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CAMI
Iwas going insane.
I knew Landon was doing his best. He was pushing all his work into the afternoons when Emma was napping and then working late into the night. By the end of the first week, we hit every major park and playground in the city. We went to the Los Angeles Zoo twice, drove down to the South Coast Botanical Garden, and spent at least a couple hours at the beach almost every day.
Still, returning to the sky fortress with its narrow rim of outdoor space made my chest close up and my breath hitch. I didn’t say anything to Landon about it, but he could see it on my face. And maybe he saw it on Emma’s, too. She didn’t understand how the world, which had been at her fingertips her entire life, was now so far down that the people looked like ants and the plants were indistinguishable. Inaccessible unless this tall, kind man took us down 650 feet.
It was getting harder to get her to come back. At the playground, she scampered up to the highest ramparts and laughed when we told her it was time to go. At the beach, she danced into the surf and dared the shallows when we tried to get her dried off. At the Botanical Garden, while I was in the restroom, she hid from Landon in the Japanese Garden so well that he had the place shut down, convinced someone had snatched her.
When she finally reappeared, laughing delightedly, his face was gray with fear. He drew in a deep breath, blew it out, then balled his hands into fists and walked away.
“Is Mr. Landon mad?” Emma asked, understating the matter as only a three-year-old could.
“He’s afraid,” I said, lifting her up. “You scared both of us. We thought something had happened to you.”
People who had been trapped by the shutdown wandered by, eyeing us curiously. It was too much attention for Landon’s liking, and he came back to hustle us home.
When Emma nodded off in the backseat, I turned to Landon. “I think we need to tell her who you are.”
“I agree,” he said shortly.
I studied his profile. His jaw was still clenched even though we were nearly home. “Are you angry?” I asked, echoing Emma’s question.
“I’m fucking terrified.”
I understood, but I also didn’t. It was over. She was safely in the backseat. My own terror had abated, turned to frustration with Emma for putting us through that, and then to a reluctant understanding. She didn’t want to go back to the hermetically sealed tower apartment.
I reached out and touched his tensed arm. “Hey, it’s okay. She’s fine.”
“This time. I took my eyes off her long enough for her to hide. Next time, it could be long enough for someone to take her.”
“You can’t watch her every second.”
His frustrated silence told me that was exactly what he planned to do from now on.
“You didn’t do anything wrong,” I said quietly. I didn’t want to tell Landon how many times Emma had scampered away from me in a store or squirreled her way underneath a guest bed and refused to respond when I called. He’d lost her once, and he’d lost her good, but I had half a dozen scares on him.
We didn’t tell Emma that evening. Landon was too off. He went into his office to work for the rest of the evening, not even stopping to eat dinner with us like he normally did. He did come out to read Emma a bedtime story while I did dishes. I was coming down the hall when I heard her high, sweet voice say, “I’m sorry, Mr. Landon. I didn’t mean to scare you.”
“You scared the sh–” he stopped himself. Gentled his voice. “You scared me a lot, Emma. I was afraid something had happened to you.”
“I’m just really good at hiding.”
“I know. And I’m usually good at finding, but let’s make sure we’re both in on the game next time, okay?”
“Okay!”
“And maybe I can get us a better place to play. I know this apartment isn’t very big.”
“No,” she agreed gravely. “And the plants don’t like it.” Despite our best efforts, the plants the interior decorator had set out on the thin strip of terrace were dying.
In the hallway, I smiled to myself at her description. Then I tilted my head curiously at Landon’s response.
“I’m working on it right now. I promise.”
The covers rustled as he hugged her good night. I stepped back into the kitchen silently and pretended to be drying a pan. I heard her door close and his footsteps coming down the hall. I half expected him to turn back into his office, but instead he came all the way into the main room.
“She’s down. It only took two stories.”
