Page 64 of Breathless With Her

I’d been to Fort Collins countless times. I hadn’t known that Frank Rose lived here.

He had even kept his name.

He hadn’t gone under some secret identity or done any of the things my imagination had supplied when I was younger.

No, he had just left us. Moved away. But maybe it was for a reason.

Maybe he just didn’t want children. Perhaps he didn’t want any of that. Maybe he wanted a completely new life.

One without us.

I shook my head and followed the GPS off the highway and into a newly developed neighborhood.

My stomach clenched as I looked around. I swallowed hard.

This wasn’t some downtown urban area. This wasn’t going to be a shelter where some down on his luck old man now lived.

No, there were children playing basketball on driveways. Others in yards, playing jump rope and other games.

Little kids on bicycles with helmets and elbow pads and even knee pads.

There were parents all around, constantly watching. Hovering.

This was a neighborhood that took care of its children and watched them.

This was a place for families.

My hands shook as I took a turn down another street with identical houses and smiling people.

“Why are you here, Dad?”

I didn’t mean to whisper the words. I didn’t want to say them at all.

They just poured out of me.

This wasn’t a place for a man in hiding. This was a place for a man who was living.

I took another turn, and my GPS told me I had arrived.

I parked in front of the neighborhood playground and turned off my engine, but I didn’t look to the left.

I didn’t look where I knew the house was.

Because if I did, then I would be there for real. And everything would be different.

This couldn’t be happening. I couldn’t be in such a family-friendly neighborhood.

Maybe it was a mistake. Perhaps this was a different Frank Rose.

Of course, the detective had been a hundred percent sure that this was where my father had ended up.

How long?

Not too long, considering the ages of the homes here.

But, dear God. What did this mean?

I finally gathered the courage to look left, my heart in my throat, and my stomach aching.

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