Clad in a pair of denim overalls and a t-shirt, I slip from my bedroom, carefully checking each direction in the hallway and listening for either Gavin or Catharina. When I don’t see or hear either of them, I creep toward the stairs, pausing every so often to check again.
At the bottom of the steps, I give myself a moment to pause and breathe. But then the sound of Catharina’s voice freezes me in place, my heart hammering against my ribs.
Holding my breath, I listen again, straining to hear which direction she might be coming from. And nearly pass out from relief when I realize she’s in her office.
Unable to resist the pull of hearing her voice one last time, I creep toward the door to her office. It’s cracked, just a bit, but enough for me to hear her side of the conversation she’s having.
“I already spanked her, Maxwell, and when you bring Victoria over she will be apologizing for her behavior.” A long pause, and then a deep sigh that sounds like it comes from her very soul. “Fuck, Max. I’m so, so sorry. You know I love Victoria like she’s my own?—”
There it is. Straight from the horse’s mouth, as the saying goes.
I didn’t know, until now, that a person could feel the kind of pain I feel at those words. It was one thing to think it, even toknowit deep in my soul. But to have Catharina, the woman I love with every cell of my being, admit she loves someone else…
It’s more than any one person should be expected to bear.
Unable to stand the thought of listening to another second of her telling Uncle Max how much she loves Tori, I turn on myheel and hurry toward the front door, pausing only to punch in the code I’ve memorized. Again, the thought flits through my mind that the Universe must be on my side right now, because it’s almost insultingly easy to slip from the house and into the wooded area surrounding it.
Once I’m deep enough in that I can just barely make out the building I thought would be my forever home, I unhook the locket from around my neck. Mommy told me it would help her find me if I ever got lost, so I have to assume there’s some kind of tracking device built into it. Assuming they come looking for me at all, this should buy me some time.
Standing beneath a tree that seems to stretch all the way up to the sky, I pull my arm back and throw. The locket falls uselessly to the ground and I let out an annoyed huff as I bend down to grab it again. It takes three more tries, but finally the chain snags on a branch.
There. That should keep them busy for a little while.
With my decoy in place, I hurry back toward the road. Hugging the treeline, I follow the pavement to town.
To freedom.
Chapter Twenty-Seven
Catharina
The coffee does nothing to settle my jittery nerves. Neither does the work I try to force myself to do while Alexis sleeps. Part of me is tempted to go upstairs and wake her so we can have the discussion we absolutely need to have about her behavior.
But Alexis needs her rest after her big day, and we both need some space. I reach for the monitor on my desk, then swear loudly at myself when my hand comes up empty.
Gavin’s a liar. I amnota good Mommy. Not at all.
As I rise from my chair, silently berating myself for not thinking to grab her monitor, my phone rings.
Maxwell.
Fuck.
If it was anyone else, I would just ignore the call. But after today’s events, I owe him some kind of explanation, even if I don’t have all the answers myself yet.
So I force myself to pick up the phone, hitting the button to answer his call. “Maxwell.”
“What the fuck happened today, Cat?”
I have to fight back a wave of my own anger at the fury in his voice. There are very few people in the world I would allow to speak to me the way he is right now, and unfortunately for me, he’s one of them. “I’m not entirely sure. But once Alexis wakes up from her nap, I plan to get to the bottom of it.”
“I’m on my way over. You can handle her however you see fit, after I blister her bottom.”
Absolutely the fuck not. There’s no way I’m letting him lay a finger on my babygirl in this state. It’s bad enough that I spanked her when I was angry, but Maxwell is even larger and stronger than I am. But snapping at him will only piss us both off, so I keep my tone firm but cool when I respond. “I already spanked her, Maxwell, and when you bring Victoria over she will be apologizing for her behavior.”
“You’re damn right she’ll be apologizing. Victoria has a sprained wrist, and Donovan says she’s lucky she didn’t break it with how hard she fell.”
How much guilt can one person possibly feel? “Fuck, Max. I’m so, so sorry. You know I love Victoria like she’s my own and I am so sorry I let this happen.”
