protected my right to say no.

“Why did my father hide this from me?”

“Because he believed you would say yes.”

That answer hurt in a way I couldn’t immediately explain.

Not because my father had thought he knew me.

I looked again at Daniel’s signature.

Tomorrow, Marissa would bring me his letter.

And somewhere inside that envelope was the answer to a question I had not thought to ask until now.

If Daniel Keane had fought to make certain I had a choice…

why had my own father worked