She’s their mother. She should be guarding those kids with her life.
I know. I’m trying to give her the benefit of the doubt here.
I looked up from my phone when I heard rain hit the windshield.Just fucking great.The lack of sleep was starting to catch up with me because my mood was rapidly sinking. The crazy-ass time zone change that my body was still trying to adjust to wasn’t helping matters.
Did you talk to Michael?
Yeah. He was less than thrilled that I stayed behind. He’s going to meet you and the others in New York. I imagine he’ll text you soon to let you know the plan.
Why is he meeting us in New York? Did you tell him that I wasn’t capable of bringing them to Vail on my own?
No. It’s so you can get back here faster. He thought he’d meet you in New York to get Aria’s family. That will save six hours of flight time from you having to go to Vail and then turn around and go back to New York.
Good. I’d like to get back and help.
I knew you missed me.
Dream on. I want to help find the other boy.
A man wearing a gray coat with the hood over his head caught my attention. When I saw him go into the restaurant, I realized it was likely Daniel. I quickly wrapped things up with Taylor for now.
Hey, I’ll text you in a bit. I’m meeting Daniel in a few minutes.
Okay.
I slipped my phone into the inside pocket of my coat. After I pulled the hood over my head, I opened the car door and got out. The rain was coming down steadily as I hurried to the door of the restaurant. Just inside the door, Daniel waited for me.
“Hey,” I said when he turned to face me.
“Good to see you, Sawyer,” he said as we shook hands. Daniel’s Russian accent had always been heavy, but I noticed it seemed a little less prominent today. “Want to sit inside?” he asked.
I glanced around the place and noticed we were the only patrons here.
“Yes. Inside works,” I replied.
“We can sit wherever. What do you want? I will go get it at the counter.”
“Something with caffeine and anything from the pastry case that looks like it has sugar in it.”
Daniel nodded and walked to the counter while I took a seat at a table for two closest to the double door that led to the patio. I unzipped my coat as I listened to Daniel order, and I detected virtually no accent. The man behind the counter poured two mugs of coffee and set them on a tray before leaning over to get something out of the pastry case.
Daniel set the tray down before taking his seat across from me. I eagerly took a mug off the tray along with a small plastic pod of creamer and some sugar packets. As I dumped the creamer and sugar into my coffee, I gestured toward the plate of what I assumed were cookies.
“What are those?” I asked.
“They are light cookies. It is called Strassburgare.” I noticed his accent was back.
“Light cookies? As in low sugar or something?”
“Light as in airy.”
“Okay, good, because I’m not into low sugar shit.”
“Ah.” Daniel nodded at the empty sugar packets. “I can see that.” He took a sip of coffee and then set it down. “You know, the Swedes say caffeine is bad for you. You should drink something better such as herbal tea.”
“Well, I’m not Swedish,” I retorted.
“I am not either,” Daniel said and then smiled before biting into one of the cookies.
