I Made a Promise

Chapter 24

~Skylar's POV~
We got to the place. It was some type of community. The front entrance was gated and Daniel pulled up to a booth thing.
"Name and lot number?" The person asked.
"Daniel Quinn. 265." Daniel said.
Then the gate opened and we went inside.

We drove around.
"This place is nice.." I said.
Then I saw some people driving around in golf carts.
"Yea, we've been at this place for like... 10 years now.. I think." He said.
"How come you never told me about this before?" I asked him.

"I didn't know if you would like it..." he chuckled.
"This place seems really cool." I said. We pulled up to his house. It was a small house.
"Aww, this is so cute." I smiled when we walked in.
The place was small, but adorable. There was a small kitchen, a small living room. One bedroom in the back, a bathroom, and a loft that was almost the whole entire house length.

We put away the groceries.
"Where will we sleep?" I asked him.
"My parents sleep in that room." He pointed to the back bedroom. "My brother usually sleeps in the living room sofa bed and their kids sleep on the couch cushions on the floor next to them. I'm usually stuck in the loft." He chuckled.

The loft was pretty spacious actually. We couldn't stand up, but it wasn't like we were army crawling our way in it.
"Ok, do you know when everyone will be here?" I asked.
"Yea, my brother's gonna be here in probably a half hour... and my parents actually couldn't come, so it's just gonna be us and my brother and his family." He explained, looking at his phone.

"Oh, how come they couldn't come?" I asked him.
"Something came up at work." He explained.
I nodded my head.
"Hey, do you wanna check the place out? We can go on a golf cart ride." He said.

"Yea sure. That sounds fun." I smiled. I've never been on a golf cart before.
He got the keys from the key rack and we went to the golf cart.
He drove around the community. It was huge.
"Wow, how big is this place?" I chuckled as we were driving around.

He opened up a compartment and pulled out a map of the place.
"Oh my god." I laughed when I saw it. There was so many streets.
"Yea, it took me about a month to fully know my way around here." He laughed.

We drove around for 15 minutes before we headed back to the house.
Once we got back, there was another car on the lot.
"Oh hey, they're here." He said, talking about this brother.

We went inside and saw his brother.
"Hey D, what's up?" Daniel's brother came over to greet him.
"Hey, David, this is my girlfriend, Skylar. Skylar this is my brother, David." Daniel introduced us.
"Nice to meet you." He smiled at me.
"Nice to meet you too." I smiled back.

"Where's Lia and the kids?" Daniel asked his brother.
"They walked to the park around the corner. The kids were restless in the car." He chuckled.
"Ok, should we start cooking, it's already past 6." Daniel said.

"You're right." David said.
As soon as they started getting everything out, Lia and the kids came back.
"Hi, I'm Lia. And you must be.... Skylar, right?" She asked me.
"Yes, Hi. It's good to meet you." I smiled.

I felt a small tug on my jacket and saw her son with a toy.
"Hi, my names Jayden, but everyone calls me Jay." He smiled.
"Hey Jay. My name's Skylar." I smiled at him.
He giggled.
"Yea, I know. Daniel never stops talking about you." He said.

I laughed and looked at Daniel who was chuckling under his breath at what his nephew was saying.
"Do you like dinosaurs?" Jayden asked me.
"I think they're so cool! What's your favorite?" I asked him.
He had a toy of a T-Rex and held it up.
"Wow, that's so cool! Mines a triceratops." I smiled.

He got excited that I actually knew about that.
"Yea! The one with the 3 horns!" He excitedly yelled out. I laughed.
"Mama, park please." The little girl told Lia.
"Julia, we were just there." Lia laughed.

Lia picked her up and Julia smiled at me. Then she waved her little hand at me.
"Julia, can you say hi to Skylar?" Lia asked her daughter.
"Hi." She smiled and buried her head in her mom's shoulder.
"Sorry, she's a little shy." Lia said.

"It's ok. My sister used to be the exact same way." I laughed.
"Alright, we're gonna start cooking the steaks. Dinner should be ready in about 20 minutes." David said.
"Alright." Lia said.
"Hey, why don't you guys for around for a ride in the golf cart while the food's being made?" Daniel said.

"Can we?! Please mommy!" Jayden said.
"Ok, sure. Let's go." Lia said.
The 4 of us went down to the golf cart.
"Where do you want to sit?" She asked me.
"I don't mind." I said.

"Skylar, can I sit on your lap?" Jayden asked me.
I chuckled.
"Ok sure." I smiled.
Lia and I were both sitting in the front, Julia was sitting in between us and Jayden was on my lap.

We drove down to the park by the beach. Lia and I sat on a bench while Jayden and Julia played.
"So, what do you do?" Lia asked me.
"Right now, I'm a finance major at UCLA, but I was thinking about changing it. But I really don't want to restart college.. so I'm not really sure what to do." I explained.

"Yea I get it. I went to college to become a teacher. I was one for about 3 years, then after I had Julia, I just wanted to be a stay at home mom. It crushed me not being able to be there for all of Jayden's childhood. I was constantly grading papers and making lesson plans. I was never free." She explained.

"How'd you and David meet?" I asked her.
"We were on a cruise ship and I met him at the bar. He took me back to his room.. and the rest is history." She chuckled.
"Oh wow, I've always wanted to go on a cruise." I said.
"How about you and Daniel?" She asked me.

"He came in to the coffee shop I worked at. He told me to make him a surprise drink. And it sort of became his usual. For 2 whole weeks he would just come in everyday before we ended up having a date where we went to Disney Land. He took me back to his place, and here we are." I explained.

Before we could talk more, I heard something. I looked around, confused for a moment.
"What are you looking at?" Lia asked me.
"I just.. thought I heard something..." I said.
"Like what?" Lia asked, looking around.

"I'm not sure... it was sort of like a... brake. Like a car braking too hard or something." I said.
I looked around for another couple seconds before I brushed it off.
"I'm probably just crazy... sorry I just get really paranoid sometimes..." I said.

"No, it's fine... sometimes that's a good thing to have. Especially when you have kids." Lia told me.
I nodded my head.
"Yea... maybe it is..." I sort of brushed it off.
"So, Daniel told us that you aren't originally from California. But I didn't hear where he said you were originally from... so where did you grow up?" She asked me.

"Chicago. Illinois. I moved to LA because of college." I explained.
"Really? I would've never guessed. How come you decided LA? Why not the University of Chicago?" She asked me.
I stood quiet for a second, trying to figure out how to word it.

"I just.. needed a fresh start, my whole family's from Chicago. And... there's just some bad memories I have there that I wanted to escape from." I vaguely explained.
She looked at me with some sympathy and she put her hand on my shoulder.
"Yea. I get it.." she said.

We stayed quiet for about a minute, watching her kids on the playground, before I noticed something. Her kids were running around only 10 feet in front of us. But I saw something. A car speeding. And not stopping. It was only about 400 feet from us.

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