“I came to apologize.”
Before I get the chance to move, before I can even sit up properly, the door opens, and he walks in.
He sees me rising from the bed in my boxer shorts. He sees Carmen sitting beside me. His lips part. His eyes move from me to her, then around the room. They land on the bathroom, on our clothes hanging there, still damp.
His face drains.
“No,” he says. “No. No. No.”
He lunges forward, grips Carmen under the arm, and yanks her up. “This ends now.”
Dad, stop,I sign, my hands shaking.
“Stop!” Carmen shouts. “We can explain!”
“What is there to explain?” he roars, dragging her toward the door. “I leave for one night and this is what I come back to?”
“Let go of me!” she yells.
I move before my brain catches up. The floor tilts as my feet hit it. I grab the bedpost, steady myself, and step between them.
Stop,I sign again.
He freezes when he sees my hands.
Carmen wrenches free and steps back. “He came home drunk,” she says. “He went into the wrong room. That’s all. “
Dad laughs, sharp and humorless. “You expect me to believe he came to your room by accident?”
I was drunk. I thought it was my room,I sign.
“Then why are you half-naked?” he demands.
She gave me a cold shower to sober me up.
“I don’t believe this shit,” he snarls. “I’m calling Simona. We’ll find you a new foster family.”
No.I sign immediately.She did nothing wrong. This is my fault.
Carmen folds her arms. “If you don’t believe us, that’s on you. But don’t touch me again.”
Dad exhales, dragging a hand down his face. The anger is still there, but something else slips through it. Fear, maybe.
“This can’t happen again,” he says finally, his voice lower. “Do you understand me?”
He knows exactly what this could do to him. To the perfect mask he puts on every morning before he walks out the door. Respected and untouchable Judge Harrington.
Not the man who adopted two problematic kids who end up crossing lines.
That would ruin him. And he knows it.
I can’t let him take her away. Not now. Not when I am this close to knowing her. I am still dumb. Still reckless. But I am not dumb enough to lose her.
We both nod.
Then he looks at me.
“You,” he says. “You’re coming with me to cool off.”
