Page 13 of Exile

I took a breath. “I wanted to meet you. Mom…she never talked about you much. Well, when she did talk about you, it was only negative. I barely know anything about you except your name and a bit about your career.”

“Your mother has never been the sentimental type,” Caspian muttered, reaching for a mug on the side table. He took a long sip, his eyes never leaving me. “What’s Julie got to do with this, anyway? She send you here?”

“No,” I said quietly. “She doesn’t know I’m here. And we kinda had an argument before I decided to go on a road trip, so I don’t think she would actually care.”

She’d just be angry at me.

I thought I caught a flicker of something in his eyes for a moment. Disappointment, maybe. But it disappeared as quickly as it came. “Huh, figures.” He leaned back in his chair, setting the mug down. “So, what? You just decided to track me down for kicks? How’d you do that? Nobody really knows I’m here. That’s why I like it.”

I shook my head. “It’s not like that at all. I was on a road trip, and two nights ago, I was ready to return home. Burlington, Vermont, is my home.”

“I was born there,” he told me.

“I know. Saw it on Google.” I pursed my lips.

He didn’t say another word, waiting for me to continue my story of how I ended up here.

“I was eating dinner at Lakeside Lodge—”

“In Sault Ste. Marie?”

“Yes. And I was talking to the waitress when you came up in the conversation. You came up because there were pictures of famous people on the wall. She said one actor didn’t want his picture on that wall. She told me it was you, and I lied about knowing you, hoping to have her tell me where you lived. She believed me that I didn’t know you—technically, I don’t—and, so, she told me you lived here. Hidden from the world. All alone.”

“I’m not alone.”

I liked to believe that, but he seemed pretty damn lonely to me.

“So, you’ve seen me now. Happy? Will you leave now?”

I couldn’t hide a grin.

He was charming, in a way.

“Happy that I finally got to meet you? Yes. Will I leave? No. I booked a tiny house by the camping area for two weeks.”

He sucked in a deep breath. I watched as he leaned forward, resting his elbows on his knees and rubbing his hands together. “Right.”

“Can I ask you something?”

“No.”

I raised a brow. “Theresa was right. You’re kind of an asshole.”

“Did she say that?”

I shrugged. “Maybe not with those exact words, but hers intended the same.”

A sigh left him, and he looked at me with furrowed brows. “What do you want to know, kid?”

“I would like to understand why…” I trailed off, unsure how to phrase it without setting him off. Anything could trigger him, it seemed. “Why things ended up the way they did.”

His jaw tightened, and he let out a low laugh, though no humor existed. “Kid, you’re gonna have to be more specific than that. What things?”

He wasn’t making this easy, but I hadn’t expected him to. “Why did you and Mom stop talking? What was the real reason?”

Caspian’s expression darkened, and he looked away. His gaze shifted to the window. “That’s between me and Julie. It’s got nothing to do with you.”

Not directly. But it did shape Mom and, therefore, my relationship with her.

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