Page 36 of Lies in Promises
Robert looks back at me. “I need the kids to stay here with you for a little bit.”
“What?” I ask, bewildered.
“Yes. It’s to protect them. I don’t know who killed Marisela’s father or who took her. For all I know, whoever it was is after us too. If they were to stay at our house, Bennett, something could happen, and I wouldn’t be able to live with myself. They need to stay here with you and Henry.”
“For how long?” I voice, my mind all over the place.
I don’t know the first thing about taking care of kids. Hell, I feel like I’m still one at times—I definitely felt like one this morning.
“A couple weeks maybe. I promise, it won’t be a permeant thing. I will be back. It will just be until things settle down, until I’m able to find Marisela. As soon as I do, I will come right back.”
I promise.
I will be back.
I want to roll my eyes. He said those words to me when I was eight, and they never happened.
He could be telling the truth and come back in a week, Marisela in tow, but he is going in blind. He doesn’t know where to start or what might be waiting for him. There is a chance he may never make it back.
If he does this, he could be abandoning his kids like he did to me, and I can’t let that happen.
“Why do you have to go looking for her? We can hire someone. I’ll pay for it, and you won’t have to go.”
He’s shaking his head before I even finish. “I have to go, Bennett.”
“No, you fucking don’t.”
“She’s my wife, Benny! I promised I would protect her always, that I would always go looking for her. That’s what I’m going to do.”
“Your kids need you,” I say, my voice rising, trying to get through to him.
“And they also need their mother,” Robert insists through clenched teeth.
“You can’t just go and leave your kids with two strangers.”
“You’re not strangers.”
I roll my eyes. “Really?” I wave a hand toward the nearly closed door. “I didn’t know they existed half an hour ago. I don’t even know their names!”
He knows I’m right, and I can see it on his face.
For a small moment, I think he’s going to concede and let me hire someone to find Marisela. But the moment is gone when he stands and shakes his head.
“I have to be the one to find her. I have to go, and the kids need to stay here with you,” he says, his voice hard, almost sounding like our father.
“There’s a chance you won’t come back. Three people are dead, and for all you know, Marisela could be too. What if whoever did it is waiting for you at your house to finish the job?” He just looks at me as I speak, as if he’s not really hearing me. I can see it in the way he stands and in the way his face is set. He’s going to go. “Don’t leave your kids like you left me.”
The last part stuns him.
“This is not the same,” he says softly, but I don’t know if he’s trying to convince me or himself.
“What if I say no? To letting them stay here? To watching them? What happens then? Will you still leave?”
I won’t say no. I wouldn’t do that to him or to them. My brother might have walked out of my life for a decade and a half, and I may not know his children whatsoever, but I wouldn’t turn my back on them. I’m not that cruel.
And Robert knows that.
“You won’t,” he says, tears forming in his eyes. I watch him swallow hard. “Please, Bennett. I have to go look for her, but I won’t put my children in harm’s way while doing it. Please. Do this for them. If not for me, do this for them. I’m begging you, brother. Please.”
