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Damn right, you put your foot down, baby.
“Okay, truth be told, I don’t keep a close watch on what’s happening on every account. It was my fault for letting this happen in this one. I specifically wantedyouhere, but apparently, no one communicated why, and I can’t blame anyone but myself for that now. If it’s about money—”
“It’s not about money,” Valerie said quietly. “It’s about being able to take ownership of my work and put my name on the things I’m proud of. I can do that at my new firm.”
“I’ll make it worth your while. Just let me talk to her. I promise, I won’t yell.”
Valerie looked at Tim.
He didn’t want to lead her, so he kept his expression as neutral as he could and clasped his hands behind his back. There was an opportunity for that compromise she’d said she wanted, and he hoped she hadn’t changed her mind.
She nodded once. “All right. I’ll get you her card. Come on into the office.”
She got the blowhard moving toward the door, and turned backward to mouth to Tim, “Stay right there.”
“Of course.”
He turned to look at the truck.
Heidi gave him the thumbs-up sign.
A couple of minutes later, Valerie stepped outside and let out a deep breath before starting down the short walkway.
“I’m proud of you,” he said as she walked closer.
“Me, too,” Heidi shouted from the truck.
Valerie furrowed her brow and turned toward the truck.
“Ignore her,” Tim said. “I think the tendency to eavesdrop goes hand-in-hand with being something of a voyeur.”
“What are you doing here?”
“We dropped Kevin off. It was weird that he wanted a ride, but of course we weren’t going to tell him no.”
“Oh. I guess I finally put the fear of Jesus into him.”
“What?”
She shrugged. “I yell at him a lot. At that age, you can’t tell how much of it is going to stick.”
“What do you tell him?”
“I can’t tell you that. It’s a trade secret.”
“Atradesecret?”
She batted her eyelashes and grinned that coy smile of hers that always made his belly flutter like he was a damn sixteen-year-old. “Okay, maybe not atradesecret, but a cultural one. In my culture, we’re quite fond of telling other people’s kids when they’re being butts. We’re intrusive that way. It’s thetakes a community to raise a childprinciple, I guess, and heisa child. He may have reached the age of majority, Tim, but as far as he’s concerned, he hasn’t signed up for being a full-time adult.”
“That’s a problem.”
She shook her head and put up her hands. “It’snota problem. Realign your expectations. He’s not a confident person, and if he needs two or three years to figure himself out, then let him have it. You can afford to give it to him. He’ll be better for it in the end.”
“He wasn’t ready to be pushed out of the nest, is what you’re saying.”
“I don’t think he was.”
“We never tried to push him out. I mean, we wanted him to go to college, but at no point did we ever say that he couldn’t take more time to launch if he needed to.”
