Page 49 of The Last One You Loved
“I don’t like the dark,” she told me as if I didn’t know this already. As if we didn’t have a dozen different nightlights in the house because of it. Personally, I thought it stemmed from when she’d been a baby, left alone too much, screaming in the dark for her basic necessities. From times encoded in her body before she could even process them. It made my soul hurt to think of her like that. The way I’d found her…
“I know,” I said.
“That’s how you and McKenna feel. Like I do about the dark.”
I glanced at her in my rearview mirror, awed by the way she processed the world. I’d never believed in the whole empath thing until her. When Mama had first told me, I’d scoffed, but Mila amazed me almost daily with an insight into people most adults didn’t even have. And now, my daughter was right. I was afraid, and I knew exactly what was making me scared, but I had no idea why McKenna was.
We pulled into the garage as I tried to figure out a response Mila would understand. When I got out of the car and opened the back door for her, she slid out of her car seat but stood next to it, eyes almost even with mine. She placed her hands on my face. “Do you need to borrow my nightlight, Daddy?”
My breath caught at my magnificent little child offering up the one thing that banished her fear so I wouldn’t be afraid.
My voice was gruff when I responded. “No, sweetheart, but thank you. McKenna and I…we need to find a different kind of light.”
She nodded sagely, as if she understood completely.
Then, she slipped out of the car and headed for the front door at a dead run.
“Watch your step!” I hollered.
When I finally caught up, it was to see McKenna pulling her two bags out of the back of the rental. The same two she’d had with her when she’d arrived two nights ago. But the sight of them was a reminder this was a vacation for her, not a cross-country move. She’d be gone in days, and I’d have to pick up the remains of our life when she left again.
As soon as I unlocked the door, Mila zoomed past me toward the back of the house just as McKenna joined me on the top step. I reached for the bigger bag, and our hands collided. Heat and desire swept through me, flickering at the fuse that had once ignited us, uncontrollable feelings I didn’t want to have. When I met her gaze, her lips parted again like at breakfast. Knowing she felt the attraction between us made me want to yank her to me and kiss her as much as it made me want to push her into her car and force her to drive away.
Instead, I pulled the luggage into the house and toward the guest room. “You’re just back here.”
She followed me. Mila was already there, sitting on the bed, bouncing up and down.
“We’ve never had a guest stay over other than Miss Rianne,” Mila said.
McKenna looked over at me, dragging her eyes down my body and then back to my face, and I wondered who she thought Rianne was. I could have told her she was our ancient third-grade teacher, but for some inexplicable reason, I hoped she was jealous. I hoped she thought Rianne was my girlfriend.
“You need to go get ready for bed,” I told Mila.
She sighed and dragged her feet as she got up. “Okay. But can McKenna readThe Day the Unicorns Saved the Worldwith us?”
My heart squeezed. I’d accused McK of being selfish earlier, but really, I was the selfish bastard because I wanted all of Mila’s sweet moments to be mine and mine alone. “That’s up to McKenna. She might want some peace and quiet.”
Mila turned to face McKenna. “You have to listen to the story. It’s about Chester and his friends and how they save the world from a troll who lives in a cave above their valley. He wants to steal their horns because they have magic.”
“If you tell her the whole story, she won’t need to read it,” I said, lips twitching.
McKenna’s head was tilted, watching our exchange, and then she said quietly, “I’d love to read the story with you.”
“Yes!” Mila did her victory move again and then twirled out of the room. “I’ll wash up as quick as I can.”
“Don’t skip brushing your teeth!” I hollered after her.
“I won’t. I won’t.”
I turned back, and McKenna’s face was soft with an emotion I couldn’t name.
“You’re really amazing with her,” she said quietly.
I rubbed my beard. “She makes it easy.”
She nodded and then turned serious. “Thank you for letting me stay. For giving me the chance to know her.”
I shifted my feet, uncomfortable with everything about her being there. “I don’t think we should tell her about your relationship yet. She knows Sybil is her mom, but she hasn’t seen her once since the visitations stopped, so I don’t think she even remembers her.”
