Page 118 of The Bad Wedding Date

“I’m the guy you met at the bus stop.” He gave me a soft wink before he stepped back off the bed and made his way to the other side of the room. “Don’t answer the door to anyone but me,”

“How long will you be gone?”

With his hand on the door handle, he glanced over his shoulder to look at me. “This shouldn’t take long.”

* * *

Only an hour had passed, but it felt like a day. A long day filled with worry, pacing back and forth, and far too much nail-biting. If I’d had my step tracker on, I’d have completed my ten thousand steps for the day three times over. I couldn’t sit still. The phone in my hand moved from palm to palm and back again repeatedly. The urge to call him and ask him ifhewas all right overwhelmed me. I’d never held so much fear and concern over the safety of anybody else in my life. Not even my own family, and I wasn’t sure what that said about me as a daughter, a sister, or even a human.

Calm down! He’s the biggest, strongest guy you’ve ever come across in your whole life. He can take care of himself. He wouldn’t leave you here alone if he thought there was even a small chance of him getting harmed in any way. He wouldn’t leave you like that.

My conscience had firmly set up home in Camp Fraser, as had my ever-beating heart that thumped away in support of whatever my conscience threw at me. My growing anxiety, however, didn’t hold such firm beliefs in… well, anything. All that thing saw at every turn was danger.

Turning my phone over to look at the screen, I swiped to unlock it, so close to calling Fraser and asking for an update, when it started to ring in my hand.

The word ‘Dad’ flashed up at me—a sight I hadn’t seen too often in recent years. I thought about ignoring it, but something told me it had to be important.

“Dad?” I answered.

“Charlotte,” he said, his voice soft and warm, reminding me of the times we’d spent alone together growing up when Emelia or Mum hadn’t been around—when he’d been the father I’d always hoped he could be instead of the businessman who hung off every word my mother spoke.

“Is everything okay?” I asked, scowling.

“I was calling you to ask the same thing.”

“I’m fine. Why wouldn’t I be?”

“I bumped into Penn earlier today. He mentioned having run into you after the wedding.”

Chasing me down at my place of work to humiliate me and talk in riddles was hardly a chance encounter, but Dad didn’t need to know those details. I was more interested in finding out why he had called rather than discussing Penn’s version of events. He always had been a good liar.

“We may have had a brief conversation,” I replied. “I’d hardly call it stimulating or of any value.”

“You’re not a fan of his, I know.” Dad’s pause was brief, but I caught the hesitation. “However, Penndidsay something to me that made me want to call in and check on my daughter. He reminded me that maybe I don’t do that enough. That made me feel rather ashamed.”

My father may have been softer than my mother, but he wasn’t the kind of grown man to ever admit to being wrong or ashamed.

“What did he say to you to make you feel that way?” I asked.

“He asked if I knew what you were doing with your life these days. Such a simple question really, isn’t it? One a father should be able to answer about his youngest child. Only, I couldn’t. Aside from your sister’s wedding, I realised how long it has been since we last talked properly.”

Try ten years,I almost said. “You mean about something that didn’t involve an instruction, criticism, or demand from my mother.”

“She means well deep down in her heart, darling.”

“I’m sure she does. You shouldn’t let a man like Penn make you question who you are as a father, though. He, of all people, has never had my best interests at heart.”

“Maybe not. Still, his question caught me off guard, and those feelings of shame were there regardless of his intentions. When he said he worried about you, I realised that I should worry about you more, too.”

I barked out a cold laugh, the amusement making me spin around in a circle before dropping to the edge of the huge bed. “Wow. That’s a first from Penn. What is he worried about? The fact that I could finally be happy?”

“Are you?” Dad asked quickly, catching me off guard.

All humour dropped from my face, and I opened my mouth to say something in response, only to close it again as my thoughts collided into one another like a storm had just blown through them.

Happy.

That one word held such weight. I didn’t even know what it meant, and I was twenty-four years of age. The only time I let happiness wash over me was when lying in bed beside Fraser. Then, I felt on top of the world.

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