Aria, I have watched you from afar and I felt as it was the right time to introduce myself. I can’t reveal to you how I know your name yet or how I...know you, but I am drawn to you. I always have been.” I just stare at him. Do I call my best friend, Ashley and tell her that a magical creature has appeared out of thin air? Do I Google map the nearest psychiatric ward? “Are you real?” I ask. “Yes, Aria I am.” That exact moment I realized that the CD player was no longing skipping but had. I wanted to reach out and stroke it, but didn't want to disturb the peace that she seemed to have."I'll do my best so that you don't have to, My Lady."I didn't know what to say next. So I grasped for the next thing that came to mind. "Where is Grant? I haven't seen him lately." I sent him to my father. I was afraid what you would do to his garden if he really irritated you." I am sorry about the garden, I wasn't paying attention." It was true."You weren't paying attention?" No, I started. As if I should know!"I don't know," I shrugged, "I haven't seen her all evening." Well, you'd better go and find her. Supper's nearly ready."Well, she wasn't with the poultry, and I knew she hadn't been in the barn with the machinery as I'd just come from there. I found her in the barn where we kept our milch cow, curled up on some hay and crying. I sat behind her and touched her shoulder, but she flinched away."Leave me alone." Not until you tell me what's the matter."She just curled up. Adriana’s fuck-toy. I would never have thought in my lifetime that that phrase would ever enter my mind, much less be a real thing. Samuel, though, was different. An ex-Navy Seal who wanted a wife and mother for his young daughter... and she wanted him.Was our family enough to overcome all that? I just had to trust that it was, that she still loved us.While I was ruminating my sorrows, my phone buzzed in my pocket. I looked at it and my heart rate must have doubled in that instant. It was a.