Page 114 of Hero for the Holidays

They took Sunday out to the car after they filled out all of the paperwork, and hit the road.

There was a celebratory feel to the drive back, and yet, he couldn’t quite shake the feeling that they were leaving something else behind, even as they brought the dog back.

He couldn’t quite shake the feeling that they were supposed to leave all of their need for each other back in that hotel.

And it just wasn’t going to work that way. Not for him.

But he sensed a whole lot of hesitance in Fia. Deep, intense walls that she still had up around her heart.

He had earned those. He knew that. He was trying to figure out all the ways that he could atone. It wasn’t, apparently, agreeing to move in with her. It wasn’t, apparently, being a decent enough dad. It wasn’t multiple orgasms, either.

He would keep apologizing until his throat was sore. He could never stop being sorry for the way that he’d failed her.

But he didn’t especially know what else to do.

He would let it sit for now. Because if there was one thing he’d learned over thirteen years of not having the woman he loved in his bed, in his arms, it was that he could endure a whole hell of a lot.

So he could wait. He could wait until he could figure it all out.

And in the meantime, he would try. He would try to keep challenging himself. He would try to keep changing. And most of all, he needed to keep on listening to her.

Because that was what she’d said he hadn’t done. And he knew it to be true. He hadn’t been able to listen because he’d been so caught up in his own bullshit. In his own issues.

And he didn’t want it to be about him. It needed to be about her. What she wanted too.

And it needed to be about him being able to give her what she needed.

And maybe that was the thing. He wasn’t quite sure what all she needed yet. So until then did, he needed to move slowly. He needed to not spook her.

That was the main thing.

They finally arrived back at Four Corners, and they decided to go straight to the King residence.

“We’re going to have to give her a little heads-up,” Fia said.

“I’ll wait out here with Sunday,” he said. “You go in.”

“Really?”

“You’re the one who found her.”

Fia got out of the car, and he watched her the whole way.

He looked down at the dog. “You have no idea,” he said to her. “But that woman over there just made your life. She really did.”

A minute later the door opened, and Fia came out with a stunned-looking Lila.

And that was when he chose to open the door.

“Sunday!”

The dog raced across the grass. Right toward Lila.

And he had never seen a single thing that matched the joy on his daughter’s face right then.

They couldn’t work miracles. They couldn’t bring back the parents who had loved her and raised her from the time she was a baby. But if Sunday could be one thing, it was evidence that they would move mountains to give her what they could.

That they would always listen, and always care.

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