Love, Lies & Immortal Ties - Whitby Shadows Series Book 1

Chapter Twenty-Two

As I half expected, Dad was up and eating breakfast when me and Luke walked in together, my shoes in my hand, and my dress still knotted up against my thigh.

He gave me one look and raised a grey bushy eyebrow. "I'm pretty certain you left with Marcus last night."

My cheeks flushed red. "We've had a...disagreement."

Dad rolled his eyes. "What did you do?"

My jaw dropped. "Dad!"

He chuckled. "I'm joking. What happened?"

I told him the tale right from the wine and the hot blonde through to Marcus hanging up on me this morning.

Chewing on a piece of toast, he enjoyed drawing the silence out for a minute or so before he said, "Really this is about your insecurities."

I looked at Luke who just shrugged his shoulders. Sophie huddled over the cooker, frying bacon, trying her hardest to appear like she wasn't there.

I marched over to the table, pulled out a chair, and grabbed a piece of toast from the rack. "How do you figure that out?"

A playful smirk tweaked at his lips making me wonder if he had been expecting more of a reaction. "The driving after drinking is a separate issue but the blonde woman and him disappearing in the middle of the night, you're putting two and two together and coming up with thirteen."

"I never said I thought him disappearing had anything to do with her."

"You didn't have to."

I frowned and chomped down on my toast. "So what about the drinking and driving?"

"That's a curious one. Perhaps he has a high tolerance for alcohol like some people have a high pain threshold. We're not all the same. He's too much of a gentleman to do anything reckless."

Luke snorted and disappeared outside.

"Are you actually saying these words, Dad?"

"I'm just saying give him a chance to explain himself."

"You mean now he's had all day to come up with a viable excuse?"

"Don't be so pessimistic," he replied, picking up a piece of bacon. "You're jumping to conclusions and making assumptions about things before you've heard him out."

I sighed and forced the rest of my toast down before I excused myself to shower and change. Just as I flicked the shower on, my phone beeped with an email. It was from Dad. I opened it to see the pictures he'd taken of me and Marcus last night.

My heart skipped a beat as I glanced at them, one by one. It looked like I was stood next to a movie star with the car and the way Marcus held himself, such easy confidence and striking good looks. I studied myself critically, coming to the conclusion I looked like nothing more than a gawky teenager clinging on to an older man.

"Excellent timing, Dad" I mumbled to myself.

After I cleaned myself up, I changed into some rough clothes and headed back into the house to give Joanna a hand. She'd managed to get a babysitter for the twins so I figured if I helped her out, she could have a couple of hours to herself before she had to pick them up.

Working our way through the first-floor rooms, she suddenly turned to me after several minutes of silence and said, "Why don't we hang out more?"

Startled, I looked up from fluffing the pillows and said, "What do you mean?"

"I mean we're not too dissimilar in age, you're up here quite often to see your dad, we get along. Why haven't we ever become better friends?"

I faltered. I didn't know what to say. More to the point, what kind of an answer was she expecting or wanting here? "I...I don't know."