Page 140 of Split You Open

My stomach bottoms out in surprise.

Then twists with fear.

Looking up, I find Blair beaming from ear to ear. She looks from the screen to me, her eyes bright with excitement.

Gaping at her, I ask weakly, “That scary ass motherfucker is your dad?”

Blair waves off my concern and giggles. “He’s not scary!”

“Tell that to the goosebumps that rose up in his presence, cariño.” I shake my head. “He knew who I was.”

“Everyone knows who you are around here,” Rhett points out.

I shake my head. “But he’s not from around here, is he? And I wasn’t wearing my name tag today. I’m telling you, he knew me.”

Rhett shoots me a worried look before his brows slam together. He opens his mouth to speak but Blair lets out another happy squeal.

“He knows you and he didn’t threaten you? Wow!” she claps her hands together as she grins. “That means he probably likes you already!”

“Does it? Really?” I hedge, my voice strained as anxiety brews under my skin.

Rhett shakes his head frantically, terror turning his face white, when Blair turns her back to him.

Yeah, that’s what I’m thinking too.

“Did he say anything?” Blair asks.

“Ah…” I frown. “He said he’s completing a special project and that he wanted to see if Ledger was around. Oh, and he’ll be back.”

“Son of bitch! Fuck!” Ledger shouts as he storms away from us. He kicks one of the chairs around the firepit and then spits into the cold, empty pit.

Rhett and I watch Ledger as he flips a chair and chucks his walkie talkie toward the cabin.

“Shouldn’t he be excited that his best friend is in town?” Rhett mutters to me.

“I mean I would be excited.”

Rhett hums, his brows creeping together. “And shouldn’t he be thankful we have backup if trouble shows up?”

“Yeah…”

“So why isn’t he excited or thankful, Santi?”

“My guess? He’s probably afraid that Dad is going to find out how the hell all of this started,” Blair says, interrupting us. “As he should be.”

Rhett and I trade looks again before I glance at her.

“Is the blow out going to be bad?” Rhett asks her.

Blair chuckles and says in a low, conspiratory whisper, “Dad’s not predictable. Who knows what’ll happen when he finds out?”

Between my interaction with her dad, Ledger’s reaction now, and learning last night what her dad’s really like, her response doesn’t inspire any sort of confidence in me. In fact, I’m feeling more shaken now than when I got up here. When I turn to look up at Blair, I find her staring at the screen again, her grin so wide that I’m afraid it’ll split her face in two.

It’s the joy on her face that pushes aside my trepidation. The grin that stretches across my face surely mirrors hers. Seeing Blair happy is enough to accept whatever the hell is about to happen now that her dad is in town. She isn’t happy enough for my liking these days. Who am I to kill the mood?

“I wish I’d known who he was. I would’ve invited him to dinner and asked him about the text messages he sent to Ledger,” I tell her.

Ledger whirls around and stomps back toward us. “What fucking text messages, Santi?”