Total pages in book: 110
Estimated words: 102185 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 511(@200wpm)___ 409(@250wpm)___ 341(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 102185 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 511(@200wpm)___ 409(@250wpm)___ 341(@300wpm)
“On?”
He glosses right over the niceties like I hadn’t said a dang word. “Our family.”
He shuffles his finger in the air between the books and the ladder. “Put those up. You can ask me. I can tell you anything you need to know.”
“Actually, no one tells me anything, so I decided to do the research myself.” I sit down, setting my clasped hands on the wood in front of me, prim and proper, like what was always expected of me.
His footsteps are heavy against the wood floors as he crosses the room. Coming to the side of the table, he asks, “Don’t you have work to do?”
“You’re starting to make me think I might discover something you don’t want me to know.”
“You’re not an ingenue, Cricket. You’re a mother with no husband.” He shoves his finger in the direction of the entrance to the library. “That child has no father. I think you understand very well that every family has a dark past.”
The heat of my boiling blood reaches my cheeks. The fire burns in my eyes as I stare at him. I may be used to this treatment, but when he drags my son into it . . . “Jacob is not a part of your dark past. You created that all on your own. He’s the only good thing to come of this family.” I almost feel bad for not mentioning Savvy, but she’d rather me make the point than water down my argument. “Anyway, you’re wrong.”
“How so?” His fingers begin a sonata of heavy taps against the wood table. Playing piano used to bring him joy. He stopped playing years ago, but it would benefit him to pick up the hobby again.
I sit back under a shrug, and reply, “The Greenes don’t seem to fall under that concept. They’re the nicest people I’ve met in a long time.”
His pause is slow; his eyes narrowed on mine. “What are you going on about, Buggy?”
“Please don’t call me that. I have never liked it, and you know that. Is that why you still use it? To upset me?”
Resting his hand on the books in front of me, he leans down. “Are you challenging me? You do realize everything in your life is because I gave it or allowed it?”
An undercurrent of that darkness he mentioned shifts his mood. “I’m trying to talk to you like a daughter to her father, but you entered the library with built-in resentment. Is it me that you resent? Is it that I had a child out of wedlock, and you lost your spot at the men’s club for two years? Is that what bothers you? You got it back, so there should be no issues.”
“I bought it back for a quarter-million-dollar donation.” He walks away, stopping in front of the ladder that reaches to the highest shelf. Crossing his arms over his chest stretches the shoulders of his suit. The threads pull as if hanging on for dear life. It’s not worth mentioning, as he would view it as a slight instead of helpful.
“Seems like a lot of money to pay people you used to call friends.”
He hits me with a glare, but it doesn’t last before he turns away from me again, walking to the windows on the far side of the room. “Why is everything with you a confrontation lately?”
“Me? I was just using the library.” Playing dumb is not a defense. I need a strategy, but I’m too tired to fight his battles. “Why is there a feud between the Dovers and the Greenes?”
His head jerks as if he had been slapped. There’s no other reaction or word spoken. I almost wonder if he didn’t hear me. He paces past me and then stops at the side of the table again. He taught me one golden rule in sales: the first one who speaks loses. “Why would that be of any interest to you?” His voice is not one I recognize. Nowhere in there is the stanch, cutthroat businessman. The harsh tone he used with me as a child has softened.
I haven’t been nervous until now. My palms are sweaty, and I press my hands to my thighs to stop them from shaking. I don’t back down, though. I raise my chin and ask, “Were you in love with Julie Ann Greene?”
His face drains of color, and he walks away from me. Sitting in a leather chair with his back to me, he stares at the stained glass window. “Did you know your mother made this with her own hands?” He glances back at me.
I look at the colorful glass again and see the bluebirds and cardinals sitting on the tree branches. The sun works through the leaves, and the flowers dot the grass freely as if there were no plan, just like in nature. “I didn’t know that. It was always my favorite growing up.” I push up despite my unsteady hands and cross the room to sit in the chair next to him. My heart thunders in my chest, and I keep my eyes ahead, but whisper, “Griffin Greene is Jacob’s dad.”