Page 3 of Hero for the Holidays

“It’s better than nothing I guess.”

He really felt for the kid. She had nothing but a host of bad options, from her perspective. She could keep getting bounced around foster homes for the next five years. She could run away, like she’d said. He wasn’t Jack and Melissa. He wasn’t going to be.

But he wasn’t the system either.

“On the ranch you’re going to have tons of room to run around. I’ve got horses and—”

“Horses?”

“Yeah.” He thought he might’ve found a little bit of an in there. “Lots of horses. You can have one. Just for you.”

“Do you have Wi-Fi?”

“Hell yeah. We aren’t animals.” He figured he should probably watch his language a little bit around a kid. “Sorry.”

“So what happens after this?”

“Well, they tell me they’re going to send a caseworker out to check on you in two weeks. I’ve already passed all kinds of checks. I’m approved like any of the foster families you stayed with before. My house is approved. And if you hate it, you can tell them that. And maybe they’ll take you away. But I hope you won’t.”

“I guess I just don’t understand what you’re doing.” She frowned. “Why you showed up. Why you... You’re really young.”

“Yeah,” he said. “Lila, I was seventeen when you were born.”

She looked shocked by that. “You were?”

“Yeah. We were too young. Okay? It wasn’t... It wasn’t that I didn’t want you. It was never that. The choice got taken away from me. But... I’m your father. And it doesn’t matter whether you think of me that way or not, I think of you as my daughter. I have this whole time. So whether or not you ever feel it, I do. I do.”

Her social worker had given them some space to meet alone, but right after that, the woman, Angela Carter, came into the room. “What do you think, Lila?”

“I don’t have a choice, do I?”

“Not entirely. But Mr. King passes muster for me, if that helps. If he didn’t, you wouldn’t be leaving this office.”

“I guess it doesn’t really matter,” she said. “Because wherever I go my parents are dead.”

“That’s true,” said Landry. “But you know, I have brothers. And a sister. So you will have uncles and an aunt. And a cousin.”

“A cousin?” she asked.

“Yeah. My sister, Arizona, has a stepson. He’s just a little older than you. And she’s expecting a baby, actually. So more cousins.”

And he’d found it. He knew. Something that got underneath that armor she was wearing. Family. She might not be able to see him as her dad. But he had more family than just himself. He had quite a lot of family, in fact.

“I didn’t have any uncles or aunts.”

He’d known that. Because no one who was part of her adoptive family had taken her, so he’d assumed there was an estrangement, or no one. In that sense, he was offering her something totally new. Horses and aunts and uncles.

“I got a vacation rental in the city tonight,” he said. “You’ll have your own room. I figure we can go shopping for some stuff and get some dinner. And then we’ll head back to Four Corners.”

She didn’t say anything. She didn’t even nod. But Angela Carter handed him a case file. “We’ll see you in two weeks, Mr. King. I hope everything goes well. She’s a good kid.”

“I already know that.”

They went from there to the mall, where he had a feeling that he’d had been soundly taken advantage of. Because he bought that little girl every single thing she asked for.

He hadn’t known what to expect, but apparently stuffed animals that looked like their skeletons were showing were big with the teenage girl set.

He bought countless bottles of nail polish shaped like skulls, a bed set that was black with mushrooms and frogs. He learned what boba tea was, and they both had some with cotton candy on the top. He was deeply suspicious of the entire thing.

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