Total pages in book: 73
Estimated words: 71843 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 359(@200wpm)___ 287(@250wpm)___ 239(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 71843 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 359(@200wpm)___ 287(@250wpm)___ 239(@300wpm)
I was guessing, from her crestfallen expression, that it had not gone well. “Okay.”
“Yeah, well, you know how when I vault over someone, if I’m too close, they have to stay still so I have clearance?”
“Yes, I do.”
She grimaced. “Well, he got startled, and moved, and then when I made contact, which wasn’t that hard, I swear to God because I was already halfway over—I ended up knocking him over the back of the couch.”
I could sort of picture it in my mind, because she did it to Sam on purpose.
He would come in, have his back turned, and she’d leap at him like a baby spider monkey and end up with her arms around his neck and her legs around his waist. Sometimes he’d clutch her legs and run around the living room; other times, scarier times, he’d duck down and flip her over the top of his head, and she’d twist around and end up on her feet, facing him. She could do it because of her martial arts training, and because she was extremely flexible from aerial yoga, had recently started up with her Pure Barre classes again, and more than anything, because she was a very accomplished tumbler. The other part of it was that Sam, being a wall of hard, heavy muscle, was not about to buckle under the insignificant weight of his daughter.
“I see,” I said softly. “So what happened?”
“I really scared him,” she reported, biting her bottom lip, “and he…yelled.”
Ah. “At you. He yelled at you?”
She nodded.
“Because he was startled, and you knocked him down.”
More nodding.
My daughter was petite, but she wasn’t fragile. She had the tight, powerful musculature of a dancer, so when she hit you, you felt it. And while she had developed fluid, graceful movement when she was doing her aerial yoga, when she was fighting, that was different. I was sure, from Mr. Holmes’ perspective, that it looked like she sprang at him and put him on the ground.
“Okay, so how did you leave things with Mr. and Mrs. Holmes?”
“I was so embarrassed I took my stuff and I walked down to the end of their drive.”
“In the rain?”
She nodded.
God. “And then what happened?”
“Well, then Kay came out, but the car was there, so I told him I’d call him, and I left.”
“You should probably call them, don’t you think?”
She passed me her phone, and I saw the fifteen missed calls from her boyfriend.
“Do you want me to call instead?” She needed the out, poor kid.
She deflated with relief. “Yes, please,” she said, and then she inhaled deeply. “Is that chili?”
“Yeah, go get some,” I told her. “And Jake’s in there.”
She brightened instantly. “Kola sent me a pic of the zipline. Is it already down, ’cause I wanted to try it out tomorrow.”
“What do you think?”
“I think greatness is wasted on you people.”
I had no response.
Sam, having waited long enough, stepped into the room then, and Hannah turned and leaped at him. He plucked her easily from the air and then wrapped her in his arms and crushed her against him. She gasped, just like I did and Kola did when he did the same thing to us. He wasn’t gentle, and neither was his daughter. When she coiled her arms around his neck, his eyes flicked to me. They were flat and cold because he could see, plain as day, that she’d been crying.
Making Hannah Kage cry was a mistake.
I cleared my throat. “Hannah accidentally put Mr. Holmes on his ass.”
Murderous intent changed instantly to confusion.
“Dad, I knocked Mr. Holmes over his couch,” she lamented.
Sam’s grin as he turned with her in his arms, was evil. I would have to scold him later.
Alone, I made the call, and Mrs. Holmes picked up on the second ring.
“Oh, Mr. Harcourt, I’m––”
“Jory, please,” I reminded her, because I’d mentioned it on more than one occasion. “I hope that Mr. Holmes is all right.”
“Oh my goodness, yes,” she replied, exhaling sharply. “We both feel awful, just awful.”
“It’s okay. It––”
“Oh no, Jory, please, I’m so, so sorry. I mean, first off, I insult you and your husband because clearly, I’m an insensitive idiot, and end up making that sweet girl cry. And then, on top of that, my husband yells at her and hurts her feelings all over again!”
It was very nice to hear how worked up she was over my kid. I could be friends with a woman like this.
“She scared the crap out of him, which made him yell, and then once he got up, he was embarrassed and yelled again, and by that time, she was flying out of the room.”
“That’s what I understood, yes.”
“Well, once I made sure he was in one piece, I went to check on her, and she wasn’t in the bedroom, and my son comes back inside soaked to the skin and says that she was picked up. And I was surprised you didn’t come in until he told me that it wasn’t you or your husband that came, but instead her driver. Did he get that right?”