Page 16 of Wilder's Promise
I find her in the common room, sitting alone at the bar with a glass of what looks like whiskey in front of her. She stares into the amber liquid without drinking it, lost in thought.
"Should you be drinking that?" I ask, sliding onto the stool beside her.
"Probably not." She pushes the glass away. "I don't even like whiskey. It just seemed appropriate, given the circumstances."
"Understandable." I signal to the prospect behind the bar for water instead. "How are you holding up?"
"How do you think?" She turns to face me. "My father and his merry band of outlaws are about to launch an assault on their enemies while I sit here waiting to find out if I'll be running for my life by morning."
"When you put it that way..." I accept the water from the prospect with a nod of thanks.
"Is he always like this?" she asks after a moment. "So... certain?"
"Your father? Yeah, pretty much. It's why men follow him."
"Even to their deaths?"
I consider this. "Especially then. He never asks anyone to take a risk he wouldn't take himself. Usually, he takes the biggest risks."
"Like tonight." It's not a question.
"Like tonight," I confirm. "He'll be the first through the door at Charles's compound."
She's quiet for a moment, absently tracing patterns in the condensation on the bar. "I keep telling myself I don't care what happens to him. That he made his choices, and I made mine."
"But?"
"But I don't want him to die." The admission seems to cost her something. "How pathetic is that? After everything, I still care whether he lives or dies."
"That's not pathetic, Emma. That's human."
She looks at me then like she's trying to see past the cut and the road name to the man beneath. "Are you? Human, I mean. Sometimes I wonder about the men in this life."
"Last I checked." I attempt a smile. "Still bleed red, still feel pain."
Her eyes drift to my bandaged arm. "I'm sorry about that. About what happened at the diner."
"Not your fault."
"It kind of is, though." She gestures vaguely. "If I wasn't Reaper Kane's daughter, you wouldn't have a knife wound right now."
"If you weren't Reaper Kane's daughter, I wouldn't have met you at all." The words come out before I can stop them, more revealing than I intended.
She blinks, caught off guard by my candor. A faint blush colors her cheeks, but she doesn't look away. "Is that a good thing or a bad thing, in your estimation?"
"Good," I say without hesitation. "Definitely good."
"You might be the first person I've met who thinks being connected to my father is a positive."
"I see the world differently than most people."
"Because you're Wilder," she says, a hint of a smile playing at her lips. "The death-defying stuntman."
"Something like that." I take a drink of water to hide my own smile. "Want to get some air? It's going to be a long night of waiting."
She nods, sliding off the barstool. "Lead the way."
I guide her through the clubhouse to a side door that opens onto a small courtyard enclosed by the high compound walls. It's one of the few quiet spots in the compound, with a couple of wooden benches and potted plants that my sister insisted on adding the last time she visited. The evening air is cool, scented with pine from the surrounding forest.
