. “I… I kind of… maybe… freaked out and didn’t think about it…”
“Anthony, we’ve been coming here every Monday, same time, same table, since I was 9… over a dozen years. Hailey’s really bad about things when they first happen, but she gets her act together pretty quick.” Casting me a reassuring smile, Kelly adjusted Tommy against her shoulder, and I sucked in a sharp breath that did nothing to cool the fire in my chest.
Turning to Hailey, I clenched my jaw absently as a hundred million thoughts raced through my head. She had a point, after all; this was a large city, and there were over 2 million people living in it.
“So, what do you want to do? You going back to work after this?” Exhaling heavily, I trained my gaze on Hailey’s as she shuffled Antonya against her chest. I had to resist the urge to glance around at the other patrons seated around us, but no one was paying attention. For just a fraction of a second, my mind flung back to two weeks ago when someone had complained to the wait staff about Hailey breastfeeding in public.
The owner came out and told the woman that she shouldn’t have come to an eating establishment if it bothered her that the people around her would be doing just that.
“No, I’m going to call George after lunch and say I have an emergency. This is only my fourth day out all year, not including the three days I was in the hospital. It’s fine.” Drawing my attention, Hailey shrugged slightly—as if she wasn’t just freaking the fuck out, and I dragged my palm down my face to fall back against the booth.
“Don’t do that, Anthony. We need to figure out if your dad sent him or something before we go jumping to conclusions. Well, I mean… is your dad the kind of man to send a P.I. after you after… what, three weeks since you shut off your phone?”
“I honestly couldn’t tell you—I’ve never just disappeared on him before. It’s not out of the realm of possibility, though.”
“Why would he send a private investigator after you?” For the first time, I realized that Hailey’s sisters didn’t know who I was, and I cleared my throat roughly at Tracy’s probing. “… Is he super controlling? You know, our dad was—”
“I know…” Quipping up before I had to go through that whole debacle again, I found three pairs of shocked eyes on me. Craning my neck, I cupped my chin in my hand as the situation just seemed to spiral out of control. “I know about your father—and yeah, mine is the same… It’s just… I’m kind of… rich…”
Speaking slowly, carefully, my bland tone only earned me silence, and I grimaced from the tension that slithered up my back and over my shoulders.
“Okay—but you’re almost 35, you said—you never told him to shove it and put all your money in a different account he couldn’t get to and do what you’re doing right now? Why did you come here to disappear?” My gaze flew to Marissa, and my heart thudded hard against its cage as she swiped a napkin across her son’s mouth without taking her eyes off me. “You’re not like H—you didn’t have little sisters you had to take care of. If your dad would resort to sending a stalker after you, you should’ve left earlier. It’s dangerous to be around that, Anthony—at least we got lucky and learned that with Hailey.”
“I… I don’t know why I never left earlier.” My confession earned me empathetic gazes, and I propped my forearms on the table top with a slight shake of my head. “If Hailey’s not going back to work, we’ll go around and get some stuff done. You can point out the guy if you see him.”
“Okay.” Hailey agreed easily, and I nodded firmly before my gaze flickered to Antonya. Pursing my lips tightly together, I watched my daughter palm Hailey’s upper breast—the only part of her visible beyond the thin blanket that offered darkness—and conviction branded my heart.
My father would never meet Antonya; he would never even know about her if I could help it.
“… So, you never answered the question, Anthony, why would your father send a P.I. after you?” Thankful that Kelly didn’t try to redirect the conversation back onto something I just wasn’t ready to explain, I propped my elbows on the table’s edge to hold my chin on my fists. “I mean—he can just track your phone or credit card purchases, right?”
“Theoretically, yes, he could. My father’s always been like this, though; he won’t go into a situation without knowing it inside and out. I never told him I was coming here or why or who was involved in the decision, so if he showed up, he’d be blind.” Darkness coated my voice, and I kept my gaze on Hailey and Antonya as that hatred, that meanness, that I had spent the past ten months working on came bubbling up.
“I shut off my phone when I was heading to Kelly’s house that first time, too. It’s been collecting dust at the hotel room ever since, and I haven’t been there since Thursday.”
“You got that face that Hailey made when Dad smacked me the first time.” Marissa’s declaration came once she’d carefully covered her son’s ears, and she sent me a pointed look as every muscle—even my heart- froze. “You look like you want to kill him or something.”
That sobered me up right quick, and I sat in silence, staring at Antonya, for a long, heavy second. Pushing myself up from my seat, I shuffled the inch or two out of the booth to stalk towards the back door that led to a courtyard dining area. My mind was still, only working hard enough to avoid banging into other patrons’ tables, and I shoved open the door roughly with a grunt. The eyes boring holes into my back left me as I put a thick, vine-crawled wall between us, and I raked my hands through my hair to hold the strands taught.
Fishing my cell phone out of my pocket, I navigated the smart device to my contacts to call my therapist. The line ringing gyrated harshly against my eardrums, and I paced furiously down the wall and back up. People looked at me, the intensity of their curiosity c
ausing the hairs on my arms to rise, but I couldn’t have given a lesser shit in that moment.
“Hello, Doctor Owen Rodgers—” Sucking in a hard, sharp breath through flared nostrils, I didn’t even have to open my mouth for Owen to realize who I was. “Anthony, hey. I’ve been waiting for your call. It’s been three weeks… how are things going?”
“Forget about that, what can you tell me about how women react to their parents beating the shit out of them?” Mumbling as loudly as I dared, I sat down on a bench in the corner to exhale loudly. “I just, she and her sisters act like it’s run of the mill… like—”
“Like it’s just a part of their life that they can’t change and can’t get hung up on?” Nodding even though Owen couldn’t see me, I grunted in agreement before he continued. “You know, Anthony… abuse is different for everyone. I’m just assuming here, but this woman and her sisters probably got through it a long time ago. For them, it’s a part of their life that they couldn’t change then, but did, and are better for it now. The journey out was their way of acceptance. At least, that’s something that I see often with physical abuse.”
“That makes sense…”
“Does it bother you so much because it happened, or because you’re only just beginning on that journey, Anthony?” Propping my elbow on my knee, I cupped my chin at the question before a shadow cast over me. Hailey’s smell wafted into my nostrils as I stared at the cobbled, decorative stones that paved the ground, and she sat down silently with a sleeping Antonya in her arms.
“Both… With everything going on here… and now, my father sent a P.I. after me—at least, that’s what probably happened— and I don’t want to throw away months of work or the last three weeks for him. He’s not worth it.” My gruff response earned me a soft sigh from Hailey, and she leaned to rest her head on my shoulder. The line was quiet, and it was as if Owen could tell she was there as he waited for her to speak.
