“I know. I know Dad, I’m sorry. I’ve been…working.”
“Working? Undercover? You’re being safe, aren’t you?”
“Papa?”
“Yes, honey?”
“Can I come over for dinner? I’ll bring that Thai food you like.”
“With the glass noodles? You know I can’t say no to that.”
I smile, tears pricking at the backs of my eyes. God, I’ve missed him.
“I’ll be there in thirty minutes.”
“Drive safe.”
I drop Rosa off at Agnes’s and swing by the Thai place to get my father’s glass noodles and myself some pho, and he opens the door when I knock, moving aside.
I walk inside and set up the food on the kitchen table.
“What brings you here so suddenly, Sophie?” he asks after we’re sat across from each other at the table.
“It’s been a hard week,” I admit, poking at my pho with my chopsticks. He uses a fork to scoop glass noodles into his mouth.
“Hard how?” he asks after he finishes chewing.
“I was undercover and, well, I met Rosa’s father.”
“Rosa’s father?” He blinks at me. “How…how did that go?”
“Good,” I say, hedging my answers. I can’t tell him that her father is Luca Rossi. He’d know the name.
He’d be afraid for me, and I can’t have that.
“And now?”
“He’s in trouble. Arrested.”
“Because of your undercover work?”
“Yes.”
“Well, then, honey, you should be proud.”
I frown, looking up at him. “But I’m not proud, Papa. I’m not proud, because he’s a good man, deep down. He’s lived a hard life.”
“And that excuses his criminal behavior?” My father scoffs. “Sophie. You know better than that.”
“What does it matter, though? The laws? They’re all flawed,” I argue, and my father hums in the back of his throat, looking at me curiously.
“You’re in love with him. Rosa’s father.”
I meet my father’s eyes, my lip trembling. “Yes.”
“And you feel it? Deep down, like in your bones?”
“Yes,” I breathe, never knowing how to put a name to that feeling.
