Page 110 of The Fake Out

A waitress stopped at the table, a middle-aged woman who looked tired.

He smiled. “Well, hello there, pretty lady.”

She blushed. “What can I get you?”

My father ordered a full steak dinner. I ordered nothing.

After the server left, I asked, “What do you need to talk about?”

He wasn’t here for a friendly catch-up, I knew that. There had to be a reason he’d only wanted to meet with me.

“Is it such a bad thing I wanted to see how my girl was doing?”

I shifted in my seat. “You haven’t bothered to see how I was doing in three years. Why the sudden change?”

“Just thought it was about time,” he said, his voice jovial, but his eyes were hard. “Besides, you were the one contacting me.”

“Mama and Iris also tried to contact you. I didn’t see you calling them back.” I took a sip of my tea. “What do you want?”

The waitress stopped and dropped off a cup of coffee. My father added cream and sugar and stirred it slowly before taking a sip. He stared at me over the rim.

“I’ve heard congratulations are in order.”

My breath caught. Of course, he would have heard about the engagement.

“Thanks,” I said, going for nonchalant. “You’re not invited to the wedding.”

He smirked, added a bit more cream to his coffee and stirred. The tinkling of the spoon sounded impossibly loud. “Who’s going to give you away? That’s my job, after all.”

“Mama will. Or hell, the mail carrier. He’s way more reliable than you ever were.”

His mouth tightened at the corners but otherwise he seemed unaffected. “I’d sure like to meet this fiancé of yours.”

“I’d rather you didn’t.” I pushed my glass away and took a deep breath.

“I have this opportunity to invest in some condos in Florida he might be interested in, you know.”

“No.”

“What about—?”

“No. You’re not meeting Chris and you’re definitely not talking to him about any of your scams.”

The thought of Dale Sampson going anywhere near Chris gave me hives. My father would work any angle he could to get money out of Chris, and Chris… he liked to help people. No, he was too good to be in the same room as my father.

“We can cut the niceties. The truth is that I don’t want you anywhere near me or Mama or Iris. But Iris wants you at her graduation. That is the only reason I called.”

His eyebrows rose in surprise. “She’s already graduating?”

“She’ll be eighteen in a couple of months.” I shook my head. “I guess I shouldn’t expect you to know that. But for some reason, she has it in her head you aren’t all that bad. She’s wrong, of course.”

“So that’s the reason for all the phone calls?” His eyes drifted to a spot over my shoulder.

“Yes. She has her heart set on you being there.”

He smiled. I turned and saw a pretty, older woman with big blonde hair blushing at his attention. Ugh. “I could probably make it.”

“That’s the thing, Dad. If you aren’t going to come, don’t bother saying you will. I’m tired of covering for you. I’ve run out of excuses. You can only have so many aunts die. I think you’re up to eight now.”