Deceived by Julie Anne Lindsey Page B

Dallas where we can set up our homestead. You’ll like it because you can drive into the city anytime you want. You want city life, right?”
    I hated that he meant to please me. I didn’t want to move again. “Do we have to?” The words sounded petulant.
    “Honey, it’s for the best. Trust me. I wouldn’t ask if there was any other way.” He stared at me. Authority dripped from his words.
    “No.”
    His eyebrows crept toward his hairline. Would they stop? “No?”
    I crossed my arms over my chest. “No. I want to stay this time. I just got here and I like it. It’s my senior year. Next year I’m going somewhere completely different. Let me finish what I’ve started here.” I pleaded silently with eyes I knew looked like Mom’s. “You said you’d be working in this area more. If I move to Texas, then what? We’re separated by a thousand miles again? Can’t you wait to move until the end of the year? You travel all the time anyway. It doesn’t matter where you live. Why not stay at the cabin?” He didn’t jump in or push back. Hope rose in my chest. “Please, Dad.”
    His gaze darted over the room. Honestly, if he’d asked me to return to the cabin with him, it would’ve been harder. Mom was there. Every inch of the surrounding hills and forest reminded me of her. The new houses for every assignment location reminded me she was gone.
    “Do we have to go now? Can’t it wait until the end of the school year?”
    “I have to move now.”
    “I don’t?” Well, this was new territory for me. I didn’t know how to proceed.
    “You’ll be going to college in a few months.” He deflated. That wasn’t like him.
    “Gabriella, you’ll be eighteen in two months. A year from now you’ll live who-knows-where enjoying college life.” He rubbed his chin. “I’ll be working in the area for a while. You’re right about me being closer to you if you don’t move right away. Maybe I will visit the cabin.”
    “Is that a yes?”
    He looked weary and older than I’d ever seen him. “If you want to stay here until graduation, you can. I won’t make you leave, but I’d appreciate it if you’d take those self-defense classes the school offers and maybe carry a gun.” The sparkle in his eye told me he only half-joked about the gun.
    My cheeks hurt from the ridiculous smile. I could stay. Stay . The word had to settle in. Stay was the opposite of anything I’d ever known.
    “If you’re going to be … ” He cleared his throat. “If you’re going to remain here, we’ll need to talk about security.”
    Ugh. My stomach sank. I couldn’t talk about school security with Dad. If he had any inkling that I thought someone followed me around my new town, he’d pack my bags immediately and toss me in the car. I said nothing. I waited to see what he thought he knew.
    “Gabriella, tell me anything that’s happened since you got here. Anything at all that didn’t seem right to you. The ribbon you found in your locker bothered you. I’m glad you told me, but there might be other things you blew off. Some things, by themselves, mean nothing but together are quite serious.”
    “Nothing.” My mind ticked off a growing list—the car with the squeaky belt, the orange glow, feelings of being followed, a guy who had tried to get into Pixie’s car with me, Davis’s and Brian’s strange appearances … I hated lying to my dad. As far as I knew, he had never lied to anyone a single day in his life. He valued honesty above everything else. He said honesty was a defining quality of character. Lying was low, even for me, and I was ashamed.
    “Honey, anything at all that wasn’t quite right. It might’ve been someone you encountered or a situation you found yourself in?” He searched my face.
    I tried to seem surprised at the questions. “No.” Liar. “Nothing I can think of.”
    “How about your dream?” Dad worried about my dream as much as I did.
    I could think of no sane way to tell him that the dream