AllFreeNovel
Share Us
“Perry? Meh, he probably has herpes or something. He’s slept with half your bridge club.” Frank eyed Maggie, trying to see if she was serious or not. He didn’t like Perry with his overly white smile, golfer’s tan, and cheap shoes. The man acted as if he were the George Clooney of the country club, swilling around the card room, plying the ladies with prosecco, and a thick layer of charm.
“Lydia Babin said he was totally clean. She made him present her with a clean bill of health before she would climb on for a ride,” Maggie said, smooth as velvet… even though a wicked smile hovered at her lips.
The nurse writing down crap on a little clipboard snickered.
“Lydia slept with Perry? What? She hard up or something?”
Maggie laughed. “Well, yeah, she was married to a man who raised crickets and sold them for bait for five years… a man who had sex with her only twenty-four times. She’s so hard up she’d likely sleep with Jack Baumgartner, too.”
“The woman only had sex twenty-four times?” the nurse said, spinning around and looking horrified.
“She kept a journal,” Maggie said gravely. “Very little sex because her husband had erectile dysfunction. The woman is due some fun.”
Frank snorted as the nurse saluted. “Okay, Mr. Ullo, I’ll be back in a bit. Try to rest.” She winked at him and shot Maggie an encouraging smile. Nothing about chemo was much fun, but the employees in the cancer center worked hard to make the environment as welcoming as possible.
Silence descended like a cold blanket. Maggie looked down at her nail, pushing at a cuticle, trying to pretend everything was normal.
“You talk to Tess?” he asked.
“Yeah, she came back while you were asleep. Oddly enough Graham dropped her off. Couldn’t get a word out of her about that, though.”
“Graham?”
“You know, the man you hired over her.”
“I didn’t hire him over her. I hired him for her.”
Maggie frowned. “That makes no sense and you know it. But I can’t figure out how she came to be with him that afternoon. After your ill-timed announcement, she disappeared for hours. Her car stayed, so she had to have run into him or something.”
Frank nodded, not quite understanding how his daughter had ended up with Graham either but understanding why. Something had happened between Graham and Tess—he’d seen that firsthand in his office. They’d both been shocked to see the other… and then there was guilt and anger. He wasn’t the sharpest tool in the shed, but he could put one and one together to get a solution. Tess and Graham had something going on long before Frank had hired Graham. “I don’t know why Graham brought her home. I don’t even feel like I know Tess anymore.” Maggie harrumphed.
“What?”
“Who’s to blame for that? You’ve handled things wrong at every turn, Frank. I tried to tell Tess you didn’t mean to make her feel unappreciated, but she’s like a damn billy goat. Won’t be budged.”
Frank said nothing. Part of him harbored deep anger at his daughter for being so irrational, for putting Frank Ullo Float Builders in jeopardy. But another part of him admired her courage and conviction. His daughter refused to be a victim, refused to take the easy way. Shewashis daughter. “She has that right.”
“How can you say that? You’re sick. Everything has changed, Frank. She’s being intentionally stubborn.”
“Only because she believes in herself. I like that about our girl.”
“She’s hurting. You’re hurting. And both of you are too bullheaded to make it right. Doesn’t make sense at a time like this to be so set against each other. You need her, and she needs to be there for you.”
“It makes sense to me, Maggie. I know Tess loves me, but I also know she’s had me wrapped around her little finger ever since she gave me that first gummy smile. I’ve given her the world—the best schools, a new car on her sixteenth birthday, a job after she finished that expensive college. We made our boys walk a tougher road than Tess.”
Maggie frowned. “So you’re trying to teach her to stand on her own two feet now?”
“It’s not the best time, and I never intended it to be this way. But when I saw how she reacted to not being given control of the company, I knew I’d made a mistake in raising her. I’m not saying she ain’t a good girl, Mags. But she’s never been tested. Tess has leaped and now she must deal with where she’s landed. We all have to deal with where she’s landed.”
His wife of forty-nine years shook her head. “I don’t understand you.”
He gave her his boyish crooked smile, the one he’d used to get in her pants all those years ago. “Yeah, you do. Deep down you know Tess needs space and some growing room.”
“But you don’t have much tim—” Maggie clamped her mouth closed and blinked away sudden tears.
“Come here,” he said, motioning her to him.
She moved toward him, reaching out to clasp the fingers he wiggled her way. Her touch warmed him, comforting him, giving him strength the way it always had. “Oh, Frank, this is terrible.”
