Coming Back (The Sarah Kinsely Story - Book #2) (8 page)

We spent the rest of the evening catching up, talking about life, and our past lives. At one point we started laughing uncontrollably about something I can’t remember, but it felt nice. It was like a terribly awkward and memorable first date.

I knew that he was trying hard to make up for whatever emotional gap had been created by the misunderstanding, but I couldn't help but feel a slight distance in everything I said. I still wasn't convinced.

Call me hardhearted, call me an idiot, but I had just been through too much to be so easy.

One night of sitting on my couch wasn’t going to convince me to forget.

I told him that I had to go to work the next day, he told me he had to be back in his restaurant in just a few hours to start his work, so I led him to the door.

Before I opened it he turned to me, put his hand on my elbow and asked,

“Will I ever get to see you again?”

“I'm not sure. I'm just not sure.”

With that, I opened the door and watched Aiden walk out into the darkness.

Chapter 15

The next day at work seemed almost pointless.

I just had too much on my mind to even think about getting anything productive done. I spent a lot of time wandering around the office, getting a drink every 15 minutes, draining my bladder every 30 minutes, and checking Facebook all those times in between. Aiden had dropped a bombshell on me the night before and I still hadn't had time to process it.

I had to hand it to him, he had displayed an impressive persistence in trying to get in contact with me. If his story was true, it was something to be admired and to feel flattered over. If it wasn't true, I should probably start telling people, including the police, to keep on the lookout for the handsome stalker creeping around my house all the time.

I didn't know what to think about Aiden, about Peyton, about Lizzy, and even about Angela.

Had she been the one who had invited Aiden to the party?

I just couldn't be sure.

I felt a little paranoid about everything that was going on.

I kept trying to tell myself to relax, but I couldn’t.

I needed answers.

I needed to figure out what was going on so I could move on with my life either way.

If he
was
lying, and it was all part of some sick twisted joke, I could get over it. I could move on.

If he wasn't lying, if he really did have a daughter, if his story was true, then I could never live with myself if I didn't at least give him another chance.

I spent the entire morning playing through each scenario.

By lunch, my appetite was gone.

I stopped making trips to the water fountain, I no longer paced around the room, and I stopped checking Facebook. I simply sat and stared out the window. The scenarios were running circles around my head so quickly that I no longer could grasp each individual thread of thought. I was merely an observer on a stage watching my life unfold in my mind.

Then, I had an idea.

There could only be one way for me to know for sure.

Only one way to end the unknowing.

I picked up my phone and sent Aiden a text.

It said:

I want to meet your daughter.

Chapter 16

He picked me up at around 10 a.m. that Saturday morning.

He hadn't told me what we were doing, where we were going or even who we were going with. When I opened the door to let them in, before I could even say hello he had put a finger to his lips, darted his eyes towards the ground behind him and said,

"Hello Sarah, it's nice to see you."

He sounded like he was acting for the first time in his life.

I knew he was trying to get me to do something, I just couldn't understand what. So I responded back to him in the same way.

"Hello Aiden, it's very nice to see you too."

"There is somebody I would like you to meet. She is a very special girl, but she is a little shy."

Suddenly, a small child, a girl with curly red hair, emerged from behind Aiden's leg. She was holding a notebook, had a backpack with a retro looking space logo and the words "Stanford space camp" written in NASA like letters arching over the top. She looked up at me momentarily, then shot her eyes back down to her notebook, quickly opening it and scanning for some important piece of information.

"Hello," I said.

She simply nodded her head.

I looked at Aiden, and he flashed a smile and shrugged his shoulders.

"So, do you know where your dad is taking us today?"

She nodded her head again.

"But we promised not to tell, right my little Lizzy?"

Aiden swooped down to pick her up.

There are some men, that you can just tell, love playing with their kids. Aiden was one of those men. The way he held his daughter, the way his gaze never left her as she whispered tiny little secrets into his ear and pointed towards drawings, scribblings, and barely legible notes in her notebook. For a moment, I felt like they had forgotten I was standing there, like they were involved in their own little world just the two of them. I watched for as long as they let me, recounting the story the Aiden had told me that night when I let him in and the two of us sat together on the couch sipping tea.

So, it was all true.

This was the Lizzy from the text. This sweet, innocent little girl was what I had been so worried about. This precious little extension of Aiden is what had I had turned my life upside down over.

A moment of embarrassment swept over me.

I had been upset over a child, an innocent little child. I felt like reaching out to her and apologizing, but I doubt that she even knew who I was. Instead, I determined to make that day memorable, both for her and I. I had no idea if I would ever see Aiden again after this, if we could strike up some sort of relationship, but I owed it to that little girl to make today something she would scribe in that little notebook of hers as; “a fun day”.

By the time we parked the car I thought I knew what surprises Aiden and his daughter had in store for me that day. I was familiar enough with the area, if only because it was one of Portland's main tourist attractions, to recognize the signs.

While still in the car, I turned to little Lizzy and said, "Do you like roses?"

"Yes." Was all she let on.

Aiden just smiled again and shrugged his shoulders.

"So, I guess we are going to see the Rose Garden today?" I asked not to no one in particular.

Little Lizzy squealed and wrote something down in her notebook.

“Maybe,” Aiden said.

We all got out of the car, started slowly strolling through the beautiful roses in Portland's famous Rose Garden, walked over the iron etched names of all the previous Rose Queen winners, took pictures under the geometric sculpture that sat dead center in the garden of flowers, and then kept walking.

And Walking.

And Walking, and Walking and Walking.

We passed the tennis courts, we passed the concession stand that sold over priced hotdogs, we passed the little eating area at the base of the hill, and finally I saw it.

A dark green sign that read:

"Zoo Train"

This time, I was the one who let out a squeal. I looked at little Lizzy and she had the biggest smile I've ever seen on a child stretching, reaching across her face.

This must have been her idea.

We boarded the train from The Portland Rose Garden to the Zoo's entrance, and within just a few minutes of traveling through the woods of Washington Park we arrived.

"We have to go to the polar bears first dad," Little Lizzy said, "I still have to see if I can take their measurements."

Aiden looked at me and said, "Would that be okay if we go to the polar bears first, Sarah?"

"Of course," I said, "polar bears are my favorite."

We spent the entirety of the early afternoon going from exhibit to exhibit, nearly chasing after little Lizzy as she jotted down notes, pulled out rulers, magnifying glasses and binoculars from her little backpack to take measurements, observe the wildlife, and just generally be a cute little scientist.

The shyness with which I was greeted early that morning had melted away by then. She was now a vibrant, colorful, bright little girl whose excitement was contagious. I found myself wanting to stop and read each of the display panels with her, to try and experience life through her eyes.

For lunch, we ate on the zoo's campus. It was overpriced, not really that tasty, and I was surprised to see Aiden enjoying it so much. Seeing him scarfing down his overpriced hot dog with his daughter munching on her overpriced elephant ear, you never would've guessed that this man owned one of the finest restaurants in all of the Northwest.

By late afternoon, little Lizzy was beginning to drag her feet. We had made it through perhaps half of the animals available to see at the zoo, and Lizzy was ready to go home. To be honest, so was I. I hadn’t spent that much time with a child since the last family reunion I went to.

We wound our way back to the entrance, boarded the train, traveled through the woods, walked through the Rose Garden and got back into Aiden's car.

Before we even made it to downtown, little Lizzy was asleep.

Aiden looked in his rear-view mirror and a soft, warm smile came over his face. He turned to me and whispered, "I love my little Lizzy"

He didn't have to tell me. I had seen it. I could almost reach out and touch the love that he and his daughter had for each other. They were a team. A team that had been through a lot together, I imagined.

I knew that he had a deep and abiding love for his mother, he had told me what he had done for her, but seeing him with his daughter showed me, not only a new side of Aiden, but a new side of life that I had never considered before. I found a tear rolling down my cheek as I thought about how much Aiden and his daughter must have overcome to have built this life that they had together. I thought how trivial my own problems were, compared to the great challenges that Aiden and little Lizzy had been through.

And yet, they loved each other more deeply than any father-daughter relationship I had ever seen.

I wanted to spend more time with Aiden. I wanted to be with him, I wanted him to shower we with that kind of that love.

I turned to him and said, "I'm so sorry."

Chapter 17

Aiden put little Lizzy to bed while I waited in the library.

I had wrongly assumed that a man of his wealth would have hired a nanny to care for his daughter, but he hadn't.

I heard their bantering laughter from down the hall as he ushered her along through the teeth brushing, the hair tying, and finally the bed time story telling.

I smiled when I could hear what they were saying. Those two truly lived in their own world full of idioms and secret signals. So much of their relationship was unspoken that if I hadn't witnessed it at the zoo earlier that day, I never would have been able to piece together what they were doing from the sounds alone.

As little Lizzy drifted off to sleep to the sound of her father's voice reading
Where The Wild Things Are
, my eye caught sight of a familiar book.

Secrets of a Supersexpert
was just where it had been left the night Aiden had invited us girls over for dinner. I felt an embarrassed smile push up at the edges of my cheeks as I recalled Lizzy, the tattooed receptionist, had been magnetically attracted to this book and how she had used it to keep me with Aiden as she, and the other girls, made their getaway. I shook my head thinking about how I had seen that as evidence, proof even, of her involvement with Aiden.

I pulled the book out, trying to get my mind to focus on something other than how stupid I had been. I thumbed through a few pages. The photos were vivid, and unlike the grotesque pornography that my ex had tricked me into watching with him, these photos were tasteful, even erotic.

At some point my memories of that room, combined with the raw emotional reaction I was having to spending the day with Aiden and his daughter, put my mind into a deep sensual trance.

I became engrossed in the book.

I read each word carefully, scanning the letters for some clue to the secrets of sexual nirvana. I traced the outlines of each nude body, searching, scanning for some clue that I might pick up on to use for later.

I began seeing myself in those photos.

I could feel what the author was writing. I could put myself in place of the nude models. I could feel the enjoyment of the two lovers embraced, their pleasure caught in a split second, to be preserved and enjoyed by others for ever.

My breath deepened and slowed. My body warmed to a comfortable heat that began between my legs.

I wondered if I shouldn't run to the bathroom, towing the book along for "company".