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This is the truth.
Barty Blake wasn't very good with feelings and wasn't very good at making his reasons for things apparent towards people that happened to be his family, but he loved his wife and he loved his children and he would do anything to protect them.
He hadn't liked Mayor Jones very much and that dislike had rolled over onto his son when Daphne had started crushing on him.
Perhaps it was harsh, in hindsight, his feelings about Jones clouding his judgement about Fred, but Daphne was Barty's baby girl, this little black sheep of the family, and his protective instincts rose up when it became increasingly obvious that Daphne was truly in love with the young man; and that Fred just wasn't getting it.
Then the announcement of Daphne and Fred's engagement in police station happened.
(Barty wasn't proud that he'd fainted, but it was nice to know that he wasn't the only one blown away in that situation--sort of. It made him anxious that not even Daphne's friends knew about it when she told them almost everything and was with them most hours of the day. That spoke many things in volumes Barty wasn't used to hearing.)
Jones was unmasked by Fred and dropped a nuclear bomb of information on everyone in attendance on that cliffside.
(While Nan had been somewhat appeased by the fact that it turned out Fred belonged to Brad Chiles and Judy Reeves, Barty couldn't shake off the look on the ex-Mayor's face when he'd been taken by Sheriff Stone--crying hideously--into the police cruiser near the Blakes. The man had lost everything in one fell swoop, but there wasn't anger on his face, just something sad and knowing.
Barty tried not to think about the man calling out to the boy he raised one last time.)
Fred left, Daphne's other friends scattered by the Rogers sending their son and dog away and Velma secluded by her parents for a little while with everything that had happened.
(Nan and Barty had wanted their daughter to have different friends since before they could remember, ones in their own social circle, ones that wouldn't lead their Daphne into danger quite so often and with so much publicity that would last as long as the internet continued to hold information forever.
But not like this. They wanted a smooth, clean break like college or different interests--not by realizing one of her friends had been lying to the whole group that Cassidy Williams was in Crystal Cover under an alias; not by two frienda being thrown to the wolves of military school and a farm that bordered Scorpion Wells and Gatorsburg, respectively; not by the young man she'd wanted to marry disappearing into the night to go find parents that had apparently been dumb enough to bring him to Crystal Cove as a newborn when they weren't welcome and hadn't ever tried to get him back.
Maybe that was a little harsh, but Barty remembered Brad and Judy. He remembered their mystery solving, their closeness, their godforsaken traps--huh...--and that if they really wanted something, they never stopped until they got it. Fred shouldn't have had to look for them.)
And Daphne was left with a broken heart.
Barty would not have her turn into some tragic, underweight and depressed girl as in some trash novella, so after he'd let her cry for over two days alone in her room (he had the maids try and bring her some food, but it was always sent back with them telling Barty she wouldn't open the door) he took it upon himself to intervene.
Nan had gone into her zone of stress decorating, getting the manor repainted another shade of pink, "They used this back in those old Addams Family shows when everything was screened in black and white. It brings out the yellow I'm doing the curtains in next. It also helps elevate the mood...or so I'm told?" and their elders daughters were going about their usual days in the hospital, on the runway, on the track, and out on a dangerous terrain training new military recruits.
Barty had gotten up, changed into his least threatening clothes--like back in college, before his wardrobe was more uniform and in royal hues--and rounded up what he thought would get him through Daphne's door.
He grabbed three of her favorite books from the family library (dog eared copies of Breakfast at Tiffany's, The Turn of the Screw, and The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde) and a small tray of her comfort foods (fluffy Japanese pancakes, a tiny cheesecake, and a grilled cheese sandwich that Barty actually managed to make on his own) and knocked firmly on her door.
"Honey?"
Her voice was choked, and breathless, and still full of all-consuming sorrow, when she answered back, "Go away."
But he'd loved her since the moment she was born, and he was not willing to leave her suffering on this third day. He tried the door, found it locked, turned around and kicked it in.
A little damage in the short term is nothing to concern himself over as he walks in and finds all the windows with their shades drawn and his daughter sitting bolt upright in bed in his trespassing; but she is still crying even in her surprise.
He sets down the heavy tray of food and literature on her vanity, rolls up his sleeves as if he has ever done manual labor in his life, and opens his arms with an apology.
"I'm so sorry, honey. It wasn't your fault."
It's what Daphne needed, that trigger to break down completely and surrender to comfort given by someone--maybe not anyone she would have preferred, which was any one of her friends in Velma, Shaggy, the dog, or Fred; but her father was someone warm--and she was glad of the arms around her. Rubbing circles along her back and soothing fingers down from her scalp and up again.
She didn't say anything, and Barty didn't prompt her. He just loved her and let her throw away the need to be miserable alone for a little while.
