Chapter 10
Lamar blew out a breath, at the same time patting his flat belly over his sweater. “Everything was delicious. If I eat like this every day I’d weigh well over two hundred pounds.”
“You wouldn’t if you had to walk five flights of stairs several times a day,” Nydia said, smiling. “By the way, how much do you weigh?”
“One eighty,” he admitted.
“That’s not much for your height.”
“It’s enough for someone who’s six foot.”
“I thought you were taller than that.”
Lamar winked at her. “That’s because you’re a little bitty thing. What are you, five-one?”
She managed to look insulted. “Not! I’m five foot two.”
“Five-two is still petite. My daughter is ten, and she’s already five-four.”
Nydia leaned back in her chair. “How tall was her mother?”
“Valerie was five foot six.”
“There you go, Lamar. Your daughter will be at least her height or taller. I know she’s only ten, but does she know what she wants to be when she grows up?”
Lamar folded his napkin and placed it beside his empty plate. He’d eaten one biscuit, then another, and before long he’d devoured four of the buttery, incredibly melt-in-the mouth quick breads. He wanted to tell Nydia that she was every normal man’s dream. She had looks, brains, and she could cook!
“Kendra claims she wanted to be a fighter jet pilot.”
Nydia leaned forward. “You’re kidding.”
Lamar shook his head. “No, I’m not. She loves to fly, and I guess she got that from her mother. Valerie was a flight attendant.”
“That would mean a career in the military. If she can get into the Air Force or Naval Academy, then she can write her ticket, because times have changed where women are now piloting military jets.”
Lamar spayed his fingers on the table. “That’s only a possibility if she keeps her grades up. Fortunately, she’s a whiz kid when it comes to math and science.”
“I suppose she gets that from Daddy.”
“I did okay.”
Nydia pointed at him. “There you go again being self-effacing.”
“I thought I was modest,” Lamar countered, reminding Nydia of what she’d said the night of Cameron’s wedding.
“That, too.” She stood and began clearing the table. “What type of engineering was your major?”
Lamar rose and gathered plates and flatware. “Construction engineering.”
“What’s the difference between a construction engineer and a civil engineer?”
He followed Nydia into the kitchen, scraped and rinsed the dishes before handing them to her to stack in the dishwasher. “Construction engineering is a professional sub-practice area of civil or architectural engineering.”
“I still don’t understand the difference.”
“As a construction engineer I deal with designing, planning, construction, and management of infrastructure such as tunnels, roads, bridges, railroads, dams, and other projects. Civil engineers concentrate primarily on the design work, which is more analytical. My partners are civil engineers and I’m the CM, or construction manager. I focus on construction procedures, methods, schedules, costs, and personnel management. My primary concern is to deliver a project on time, within budget, and of course with the desired quality.”
“Do you have cost overruns?”
