Page 86 of Yours To Hold
Maybe it is just better if I leave town now.
Opening my phone, I dial the last number in my recent calls list. It goes straight to voicemail. I guess it’s better this way as tears start to fill my eyes.
“Hi, Janet. It’s Ivy Connors. I wanted to let you know there won’t be any issues with starting next week. Looking forward to it.”
I end the call and toss my phone into the front seat. Turning on my car, I leave the hospital.
And put the three people I love most in my rearview mirror.
ChapterTwenty-Four
MASON
“Daddy, do we have to go to dinner tonight?”
“What? Why wouldn’t you want to go to family dinner?”
Willow burrows farther into the couch. With summer coming to an end, she’d usually be playing outside with her friends from sunup to sundown. Instead, she’s been moping around the house.
“My throat still hurts.”
I drop down onto the coffee table, taking in my sweet daughter. Her eyes are sad. Everything about her face is sad right now. This is not the bright and happy Willow that she normally is.
I feel her head. No fever. “You don’t feel warm.”
She sighs. “It’s my throat. Not my head.”
The doctor cleared her at her last appointment. I’m guessing it has to do with a certain person who is no longer in town.
“Maybe seeing everyone will make you feel better, Pipsqueak.”
Willow shrugs a shoulder.
“How about this.” I scoop her into my arms. “If you don’t feel better after dinner, we’ll leave and make sundaes. How does that sound?”
That perks her up. “Okay, Daddy.”
Dropping a kiss on her head, I set her down on her feet. “Go grab your shoes and we’ll head out.”
Willow runs off.
It’s been like this ever since Ivy left.
One minute she was here, the next she was gone. I don’t know what happened with her and Gemma at the hospital. I had other things to worry about. Like Willow.
Gemma barely said two words to me at the hospital. I couldn’t even talk to her after because she’s been in LA with Blake.
She’ll be at dinner tonight. And that’s part of the reason I want to go. Something happened to send Ivy running. She didn’t just leave me. She left Willow.
Logically, I know she was going to leave at the end of the summer. But we still had time together. Ever since she left, Willow and I have been struggling. It’s like she took everything good with her.
So much for being a summer fling.
I gave Ivy my heart and she took it with her.
“Ready, Daddy!” Willow comes around the corner in a pair of unicorn rain boots. There hasn’t been a rainy day since that big storm blew through.
Fuck. Once again I’m thinking about Ivy.
