Read Chapter 1, Deeds Not Words…

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Whit started his car as Olivia freaked out on the other end of the phone. Just when Whit thought his night and a long day were winding down, he added worry for his daughter on top of it. “Slow down and say that again. I can’t understand you when you bark at me that way.” 

All he had caught was that his daughter was in trouble. 

“Your daughter has run off again,” Olivia repeated. “We dropped her off at dance class, and before we could get to the restaurant, the instructor called. She wondered if Emily was going to show up tonight because she’s missed every day of class for the past month!”

“An entire month? That’s crazy!” Whit couldn’t believe how long his daughter had managed to pull this off. They had already gotten onto her once, and Whit found it surprising that she would try and pull something again this soon.

“Yeah, I grounded her the last time she did this, and she’s lucky I allowed her to even go to class. I thought with us dropping her off, she wouldn’t pull this crap again.”

Whit glanced at Anna, who sat beside him with worry in her eyes. “Where are you now?” He wondered if they had already made it back to the studio.

“We were on our way to dinner, but as soon as we can get an exit off of the freeway, we’re turning around.”

“Don’t,” he said, turning out of the church parking lot. “You and Mark go to dinner. I’ll go wait for Emily. I’m on my way back into town anyway.”

“Wait for her?” Olivia asked.

Whit hated when she questioned his methods. “Yes, there’s no reason to burn up gas driving around. Wherever she is, she’s going to know you expect her to be at the studio when it’s time to pick her up. I assume you’ve told her she couldn’t get another ride?”

“Yes. Only one of us can pick her up.”

“Well, she’ll have her friend drop her off, and she’ll pretend to walk out of class. I’d like to be the one to surprise her.” 

Emily was going to have her excuse all planned out for her mother, so hopefully, Whit would take her off guard.

He could hear Mark bitching in the background. “This is getting to be a bad habit. Maybe you should let her father deal with it.” He clearly didn’t like the idea of having to turn around and drive all the way back. 

“Fine,” Olivia said. “Mark has reservations anyway. I swear, she did this to ruin our night. She knows that we rarely get any time to ourselves with all the funerals and visitations. Not to mention, the bodies are piling up.”

Olivia always took everything personally, as if every decision everyone in her life made revolved around her. “I’m sure she did it to improve her night, not to wreck yours.”

“Funny,” said Olivia. “Try not to make a joke out of this when you pick her up. If you were a little harder on her now and then, instead of making me the disciplinarian, we might not be having this problem. Maybe she’d take things more seriously.”

“I’ll try my best.” He would just think of Olivia to snuff the humor out.

“We shouldn’t be late,” she explained. “I’ll let you know when we can come and pick her up. I assume you’ll be at your place?”

“Take all the time you want. I’ll have her spend the night with me and take her to school in the morning. I think she needs a long talk from a man’s point of view.” She needed to understand that boys didn’t think the same way girls did. He wasn’t sure if he was right to have that talk, but someone had to say something.

“Yeah, so try to act like a man and not an overgrown child.” Olivia’s tone was full of hate. He could always count on at least one dig at his manhood in every conversation with Olivia. And she wondered why it didn’t work out.

“And you try not to be so cold. I’m sure Mark will appreciate the night off.” Whit ended the call before things got ugly. He glanced at Anna, who had her lips pulled in tight as if she refused to laugh at his joke. “What?”

“You two are so awful to each other.” She angled in her seat to face him.

“She pushes my mean button. I can’t help it.” Whit didn’t like the person she made him be. “Just one of the many reasons I divorced her.”

“Well, I still say if either of you is going to get through to your daughter, you are going to have to work as a united front. It’s what my parents had to do with me. And God knows it wasn’t easy on either of them. Especially my poor father.”

“Ah, I forgot what a rebel you were.” 

She had told him about her throwing parties and thieving like a wild child. He loved those glimpses into her life.

Anna shook her head. “I was a chicken. But Emily isn’t. And she’s already playing you two against each other.”

“You might be right, but all I can think about right now is where she is and what she’s doing. If that car-driving nitwit lays a hand on her, I’m going to rip his fingers off and shove them down his throat.”

Anna gave him a scolding look. “Whit, don’t get all worked up.”

“Don’t tell me not to get worked up,” he said, frowning. “How could I not? I’m already keyed up after that case, and now I have to go and deal with my delinquent child being pawed at by some smug punk. And no telling what he has in mind in his Mustang.” Whit chewed the word up and spat it out. He hated to think that anyone could take advantage of his daughter. The fact that he couldn’t stop it made him sick to his stomach.

He drove across town, putting the pedal to the floorboard on the freeway, and didn’t let up until he hit the exit to the dance studio.

Anna breathed a sigh of relief when they left the freeway. “Did you get out your frustration on that gas pedal?”

“I’m still so angry with her. What is she thinking?”

Anna looked at her phone. “She thinks she’s in control of her life when she does this. She’s thinking you’ll never figure out what she’s doing, and if you do, it’s only going to make you understand that she’s in control of her life.”

All of that was probably true. “She’s pissing me off. And I can honestly say, until recently, that’s never happened before. Why the sudden change? Why can’t we always get along? She could be daddy’s girl forever, and that would work for me. You were.”

“Her mother is getting closer to Mark. You’re busier than ever. She’s about to be fifteen. All of her other friends are doing this kind of stuff. She wants to fit in, and maybe she’s being pressured. It could be a number of things.”

“Stop seeing her side of it. She’s wrong.”

“Of course, she is,” said Anna. “And you keep asking why. I’m only telling you how it might be. Don’t you remember being her age?”

“When I was her age, it was different.” He hated the fact that he sounded like his grandfather. He wished he could take the words back as soon as he said them.

“How?” Anna nudged him. “And don’t tell me the world was simpler. I hate it when people say that. Every generation has its troubles. It’s never easy during that time of your life. She’s becoming a young woman.”

“Stop saying that. I’ve heard it from her mother since she was twelve.” Saying it wasn’t going to make him like it.

“And it was just as true.”

“I haven’t had time to prepare her for anything, you know. I wanted to teach her self-defense and give her life lessons. Hell, I don’t think I’ve even figured everything out, and I’m forty-four years old.”

“My father always said, we’ll never really ever figure everything out. I believe him.”

Whit noticed Anna always had a certain look on her face when she talked about her father. She would lift her chin confidently, so certain that what she was saying was gospel.

“Well, that’s another thing me and your old man agree on,” he said. “But that doesn’t help me.” He needed to prepare her for the world.

He took another exit and slowed to turn onto a street that would take him to Anna’s neighborhood. “I’ll just drop you off at home, I guess. No need for both of us to sit around waiting.”

“No,” she said with a sound of urgency. “I’d rather stay with you if you don’t mind. Besides, someone has to make sure you don’t kill that poor boy. You can drop me off on the way home.”

He was surprised she wanted to stay with him. They were barely apart anymore, only at night, but they texted most of the time until they fell asleep. Even then, most of his dreams were about her. She was becoming a welcome constant in his life, and the last case seemed to seal it even more than all the rest.

Whit took another turn and headed back across town to the dance studio. When the time came for Emily to be dropped off, Whit parked just up from the studio and waited.

Sure enough, the black mustang she’d been in before pulled up, and Whit got out while his daughter said her goodbyes. He rolled up his sleeves and prepared to deal with him as Anna got out and hurried after him.

“Whit, wait! He’s only a kid, remember?”

Whit walked up to the driver’s side and knocked on the window. He heard a clear, “Oh my God,” coming from Emily. She got out of the car and slammed the door. “Dad!”

Whit reached in the window when it went down far enough and grabbed the kid by the collar. “My daughter is fourteen years old!”

“I didn’t know, sir!” said Jaxon with an x as his eyes nearly bulged out of his head. “She said she was fifteen.”

“She lied. She’s supposed to be in dance class. Did you know that?”

“Dad!” She turned and saw Anna, who looked just as helpless. “Make him stop!”

Anna shrugged. “I can’t stop him.” She wasn’t about to get in the way.

“Yes, sir. I’m sorry, sir. She just asked me to pick her up. We just talked.”

“Anna, get her in the car.” Whit barked the order and didn’t even think about how cruel he sounded.

“Come on,” said Anna. “I’d recommend you do what he says. I’ve never seen him this pissed off.”

Emily’s face twisted as Whit let go of the boy’s collar. “I hate you!” She turned and stormed to the Falcon with Anna as he leaned down into the car.

He wanted the young man to feel his breath on his cheek. “If you even think about picking my girl up again from anywhere other than my house—and with my permission—I’ll make sure you never drive anything in this town ever again. You feel me?” 

Whit thought he was acting nice by not telling him never to come around her again, but he was trying to be realistic. Forbidding her was only going to make her want to be with him more.

“Yes, sir.” Jaxon was shaking in his seat.

Whit stepped away from the car and went back to the Falcon as the boy sped away.

“I can’t believe you did that!” said Emily as he got in the car. “I’ll never forgive you! You made me look so stupid!”

“You are lucky that’s all I did, young lady. What were you thinking? Your mother is worried sick. Did you even stop to think about that? About either of us?”

“Jaxon didn’t do anything wrong. And now he thinks I’m stupid and that my dad’s a psycho.”

“He hasn’t seen me go psycho, Em. But I can guarantee if I ever catch you sneaking off like this again, you’ll both see the psycho in me. Do you have any idea how dangerous what you’re doing is?”

He started the car, and Anna turned around in her seat to hand Emily a tissue. Neither of them said more than one-word sentences, and neither spoke to him.

After he calmed down, he called Olivia and told her that he had found Emily and she was fine. He ended the call and parked in his drive.

“I want to go home,” said Emily.

“This is your home. You’re staying the night with me.” He didn’t want to hear it.

“I’m mad at you right now,” said Emily. “Everyone is going to find out what you did, and I’ll be the laughing stock at school.”

“You’ll get over it.” He wasn’t going to let her make him feel bad. He had dealt with too many situations to care about her feelings. At least she was still alive to feel.

As they went into the house, Emily stormed past him into her room, where she slammed the door.

“Great,” he said, releasing a long breath. He turned to Anna. “I’m sorry. I should have taken you home. I was just so hellbent on getting her back here.”

“It’s okay. I could have said something. But I can always call a ride.”

“Or you could stay.” He gave a slight shrug, hoping she wouldn’t think it was a big deal. “You do love the couch, right?”

Anna smiled. “I love the couch. It’s a great couch.”

“And maybe you wouldn’t mind checking on my girl for me? She kind of hates me right now.”

She gave him a half-hearted smile. “She doesn’t hate you. She hates what you did.”

“Do you hate me for that too? I mean, can you blame me?” He was beginning to see that he had overreacted and wished he could take it back. He also hated that Anna and Emily had seen him that way. 

The longer he looked into Anna’s eyes, the worse he felt. He had never wanted her to see him in a bad light. The only thing worse was knowing Emily did.

“He was just a kid, Whit. And your daughter went with him willingly. He didn’t know he did anything wrong.”

“He knows now.”

“Half of downtown knows.” Anna gave him an apologetic look.

“I was pretty bad, huh?” He got a sinking feeling in his gut.

Anna nodded. “Yeah, you should apologize—but after I talk to her.”

He couldn’t get over how amazing Anna was. He wished he could tell her. “Thank you.”

She gestured toward the couch. “Have my bed ready when I come back.” She gave a teasing look as she went to Emily’s room.