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Helen had said Tyler was taking care of the business. Truthfully, Kevin had no doubt that Tyler could handle it, that hewashandling it. Ty was more than capable, and in the near future—nearer than Kevin had wanted, it seemed—he’d take it over entirely.
The thing was, Kevin wasn’t ready to let it go.
The click of the latch at the front door sounded only moments before someone entered the house.
“Hey, Dad.” Tyler shut the entry behind him, then strode toward the dining room table. Wearing the dark-gray puffer coat that had duct tape to cover the rips and tears the fabric had suffered over the years of construction work, and walking with a barely perceptible limp, Tyler approached Kevin with a paper hot cup in each hand. “What are you doing here?”
Heat crept up Kevin’s neck, as if he’d been caught doing something wrong. Maybe because he felt caught. Caught in a moment of wallowing in self-pity. Caught feeling lost about what life was supposed to look like next.
Clearing his throat, he straightened and looked up at his son with a half a grin, hoping that would convince Ty all was well. No pity party happening there. “Just reconciling some orders. How are things at the shop?”
Tyler set down a paper cup full of something hot and hopefully tastier than the weak tea Kevin been nursing the past hour.
“What did you bring me here?” Kevin asked.
Tyler pulled out the chair across from Kevin and lowered himself onto it as if he might be a bit sore. He dropped a conspirator’s wink. “Coffee. It’s decaf though, so don’t get too excited.”
Kevin nodded and reached for that small forbidden gift. “I’ll take what I can get.” After a long drag of the Storm Café’s rich brew, he sighed with satisfaction. “Your mother has banned me from all of it.”
“I’ve heard.” Tyler grinned and then shrugged. “She loves you and seems to want you to hang around awhile longer. I can’t imagine Becca would do much of anything different if it were me.” He held up his own coffee, a silent, secret pact of loyalty in the gesture, and Kevin clunked his against it.
“Let’s go back to what it is you’re doing here.” Tyler tapped the pad of paper sitting in front of Kevin. “This doesn’t look like order reconciliation—and by the way, that’s already been done. Lauren and Jade took a pass at it while you were still in recovery. Both of them being very good at business and all things spreadsheet, I would trust that they did a good job.”
Suddenly this visit felt less like a reprieve from the doldrums of recovery and more like the build-up to a mild rebuke. Or something equally unpleasant. Kevin cleared the growing lump from his throat. “I noticed it all looked good.”
Once again Tyler tapped that pad of paper. “Now, back to this. What is it?”
Oh, yes. The thing that made Kevin wrestle with frustration and then feel caught when Tyler had entered unexpectedly. Kevin picked up the pencil and traced over the lines he’d sketched, darkening the ones he wanted to keep. “It’s a drawing.”
“For what?” By his tone, Tyler already had an idea of the answer—and likely he was right.
Kevin squared his gaze directly on his son, taking back his fatherly poise. “For that Henton project. We need a solid sketch and a reasonable materials list before we can put in the bid they asked for.”
“Dad.” In the space before Tyler plunged forward, the expression in his eyes shifted. When he continued, his voice softened. “Dad, I already turned that job down.”
“What?” He shouldn’t be surprised or upset. But he was both. “We haven’t discussed it.”
“It wasn’t even a real decision, Dad. We couldnottake that job.”
“Hentons would give us a few weeks’ grace. It’s a big job, Ty. Good money.”
“Yeah. It is a big job. One that’s remote and a two-hour drive from here.”
“We’ve done that before. Many times over.”
Tyler sighed as he wrapped both large hands around his half-full cup. He stared at the space between his arms and slowly nodded. “We have done so before.” He peeked at Kevin, hesitancy marking every feature of his expression. “We can’t keep doing this though.”
“What?” Dread sank into Kevin’s gut. This was not simply a mild rebuke, aHey, Dad, you really do need to take it easy for a few weeks.No, this was so much bigger than that.
“Ican’t keep doing this.”
Kevin opened his mouth to argue that he’d recover and they’d go on as normal, but then Tyler’s statement sank in.Hecouldn’t keep doing this? “I . . . I don’t understand. Is . . . is it your leg? Does it bother you?”
“That’s not it. My leg is as fine as it was last year. And the year before that.” Tyler sank back against the backrest of his chair and ran forked fingers through his hair. “Look, this is likely terrible timing—but then again, it seems like it’s time we both took an honest look at the future.”
Then Kevin understood. The awful, sinking feeling persisted.
“You don’t want my business.” That dread had puddled and then cooled.
