“I used to spend my summers here in the States when I was in university back home. I’d come here and work for my father, learning the ins and outs of the business, but I didn’t officially pack up and leave until after I graduated with my master’s,” he tells me. “That was seven years ago.”

“Do you miss it?”

“Scotland?”

With a nod of my head, he answers flatly, “Yes,” before asking, “Where are you from?”

“Kansas.”

“What brought you out here?”

I shift in my seat, marking my discomfort with answering, but before I can speak, my cell rings from inside my purse that’s lying on the table. Picking it up, I see it’s Bennett, and answer the call.

“Bennett, hi,” I say so Declan knows who I’m talking to.

“Just checking in. My meeting wrapped up a lot earlier than I expected, and I was hoping to see you,” he says sweetly.

“You just saw me.”

“So is this your way of saying you’re too busy?”

“No, I’m never too busy for you. Are you still at the office?” I ask as I cast a quick glance over at Declan and see the irritation in his eyes.

Good. Get jealous.

“Yeah. Are you hungry? I can have something delivered.”

“That sounds great, honey,” I tell him, playing up the sweetness just to pluck on Declan’s nerves, and I can tell it’s working by the tensed muscles in his neck and his set jaw. “I’m on my way now, okay?”

“All right. I love you.”

“Love you too.”

Looking at Declan, I tell him, “I have to go meet Bennett.”

“Yeah, I heard,” he says, clipping his words.

I run my hand over his clenched fist that rests on the table, and say, “Thanks.”

“For what?”

“Talking to me.” Staring into his eyes, I tell him again, “Thank you,” so he can hear the sincerity in my words.

His hand relaxes under mine, and he flips it so that he’s now holding mine, and with a smile, says, “Let me walk you out.”

As he helps me with my coat, I finally feel like I’ve found the match I’ve been looking for. There have been a few men before Declan, but none that ever gave me the promise I feel he may have, so I let him hold on to my hand for a moment longer than I should as he walks me out to the valet who is waiting with my car.

I slip into the driver’s seat and Declan peers down, reminding me, “Friday is your appointment with the caterer. Four o’clock.”

“I’ve got it on my calendar.”

“You mean that paper calendar that doesn’t provide you with notifications or reminder alerts?” he teases.

Laughing at his dig, I say, “Yeah, that one. But apparently that’s all I need since you tend to do the reminding for me.”

“I’ll see you Friday then?”

“You’ll see me Friday,” I affirm before he closes my door, and I start driving over to the Willis Tower to meet my husband for a late lunch, all the while, feeling optimistic for the first time in a long time.

I SIT BY myself on the front steps of the school, waiting for Pike to meet me so that we can go home. He’s in trouble with one of his teachers again and has detention, so I take the hour to get all my tears out so that he doesn’t see me cry. Apparently I’ve lost track of time when I hear the metal doors bang open and pop my head up to see Pike walking down the steps. Quickly, I wipe my face, but he sees the tears anyway.

“Why’re you crying?” he asks, but I don’t say anything as I stand up and shrug my backpack on over my shoulders. “Elizabeth? What happened?”

“Nothing. Can we go now?”

“No. Not until you tell me why you’re upset.”

Hanging my head down, I kick a couple pebbles on the sidewalk, telling him, “The kids in my class make fun of me.”

“What did they say?” he asks in a hard voice.

“Doesn’t matter,” I tell him. I’ve been at this school for a few months now. Long enough to hit a growth spurt and no longer fit into the clothes my last foster family bought me, so now I’m stuck wearing clothes that Bobbi gets from thrift stores, and the other kids pick on me for the way I look.

“It matters to me,” he states, and when I look up at him, I say, “They call me names. Saying I look like I get my clothes from a garbage can.” I can feel the tears fall again as I continue, “They call me names to my face and then whisper and laugh at me.”

“Those kids are ass wipes.”

“I have no friends, Pike,” I say, crying. “I’m all alone, and I wanna go home. I miss my dad, and I wanna go home.”

In a second, he has me in his arms, and I wet his shirt with my tears. Every night I pray to a God I’m not sure even exists that I’ll wake up from this nightmare, but I’m still here. I’m almost nine years old and I haven’t seen my dad, heard his voice, felt his hugs—nothing—in nearly four years. I have a case worker who has only seen me twice since I’ve been here, and both times I cry and beg for her to take me to my dad, but she won’t. He’s too far away. I’m starting to believe that I’ll never get him back because waiting until I’m fourteen seems like forever.

“I’m sorry,” Pike eventually says as we stand on the sidewalk hugging. “But you’re not alone. You have me.”

He’s right. He’s the only one I have, but he’s a twelve-year-old boy, and next year he’ll be at the middle school, leaving me here alone. Alone with kids that don’t like me.

When he draws back and looks down at me, I cringe at the greenish tint left over from the black eye Carl gave him the other day. I learned fast that when Bobbi is around, Carl is semi-pleasant, but the moment she leaves, he starts drinking. I try to hide and be invisible when he drinks because he’s scary to be around. He yells a lot, and if Pike and I make too much noise, he gets really mad and usually hits us.

My first slap came a week after I got here. Bobbi left for the weekend and Carl was downstairs watching TV while I was upstairs. I found a radio on the top shelf of the closet in my room and was standing on a chair to get it down, but I slipped, causing the chair to tip over and the radio to crash to the floor. Carl busted through my door and saw the broken radio. Before I knew what was happening, he had yanked me up by the arm and slapped me across the face. The burning sting held to the skin of my cheek as I cried into my pillow afterward.

Pike and I take our time walking home, but when we get to our street, Bobbi’s car is gone, and only Carl’s truck is in front of the house. My stomach sinks. It’s the weekend, so I’m sure it’ll just be the three of us. Bobbi never tells us when she’s leaving, but lately, it seems to be all the time. She’s never home anymore.

“Just go straight to your room,” Pike tells me as we walk to the front door. “I’ll grab you a snack and bring it up.”

“Okay.”

But that wouldn’t happen. Instead, I was about to be introduced to a black hole that would claim another piece of my faith in human decency.

“Where the hell have you kids been?” Carl yells at us when we walk in, and the gravel in his voice makes me cling to Pike’s arm in fear.

“I had detention. I told Elizabeth to wait for me so she wouldn’t have to walk home alone,” Pike explains.

“You think I have all the goddamn time in the world to be wondering where you shits are?” he shouts and then grabs Pike by his shirt, ripping him out from my hold on his arm and shoving him away from me. He then gets in my face, stinking of beer and cigarettes.

“And you . . .” he spits as I start to cry, which does nothing but piss him off even more. “Fuck! Why are you always fuckin’ crying? I’m not gonna spend another weekend here with you listening to this shit.” When he lifts his dirty shirt and starts to unbuckle his belt, the chills of fear run rampant, spiking through my veins.

Pike bolts off the floor and goes after Carl, but it only takes one hit to knock Pike back, and Carl has his hand locked around my wrist as I scream and thrash. Suddenly, he has me lifted off the ground with a firm hold around my waist.