Page 6 of The Beekeeper

I still remembered Blaze’s befuddled expression, and to be honest, I wasn’t sure how or why the response came so easily off my tongue. All I knew was that whenever I had struggled with something I couldn’t figure out, Dad always grabbed a board game and promised that by the time we were through, I’d have my answer; and he was always right.

I still remembered my surprise when Blaze actually did what I said, thinking there was no way a famous actor (even one in hiding) would just…obey.

“A game?” He stared at the Othello box I’d pulled from Lou’s board game shelf; it was a quick setup, the rules easy to understand, but the strategy required thought and therefore, a good distraction.

“Not sure I’m in the mood to lose,” he muttered, but pulled up the chair and sat anyway.

“Win or lose, does it matter if it keeps you sober?”

He scowled at me, doubting. “I guess we’ll see.”

Two hours later, he played his final piece—and won. But the outcome didn’t matter, the game did. It kept him focused on something other than the cravings he was trying to outrun. And it kept him coming back downstairs, night after night, for game therapy. And as we played, we talked about any and everything, like that game time was a witching hour during which anything could be said and confessed…and then forgotten by morning light.

The only truth I hadn’t told him was that I knew who he really was. At the time, I thought I was respecting his need for anonymity. But now, looking back, I could see how that only made it a thousand times worse when he’d realized not only had I known who he was, but as my family was only too happy to out me that my childhood bedroom was plastered with movie posters of him.

“Here we are,” I told Paisley, extending my arm in a sweep across the field of wildflowers in front of us.

She stepped behind my leg, almost like she was afraid, and looked around.

“What are those?” She pointed to the wooden towers that lined the perimeter of the trees.

Slowly, I crouched until I was level with her.

“Those are all the bees’ houses. They’re called hives,” I said.

She stared hard for another second, a blonde curl blowing in front of her face.

“How many bees live there?” Her eyes darted around like she was trying to count each buzzing little body that zoomed by.

“How many do you think?”

Her eyes dropped. “I don’t know.”

“That’s okay. Try to guess.”

Her little forehead scrunched. “Five hundred.”

I smiled. “More.”

Her mouth pursed. “A thousand.”

“More.”

Her brows popped up, her eyes adorably wide. “More than a thousand?” she lisped, and it was the cutest thing in the world.

“Oh yeah.”

She paused for a long second—so long most people would’ve given in and given her the answer already, but I didn’t. I waited. It wasn’t the answer that mattered; it was that she kept trying.

“Ten thousand?”

I had to fight to hold back a chuckle, not because she was wrong but because missing those two front teeth was really messing with her T-sounds.

I dipped my head closer to hers and whispered like it was a secret, “Twenty thousand.”

“Twenty?”

“In each hive.”