Chapter 21
Bridget rounded on Reeves. “You just can’t control yourself, can you?”
“What does that mean?” Reeves demanded, his gaze still on the place where his daughter had disappeared. He was far from being in the mood for Bridget’s reprimands. “I didn’t do anything this time.”
“You really believe that?” she asked. “You frightened her. Saying out loud that you were going to identify the kidnapper like that… she must have believed you were going to interrogate her again, the way you did the night we first arrived here. That’s why she ran away.”
Guilt blossomed in the pit of Reeves’ stomach, but he pushed it down.
“I wasn’t going to question her,” he said.
“And even if I were… she’s going to have to answer those questions eventually, you know.
I’ve agreed to be patient about this, but patience doesn’t mean waiting forever.
Eventually, I’m going to have to get some answers. ”
He really hadn’t meant to ask Emma anything more about her kidnapping.
Especially after last night’s events, it seemed unwise to push her any farther than she was ready to go.
But it was hard to resist arguing with Bridget when she was so loud and insistent.
He wanted to push back at her. He wanted her to hear him say that she was in the wrong, even if he wasn’t at all sure that she really was.
“You can’t make her give you answers before she’s ready!” Bridget said, her cheeks growing pink. “If someone was in her room last night, if she was aware that her kidnapper is still stalking her, that’s probably proved a setback to her. She probably feels less ready than ever to talk to you.”
“She has to,” Reeves said, even though a large part of him agreed fully with what Bridget was saying.
He wished he could simply tell her that he knew her to be right, but things weren’t that simple.
“She does have to tell me eventually. I understand it’s hard for her, and I wish I could see it as you did.
I wish I could just shelter her forever.
But if the kidnapper is still targeting us, I do have to find out who he is.
Talking about what happened might upset her, but I would rather her be upset than in actual danger.
And to be honest, I’m surprised you don’t agree with me on that matter! ”
“I do agree,” Bridget insisted. “You don’t truly believe that I don’t want her protected just because I want us to care for her emotional well-being, do you?
She’s upset. We can mount a guard around her, as you said.
We shouldn’t force her to talk about what happened, though, any more than you should cancel the ball.
That would also be allowing your enemy to control your responses. ”
He raised an eyebrow. “I thought you believed I should cancel the ball.”
“And you insisted that you shouldn’t,” she fired back. “Don’t ask me to make this argument for you when you already made it for yourself. You’re more than happy to go ahead with something a little risky when it isn’t something I suggested.”
“You think that’s the issue here? You think I’m pushing Emma for a name because you told me not to?”
“I think if it had been your own idea, you would recognize the value in it,” Bridget said, folding her arms across her chest. “I think you resist it because it came from me, that’s all.
And I’m not going back to the orphanage,” she added.
“You’d have to tie me to a horse and send me away against my will.
I’m going to stay here and help Emma, because I truly believe that she needs me now more than ever. ”
Reeves closed his eyes and sighed. “I don’t intend to try to force her to tell me anything,” he said. “I wish she would. And I can’t pretend to enjoy the fact that you always jump to this topic. But that is not what I was thinking about in this instance, Bridget.”
Her eyes widened slightly. “It isn’t?”
“No,” he said. “You’re right. What happened last night was alarming.
And I do want to know who the guilty party is.
But seeing the way she reacted last night when she woke up and realized what was going on…
no, I’m not going to force her into anything more challenging right now.
I meant what I said. If I could protect her from everything, simply put her into a safe room so that she would never have to face any of this, I would do that. Any father would do that.”
A shadow crossed her face, and Reeves recalled the struggles Bridget had confided in him with her own father.
Maybe she was thinking that he wouldn’t do that.
And she would probably be right. If he had turned her out of his house simply for failing to find a husband…
well, that was something he would never in a million years have done to his own daughter.
He shouldn’t have spoken to her that way. He shouldn’t have talked about what a good father would do, because her own father wouldn’t have treated her the way he was describing. That was unfair.
Suddenly, he felt a burning urge to meet the man who had been so cold to Bridget, and to find out what he could have been thinking.
How miraculous that she came to be such a compassionate person in the face of an upbringing like that.
She cleared her throat, perhaps sensing her own vulnerability. “If you weren’t thinking of interrogating Emma, what did you mean by saying we were going to find out who her kidnapper was?”
“I am more determined than ever to hunt the fiend down,” Reeves said.
“That much is absolutely true. He can’t be allowed to stalk and haunt our family like this.
And by having the ball, maybe we’ll lure him out into the open.
Maybe the opportunity to come into our house will be too much for him to refuse.
If he does, I’ll identify him. I’ll figure out who came into the house that wasn’t on the guest list.”
“Unless he is on the guest list,” Bridget said, as if it were the most obvious thing in the world.”
Reeves frowned. “Do you think I associate with kidnappers?”
“I don’t think you associate with anybody you know to be a kidnapper.
But whoever this is, they’re targeting your family.
Don't you wonder why that is? They must have a reason. It doesn’t seem likely to be random,” she said sensibly.
“Whoever this is, it’s someone who has a problem with you, Reeves.
It’s someone who wants to punish you through your daughter.
That’s my theory, anyway. Do you have any enemies? ”
So, she was saying this was his fault? That it had only happened because of him?
Reeves turned away from her. He couldn’t even bear to look at her. Not after hearing her say that.
There was a long silence.
“Reeves,” Bridget said quietly. “You know I’m only trying to help. I’m not trying to be argumentative.”
“You don’t need to tell me that what happened to Emma was my fault,” he said, his tone dark. “I know it happened because of me. I’ve known that all along.”
“What do you mean?” she whispered.
“It’s the reason she won’t talk to me,” Reeves said.
These thoughts had plagued him from the moment he’d recovered his daughter, but saying them out loud made him feel worse than ever.
Still, he kept going. It was like extracting a poison.
Maybe if he forced himself to say it, it would finally stop hurting as badly as it did.
“She isn’t talking to anybody, Reeves,” Bridget said. “You can’t think that’s about you.”
He turned to face her. Her eyes were wide, her hands at her sides. It took him slightly aback. He’d expected a more defensive stance.
“It is about me,” he said. The words threatened to choke him.
“You know it is. That’s the reason you wanted to come back here in the first place.
It’s the reason you aren’t willing to leave now.
You know she’s more comfortable with you than she is with me.
It didn’t seem so odd at first, when she had only just been saved and was used to being at the orphanage, but now she’s back at home.
She ought to know she’s safe here. She ought to feel more at ease.
Don’t you ask yourself why that hasn’t happened? ”
“These things take as long as they take, Reeves.” She took a step closer to him, and Reeves tensed. “I’ve told you not to rush her.”
“But why is she so much more comfortable around you than she is around me?” He shook his head.
“You don’t have to answer. I know the reason.
It’s because her kidnapping was my fault.
Because I didn’t protect her. The night she was taken…
I made her angry. She ran away from me, and that’s when she was grabbed.
If I had protected her, it wouldn’t have happened.
She would never have been frightened or hurt.
And what she’s learned is that she can’t rely on her own father to keep her safe.
” He shivered as he said it. He had been carrying this pain for a long time.
Bridget stared up at him. “That isn’t true,” she said, her voice quiet but steady. “That isn’t what’s happening here, Reeves.”
“Do you know that? Did she tell you that?” His tone was sharper than he’d intended it to be, but he didn’t apologize for it. He was too upset to be responsible right now.
“You know she didn’t,” Bridget said evenly. “But you also know I have experience with these things. If what you’re saying were true, she would be acting differently toward you than she is acting toward other people. This isn’t a case of Emma blaming you for what happened, Reeves.”
“She is acting differently toward me,” Reeves growled.
“She’s treating you like a kind stranger she just met—exactly what you are, in other words.
But she isn’t treating me like her father.
You didn’t know us before all this, Bridget.
You don’t know what things were like between us.
You have to trust me when I tell you that this is abnormal.
She has never been like this toward me, and the only conclusion I can draw is that she knows what I know.
She knows that trusting me was a mistake.
She knows to never put her trust in me again, because when it comes to keeping her safe, I’ve failed radically.
She sees the truth, and she isn’t going to allow herself to put her faith in someone who has let her down.
” He sighed. “The truth is that I wouldn’t want her to.
I want her to protect herself from people who fail her, even if that means me. ”
“But, Reeves…”
She was going to argue with him again, he could tell. And he couldn’t bear it. He couldn’t stand here and listen to her say that he was wrong about all this. Not now that he had finally managed to get these words out.
He held up a hand. “Leave me be,” he said. “Let me focus on preparing for the ball. I truly believe this is the best way to move forward—the best way to ensure that the person who attacked my family is finally caught.”
She regarded him for a moment, and he wondered if she was going to press the issue and try to go on arguing—but at length she sighed and turned away, leaving Reeves alone with the cacophony of his thoughts.