Stella sighs. “We tried to get on an earlier flight, but no luck. When are you being sprung?”
“They haven’t told me yet, and you shouldn’t cut your trip short. I don’t need—”
“Sophie!” This outburst is loud enough to ring my possibly concussed ears. “You. Were. Hit.Byacar. Hospital. Where else would Ibe?”
“I feel bad…”
“You should feel bad for Ashton after I get finished with him,” she practically growls. “And don’t you dare say it was an accident. What’s the plan when you’re released, because you can’t go back to our place?”
Stella and I moved out of our mother’s house a few months ago. I love the independence, but Stella calling itourplace always makes me laugh.
She spends most of her time with Gunnar, even staying with him at the castle most nights.
“I hadn’t gotten that far,” I admit. I love our little apartment, but it’s on the third floor of a big rambling house. There are a lot of stairs, and none of them accessible to me and my broken foot. “I could go back to Mom’s…”
Another pause, and I wonder what’s going to come out of her mouth. “I’m calling Dad,” she announces. “Be there as soon as we can.”
Stella hangs up.
Not fifteen minutes after I hang up with Stella, my father arrives.
I hear his voice from the hall, and a wash of emotions crash over me with more impact than the car.
The soft assurance of knowing that my dad is here and everything will be okay. He’ll make everything okay.
He cares enough to come and see me, even though I didn’t call him.
The flash of guilt—he doesn’t have time to be here because he’ssobusy. What if the king needs something while he’s here?
I didn’t even call him. I should have called him. What daughter doesn’t call her father when she’s hit by a car?
All this and more, so as I listen to his voice having a conversation with the doctor outside my room, I quickly become a jittery mess.
Is he mad? Disappointed? Happy to see me? Upset that Mom was my first phone call?
It’s difficult to find a way to have your father fit back into your life after not being a part of it for fifteen years. There are no hard feelings—twenty-five-year-old me understands the reasons why he left. (My mother)
Ten-year-old me is still trying to get over it.
We’ve both made efforts, but the fact remains that my father doesn’t know me. And I know moreabouthim, than actually him.
Everyone in Laandia knows the facts about my father: best friend and advisor to the king, former member of Kräftig metal band, former romance novel cover model, best looking man in Battle Harbour.
I know he drinks green tea and is trying to cut back on sugar. I know he takes pride in his wardrobe. I know he says he’s proud of me and Stella, but there’s so much about Duncan Laz that is a mystery to me, his own daughter.
He tries. I know he does. But being the king’s advisor doesn’t leave a lot of spare time for family. At least not daughters who missed out on a decade of having a father in their lives.
Dad working with the king is what caused my parent’sdivorce.
He would spend long hours at the castle, in meetings and doing paperwork and basically helping King Magnus run the kingdom. The country of Laandia is less than a hundred years old, and Magnus is only the third king, so there was a steep learning curve when he took the throne.
My father is very good at learning curves.
He also became very good at running a kingdom. He was a natural, Magnus would say to my mother, who would smile behind gritted teeth. No one expected much from King Magnus, who had been a former athlete and musician, and Dad’s practicality and charm smoothed edges and unruffled feathers for Magnus. He worked long into the night as the advisor to the king, and a few nights every week, he didn’t bother coming home at night.
But he’s come to see me in the hospital. “Sophie,” he says, his voice choked. “Sweetheart.”
I smile and try to forget the pain in my foot. “I’m okay.”
