Page 20 of Angel's Fantasy

If I hadn’t been watching, I would’ve missed the slight movement of his head that passed for a nod, and the little twitch at the corners of his mouth that told me he approved.

“Good, Kimbella,” he whispered. “Go now. I don’t want you to see me like this.”

“Okay,” I said, squeezing his hand again. But if he heard me, he didn’t say anything else, and after a few moments I could see his chest rising and falling in that slow, familiar rhythm that told me the pain meds had kicked in again.

I waited for a little while longer, just content to sit there with him and watch over him. But then I remembered his words and how agitated he’d probably be if he woke up to still find me there.

He might be weak at the moment, but I knew my dad, and he didn’t like to look weak. Sending me off to stay with Angel had been a hard blow to his ego, and I’d worried at the time that he’d die if I didn’t go.

I hadn’t anticipated him nearly dying because of it.

Stress caused heart attacks, though, right? And there was no doubt that I’d stressed him out with my last-minute plan to buy him more time to pay off his debt.

Now, though, we’d have to come up with a better plan—together this time. One that would keep me home and still let him own up to his other obligations.

I sighed and stood up, finally letting go of his hand for the first time in hours.

There would be plenty of time to worry about all of that other stuff later, once he was safe and sound at home. For now, the best thing for me to do was to go there and make sure everything was perfect for him. He’d need food and medicine and a comfortable place to sleep downstairs, and those were all things I could take care of for him.

At least I felt like I had a purpose again, and maybe, just maybe, it could be a new beginning for us. A clean slate.

A chance to finally put the past behind us and start over as a father and daughter.

A family.

* * *

I was barely standingby the time the bus stopped in my neighborhood and I slowly eased myself down onto the curb. More than twelve hours had passed since Angel and I had gone racing to the hospital, but it felt more like a lifetime to my aching feet and back, sore from a day of pacing up and down tile corridors and fearfully perched on the edge of foam seat cushions that might as well have been made of concrete.

I had to stop myself in the courtyard when my legs automatically started carrying me to Angel’s condo, and for a moment I simply stood outside in the dark, trying to remind my body of what my brain had been wrestling with all day—that I wouldn’t be going back to Angel’s condo tonight.

That I might not ever go back there, now that he’d granted me the freedom to go home.

Home.

Finally getting with the program, my feet carried me back across the small patch of grass to my dad’s front door—our front door—and I fished my old key out of my purse as a grin spread across my face.

I had mixed feelings about leaving Angel’s place—about leaving him—but it was never supposed to be something that would last forever, and certainly never supposed to be something I would end up missing.

Still, if I was being honest, as happy as I was to be going home, a part of me did miss Angel already.

I’d have to push that part of me aside, though, and deal with what was happening in my life now. My dad’s heart attack had changed everything for me, and taking care of him had to be my number one priority. I owed it to him, and to my mom, and to myself to make things work, to fix our strained relationship and get back to a place where we could maybe, finally find a little bit of happiness as a family.

With that thought in my head, I started moving around the old condo, sighing as I realized the place probably hadn’t seen a vacuum cleaner or a dust rag since I’d been gone.

That was okay, though. Those were things I could easily take care of. That’s what I was there for.

I walked back to the hall closet to grab a broom and start working, determined to at last get something accomplished, no matter how tired my feet and back might be, and that’s when I spotted it.

A simple sheet of paper on the end table by the stairs, folded in half.

Dad never left mail lying around, and anything important never made it out to that table. In his line of business, he was always careful not to give any information away, especially when so many pairs of prying eyes were in and out of the place on a daily basis.

It was probably something as simple as a grocery list. Maybe something my dad had been holding onto when he’d had his heart attack.

That only served to make me more curious, though, and I crossed the hall to pick it up.

Important or not, I had to know what it was.

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