Maybe it was a good thing Brock had said he wouldn’t ever see me again. I could only hope that I’d accomplished what I’d promised Steele. I could only hope I had scared Brock into his wits.
Because, apparently, I had not scared myself enough from considering something idiotic.
* * *
I parked my car behind my father’s Tesla and my mother’s Prius. I had fought like hell to live on my own for a good three years now, but given how often my parents conducted work out of their home, they had insisted if I wanted to remain on the path to taking over the company someday, I had to be there. It would have been easy to say no…except I liked the notion of running the family energy company. And, yes, I liked not having to pay rent.
I just didn’t enjoy having my future handed to me on a silver platter.
I walked through the walkway, past our professionally pruned grass and bushes—only with money could you have a yard in New Mexico that looked like something out of California—through the gate, opened the massive front door, took off my shoes, and walked across the marble floor.
“Is that you, Tara?” my father said.
“Hi, Dad,” I said. I didn’t have to hear him to know where he was. “I’ll be there in a second.”
Nor did he have to ask me to come to him.
I walked into our home office, a room that looked like a hotel conference room, and saw my father on his laptop at the head of an oblong table. Above, a chandelier hung, and to the sides, two different workstations were set up.
“Where have you been?” he said. “I’ve been wanting to go over this week’s plans with you and your sister.”
“I was at brunch with some friends,” I said.
“Well, it’s almost three o’clock.”
“We like to eat slow.”
My father bit his lip. He sniffed the air, as if something awful had just pervaded the room.
“Who did you see?” he said. “You stink like oil and gasoline. Were you with those boys again?”
Those boys.
“No, Dad,” I lied. “This is the smell you get in the New Mexico summer.”
“It’s especially strong on you,” he said. “We don’t want you to be seeing those kids again. They’re no good and they have no future.”
Yes, and when I was fifteen, that was great. I’m twenty-five now, so who cares?
“I just don’t want you or Elizabeth dragged down by them.”
“I don’t think you’ll ever have to worry about Elizabeth,” I said.
“You know best, father,” Elizabeth said as she walked into the room.
Elizabeth and I shared a couple of the same features. We both had long brown hair and blue eyes, but we were not identical twins by any stretch of the imagination. I was taller and skinnier, she shorter and thicker; I was usually low-key but willing to fight, while Elizabeth was prudish and easily disgusted; I was the sister sent to discuss business partnerships, and she the one to negotiate the contentious details.
I loved my sister, and we genuinely cared for each other, but it wasn’t a stretch to say that if we weren’t born into the same family, we probably wouldn’t be friends.
“Thank you, daughter,” he said, though he did not look in Elizabeth’s direction.
“And you won’t have to worry about me, either, Dad,” I said.
“Don’t give me further reason to.”
I sighed. Did Dad really not understand the difference between a boy and an adult man who had a bit of a mean streak? Yes, some of them had seemingly not grown up past the age of fifteen, but at least Brock, for example…
Well, it didn’t matter. I would not see him again.
