“Where’s his car, Mom? Is he not here?”
I grab her hand and move us up the driveway to the porch. “We won’t know if we don’t knock, right? But even if he’s not here, I’m sure we’ll find him. Malus is a pretty small town.”
I let Maisy knock on the door, and she does so very loudly. I can feel the energy vibrating through her hand as we stand there and wait. My heart slams crazily in my chest, and I have to work at keeping my body from trembling.
When there’s no answer, I tell her to knock one more time, just in case he is inside and didn’t hear. When there’s still no answer, I turn us back to the stairs.
“Well, it looks like we get to explore Malus a little,” I comment.
Maisy’s feet are lead, and her shoulders slump as we walk down the steps. Once at the bottom, I grip her shoulders and turn her to face me. I tip her chin up with my knuckle.
“Hey. Turn that frown upside down. We’re here. You’ll still get to see him and surprise him. You’ll just have to wait a little longer.”
My chest hollows at her dejected look.
“What if he’s not here? What if he had to go out of town?”
I get the feeling Judge doesn’t leave Malus often, and only when he has to. He’s too much a part of the town. He used to talk about coming back here and making major changes. He and his brothers wanted to rewrite the history of Sweet Haven and make it a safe place to be. They wanted to rebuild and erase the hate and revulsion and replace it with security, warmth, and love. I could see the passion in his eyes when he spoke about it.
“I’m sure he’s here somewhere. It’ll be like hide and seek. Only he doesn’t know he’s playing.”
That gets the job done. Her sorrowful face splits into a grin and she giggles. Tapping her nose with the tip of my finger, I straighten back up.
“Now, where to start looking….”
Maisy skips beside me as we walk back to the car. “How about the ice-cream shop? We could try there first.”
I laugh at her devious suggestion, glad her mood has lightened. “You think you’re sneaky, don’t you?”
She tilts her head back and looks at me innocently. Why kids think they can fool their parents when we pulled the same thing is beyond me. “Well, you never know. He could be there.”
Technically, he could be, but I don’t see Judge as the type to visit ice-cream parlors often, if at all. Except when he’s taking his daughter, that is.
As we approach the car, I look up and down the street and see a couple of kids playing. A dog barks in the distance, and someone has music playing. The yards are clean, but toys litter the grass. Everything seems warm and inviting. A place to build a fami
ly and friendships. It looks like Judge and his brothers accomplished what they aimed to do.
“Excuse me!”
I spin my head around, my hand still on the backdoor handle, and see a young couple walking toward us.
I open Maisy’s door and let her climb inside. “Go ahead and buckle up.”
Once the door is shut, I turn to face them.
“Uh, hi.” I wave awkwardly as they come to a stop a few feet away.
The guy, probably late teens, has his arm around the girl’s waist with his hand shoved in her back pocket.
“Are you looking for Judge?” the girl asks.
“I am. Do you happen to know where he is?”
They share some weird look before the girl brings her gaze back to mine. “Yeah. We just walked by The Hill. His car was in the parking lot.”
“The Hill?”
“It’s the only restaurant here in Malus,” the guy answers.