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That smile died the moment that I heard my father’s voice.
“Dillan,” my father’s cool, gruff voice came over the line. “This is your father.” I rolled my eyes as he said that. I knew exactly who it was. Even if my caller ID hadn’t said ‘private’ I would’ve known who he was the moment he said my name. He always said it so condescendingly that it could be nobody else. “I would like to schedule a meeting with you and your sister to discuss these recent new developments that I’ve been hearing. If you could call my secretary back to schedule this meeting at your earliest convenience, that would be acceptable.”
“If you could call my secretary back to schedule…” I mimicked his cool, courteous tone. “Yeah, fuckin’ right.”
Just as I was about to put my phone down, it rang in my hand.
Delanie’s face popped up onto the screen, and I smiled as I placed it to my ear.
Before I could say hello, she was already talking.
“I think you should go with beach themes today,” I heard my sister say into my ear.
“Why are you awake?” I asked.
She’d left for Austin last night with Bourne, and I honestly wasn’t sure why she was talking to me so early.
“I’m…” She paused. “I’m not ready to talk about it yet.”
I laughed, thinking that whatever was bothering her likely had a lot to do with a certain man that looked a lot like my man.
Only, he had a lot surlier of an attitude.
“Okay,” I said. “And I think that I’m going to go with emojis today. Beach themes tomorrow.”
“That’ll be cute. Make sure you send me a picture,” she said. “I love seeing what you come up with.”
“Do you think doing the poop emoji on the chocolate ones will be too gross?” I asked as I hefted the bag of trash that was still inside the trash can.
I shouldn’t have taken my trash out so early.
Last night, Moshe had closed for me and she hadn’t ever closed for me before.
She didn’t know that the trash had to be taken out.
She also didn’t know that she set the alarm incorrectly.
But, in a pinch, she’d done just fine. And I could handle taking out the trash.
“No,” Delanie answered. “I think it’ll be adorable. And, honestly, all these kids are buying poop emoji pillows and shit. It’s highly doubtful that they would even care that they were eating one. The parents might be a little hesitant. But you know that they normally give their kids whatever they want whenever they want when it comes to those donuts.”
That was true.
If they were coming into my shop, then they were getting whatever they wanted. Including a four-dollar donut that was decorated with a poop emoji.
“I still haven’t decided whether I’ll start tomorrow with the weekends, or just wait until next weekend,” I found myself saying as I pushed open my back door.
“I think you should take the week off, start over fresh next weekend,” Delanie suggested. “You haven’t had any time off in a really long time. And you’ve got plenty of money in the bank.”
I did.
After Delanie’s and my business started to take off, any and all money from my father was refused.
We now both lived solely on the earnings we made on our own merits.
It was a great feeling.
What was even greater was the more the sum in the account grew, the more pissed off my father got because he thought I was being ‘stubborn and bullheaded’ when I really just didn’t want anything more to do with him.
Something in which he just couldn’t wrap his head around.
“Speaking of my father,” I said as I allowed the back door to close behind me and headed for the dumpster out back. The one that I shared with the little Italian place that was directly behind me. “He called me yesterday.”
“We weren’t speaking of him,” Delanie replied. “And what did he want?”
“He wanted to meet with both of us,” I said. “Something more to do with, I think, me and Booth being seen together rather than anything else. I’ll bet Kerrie went and tattled. I think him seeing Booth and me together yesterday really hammered it home. And he decided that telling Daddy on us was the next best thing.”
“I’ve never liked him, Dill.” Delanie sighed. “And I hate that you ever gave him a chance.”
I hated that I gave him my virginity.
Honestly, I’d felt filthy the next day after doing it. I’d hated myself.
And that’d been the day that I finally started staying away from Kerrie.
“Are you going to go?” Delanie asked as I tossed the trash over the side of the dumpster.
“Hell no, I’m not going to go,” I said. “Whatever he has to say isn’t going to change a thing. I’m in love with Booth. Our father will not change that with his words.”
