Page 99 of The Beekeeper

Again, she scrubbed her foot back and forth over the ground a few times before she told me.

“Because he does everything himself.”

My next inhale burned. “Does he?” I asked, trying to keep my voice steady. “Your dad just wants to make sure everything is perfect for you. He just wants you to be happy.”

“Is he happy?” she asked, looking at me in earnest, and I found I wasn’t able to answer her.

“Well,” I began, my throat working to figure out what to say. “He’s happy when you’re happy.”

Her mouth scrunched. “Are you sure?”

“Positive,” I said firmly. “Why? Do you think he’s not happy?”

She thought again. “I don’t know. He smiles but he doesn’t seem happy.”

I didn’t say anything, but I knew what she meant. These last couple of days, Blaze was…acting. Not that his smiles were fake; I didn’t think the man could fake anything when it came to his daughter, but neither were they completely honest. As much as I wanted to ask what was on his mind, I didn’t; I was afraid.

Those images from the farmers’ market had done the opposite of die down. They’d spread to what felt like every corner of the internet with everyone trying to dissect every pixel of the snapshot. Blaze had brushed it off as nothing to worry about—that they were just fishing for something to write about him ever since he’d fallen off the paparazzi’s radar by moving here, but then his reserved silence, the slight lag in his smiles, and the way he stared at Pais almost like something was ripping him apart on the inside…I couldn’t help but think it was because of me.

Because this was supposed to be nothing…nothing but a secret, and now, it felt like the vultures were circling just waiting for the scent of blood.

And yet, it didn’t stop him from knocking on my bedroom door every night. It didn’t stop him from kissing me like it was his only shot of oxygen and then fucking me like it was all he needed to survive. It would be a lie to believe the way he touched me—took me, and then things he said while doing it hadn’t played mind games on me. Games he’d warned me about. Games we’d set up and mutually agreed on the rules. Games I had no one but myself to blame for losing. But boy, was I losing them all for him.

“Have you thought about asking him?”

Her eyes saucered. “No,” she basically mouthed, afraid to say the word out loud.

I believed that honest was better than happy when it came to kids. It wasn’t that I didn’t know or understand why Blaze was the way he was or pretended the way he did around his daughter, he wanted to protect Pais from all the things stressing him, but in the end, it only made her confused rather than safe.

And even though she was asking me, there was no answer I could give that would make this better because it wasn’t my answer she needed; it was his.

“You should ask him,” I said, and her gaze dropped. “If you want to know the truth.”

“Do you think he’ll be mad?”

“Pais, has your dad ever been mad at you?”

She shook her head.

“Then you have your answer.”

We walked back to the house in silence, Pais releasing my hand to run ahead when she saw her dad’s car parked in the drive.

“Hey, pumpkin.” He pulled her tight, and I watched his eyes close as he hugged her. Something was definitely off. “What do you say we go out for pizza and ice cream?”

“Yeah!” She bounced in his arms and then looked at me. “Are you coming, Harper?”

My mouth parted, fairly used to being invited by now to almost everything they did together, but this time, Blaze answered for me, “I was hoping it could just be the two of us, pumpkin.”

The raw tenderness in his voice did nothing to stop my heart from plummeting into my stomach.

“But…”

“It’s okay, Pais,” I quickly assured her. “I have to go visit my brother tonight anyway.” Not entirely false. Nox seemed to have fallen off the face of the earth and into his work, and I needed to check on him.

“Oh.”

“I’ll be here when you get back,” I promised. “Plus, you should share the good news about the hive with your dad.”