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CHAPTER10
Kyleigh
Every day, I received a text from Liam, and every day they started the internal battle all to respond or not to respond, all over again. I wanted to hear his voice. I wanted to see him again. But what was the point? All it was going to do is make it even harder when it ends the next time. And it would. We’re from two different worlds. Eventually, he’ll stop reaching out, and I’ll miss the daily text, but it’s for the better, even if it doesn’t feel like it.
By this time tomorrow, I’d be in a new country, and hopefully too busy to miss home or Liam.
I had finished packing, so I didn’t have an excuse to hide in my room any longer. It was time to face my parents one last time before my departure. As I carried my small suitcase downstairs, I could hear my mom talking in the kitchen.
“I really wish she wasn’t going. You have no idea how upsetting this is for me,” she said.
Great. They’re going to try to talk me out of it again.I wish they had waited until I was gone to discuss it.
It wasn’t helping my nerves, and it was too late for me to back out.
As I entered the kitchen I said, “Mom, I’m going to be okay.”
“That’s what I was just telling your mother.” My jaw dropped to see President Florraz sitting at our kitchen table. “It’s nice to see you again, Kyleigh.”
And I’m speechless.
“President Florraz, I didn’t…know that you were coming,” I said.
She smiled and replied, “I could tell that you were very nervous at dinner a couple of nights ago. I figured your mother would be equally concerned, am I right?” she said, looking at my mom.
Mom nodded. “I haven’t been able to sleep, knowing where she is going. Who will watch out for her?”
“She will be staying with Shaun and his wife Morgan and their two children,” she replied.
Shaun?That’s why he had invited me to come and meet his family on the beach. Obviously, he had known who I was and that I’d be staying with them. Damn. I should’ve gone back, but there hadn’t been any time.
“Do you mean…. Mr. Henderson?” Mom asked and I could hear the disgust in her tone as she said his name. After she told me what happened to her, I didn’t expect anything less.
“Yes, and his family. They are lovely people.”
Mom huffed. “Hendersons? I beg to differ. I know what they are, and lovely is not a word I would use,” she said bitterly.
With what I’d learned, I understood why she felt that way, but I couldn’t believe Mom was talking to the president in such a tone.
“Mom, it’s okay. I met him a few days ago. He was very nice,” I said. Not that we spoke long, but I’ve sized up assholes in less time than that.
“Kyleigh, after everything I told you, after what you know, you still want to go and stay under the same roof with a…Henderson?”
President Florraz didn’t seem shaken or curious as to what might have been said. You’ve probably heard the same story from hundreds of women already.
“Mom, do you trust our president?” I asked, hating that I was putting her on the spot.
“Of course I do. She has done so much for this country. We can hold our heads up with pride now,” she replied.
“Then trust her when she says I’ll be safe. Because she would never send me into harm’s way.”
“No, I wouldn’t,” President Florraz said. “Tabiq is my home. I want only the best for all my people. And I know it is hard to believe, but the Hendersons do as well. They are not their father.”
“And why do you believe that? What proof do you have?” mom questioned.
President Florraz said in a calm yet serious tone, “If it wasn’t for them, I might not have survived long enough to become your president. The same for my brother, Jasper. And the corrupt government would still be in control.”
I had no idea what she was speaking about, and from the expression on my mom’s face, she didn’t either. There had been rumors about locals gathering together to take down the old government, but no one ever stepped forward with details. And it never really made any sense. We didn’t have the weapons to fight them, or the means to get any. Hearing now that it was the Hendersons who backed that, explained a lot. Like how Ziva, a legend in fighting for women’s rights, would marry a Henderson.
