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He shakes his head, "No, I must say I haven't."
Mom laughs, "He'll be buying those books now to read."
"You were right Tina, she is extremely passionate about books. The way her eyes light up when she recommended Harlan to me. She'll be fantastic as either a teacher or an editor."
I can feel myself begin to blush, "Thank you." I say and put my head down and start eating.
The dinner goes amazingly well, better than I had expected. The conversation flowed, and there was no awkwardness. I honestly came here thinking I'd hate Harrison, but it's quite the opposite. I like him, he and my mom seem really happy together. My dad's gone, and Harrison will never replace him. I know that now, so I'm just going to take it as it comes.
“Mrs. Brady, when is your party?” Lacey asks practically bouncing in her seat.
"Tomorrow evening, there will be at least two hundred guests here for the party," Mom says matter-of-factly as if that’s a normal thing to say.
I blink as Lacey gasps, "Two hundred?" I ask, making sure that I heard her correctly.
Harrison laughs, "Yes, two hundred. We never did celebrate our wedding properly and tomorrow night is a party to do just that."
Damn, that means that we have to attend.
"As I was saying..." Mom continues, "It's a formal party which means you both need new dresses."
Lacey and I look at each other and smile. New dresses, that's fine, we can make a day of it. "Cool, we'll go shopping in the morning."
"You can take Barney. He'll be your personal chauffeur for the day. Also, he has my credit card so you can buy whatever you want."
I instantly shake my head, "Thanks for the offer, but I thought Lacey and I could have a girls day and go shopping and relax before the party."
"Tina," Harrison says, there’s a warning to his tone giving my mom a pointed look.
"Mia, listen to Harrison, okay? He's being nice and wants to treat you girls to a new dress." Mom tells us and gives Harrison a soft smile. I'm confused, I have no idea why she's so dead set on us spending his money, that's not who I am, and that's not how she raised me, but the pleading look in her eye makes me keep my mouth shut and nod.
"Excellent, Barney will be outside at nine-thirty ready to take you wherever you need to go." Harrison says as he throws his napkin onto the table and stands up, "Thank you for a wonderful dinner Tina, I'm just going to my office to make a couple of calls. I'll be down in a while." He kisses her cheek as he passes by her and walks out of the door.
"Want to tell me what that was about?" I ask Mom as soon as he's out of sight.
"Yeah, that was weird," Lacey comments, looking as suspicious as I feel.
Mom sighs, "Look, girls, Harrison is rich, extremely so. Barney is head of his security along with his driver. Harrison has a lot of enemies, and he doesn't want you girls caught up in the crossfire of someone trying to get at him. So please do as he says, he's only got your best interest at heart."
"Okay Mom," I say although I don't agree with it, I'll do it because I'm not wanting to argue with her or Harrison about it.
She smiles. "Good. Now, have you spoken to Sarah recently?"
I frown, "Yeah, I spoke to her yesterday, why?"
"Her mom's worried about her. She hasn't once been home since leaving for New York." Mom t
ells me, and I already know she hasn't, why would she when her life was shit when she lived here in Cali? "Dorothy was wondering if you had spoken to her and if you had that maybe you could talk to her about coming home?"
I sigh, "No, Mom, I won't. She has her reasons for not wanting to come home, and I completely understand those. I won't badger her to do it."
"I know she went through a lot while she was here. The bullying was horrendous, but Dorothy really misses her." Mom continues and Lacey shakes her head. She's met Sarah, it's something I've not told Mom, but Sarah comes and visits us sometimes and vice versa.
"Funny, she didn't seem to give a rat’s ass about Sarah when her husband was beating on her." I say as I get to my feet, "I'm not asking her, Mom, and I can't believe you would even ask." I'm so pissed off right now, how dare she, she knows what Sarah went through trying to escape the hell that Oakland brought and yet she doesn't seem to give a crap.
"Mia, I asked, and you've said no. That's all there is to it. Don't get upset." Mom pleads with me.
I glance up at the clock on the wall. It's ten-thirty. I didn't realize how much time had passed since we came down for dinner at nine. "I'm going to bed. Lacey wants to go for a run in the morning before we go shopping. Goodnight," I tell her as I walk away. I'm taking myself away from this situation. I'm still mad and Mom's acting as if she did nothing wrong when in fact she knows she did.
