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“Oh, uh…” I took a quick look around the room. “I don’t know. I went to the lady’s room to freshen up. Casey, I’m going to go home now. If you see your dad, let him know I've left.”
Chapter Fourteen
Logan
ThingschangedbetweenArianeand I after the CEO event. She was distant. She didn't answer any of my personal calls or text messages. She stopped sneaking into my office for hookups. I tried creeping into hers once, but she turned me away. Her distance affected my mood so much that people started to ask questions about my mental health.
It had only been a week since the event, and I felt grumpier than I’d been before she joined the team. On top of that, my dad had gotten worse, and Lucas and I still weren’t speaking to each other. There was so much on my plate I thought for sure I would blow my deal with the magistrate of Paris and everything would go downhill from there.
“Hey, Dad.” Casey came into my office and sat down at the conference table that I had freshly cleaned for the thousandth time. “What’s the deal around here these days? People are whispering about you being in a bad mood.”
“In a bad mood?” I questioned. “What’s bad about my mood? I'm a busy man, sometimes I’m just overwhelmed.”
She took a good long look at her old man. Casey knew when I was overwhelmed, stressed, annoyed—she knew everything. And right away, I could see that she knew something else was up. I was more than just overwhelmed; I was in a state of frenzy.
“Maybe you should take some time off for a few days. Go home and relax for a while. You don’t wanna burn yourself out and end up making yourself sick. Why can’t Ariane step into your place for a few days?”
Hearing Ariane’s name made me want to barge into her office and force her to talk to me. But I couldn’t do that. I wasn’t that controlling of a man, nor did I want Casey to find out what we had been doing, not yet anyway. So, I shook my head and brushed away the idea.
“No, I'll be fine. I just have to get my head back in the game and push a little harder.”
“Dad.” My daughter gave me a stern look. She knew how I got whenever I buried myself in work. It was always hard for me to pull myself back. “I remember what happened the last time you drowned in work. Something is definitely up with you. What is it? Lucas? Are you and Mom fighting again? Are you worried about Grandpa?”
It was all of that, plus Ariane. She was the bulk of my problems at that time, and I didn’t know how to handle it. And she didn’t even seem to be phased by it. I was driving myself mad trying to figure out what was going through her head, why she had pulled away so suddenly. But she gave no hints, and I couldn’t think of a single reason.
“Are you and Ariane going through something?” Casey’s question quickly shifted my concentration. “I noticed the silence between you two and how she kind of keeps to herself now. Did something happen at the CEO event? Because I told you it was a bad idea from the very beginning.”
I wanted to talk to my daughter about it, get some advice on how to mend things between Ariane and me. But I wasn’t ready. Casey had always had a lot of great insight for me in the past about women I’d dated. But Ariane was different. They were friends, or connected somehow.
“No,” I lied again. “I’m just stressed. Maybe I said something to her that rubbed her the wrong way, I don’t know. She still handles her job duties as normal, we just haven’t had to say much of anything to one another.”
Casey gave me another wicked side-eye before she zipped the imaginary zipper on her lips closed. She knew there was something I wasn’t telling her, and I knew her silence meant she would find out what it was sooner or later. But, for the time being, I let the conversation go and focused on work.
“What’s going on with your business idea?” I asked. “Are you still considering branching out?”
“Are you trying to kick me out?” Casey teased.
“Never, my favorite daughter.” I chuckled. “Just checking in with you and your ideas.”
“Well, yeah. I’m still considering it. I've done a few vision boards and talked to a few investors.”
“Investors?” I frowned. “What do you need investors for? I'm your father. I’ll give you the money for whatever it is you need for your start-up.”
I was a little offended by Casey trying to find investors, but I understood. She was just like me in a lot of ways; she didn’t want any handouts. She wanted to do everything on her own so that she’d be able to proudly call it her own. I admired her so much for that.
“I’m so proud of you, honey. You're really putting your best foot forward and not letting anything stand in your way. Most young women your age don’t have half as much drive as you do. I'm proud to call you my daughter.”
“Thanks, Dad.” She blushed. “I’m really trying to show Mom that I can be twice the woman she is. If not more. You know, when she found out I was planning on starting my own company, she tried to shoot me down. Or make it seem like it would just be too hard to do. I hate when she does that. It's like, she can never be happy for me or even encourage me to do things. But if I were Lucas, her precious son, she would have nothing but good things to say.”
Casey and her mother's relationship had been rocky ever since the divorce. Maybe even before then. I didn’t know how to mend things between them, or even what to say. The only thing I knew how to do was be the strength my daughter needed and give her all the encouragement she deserved.
Ariane
Work was very different after the CEO party. Like I’d said I would, I kept my distance from Logan and focused strictly on work. It was apparent that he didn’t like our new arrangement, even though it wasn’t an arrangement. I was simply keeping to myself, and I’d put our intimate life on the back burner. In my eyes, it was for the best. The guilt I felt about Lucas and the annoyance I’d experienced after the event were too much for me to bear any longer.
The fact that I was annoyed by his actions that night told me I was getting in too deep anyway. There was no way Logan and I could build a relationship that was based on a lie. At some point, it would crumble, and we’d be right back at square one—strangers.
When I got home that night, I was worn out and ready for bed. I put my takeout in the fridge, poured myself a glass of wine, and headed upstairs to shower and get in bed to start my day all over again. The air in my apartment felt very unfamiliar that night. Almost like someone else was there, or had been.
