“Nuh-uh.”
Soon, she was giggling. “You’re funny today, Daddy.”
I stuck out my tongue, making a funny face, hoping for another beautiful laugh. “Aren’t I always funny?”
“No. You’re usually quiet.”
I’d always been a quiet kid, the serious one. Responsible, hard-working, all the things that made me a good businessman. Evanne was the opposite, so it was no surprise that she thought I was quiet. Something about her thinking that about me, though, bothered me. I didn’t want serious and quiet to turn into her thinking I wasn’t open to her.
“Well,” I considered my words carefully, “I like to spend a lot of time in my head. But I promise to work at talking to you more. Deal?”
She nodded, unaware of how much of what I’d said I’d taken to heart. I wasn’t going to put that on her, though, so I asked her more about her day, and we were still talking about it when we arrived home.
I prepared dinner, and she changed into her karate uniform, then came down to do her homework while we waited for our food to cook. Until today, I’d been worried that I wouldn’t be able to keep up with Evanne’s extracurriculars, but after my talk with Da, I’d realized that I hadn’t yet fully accepted my new role. A role that required me to take another look at where my priorities were.
I’d never considered myself a control freak, but it was clear that I hadn’t given my people the chance to prove themselves that they deserved. I wasn’t walking away from my responsibilities. I was just re-ordering them. My employees were going to give me the freedom to do that.
After dropping Evanne off at karate, I headed toward Kurt Wright School, finally allowing myself to think about what would happen next, what Lumen’s response would be to what I had to say.
She was sitting at her desk when I reached her classroom, and the first thing I noticed was that she was still wearing my sister’s clothes. Then I realized how stupid that was because of course she wouldn’t have gone home, changed, then come back here just to meet me.
I knocked on her door.
“Come in,” she said. Her expression was tight, even though she smiled. “Would you like to have a seat?”
“Why don’t we go to a café instead?” I asked. “Keep school-related talk here. How does that sound?”
“That makes sense,” she said. Her eyes darted up over my shoulder. “I’ll…just be a moment to grab my things. I can meet you outside.”
I was happy to wait, but maybe she didn’t want to be seen with me in the hallways. Something about her seemed off, but she wasn’t asking me to leave, or insisting we stay, so I put my curiosity to the side and agreed to wait by my car.
A minute or so later, she joined me. She gave me another of those tight smiles and thanked me for opening the car door but didn’t say anything else as we headed to a hole-in-the-wall café not far from the school. Once we were settled at a table in the corner next to the window, we ordered our coffees.
I opened my mouth to tell her everything I’d been thinking since I’d seen her last, but then I realized her hands were pressing down on the table hard enough to make her fingers whiten.
“Are you all right, lass?”
She shook her head and wouldn’t meet my eyes. “You were the one who wanted to talk.”
I hadn’t been imagining it earlier. Something was off. How had she gone from making me breakfast this morning to…this?
“Okay,” I said, “I’ve been doing a lot of thinking about how we’ve been these past few days…”
The waiter came over and set our drinks in front of us. She immediately took it in her hands, seeming grateful for having something to physically hold onto.
I continued as the waiter walked away, “I never expected this would go on as long as it has. In all honesty, I never thought I’d see you again after our night at the hotel.”
“Me neither,” she said in a quiet voice. She stared at the steam rising from her cup.
“I’ve loved every second of it.”
Finally, she raised her gaze to meet mine.
I smiled, but it was tentative. “I hope I’m not alone in that feeling.”
Her eyes grew wide, the hopeful light in them twisting something in me.
“You’re not,” she whispered.
