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I was still confused when I walked into the dining room and set the platter on the elegantly dressed dining table. In the living room across the entryway, my father was entertaining two of his law partners. They reclined on opposite facing sofas in front of the fireplace, sipping drinks from highball glasses.
My father glanced up and saw me and a warm smile lit up his face. “Harper, come over and say hello to Mitch and John David.”
I crossed the entryway and clasped my hands in front of me, wondering why my father’s law partners were here for dinner on a weeknight without John David’s wife and Mitch’s flavor of the month. Especially since I’d been informed my attendance was mandatory. Was I in some kind of new legal trouble my father somehow knew about, and I didn’t?
Both men stood up and offered me warm smiles.
“Hello, Mr. Morgan and Mr. Hightower,” I said, extending my hand to Mitch first.
He shook it firmly, saying, “Now, now. I was Mr. Morgan when you were a girl. We’re all adults here. Call me Mitch.”
“Okay, Mitch.” I dropped his hand and shook John David’s.
“Same with me,” he said. “Although I remember a time you used to call me Mr. John David.”
I smiled at the memories. When Andi and I were elementary school students, our mother would take us to visit our father at the office, sometimes bringing him lunch while we were on summer break. We’d gotten to know the staff and my father’s partners and had called everyone Mr. or Miss along with their first names.
“How’s Frieda doing?” I asked John David as I released his hand. He and Frieda had been married longer than my parents, but I’d always remembered them being distant with each other.
“She’s doing well,” John David said. “She’s started quilting.”
“That sounds fun.”
“She’s only just begun and complains about her pieces not lining up or some such issue.” He shook his head with a frown. “I don’t even begin to understand. I just let her chatter to get it out of her system.”
I smiled, biting my tongue to keep from saying maybe if he tried to understand they’d both be happier.
None of my business.
“Dinner’s ready,” my mother said from the dining room, carrying a platter of chicken.
“Smells delicious, Sarah Jane,” Mitch said as he set his nearly empty glass on a coaster on the coffee table, then headed toward the dining room. “As always.”
“You’re just happy to eat a homemade meal,” she said with a laugh. “You could get remarried, you know.”
“No one will ever live up to the memory of my beloved Trina,” he said with a sigh. “So I don’t even try.”
Maybe he wasn’t looking for a wife, but he’d had plenty of mistresses before Trina had died, soon after I graduated from college, and I knew he’d had plenty since. Since he’d likely used up the available pool in the county, I was sure he was working on the unsuspecting women in El Dorado, an hour away.
We all took a seat at the elegant table, my parents on either end, me on one side and my father’s partners on the other. My father took some of the roasted chicken and passed it to Mitch.
“How’s that case about the Wilsons’ property dispute going?”
Mitch responded, but I tuned them out, my mind drifting to Ava. She was missing, and I was sitting here sipping water from a crystal glass. But I reminded myself that my investigation was far from official. In fact, if the police caught wind I was looking into it, they could arrest me for interfering in an investigation.
My mother would surely convince my father to kick me out then.
Everyone made small talk while I picked at my food, still wondering why I’d been invited to this dinner, let alone why it was taking place. I finally figured it out when my mother began serving her classic tiramisu for dessert.
“So, Harper,” Mitch said, holding my gaze. “We hear you’re currently without a job.”
I gave him a tight smile. “You’ve heard right.”
Mitch glanced at John David, then back at me. “We have an opening at the law firm if you’re interested. It’s not much, mostly filing and such, but it’s a start and something to do until you figure out what comes next.” He glanced at my father, then back to me. “And if you change your mind about law school, well, John David and I want you to know we’d welcome you into the firm once you pass the bar.”
My brow lifted. “You want me to work at the firm?” I glanced to my father for confirmation.
He gave a slight nod.
