Chapter Twenty-One
“Ienjoyed being with your family. I’ve met them both before but I’ve never sat down and talked to them. Laurel sure has her hands full with Cody and Katrina.”
“The kids are great, but being a single mother of a six-year-old boy and a four-year-old girl is really rough for Laurel. And she’s too damn stubborn to let Travis and me help much.”
Savannah started to say something but her cell rang. Recognizing her father’s ringtone, she froze.
“Aren’t you going to answer?” Harlan asked, glancing at her as he drove.
“It’s my father.” She didn’t want the rosy glow she’d had since the night before to go away. And she suspected once she talked to her father it would.
Harlan covered her hand and squeezed, but he didn’t speak. After all, what could he say?
Her phone rang again. She considered turning off the ringer but decided that was the coward’s way out. “Hello.”
“Hello, Savannah. This is your father.”
“I know.” She said nothing else, waiting for him to go on.
“I’d...I’d like to see you tonight, if I could.”
He sounded hesitant, even conciliatory, but she didn’t trust that. “I’m at Harlan’s. Or we will be shortly. Just a minute.” She muted the phone and said, “He wants to see me.”
“What do you want?”
“I want to see what he says. If it’s more of the same or...” She broke off and shrugged, trying not to hope he’d changed because she didn’t want to be disappointed when she found out he hadn’t.
“It’s up to you. Tell him to come by if you want.”
She turned the volume back on. “Give us half an hour and then come to Harlan’s apartment at the Wildcat Tower.” She gave him the apartment number. “You’ll have to ring us to meet you and bring you up.”
“All right. Thank you.”
“Dad? I won’t put up with any bullshit, so if that’s what you have in mind, don’t bother coming over.”
“I understand.”
Savannah hung up and looked at Harlan. “He didn’t sound like himself.”
“Is that a good or a bad thing?”
“I guess we’ll find out.”
Harlan went down to meet him and bring him up. When they entered the apartment she looked at Harlan to gauge his reaction, but he shrugged in answer to her unspoken question.
Her dad handed her a small wrapped package. “I wanted to give you your Christmas gift.”
“I have yours in the other room. I wasn’t sure we’d be seeing each other.”
