Rise - Part Three (Rise #3)(7)

"Why don't you celebrate it?"

He sits on my sofa, his long legs bent at the knees as his shoes tap an uneven beat on the floor. "I stopped when my dad died. I stopped caring about it."

I study him for a moment. He's dressed in black pants and a white shirt. At first glance, almost any woman passing him would stop to take a second glance. He's handsome in a way that suggests that he's comfortable with the man that he is, but it's a carefully honed fa?ade. He's struggling with demons that have consumed him for years. Guilt has worn him down. It has stolen things from him. Things he may never get back.





Chapter 6


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"I asked my father to come to my apartment that night because it was my birthday," he stops to swallow. "I knew that he wouldn't resist. I also knew that he'd never suspect it was a trap."

It was a trap. The word itself conjures up images of a man standing alone with his hands pointed at the ceiling as dozens of armed and shielded policemen close in on him. It wasn't that way with Frederick.

His face was calm when the elevator doors flew open. He was smiling at Landon. It's no wonder considering he just spent time with the son he must have cradled in his arms exactly thirty-two-years before that day. It was the same son who had held onto him desperately when their boat capsized. The son who was so lost in his grief that he stopped recognizing his own life as vital and important.

Frederick had taken much more than the trust of his family when he disappeared. He'd taken the person Landon was that day with him.

"I went to see him that next day at the police station because I wanted answers but he refused to talk to me."

He'd told me that when he found me on the street in front of my office talking to Ansel. "When did you talk to him again?"

"Not until that Saturday afternoon when I saw him with my mother," he stops to run his hands over the thighs of his pants. "Dane was there too but he didn't say a lot."

I'm not surprised by that. I'd spent less than an hour with Landon's younger brother but I could sense his quiet strength. They were similar in ways neither likely recognized. Even the motions of their hands as they speak are hauntingly alike.

I nod. I know that he's trying to explain, in a very long winded way, how his father ended up in a position in which he could offer information in exchange for a plea deal. It would all be fascinating if not for the fact that Frederick threw my dad to the wolves as one of his bargaining chips.

"How does your father know mine?" I blurt the question out as my hands fly to my hips. "Were you helping the police by getting close to me? Have you been seeing me so you could find out more about my dad?"

"What?" His neck turns suddenly so he's looking directly at me. "You think that? How can you think that?"

"How can I not think it?" I throw the words back at him as I lean forward. "Your dad told the police things about my father. He knew my father."

"Jesus, Tess." He pushes himself to his feet. "I don't know what the f*ck went on between your dad and mine. I don't give a shit about any of that."

I do give a shit. He may not feel the same love for his own father that I do for mine. I admit that I have no grasp on what's going on in a legal sense, but I know my dad has always told me that a person's actions reveal more about them than any words they may say.

My father didn't take me out in a boat and then risk my life so he could swim to the shore and disappear. He has been there for me each and every day since I was born. That alone speaks of his character. If he did do bad things, he didn't flee. He stayed in plain sight.

"Frederick told the police things about my dad." My words are pointed and stiff. "Don't tell me it's a coincidence that I met you right before all of this happened."

He takes a heavy step forward but I don't retreat. I won't be intimidated by him, or anyone. I'm still hell bent on honoring the vow I made last night to help my father. If Landon is the first person I need to challenge to get to the bottom of what's going on, so be it.

He exhales audibly as his eyes skim my face. "I told my mother about you a few weeks ago. I told her that I met the woman of my dreams."

I fidget slightly on my feet, my hand leaping to the front of my neck. They're words that I've longed to hear but not now. I don't want to know about his mother, or his brother, or anything other than how we ended up entangled in this mess with our fathers.

"Yesterday, after the news broke about your father, she called me in Athens." His eyes squeeze shut and his hands clasp together in front of him. "She told me that your dad was the reason she'd lost her family."

The words bite. I expected them from people who don't have a clear vision of who my father is. I know that once someone is arrested, their reputation is tarnished forever. I anticipated the uneducated wrath of strangers who think it's acceptable to insults others based on what they've read in the papers or online.

"He's not the reason," I whisper under my breath.

"You're right." His hand leaps to his chin. "My mother tried to tell me that I need to stay away from you. She said Otis Marlow's daughter couldn’t be any better than him."

I've always considered it a compliment when anyone has compared me to my father. Obviously, Anja's comment wasn't meant that way.