Page 66 of Moonlit Hideaway
“Yes, but with you here encouraging her, I’m afraid she’ll have her head in the clouds. She’s got a heritage here. Thisinn belonged to Chloe’s family. Emma is the last of the Baxter family, and she has to learn the role of an innkeeper.”
“Is that what she wants or what you want?” Sierra’s tone was sharp.
“It’s what she wanted before she started following you on social media. Now, she’s so obsessed that she forgot what happened to her mother.”
“Hank.” Sierra’s hand on him was calming. “Oh, Hank, that’s your grief talking. Don’t let it affect Emma.”
He closed his eyes, taking a deep breath. How was it that this woman saw through him so clearly?
“Maybe it’s because I can’t let her go.”
Sierra wrapped her arms around him and held him still. “You can’t cage someone’s spirit and call it love.”
Hank had no words. The same applied to her. He would never be able to hold her on this island, stuck inside this room, and call it love. She would forever feel caged while he felt lost outside this place of refuge.
“What are you going to do?” Sierra broke the quiet.
“Talk to her, I guess. Make sure she understands the realities.”
Sierra yawned and tapped his chin. “Your heart is in the right place. How about you wait until after the festival? If you can see her perform… it’s you who needs the confidence to help Emma’s gift to soar.”
“Only for her to fly away…” He shook his head sadly, wondering if she, too, felt trapped inside this tiny seaside inn.
“As long as she always comes back. She loves you, Hank.” She got up and walked toward the door she’d left open a crack. “Would you like me to stay with you tonight?”
“Yeah.” Her kindness and the conviction in her voice eroded his resistance. He couldn’t force Emma into the same trap he’d condemned her mother to. That long-buried pain was stillshaping his best intentions, and it was he who was having trouble letting go. He wanted forever, but what if forever wasn’t in the cards?
She shut the door and came toward him, opening her robe, and he realized that he could only taste forever a moment at a time. If only he could make it last and last and last.
Chapter Twenty-Three
One of the benefits of a sleepless night was sleeping in the next day. It was late when Sierra returned to her room. She and Hank did not want Emma to catch them in the morning, as she had a habit of barging into her father’s room. Sierra was glad she’d had that heart-to-heart with him because he seemed to have softened his stance of Emma never leaving the island. Once Hank got over the trauma of his wife’s death, he’d see clearer that hiding on Hattokwa the rest of his life was healing at first but confining later on.
If only she could help him out of his self-imposed shell. And yet, Hank and his mother had taken refuge with the Baxter family, and he’d told her that his father had abused them, so it was only natural that he felt safe when he arrived. At least it got him off the streets where he’d experienced homelessness.
Sierra decided she couldn’t be too hard on the man since she’d been raised in the luxurious penthouse her father provided for them—paving her path with gold and never letting her down until the day of his death. Then again, her father’s idea of caring for her was to palm her off to his underboss.
Shaking her head at how parents imposed what they believed was best on their children, she soon drifted into a deep and cozy sleep.
Pounding and yelling jolted her awake. She shot up in her bed, blinking and dazed, at first not remembering where she was. The room was dim in the early morning light, and Hank’s voice shouted through the door.
“Emma’s gone.” He rattled her door. “Did she say anything to you?”
Rushing to open the door, Sierra’s eyes met Hank’s. “What do you mean? I haven’t seen her.”
Mabel appeared from the hallway with a piece of paper in her hand. “She’s run away. Left a note. Read this.”
Hank grabbed the note and read it aloud, “Dad, I can’t be what you want me to be. I don’t want to be stuck on this island. I won’t come back until I’m a big star. Emma.”
Sierra felt a pang of guilt. Emma had overheard their conversation and decided to make a run for it. Had she put these ideas into the kid’s mind? This wasn’t at all what she expected.
“Where is she?” Sierra peeked into Emma’s empty room. Clothes were spread over the bed and floor as if she had hastily packed, but more telling, her guitar and laptop were gone.
“Maybe she’s waiting for you somewhere.” Mabel’s accusatory tone cut through the tense air. “Check your messages. You’re the one giving her all these high-fallutin’ ideas.”
“Now, Mom, this isn’t the time for blaming,” Hank said. “I’m calling Ruth.”
Confused, Sierra returned to her room and looked at her phone. “Nothing. Emma didn’t know this number because this is the phone the FBI gave me.”
