Page 91 of In a Far-Off Land
He stood so still, as if he was deciding what to do. Then he broke into a run, shouting my name. I don’t know if I ran or waited for him to get to me. All I know is that he was there, so quickly, pulling me into his warmth. His strong arms holding me tight. The scratch of his chin against my temple as he kissed my hair. My chest clenched; my throat closed.
I pulled back to look at him, but all my words—everything I had planned to say—wouldn’t come. He was different than the memory I had held all these months. He was older—so much older than when I’d left. His face was thin, almost gaunt, the lines around his eyes etched deep.
Oh, Papa. I did this to you. It hit me so hard my knees buckled.
Papa didn’t let me fall. He was still strong, and he held me up. I straightened, determined to say what I had to. What I’d come all this way to say in the cold snow. The truth. No more lies. He deserved that, at least, and then he could do what he must.
“Papa, I’m sorry.” I couldn’t look at him, so I looked at the buttons on his wool coat, glinting through my tears. “I did so much wrong. I hurt you and...” My voice cracked. “And everyone.”
I took another breath, pulling air into my aching chest, forming the words I needed to say. I made myself look into his paleblue eyes. “I’m sorry. I took the money and Mama’s ring... the things I did.” Tears filled my throat, but I kept on. “I don’t deserve anything from you.”
He opened his mouth to speak but I kept going, the words tumbling out before I lost my nerve. “All I want... is a chance to make it up to you, Papa. I will, I promise.” I blinked back tears. “Someday—” I choked out the last of it—“maybe you can forgive me... and maybe... you can...”Love me againis what I tried to say. But I couldn’t get it out.
Papa brought my cold hands to his face, laid them against his sandpaper cheeks. “I already have, my girl.”
I shook my head. He couldn’t. Not really. It wasn’t that easy. “But Papa, you don’t know what I’ve done...” I looked into his eyes and knew that he knew. At least part of it.
“I forgive you,Liebchen.” His pale eyes were bright with tears. “It is done.”
I wanted to believe it. I really did. But when he knew the rest—the shame of it—I shivered and shook my head. I couldn’t hope for that much.
He fumbled with the buttons of his overcoat and shrugged it off. Before I could protest, he’d wrapped it around me. His lingering warmth—the scents of barn and gasoline and the spicy horehound candies he liked—enveloped me.
The snow fell around us, silently landing on my eyelashes as I blinked away tears. He pulled me into his arms again, pressed a kiss to the top of my head, and held me with the fierce strength I remembered from when I was a girl. He whispered close to my ear, “I love you, my girl. Always. No matter what.”
Could he? Could he know how terrible I was and still love me?
I looked at him then. Really looked. In his lined face was noanger, not even reproach. Instead, I saw compassion and the love I had always known. There were tears in his eyes, but if I wasn’t wrong, I’d say they were tears of... joy.
Joy. Because I was back. Even this way? Even broken and ashamed?
I guess it was then I started to understand. It took me a long time to really believe it, but it was this: Papa didn’t love me because I was a good daughter. Nothing I did or didn’t do changed his love one jot—not even if I had been perfect like Penny. He loved me just because he was my father, and that would never change. Honestly, it was too much to even believe.
I leaned into him. The snow fell but I wasn’t cold anymore. Real love. Forgiveness. I didn’t deserve either—not one bit. But here he was, offering both to me just the same.
CHAPTER 12
Los Angeles
MAX
Mina shouldn’t have given up on me. I’ll tell her that when I find her, mark my words.
Maybe Mina thought it would be better for our baby not to have a father like me. But she was wrong. I’ll tell her that, too, when I find her.
After Oscar told me about the baby—my baby—after I could breathe, think straight, after my anger at Mina first flared and I broke a few things and Julia hid under the bathtub, it was then that I gave up hope. I’d never find her. My child would be a bastard, just like me.
I ransacked my cupboard for more gin, but Oscar wasn’t having that. “Come on,hermano.Men in our family don’t give up that easy.” He said a few more things—about honor and responsibility. He could be a real pain in the backside, Oscar could.
Then Oscar took me to Brody, asked how to find somebody who didn’t want to be found. Brody pulled at that outrageous mustache. “You don’t know her real name? Not even what state she’s in?”
Alone and scared, that’s what state she was in.
I paced the small office. I’d told her to keep her secrets, hadn’t I? One of the precious few times she’d followed my advice.
Brody leaned over his desk. “I’d put my money on the Midwest, from the way she talked. Minnesota or maybe Illinois. Good thing is, she’s not easy to forget. You might get lucky.” His attempt at hopeful fell flat but he was a decent mug.
We went to La Grande Station first. I had a picture of Mina, the one she’d had taken by the hack at Central Casting, the one in all the papers. A good likeness, when she was about to laugh, her head tipped a little, that brightness in her eyes. I loved it when she looked at me like that.
