Chapter 11 Daisy
Cal's truck was in the driveway when Knox pulled up.
I sat in the passenger seat for a long moment, staring at the cabin, the warm glow of lights in the windows. Inside was the man who'd raised me. The man who'd made a choice eight years ago that had changed the course of my life.
"You don't have to do this tonight." Knox's voice was quiet. "It can wait."
"No, it can't. Not after tonight. The town will be talking about what happened and you coming to help me." I turned to look at him. "I've been waiting eight years to resolve why all this happened Knox. I'm done waiting."
He nodded. Reached over and squeezed my hand.
"I'll be right here. However long it takes."
I leaned across the console and kissed him. Then I got out of the truck and walked toward the cabin.
***
Cal was in the kitchen when I came through the door. He looked up from the sandwich he was making, stooping when he saw my face.
"Daisy?" He set down the knife. "What's wrong?"
I stood in the doorway, my heart pounding, all the words I'd rehearsed tangling in my throat.
"I know," I said. "About Knox. About what you did."
Cal went still. For a long moment, neither of us moved.
"He told you." It wasn't a question.
"Yes." I stepped into the kitchen, keeping the island between us. "He told me everything. The ultimatum. The threats. The choice you forced him to make."
Cal's jaw tightened. He turned away, bracing his hands on the counter, staring out the window at nothing.
"I was protecting you."
"From what?" My voice cracked. "From being happy? From being with someone who loved me?"
"From throwing your life away." He turned back to face me, and I saw the old conviction in his eyes.
The certainty that he'd done the right thing.
"You were twenty years old, Daisy. You had your whole future ahead of you.
And Knox Parker was a dead end. A kid with a record and no prospects, who would have dragged you down into his mess. "
"That wasn't your decision to make."
"Someone had to make it." His voice was hard and unapologetic.
"Your mother was sick. Your father was useless.
I was the only one looking out for you, and I saw where that relationship was heading.
You would have stayed for him. Given up school, given up everything, to be with a boy who couldn't give you anything but trouble. "
"You don't know that."
"I do know that." He stepped closer, and I saw the pain beneath his certainty.
The love that had driven him to make an impossible choice.
"Because I know you. You're loyal to a fault.
You would have sacrificed everything for him, and he knew it.
That's why he walked away. Because I made him see what staying would cost you. "
"He walked away because you threatened him." Tears burned my eyes. "You held his future over his head and gave him an impossible choice. That's not protection, Cal. That's control."
"It's the same thing." His voice dropped. "When you love someone, you do whatever it takes to keep them safe. Even if they hate you for it."
I knew those words. I heard the echo of Knox in them. The same twisted logic that had driven him to walk away.
"You were both wrong," I said quietly. "Both of you. Making choices for me and deciding what was best without asking what I wanted."
"What you wanted would have ruined your life."
"You don't know that." I wiped my eyes, anger rising through the hurt.
"You made an assumption based on who Knox was at twenty-one.
A kid with a chip on his shoulder and nothing to lose.
But that's not who he is anymore. He's spent eight years becoming someone different.
Someone better. And he did it because he wanted to be worthy of me, even though he never thought he'd get another chance. "
Cal was quiet for a long moment.
"I've seen the change in him. Over the years. I know he's not the same kid."
"Then why didn't you tell me?" I demanded. "When I came back, when you saw me broken from a relationship with a man who did actually did ruin my life, why didn't you say something?"
Cal flinched. "What are you talking about?"
"Garrett." The name tasted bitter in my mouth.
"The man you approved of. The safe choice.
The one with the degree and the good job and the five-year plan.
He spent four years making me feel worthless.
Criticizing my body. Isolating me from my friends.
Cheating on me while telling me I was paranoid for asking questions. "
Cal's face went pale. "Daisy, I didn't know."
"No. You didn't. Because you never asked." I pressed my hand to my chest, trying to ease the ache. "You assumed Knox would hurt me because of where he came from. You assumed Garrett was safe because of where he came from. And you were wrong. About both of them."
The silence stretched. Cal stood there, looking older than I'd ever seen him, the weight of my words settling on his shoulders.
"I thought I was doing the right thing," he said finally. His voice was rough and broken. "Your mother asked me to look out for you. When she got sick, when she knew she might not... She made me promise. To keep you safe. To make sure you had the life she wanted for you."
My heart cracked. Mom. Always, it came back to Mom.
"Mom wanted me to be happy," I said softly. "That's all she ever wanted. And I was happy with Knox. Happier than I've ever been, before or since."
"I know." Cal's eyes were wet. I'd never seen him cry. Not at Mom's funeral. Not ever. "I knew it then, and I made myself ignore it. Because I was scared. Scared of losing you the way I lost her. Scared of watching you make a choice that would take you away from me."
"So you made the choice for me."
"Yes." He didn't try to justify it anymore.
He didn't defend himself. He stood there, stripped bare, letting me see the fear and love and regret that had been driving him all along.
"And I've regretted it every day since. Watching Knox become the man he is now.
Watching you come back broken from the life I thought I was saving you for. Knowing that I caused all of it."
I wanted to stay angry and to hold onto the fury that had been building since Knox told me the truth. But looking at Cal now, seeing the grief in his eyes, I couldn't.
He'd been wrong. Devastatingly, unforgivably wrong. But he'd done it because he loved me. Because he was terrified of losing the only family he had left.
"I don't know how to forgive you," I said. "Not yet. Maybe not for a long time."
Cal nodded. "I don't expect you to."
"But I'm not going to let this destroy us." I took a breath. "You're the only family I have. And I love you. Even when I'm furious at you."
Something in his face crumpled. Relief and pain and gratitude, all tangled together.
"I love you too," he said. "More than anything."
"Then prove it." I straightened my shoulders. "Knox is outside. He's been waiting in his truck while I talked to you. And he's going to keep being in my life, Cal. I'm choosing him. The way I should have been allowed to choose him eight years ago."
Cal was quiet for a long moment. I watched him wrestle with it. The instinct to protect warring with the knowledge that protection had cost us all too much already.
"You want me to accept him," he said. “Accept him as part of your life.”
"I want you to try." I held his gaze. "He's not the kid you threatened eight years ago.
He's a good man. A man who loves me enough to have walked away when you told him to, and who spent every year since then trying to become someone worthy of a second chance. That's more than most people would do."
Cal exhaled slowly. Then he nodded.
"I know that Daisy. Knox and I made peace with ourselves a while back, but that was between us. Accepting him as part of my life was easy. Accepting him as being with you will be harder, but I’m willing to try. Bring him in."
My heart stuttered. "What?"
"You heard me." Cal's voice was rough but steady. "If he's going to be in your life, we need to clear the air. All three of us."
I stared at him for a moment, not sure whether to laugh or cry. Then I walked to the front door and opened it.
Knox was leaning against his truck, arms crossed, watching the cabin. He straightened when he saw me.
"Cal wants to talk to you," I said. "Both of us."
He nodded as he walked toward me, took my hand, and together we went inside.
***
Cal had moved to the living room, positioning himself in front of the fireplace like a man preparing for battle.
Knox stopped a few feet away, his hand still holding mine. The two men faced each other, eight years of history heavy in the air between them.
"Knox." Cal's voice was gruff.
"Cal."
Silence. I held my breath.
"I was wrong." Cal said it like it cost him something. Like each word was being dragged out of him. "Eight years ago. I was wrong about you. And I was wrong to make the choice I made."
Knox didn't move as his hand tightened around mine.
"I watched you change," Cal continued. "Over the years. I watched you become someone different. Someone I'd trust to have my back in a crisis. Someone the whole town respects." He paused. "Someone my niece deserves."
"I don't need your approval," Knox said quietly. "I stopped needing it a long time ago."
"I know." Cal nodded. "But you're getting it anyway. Not because you need it, only because she needs to see that I can change too."
He looked at me. And I saw something I'd never seen in Cal before. Humility.
"I'm not going to ask for forgiveness," Cal said. "From either of you. I don't deserve it. But I'm asking for a chance. To do better. To be the uncle you needed me to be eight years ago."
Knox was silent for a long moment. I could feel the tension in his body, the war between old anger and something that wanted to let go.
"You hurt her," he said finally. "Your choice hurt her. More than you know."
"I know." Cal's voice was raw. "I'm starting to understand how much."
"And you hurt me. You made me believe I wasn't good enough for her. That I never would be."
"You proved me wrong." Cal met Knox's eyes without flinching. "Every day for eight years, you proved me wrong. I should have seen it sooner. I should have said something sooner. That's on me."
Knox exhaled slowly. Then he released my hand and stepped forward.
For a terrifying second, I thought he was going to hit Cal. Eight years of anger, finally released.
Instead, he held out his hand.
"Clean slate," Knox said. "For her. Not for us. For her."
Cal looked at the outstretched hand. Then he took it.
"For her," he agreed.
They shook. It wasn't forgiveness. But it was a start.
I stood there, tears streaming down my face, watching the two men I loved most in the world take the first step toward something new.
It wasn't perfect. Nothing about this situation was perfect. But it was real. And right now, real was enough.