𝙊𝙫𝙚𝙧𝙝𝙚𝙖𝙩𝙚𝙙 - 𝐵.𝐸

3 - 𝘞𝘪𝘭𝘥𝘧𝘭𝘰𝘸𝘦𝘳

"Come on!" A gust of wind blew through her strawberry hair as she flew past me on her bike.

"Ali! This is harddd!" My breathy voice yells as I peddle trying to catch up with her along the trails through the forest.

"We're almost there just peddle!" She screams from down the trail.

"Why are we going so fast? I thought this was gonna be a chill bike ride!?" My legs are about to give out, just like they do when I take part in any physical activity.

"It's the first sunny day we have had in a while! I don't wanna wait until the frost melts!" She yelled.

We made our way past the icy trees on our bikes we brought with us from home to a tucked away hidden greenhouse and a beautiful looking building. She wanted to get away from Clearwater so we decided to take a day trip to this place Ali mentioned.

I stopped the break on my bike and bent down catching my breath.

"So what is this place, someone's house?" I asked while we walked our bikes to the front and leaned them against the grey stoned wall with dried vines crawling up alongside it.

"It's a museum, my dad used to take me here." She said looking down at her white snowy converse. She never talks about him, the only time anyone mentioned anything was when Billie told me not to bring up any fatherly questions to her.

"Oh it is? What do they show here?" I asked. I loved museums I haven't been since I was back in New York. I guess you don't really have time for that kind of stuff when you're trying to look for your girlfriend's killer, meanwhile all this time I could have just looked in the mirror.

"Mostly plants and botanical things. They even have a whole section on poisonous ones. It's so cool they look really weird, I'll show you." She tells me as we both walk into an Edwardian style building with white walls and a very pretty staircase with red carpeting.

Now this was my type of house. Absolutely breathtaking. A Victorian masterpiece.

"Is that little Ali Anderson I hear?" A middle aged sweet looking man in a brown suit  pops his head out of the corner with a few worn out books in his hand.

"Hey uncle James!" She says, extending her arm out and hugging him.

"Oh this is my friend Maddy, we thought we would just come up here for the day." She introduced me to him. He shakes my hand causing all the books in his arm to almost fall.

"Oh uh hello. Nice to meet you." I say before he replies and fixes his loose round glasses higher on the bridge of his nose. He was actually pretty handsome, then again everyone in Ali's family is attractive.

"Well you guys can go hang out wherever, I just fixed the lights in the greenhouse so they will look nice in a few hours after the sun goes down. I'll just be in the study, If you need me I will pick us all something up for dinner later." He says before heading back into the side room.

"You never told me your uncle owns this place." I asked Ali, wanting to know more about what they do here.

"Well my family owns it. I just haven't been up here since last summer. It's half a museum but they mostly study plants here that's what my uncle and my dad used to do together before...he left." She says while we hang our jackets up.

"You know, you can talk to me about him if you want." I told her.

"There isn't that much to say. He was the best dad in the world and then all the sudden after Sadie was born he just left us. Left his whole family, left his brother and his parents and just disappeared." I could tell by her tone that she is pissed at him for leaving, I would be too especially if it was so sudden like that.