Parenting fail.
I make up a half-truth. “A little bit. It was hard to see.”
“It was so awesome!” Moffy explains the thrill of the ride, especially to Xander who’s too young to go on it. By the end, I realize that Moffy is the only one here—besides his bodyguard Declan.
“Where’s everyone else?”
“They’re coming. We got on an earlier boat.” He squats to his little brother’s height, and Xander shares a cheese puff with him. Moffy crunches on it and asks, “I saw Goofy walk past, you want to go take a picture with me?”
Xander’s gaze drops and he shakes his head.
“What about an autograph?” Moffy wonders, knowing how his brother dislikes photos. He even finds ways to hide behind his older siblings in group pictures.
Xander wavers, unsure. He hasn’t clung onto me since I whipped out the snack food, so this is good progress.
“Come on, Summers,” Moffy says with an easy smile. “You have to fill up that autograph book. What happens if Ben has more than you, huh? You can’t let that happen.”
Summers.
Every time Moffy calls him that, my chest swells with love. He’s the only one who uses that nickname with Xander, since his namesake is Alexander Summers.
His soulful amber eyes rise up to Moffy. “Will you stay with me?”
“I’m your sidekick, Summers. I wouldn’t leave you for the world.” Moffy extends his hand.
Xander grabs hold, and they both stand together.
“Can I take him alone?” Moffy asks me. “I mean with Declan and Xander’s bodyguard. But…” Not with me. Before an incoming arrow pierces my heart, I remind myself that I bring attention wherever I go. He’ll have an easier time avoiding crowds without me, and I like that Moffy wants to hang out with his little brother.
Hesitating, I teeter from one foot to the other like I have to pee. Moffy may be twelve now, but Xander is only four. What if something happens? This seems like a decision Lo and I should both make together.
“Maybe you should wait…” I trail off, seeing Lo in the distance with the older kids and Ryke, all a little wet from the ride. For probably the eleventh time today, I count heads quickly.
Sullivan.
Beckett.
Jane.
Where’s Charlie?
I crane my neck. I lean sideways. My pulse begins to quicken, and that’s when both Ryke and Lo start frenziedly scanning the area around them. Realizing Charlie isn’t with the group.
“Charlie?!” Ryke shouts, drawing more attention to us.
I wait for the nine-year-old to pop out from behind a bench or a cluster of Mickey-shaped balloons. Nothing happens. I see phones pointed at us. I hear people call our names, but I don’t spot the oldest Cobalt boy.
Xander hides behind Moffy’s legs.
My bodyguard contacts the fleet with his earpiece. “We’re missing one.”
We’re missing one.
We just lost my sister’s child.
{ 56 }
July 2027
Disneyland
California
LOREN HALE
With my cell gripped tight against my ear, I stand in the middle of the park’s offices. Ryke and Lily talk to the park coordinators in a backroom, and at the front, Jane, Sullivan, Beckett, Moffy, and Xander sit on plastic chairs by the wall.
“He wandered off,” I say, practically hysterical over the fucking phone. “I don’t know where the hell he could be, Connor. He won’t answer when we call.”
This isn’t the first time Charlie Keating Cobalt strayed from the pack, but it’s the first time in goddamn Disneyland. I overheard his very long conversation with his parents before we arrived, and the general gist was to stay with the motherfucking group.
I run my hand across my neck. It’ll be my fault if something happens to Charlie. I’m the one who convinced him to ride Splash Mountain when all he really wanted was to chill at the hotel.
“Lo, calm down,” Connor says, his voice serene.
My face sharpens. “Are you serious? You’re telling me to calm down? How are you calm right now?”
“Because I know and understand my son. He most likely found the ride pointless, and he might’ve slipped out at the last minute. He’s either at the hotel or he’ll find you.”
He’ll find me? “He’s nine, Connor.” I exhale a jagged breath. “You’re supposed to be the smart one.”
“His age is meaningless, and I am the smart one, which means my opinion holds the most weight.” He whispers to someone else, voices muffled, and then he focuses on our call again. “Lo?”
“Still here,” I snap. “Is Rose on her way to the hotel?”
“Yes. Call me if he finds you.” He says it like there’s no way I’ll locate Charlie before he locates me. After his reasoning sinks in, I no longer argue. Charlie is intelligent, maybe a notch below his father, and if anyone knows that boy, it’s Connor Cobalt.
“Are you looking for him?” I ask.
“I have my bodyguards working with security, and I’m working on tracing his phone.” It’d be easier if Garrison were here. He’s good with electronics, but for the whole month, he went to London with Willow and their daughter. “But I choose not to panic.”
“Rose doesn’t carry the same philosophy.” Lily said her older sister turned into Xena: Warrior Princess over the phone, throwing out things like battalions, combat, blades and death.
“Neither do you,” Connor says easily. “Neither does Ryke. I believe there’s a name for this.” I hear the smile in his voice.
Hot-Tempered Triad.
That’s the damn name.
I let out a deep breath, my shoulders relaxed. Connor eases the alarm in my gut. He’s always been able to make uncomfortable situations more comfortable with just his voice and some words. Our lives would be drastically more difficult without him.
After we hang up, I think about what happened. I think about the future where we’re not around the kids while they go to high school—while they go to college. I think about this, and I storm towards the row of older children.
Sulli and Beckett sit on the carpet, doing crunches side-by-side in quick spurts. No one counts. They’re not competing against one another. These crazy nine-year-olds think training for swimming and ballet is fun. And we’re at Disneyland.
My face scrunches like they’re from another planet. I can’t even comment because I’ve seen it all before. Push-ups, pull-ups, sit-ups at random hours and random places—I’ve seen it from my own brother.
It’s a different breed of person.
It’s not me.
Jane drew a tic-tac-toe board on her hand and plays with Moffy and Xander, but my oldest son registers my looming presence, features serrated like a knife. He lowers the blue magic marker, not nervous or scared. I’m not trying to frighten Moffy.
Sulli and Beckett stop mid-crunch, eyes on me.
“You four.” I motion to all of them.
“There are five of us, Dad,” Moffy says coolly, smiling. His little brother is perched on his knee with a bag of cheese puffs.
“Xander isn’t part of this speech.” My youngest son looks up at me, reflective amber eyes that carry pure innocence, his gray Star Wars tank stained with orange cheese dust. “You’ve been an excellent Disneylander, Xander.” I only use the word Disneylander because I heard Lil use it, and it reminds me of her.
Xander starts to smile at the compliment.
Moffy frowns. “So that means we did something wrong?”
Jane raises her hand, but she speaks before I even focus on her. “Uncle Loren,” she says my full name like every Cobalt kid. “I propose that we not be punished for my brother’s personality.”
Moffy nods in agreement. “We can’t look out for Charlie. I’ve tried, Dad, but it’s not possible.”
I never have the chance to ask why.
Beckett speaks from the floor, sitting straight with one bent knee. “Charlie doesn’t want us to keep
him in the group.”
Moffy adds, “He wants to do his own thing.”
Jesus Christ. “All of you—you have to look out for one another. This is just the start to the kind of chaotic places you’ll go. And I get that Charlie likes to go off on his own, but you four need to stay in touch. At least get info on where he might be headed. If he won’t tell us, he should tell all of you.” I look to Beckett, the only tame yellow-green eyes I’ve ever seen.
He shakes his head, dark brown hair swaying with him. His expression just says, I’m sorry, but you’re not right. “The whole point of being alone is so that you won’t be followed and found. And if he did tell me, I would be the first to tell you, which is precisely why he wouldn’t tell me.”
Connor said something about that over the phone. Beckett is as concerned about Charlie’s safety as the rest of us. Maybe even more.
Sulli elbows Beckett’s arm and says, “Rep of push-ups?”
Beckett nods fast, and they change positions, doing meticulous push-ups. Lowered all the way to the floor before rising back up.
Jane splays her hands on her legs, hair falling out of a pony. “Maybe we should check the Matterhorn. I heard him mentioning that ride.”
I also remember Moffy saying how he wanted to ride the Matterhorn before the day ended. I might not be Connor or even smart like my brother, but I’m not an idiot. She doesn’t really think her brother is there. Or else she would’ve mentioned Matterhorn from the moment Charlie went missing.
Jane stands.
I set a cold glare on the twelve-year-old.
Slowly, she returns to her seat. “He’ll find us. I’m sure of it,” Jane says confidently. “In the meantime, can’t we do something more?”
“You’re right. Let’s go. We can ride some rides, pretend you brother isn’t lost in a theme park where millions of people know him, and he doesn’t know a goddamn soul. Do you want some cotton candy with that?”
Jane’s shoulders just plummet, and Moffy nods to me like he understands. I don’t want them to think they’re like everyone else. Because they’re not.
They never fucking will be. The minute they forget there are people who could easily do them harm—who think about them while they stand unaware, vulnerable—that’s when everything will go to shit.
“We’re not leaving this room until…” I trail off as the door opens.
With a slowly falling mouth, Sulli mutters, “What the ever loving fuck.” That’s a new one—that I’ve never heard my brother say—but it’s accurate.
In walks a clean-cut, well-dressed nine-year-old, his eyes hidden behind black-as-night sunglasses, and when he lifts them to his brown hair, he casually takes in his surroundings. As though he expected all of this.
“Did I miss the party?” He lifts a gift shop bag. “I brought presents.” Charlie meets the ice in my eyes. Unaffected, he says like I’m not understanding, “That was a joke. I didn’t actually think there would be a party.”
To stop myself from spouting off something mean, I think about the good things.
He’s safe.
He found us.
Connor was right.
This isn’t my child. I don’t have to lecture him, give him some speech he won’t listen to, or punish him. That’s the king and queen’s job. So I gesture to Charlie. “You must’ve forgotten who your parents are—unless you just wanted to see your funeral.”
“My metaphorical funeral,” Charlie muses as he takes a seat next to Jane. “Will you cry for me, Uncle Loren? I’d cry for me.” From the way he speaks, fluidly, his voice like silk but filled with humor—the rest of the kids laugh.
I’m on edge.
“I’d weep for you, Charlie,” Jane says as Moffy draws an X on her hand.
Charlie kicks his foot on another chair, lounging, and he doesn’t have a single clue how high-strung Rose was from the moment he disappeared. How much Lily felt guilty for his journey to—where the hell did he go?
I cross my arms while Charlie pulls down his sunglasses and then rummages in his gift store bag. “For you.”
I’m unsure of who he’s talking to until he removes a Mickey Mouse hat and reaches out towards…my youngest son.
Xander is stitched on the back.
I swallow something down, maybe my anger.
My four-year-old clutches the hat, his lips upturning at the gift. Moffy helps his little brother fit on the mouse ears, the hat flattening his brown hair.
Coming from Connor Cobalt, I might question the complete sincerity—he obviously would have other motives. To appease us, calm tempers, but I’m almost positive that’s not Charlie’s intention.
I’ve seen him grab Winona’s hand before she crossed the street.
I’ve seen him help Xander secure his kneepads before he tried Moffy’s skateboard.
He’s kind with no expectations of receiving anything in return.
And he couldn’t care less if we stayed pissed, if we all hated him.
I test it. “Am I going to hear an apology?” I question sharply. It’d be hypocritical for me to ask for one. I don’t need any I’m sorrys when I handed those out like turds growing up.
Charlie thinks for a moment before saying, “‘I exist as I am, that is enough.’”
Off my confusion and what the fucking hell, Beckett says, “He quoted Walt Whitman.”
My head throbs. I press the heel of my palm to my temple. Then I think about what could’ve happened. All over again. How he left. How he was my responsibility. The room goes silent, my jaw clenched, amber eyes daggered.
Moffy covers his little brother’s ears with his hands, and then he whispers towards Charlie, “Dude, you’re fucked.” All our kids hear curse words, but they know not to say them at school—and I get it. I’m not with them, they might be saying fuck this and fuck that in fifth grade without my knowledge.
But Sulli is the only one who gets in trouble for swearing at Dalton Elementary, so the rest of them have a better time hiding it—or they just don’t curse.
Moffy also likes to reinforce the lenient don’t swear rule for his siblings, which is why he just “earmuffed” his little brother. He picked that up from Lily.
Charlie doesn’t remove his sunglasses, but his face is angled towards me.
He was your responsibility. I know.
I’d never forgive myself if something happened to Rose’s son.
“Charlie.” His name sounds like a goddamn curse on my lips. I exhale a tight breath, shifting my weight to my other foot. He’s nine. Connor might say it’s meaningless, but it means something to me. I’m in a position of authority, and I don’t want to make him feel small—but I can’t treat him like he’s as tall as me.
He fucked up.
“Don’t be like me,” I say curtly.
It must surprise him because he sits up. “How was I like you?”
“Uncaring about your own life.” Before he refutes, I care, I snap back, “You must not care about whether you live or die—because there are people who’d hurt you. Who’d want to lure you to places you’d never want to go.”
“I’m smarter than that, Uncle Loren.”
My face twists. It doesn’t matter how smart he is. He’s a nine-year-old boy, and that fact isn’t changing until he grows older. “Oh, so you can overpower two, three men? Maybe even women. All older than you. With what?”
“My words.”
“They gag you, they blindfold you—then what?” The kids are eerily quiet, but I’m not sugarcoating their reality. They’re getting older. They’re meeting the world too fast. I nod to Charlie. “I’m smarter than that. Tell that to every person with hands larger than yours. As they grab you. See if they care.”
Charlie goes rigid, shaking his head once, then twice. He stares at the ceiling. “I hate irrational people.”
But they exist. And how many times have we met them?
Christ. I take another breath, feeling the massive cement block I unloaded on them. Disneyland. We’re
in Disneyland. This is what happens when you bring a known villain to the party.
Kidding.
I’m not the villain, but I’m the kind of hero who forgets an overly happy theme song for the credits. I’m too bitter to be that sweet.
* * *
In a piggyback, I carry Lily out of the Star Tours 3-D motion simulator, my big brother and the older kids skipping ahead, talking about the attraction. We dropped Charlie off with his parents, and Xander asked softly if he could stay with Ben and Luna for a while.
After letting him go, Lil looked crestfallen in the most magical place in the world. I told her she was a sopping jellyfish that washed ashore my beach.
“You’re not too happy yourself,” she said and poked my forehead where my scowl formed.
“Have you forgotten me already, love? This is my normal face.” I gestured to my glare and then gave her a dry half-smile.
Lily eyed my lips. “I have not…forgotten.”
Then I whispered beside her ear, “Have you forgotten that you and me—we know what happiness feels like?” Her green eyes welled with years of victories. Victories that we’ve shared. Obstacles that we’ve hurdled.
So we’re not with our youngest kids for a couple hours at Disneyland.
It’s not even close to being the worst thing in our world.
Lily nodded firmly.
Now we exit the Star Wars simulator together, Lily riding piggyback, and we sing the theme song that we know and love. Not even a second through, and Moffy and Jane join in. Jane pumps her fist in the air like a sword.
Beckett and Sulli are talking down the hallway, disinterested. Some people quickly snap pictures of them, but they don’t pay attention. I try not to either.
“Duuh duuh da da da,” we sing.
Lily is so off-key that Ryke, nearby, keeps shaking his head like he has a migraine.
“Hey,” I snap in the middle of our song. “Don’t rag on my ‘puff.”
“I didn’t say a fucking thing.”
Moffy’s laughter and smile slowly die down, his gaze pinging questioningly to me, to his mom, to Ryke. I’m just messing with my older brother, but the look in my son’s eyes—it practically stops my fucking heart.
Some Kind of Perfect (Calloway Sisters #4.5) Page 55