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“Dude, I’m the one who brought her here. I should have warned you. If I’d known she’d go that far, I’d have done things differently. I’m sorry, Klein.”
“Don’t beat yourself up, man. You had bigger things going on at the time, what with becoming an insta-dad to a teenager and falling in love with your dream girl.”
He grins and jokes, “And the whole thing with the Russians abducting them both. Not that it was a big deal or cause for concern.”
“That too,” I toss ironically. “Just an average day in sunny Florida.”
He checks his watch and tips his head toward the parking lot. “I should go. We good, man?”
“We’re good.”
Like our fathers before us, we do the goodbye version of the man shake custom for unknown reasons.
Once he leaves, I walk the facility’s perimeter, taking a few laps to recenter. Pausing to check the app, I confirm via live feeds from inside Ma’s house that she’s safe. She’s watching TV with Gloria in the living room.
After her recent wandering fiasco, I upgraded the tech at her house, adding interior cameras and panic buttons, along with door sensors for the inside and outside of the house. The works.
I’ve also slept there every night, making myself at home in my old bedroom. Gloria has graciously stepped up her time with Ma during the days until I hire a caregiver or develop a better plan. It’s kind of her, but it’s a lot to ask of a neighbor. Even a friend.
And as for what our long-term options are? Yeah. I’m at a total freaking loss.
I’ll call Caroline tonight after I get Ma to sleep, and we’ll figure this shit out.
No matter how much Caroline insists, I’m not sticking our mother in some facility to live out her days. I won’t make her sell the family home either. There has to be another way.
A few minutes later, I return to our shared office space, feeling at ease. The talk with Shep gave me some much-needed perspective.
Does it make what Mia did okay? Not even close.
But it did answer that nagging question ofwhyshe did it. That’s been plaguing me. Perhaps now I can stop this pouting and antagonistic bullshit.
It’s time to make the best of it. After all, I still have the job I needed.
Yep. This will all be fine. I got this.
And then I walk into the office and see the way she and Tomer are sitting.
She’s facing her computer, and he’s pulled his chair so close beside her that she might as well be on his lap. Their heads are inches apart, and his arm is slung over the back of her chair.
And I see red.
No, scratch that. I can’t seeanything.
Chapter11
It's just research
TWENTY MINUTES EARLIER
MIA
As I walk Tomer through my suggestions for improving his facial recognition program, he eats it up like candy or crack. Or crack candy. Candy crack? That sounds like something they sold in the fifties when no one cared about corrupting kids. Like candy cigarettes.
Wait. What was I talking about?
Oh yeah. Tomer’s like a kid at Christmas.
He and I have found our groove for sure. In sync like the boy band. He’s a sponge, sucking up everything I throw at him. There’s nothing he can’t learn.
