Finally Max’s face was so covered in ice cream that Anja excused both of them so she could get him in the bath and put him to bed. After they left, I rounded on my father.
“What do you think you’re doing?” I demanded. “Stop acting like Anja and Max are my family.Toriis my family. She is my wife. Not Anja. I’ll make room for Max, but Anja and I aren’t getting back together.”
My father laughed. “Don’t be melodramatic,” he said. “I’m merely interested in welcoming the newest member of the Zoric family line. You’re reading into it too much.”
I wasn’t. “Regardless of the fact that Anja gave birth to your grandson,” I told him firmly, “Tori is the person I made vows to. Not Anja.”
Shrugging, as though he wasn’t convinced, he said, “Whatever you say, Stefan. Although I do find it interesting that she couldn’t be bothered to show up tonight.”
He shot me a smug smile. It was maddening. And the worst part was, he was right.
Storming out of the dining room, I pulled out my phone and ducked into the bathroom to call Bruce. My father’s words had sent my anxiety over the edge, and I’d finally hit my breaking point. It wasn’t like Tori to make plans and then not show up. We’d moved past that stage in our relationship—to a place of mutual trust and understanding. Or at least, I thought we had.
“Bruce,” I said tensely when the man picked up. “You have eyes on Tori?”
He paused and my heart plummeted to my feet.
“You serious?” he finally said. “I dropped her off at your father’s place hours ago. I knew she was meeting you so I watched to see she got into the building okay. Then I drove down the street for a coffee and came right back to wait for you guys. Same way I always do.”
I clenched my jaw. My father was dead.
“She’s not here,” I told him. “Stand by until you hear from me.”
Without waiting for Bruce to apologize or explain, I hung up and stormed back to the dining room. I knew it wasn’t his fault. He had done exactly what I had ordered him to do.
My father on the other hand had been too calm, too smug during dinner. Smirking every time I glanced at my phone, gazing at me pointedly as he complimented Anja or talked to Max.
This was all his doing. I knew it.
As I rounded the doorway, I saw he was pouring himself another drink.
“What did you do to her?” I demanded, panic rising inside of me. “Where is Tori?”
I’d been through this before with Anja, but this was different. This was my wife.
“I didn’t do anything,” he said, taking a sip of his drink. “Perhaps she just…took a look around and realized there wasn’t room for her in your life anymore.” He nodded to himself with a look of satisfaction. “Smart girl. Maybe I should have given her more credit.”
He was lucky I’d spent years learning how to temper my anger at him. But part of me couldn’t deny that his words had a ring of truth to them. I wanted to believe he was lying, and I’d learned long ago to never trust my father’s words at face value—but what he was saying made sense. If my father hadn’t done anything to her, though, then where the hell was she?
“I’m going home,” I said.
Bruce gave me a ride back to the condo. My mind was racing with frantic thoughts, none of them good. I grilled him again about what had gone down earlier, and he confirmed again that he’d definitely seen Tori enter my father’s building. All I could think was that maybe she’d gotten cold feet on her way up to the penthouse floor and had decided she couldn’t stand to go through with the dinner. Maybe she’d simply changed her mind, gone home, and fallen asleep.
I tried her phone again and again, alternately texting and calling. No answer.
When we got to the condo, I got out of the car and told Bruce to go check all of Tori’s usual spots while I went up to the apartment. Maybe she was hiding out someplace at school or at that Middle Eastern coffee shop where she liked to study. It was possible she felt bad about bailing on dinner and didn’t want to talk to me about it yet. I wouldn’t be mad at her over it.
But the second I stepped through the front door, I could tell the condo was empty. All the lights were off, the place was cold instead of Tori’s preferred tropical temperature of 78 degrees, and her coat and shoes weren’t in their usual spots. As I walked down the hallway to look in the bedrooms, my footsteps echoing on the tile, I got a bad feeling that I wouldn’t find her.
My gut instincts were dead on.
The guest room was devoid of her things—but so was our bedroom. Her side of the closet was stripped bare, the bathroom vanity was cleared of all her toiletries and prescriptions, and every one of her dresser drawers was completely hollowed out. As empty as the hole suddenly gaping in my chest.
My father was right.
Tori had left me.
Stefan
