Page 145 of The Vanishing Place
“Unfortunately, your dad heard your whining.” Adam shook his head. “And I had to untie you before he found you. Before you found God.”
“Sorry I ruined your plans.”
“No matter.” He smiled. “We have time now. You’ll repent soon enough.”
Adam moved farther into the room. “You’re in a special place. Away from temptation and sin. Here, you will be cleansed.”
“Right.” Effie stared into his dark eye. “And what if I don’t want to be cleansed?”
“You’ll come around eventually.”
“I doubt that.”
Adam grinned. “I like your tattoo by the way. Very touching.”
Effie slapped a hand to her wrist, covering the smallA. “It’s for Aiden.”
He raised an eyebrow. “And the secondA?”
“There’s just one.”
Adam chuckled. “You seem very chipper for someone in your situation.”
“I’m not planning to stay.”
“Is that right?”
“Lewis won’t wait forever,” said Effie. “He will look for me. And he will find me.”
A cruelness spread like roots through his face, but Effie forced herself to keep looking at him. He was thinner than she remembered, and his hair was cut close to his skull.
“I doubt that very much,” he said.
Effie’s stomach flipped, and for a moment she couldn’t find the words that she’d practiced. As she stared into his eyes, a numbness swelled in her throat and tongue.
“You don’t know anything,” she managed.
“Oh, I think I know a few things.”
Then, slowly, Adam moved aside.
No.
A beat of fear, like nothing she’d felt before, pounded through every inch of her.
“Someone wanted to say a quick hello,” he said.
“No,” Effie murmured, the word barely a whisper.
Anya.
The child stood there, her small hand clutching Adam’s.
“I always knew she’d come back to me.” He picked Anya up, and she wrapped her arms around his neck. “Daddy missed you, didn’t he?”
Then he kissed her on the forehead, and Effie saw it.Love. The unconditional bond between a father and a daughter. And the earth fell away from under her.
“Where’s Lewis?” she asked.
