Instinct

20. The Way Back Home

Liam’s phone rang as he stepped out into the dark night, his breath catching the sparse lighting and casting it in white clouds rapidly dissipating. He turned his collar up against the wind and answered as he strode toward the open door of his limo.

“Hello?”

“Hey, Liam,” said Laura.

Despite the casualness of her tone, he could sense something was up. Tired as he was, he was tempted to just ignore it. It had been a long day, much too long, and he wasn’t sure he could do much more than go home to his apartment and fall into bed. But how many times had Laura been there to hear him complain and vent when he was unsure of himself, or angry, or just lonely and overwhelmed? He couldn’t do that. It wasn’t in his nature.

“What’s up?” He asked cautiously.

A short breath later she replied. “I don’t want to leave her here on her own,” she admitted. “But I’ve been called to deal with matters down in Texas, and I can’t stay, no matter how much I want to.”

Liam slid into the limo and shut the door behind him against the biting wind and directed his driver to Laura’s house once again, rather than his own. “You’ve spoken to my parents?”

Laura sighed. “Yeah,” she replied. “They’re all caught up with riots in California. I have to go.”

Liam knew the story himself. No matter what, as a leader sometimes a person had to be that first and a parent later. Especially when they hadn’t been a parent for more than four years. He heard the genuine regret in Laura’s voice and scrubbed a hand over his face.

“You’ve told her?” he asked.

Laura said nothing, but heard the distracted nod rustling in the handset on the other end. “I couldn’t let her wake up with me gone.”

It must’ve been hard for Laura, Liam thought, to tell her daughter that she was leaving so soon after they’d found each other, but it would have been even worse to just slip out while Stephanie had been sleeping.

“I’m heading over to yours now,” he said to the unspoken question in her voice. “I’ll look out for her while you’re gone.”

“Thank you, Liam,” she’d sighed, relief tangible in her voice.

The silence that fell between them spoke volumes. “I know,” he said. “She’s different.”

“She’s grown up.”

Liam heard the tears in the elder Armstrong’s voice and winced. He’d never been a parent, so he couldn’t imagine what that must be like. Knowing that her kids had spent years without parents, becoming the people they were now, must have been heartbreaking.

“She’ll be fine,” he promised, hoping that they weren’t empty words. “We’ll figure it out.”

“Yeah,” Laura whispered. After a moment of held breath her voice sharpened up and Liam could tell her composure was back intact. “I mean it, Liam, thank you for looking out for her.”

“No problem,” he said. “Be careful.”

He could hear the smile in her voice when she replied. “You too.”

It was ironic, how easy it was to almost pretend he was Laura’s son when his parents were barely around. As he hung up he pinched the bridge of his nose and stifled a yawn.

Arriving at the house, he was relieved to hear the TV on in the living room, filling the darkening house with much needed noise. His nerves weren’t quite so frayed, knowing that Stephanie was up and about. The desolate silence he’d sensed from her was terrifying, and he knew that he wouldn’t have been able to deal with it this late at night with his imagination running rampant.