Page 17 of You Know You Wanna

“Are you okay?” I asked softly, pulling her to the side and sitting down on a bench overlooking the pools.

She glanced at me, swallowing hard and visibly fighting those tears. “No, but I will be. I have to be. I should wait at the studio. My dad said he’d meet me there.”

I gave a pointed look at the path we were right next to. “He’ll see us here. Sit with me. You look like you need a minute.”

Everything in me wanted to pull her close, hug her, and assure her that everything would be alright, but I knew better than to embrace children I didn’t know all that well. Instead, I joined her in her silence, waiting for her to choose to talk to me.

It didn’t take long. “I want to go to Juilliard.”

My eyes widened. “Wow. That sounds amazing. A little ways down the road, but definitely an amazing possibility.”

“That’s the thing,” she said, her voice getting more and more strained as tears kept welling in those beautiful eyes she’d inherited from her father. “They have a youth program, and if I audition and get a place in it, I could go to Juilliard full time one day. That’s my dream.”

“You should go for it, then,” I encouraged without hesitation. “Your dad told me you guys are from New York, so⁠—”

“My mom is sending me to some fancy boarding school in London for the year,” she blurted out, her voice cracking as she lifted teary eyes to mine. “I had to jump into the lake today to prove to my dad that I didn’t want to go, but it didn’t make a difference. I don’t have a choice, so I can’t do the youth program and then I’ll never get to go to Juilliard.”

Startled by the outburst, I was convinced it wasn’t my place to talk to her about this any more than I already had, now that I knew a little bit more about the situation. I didn’t have a clue what to say. At that exact moment though, Remington came around the corner to collect her, his hulking figure huge on the little path down to the studio.

Lulu glanced at me with such despair in her eyes that it hurt to look at her. Then she stood up and muttered, “I’d better get back to the suite. Thanks for inviting me tonight.”

“Of course,” I said. “Any time.”

She nodded, managing a tight smile before she turned and strode right past her dad without saying anything. He stopped in his tracks, doing a half-spin as she blew past him. He exhaled deeply as she marched away.

With a hand running through his hair, he faced me and closed most of the distance between us. “How did it go tonight?”

“It went well,” I said. “That’s not what she’s upset about. Apparently, there was some kind of incident at the lake today?”

He sighed again, hesitating. He shook his head at me and I saw the exasperation suddenly flaring up behind his eyes. “Before you ask, I didn’t make her jump into the damn lake. She said she would rather do that than go to London, and when I told her to prove it, she fucking jumped. I don’t even know why. It’s not like jumping into a lake is going to change her mother’s mind about sending her.”

Oooof. Touchy subject. I bit the side of my lip, but I couldn’t just keep quiet. Not when I wasn’t even sure if he knew about Lulu’s plans to attend Juilliard. “Have you stopped to consider that maybe it’s not her mother’s mind she’s trying to change?”

“What do you mean?”

“I mean that maybe she was trying to change yours. You’re her father. If her mother wants her to go and you don’t, then maybe she’s hoping you’ll fight for her.”

Silent for another long minute, he suddenly cursed and dipped his head back, eyes toward the sky as he groaned. “That’s not going to happen, and not because I don’t want it to.”

“Why, then? Why won’t you change your mind if you know how much she wants to stay here?”

“It’s not that.” He sucked in another deep breath and then pierced me with a glare so sharp that I was sure I’d overstepped. Then he spoke again and I realized it wasn’t me he was pissed at. It was himself. And maybe the mother too. “My ex isn’t going to let her stay. She and I have been separated for over two years and our divorce was just recently finalized. It got real nasty, real fast, and now she wants to settle overseas, which means Laurene is going with her.”

“There’s no chance at all you could convince her to let her stay with you instead?”

He scoffed, his expression darkening even more. “I get her all summer and for every holiday break. That was the deal.”

I could tell that he hated it. It showed in his eyes even if he hadn’t said it out loud. His entire posture was also suddenly radiating with tension, his jaw tight and his spine rigid.

“I’m sorry, Remington. That must be incredibly hard for all of you,” I said. “I’ve never been married myself and I don’t have any children of my own yet, but I did help raise my siblings. And if you want my advice, consider talking to her about it instead of having her jump into a lake to prove a point. You know she doesn’t want to go, but if she has to, then there are ways to make it easier on all of you.”

With my unsolicited and probably unwelcome advice dispensed, I turned to leave but he stopped me. “Hey, would you like to get a drink again later?”

Surprise trickled through me, but my heart jumped and a smile I couldn’t hold back tugged at my lips. I took a moment to hide it before I turned to look back at him. “Sure. I’ll see you tonight. The Kids Camp is doing a movie night if you think Laurene might be interested in doing that while you’re out.”

As he nodded, I wondered if I was treading dangerous waters with this guy. It sure felt like it was venturing into that territory, but I refused to indulge the thought. I’d promised myself I would help him feel less lonely while he was here, and that was all I was doing.

Clearly, both he and his daughter needed someone to talk to and I could be that someone for them. There was no real reason not to, and besides, I liked them. Especially now that I’d learned that his prickly exterior was just that. A prickly exterior.