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“Well, it’s more fun when you’re ten, Dad.”
He laughed as we rounded the corner. The second Flash saw me, he started barking and ran right to me. “Hey there, Flash,” I said as I tried to keep him from knocking me over.
Grabbing his leash, my father told Flash to sit. “Finn isn’t doing such a good job training this dog.”
My heart rate tripled as I quickly glanced around. “Oh, Finn’s training him?”
“Yes. And speaking of. How do you know him?”
“Know him?”
If there was one thing my father knew about me, it was how bad of a liar I was. “Finn. How do you know Ward?”
“Oh, I met him at the union meeting and then Russell and I ran into him at a pizza place once. I remembered him from the meeting.”
Staring into my eyes like they were some kind of lie detector, my father slowly nodded. “Union meeting, huh?”
I tried to brush it off as nothing. “Yep.”
“So where is your office, Dad? I’m dying to see it.”
Another firefighter walked up and took Flash. He smiled at me, and my father grunted and the guy backed off fast. “Upstairs, down the hall to the left.”
I quickly started up the steps. My eyes darted around quickly as I tried like hell not to look like I was searching for someone. Then I heard his laugh, and I stopped.
“What’s wrong?” my father asked.
“Nothing. I thought you were farther behind me, but you’re not! Hah!”
He jerked his head with a motion for me to keep moving. My body started to tingle more with each step I took.
He was close by. I could feel it in the air.
I turned to go down the hall, holding my breath. Glancing to my left as I walked, I saw four guys standing around a pool table laughing. Finn’s eyes instantly caught mine, and his smile grew bigger when he saw it was me. I tried to look away, but couldn’t. Then he saw my father, and his expression dropped. I instantly missed those beautiful emerald eyes of his when he returned his attention to the guys.
We were trying to act like normal when we both knew damn well nothing about this was normal. The way he looked at me with that smile made my knees weak and my stomach flutter.
I continued to walk toward the door marked with my father’s name. Once inside, I let out the breath I had been holding.
“Take a seat, sweetheart.”
I sat, glanced around his office, and smiled. “It’s like I’m sitting in your other office. It looks the same, Dad.”
He chuckled and leaned against the windowsill. “I like consistency; you should know that by now.”
With a grin, I nodded. “You happy here, Dad?”
“I am. What about you? You happy with what you’re doing?”
Shrugging, I replied, “I think so.”
His brows lifted. “You think so?”
My stomach twisted in knots.
“I am…happy. I enjoy my job and what I do. It’s just—” Glancing down at the hands folded in my lap, I let out a gruff laugh. How could I tell me father I was tired of being a slave to my job—tired of fighting to find my place in a world I really never wanted to be a part of? “It’s nothing. Everything is great with me.”
He moved to the chair next to me and took my hand in his. “Rory, you’re saying one thing, but your eyes are speaking a different truth.”
Lifting my gaze to meet his, I forced a weak grin. “Sometimes I feel like I have to work a little bit more than other people to prove I deserve my job.”
“Because of your mother?”
“Yes. Everyone thinks I have it easy, even though I’ve taken on more cases since I started there than probably anyone else. Then you have Russell. The lead counsel on Robert’s case. He thinks I don’t know what I’m doing. It drives me insane.”
“I know it’s frustrating, honey. I’ve seen your mother go through the same thing. Hang in there—it gets better. You were born to be a lawyer.”
There was a brief moment when I wanted to tell him all the things I had heard people say about me, but I dropped it. I wanted to tell him I wasn’t so sure I was born to be a lawyer…that it was more like my parents had guided me there. “When you and Mom decided to start a family, how did Mom do it with the hours she works?”
He pulled his head back and grimaced. “Why?”
Shrugging, I replied, “I don’t know. I’m just trying to figure it out. With the way I’m working, I have no idea how I’m supposed to date, let alone think about a family.”
He frowned. “Are you seeing someone?”
Yes.
“No. But I wouldn’t mind having a life outside of being a lawyer.”
My father stood and rubbed the back of his neck like he was worried. “Well, this is coming out of left field, Rory. I thought you were dedicated to your career.”
