Page 32 of Protecting What Is Mine

Did he threaten her?Did he beat her up?

Is that why she didn’t want to talk about it on the phone? I gasp at the next possibility. Did he hurt Vanessa? Even for Clint, that one’s hard to believe, but the very idea of it breaks my heart. The thought of my niece losing her beautiful, innocent, gap-toothed smile or seeing the joy in her eyes fade—even a little, because of some selfish a-hole brings tears to my eyes.

By the time I turn into the driveway, I’ve built my web of what-ifs into a catastrophe of epic proportions. And worried myself half to death in the process. I shut off the engine and bolt into the house.

“Sam!” I yell as I swing open the door. “Where are you?” I take in the sight before me and my eyes can’t make sense of what they see. The place is a wreck. But not in a two-working-women-and-a-six-year-old-who-have-all-been-a-little-lazy-with-the-cleaning sort of way, more like a-tornado-came-through-the-front-door-and-took-serious-issue-with-the-books-on-the-bookshelf sort of way.

Sam calmly walks out of the kitchen. “Right here, babe.”

I stop, confused by her calmness, given the state of the house. “Wait…are you okay? Why do you seem so calm? And what the heck happened?”

“Whoa, easy now. One question at a time. Yes. I am okay,” she sighs. “Sort of. I mean, I guess. I don’t know, frankly I’m too exhausted to be upset right now.”

Confused, I shake my head. “I don’t understand. What do you mean? What happened?”

Sam rubs at her upper arm and shoulder as she walks over and sits at the dining table. She looks up and motions with her head at the space across from her. “You probably ought to have a seat. It’s a long, weird story.”

Still very confused about pretty much everything, and how Sam is so calm about it all, I do my best to step over the mess as I walk to the table and have a seat.

“I’d just come in the door from work about ten minutes before. You know, I had a couple of hours before it was time to pick up Vanessa from the sitter, and I thought I’d catch up on the laundry and dishes and stuff. That’s when I hear someone outside, banging on the front door. And I’m like, what the hell? You know, thinking it’s a door to door salesmen trying too hard to sell a vacuum, or yard service, or whatever. I mean, ya know, it’s the middle of the afternoon, who else would it be? Just to be safe, I stopped to look through the peephole and then, oh my God, there’s Clint, banging away at the door like he’s trying to get inside to put out a fire.”

“So, what did you do?”

Sam stiffens. “I didn’t know what to do. At first, I just ignored it. Tried to pretend I wasn’t here in the hopes he’d get tired and leave.”

“But he didn’t?”

Sam tilts her head and looks around the room. “Um…no. After a couple more minutes of banging, he starts screaming. ‘I know you’re here. I saw you come home.’”

“Say what?” I reach for her hand. “So now he’s stalking us?”

Sam nods. “Apparently, but it gets weirder.”

Weirder than this? Oh my.

Sam continues, “When it became obvious he wasn’t leaving, I came back to the door and asked him what he wanted.”

“But you didn’t open it?”

She shakes her head. “No, not yet.”

“What did he want?”

“That’s just it.” Sam pauses. “I fully expected him to be here demanding to see Nessa or demanding to know when he would get to see her at the very least.”

I nod. “Right. Makes sense. But that’s not what he wanted?”

“No, Mol. He was only interested in you.”

My head jerks back in complete and utter disbelief. “What? Me? What on earth would he have to say about me?”

“No offense, but that’s what I thought. That’s what got me to open the door. I don’t know if I was more confused about why he’d want to talk about you or pissed that his daughter didn’t rate high enough…but anyway, I made the mistake of opening the door and he didn’t waste any time pushing his way past me.”

I squeeze Sam’s hand. “Then what happened?”

“Well, at first he calmed down. I mean, he made a big deal about why I didn’t just let him in to begin with, but he seemed more rational. You know?”

I nod.

---