Brexton lifts her eyebrows. “Well?”
“Well, what?” I ask as I glance at the notes that have nothing to do with this status meeting on my notepad, but pretend to find them interesting.
“Hunter? The client you’ve been”—Chase coughs—“err . . . not talks, just sex, recruiting.”
My cheeks flush with heat. “What about him?”
They’re the queens of being difficult, so I’ll take pleasure in being difficult for once.
“You’ve written a status sheet every week for the past few months, and it seems the only thing that’s going down isn’t your finger to the keys to fill us in on what’s going on but rather”—she looks at our dad and shrugs apologetically before looking me straight in the eye—“well, you on Hunter.”
Her smile is cold and unmoving while the rest of us in the conference room choke back shocked laughter.
“Seriously, Chase? Should we go through your exploits? How about when you—?”
“Ladies!” My dad’s voice thunders around the conference room, and the sudden bickering approaching DEFCON 3 suddenly quiets. We all turn to look at him. “Let’s keep this meeting focused, as I’m sure you’re all incredibly busy. Right?”
“Busy?” Lennox chokes on her laugh. “Sounds to me like Dekker’s been plenty busy.”
Another round of laughter ensues followed by me scratching the side of my cheek with my middle finger. “Screw off.”
Poor choice of words . . . I realize the minute I say them.
“There’s that too,” Brex chimes in.
“It’s all fun and games until you have to face the music,” Chase says in that singsong voice that annoys me. “So tell us, Dekk . . . just what’s been going on with Hunter and his stick?”
I stand and pace to the window, hating, embarrassed, and feeling on the defensive that I really don’t have much to report. The favorite child has failed.
I’m more than aware that they’re all staring at my back as I watch the clouds building across the skyline, and I wonder if we’ll get to watch the thundershowers sometime soon.
“Dekk?” my father asks.
Shit.
Time to face the music.
“I’m starting my conversation by reminding all of you that while your caseloads have remained the same, I’ve become the guinea pig for Operation Fuck You, Sanderson,” I say as I turn around, cross my arms over my chest, and lean my hips against the credenza at my back. I meet each one of their eyes.
“Just give Sanderson that look and his balls will shrivel off,” Lennox mutters. “Problem solved.”
But it’s the “Pretty please” that Chase murmurs that has us all laughing again.
“I have a meeting in twenty minutes in this conference room, so we need to get through this,” my dad warns, and it still takes a few moments for our laughter to subside.
“Hunter Maddox.” I draw in a deep breath and vacillate between the truth, somewhere close to the truth, and letting my father down wholly. “He knows I’m recruiting him. He knows we have a vested interest—”
“Vested, my ass.” Lennox laughs, but I meet Brexton’s eyes and her smile encourages me to continue.
“Truth be told, he knows why I was on the road trip. He knows why I’m there, but he’s going through a lot of shit. I’m helping him through it. I’m . . .” in love with him. My breath catches at the words I’ve skated around in my mind for what feels like days but I’ve known for longer. I blink away the tears that flood and pray no one caught them. My hands fist where they’re hidden beneath my elbows, crossed because I don’t show emotion. I don’t—
. . . they’re on your sleeve when it comes to me.
Hunter’s voice floods my head from those beginning days on the road trip, and I smile, because he’s right. I do.
And isn’t that part of this?
I twist my lips and meet each one of my sisters’ eyes as I straighten my back. “He’s currently in the playoffs and I don’t think changing agents is where his mind is at.” And it’s true . . . but there is so much more at stake here.
For me.
“But he wasn’t months ago when you started this, so that doesn’t hold water,” Lennox says and raises her eyebrows.
I refrain from glaring. It’s hard, but I do.
“True, and all that time I’ve spent pursuing him, on top of my regular client load, and honestly, I’m not sure what’s going to happen. I’m helping the human he is before the athlete everyone wants. I’m just being there for him.” I draw in a deep breath and prepare myself to meet my father’s eyes. When I do, the disappointment I expected to be there . . . isn’t. Instead, his eyes are questioning but quiet. “I know I’m an agent and my job is to recruit him and help us on the whole, but I’m also a person who can’t push another human being who is hurting.”
His nod is just as reserved as his gaze, the muscle in his jaw ticks.
“So . . .” Lennox asks. “What does that mean? When all is said and done, I mean? Should I update that status on the recruit sheet for you?”
I open my mouth to give a vague response, but my dad cuts me off. “Ladies, can you give me a moment alone with Dekk?”
Feathers may be ruffled, but the conclusion of a meeting when they all have a million things to do overrides the irritation.
“Teacher’s pet,” Brexton says with a wink as she shuts the door so I’m alone with my dad.
“Take a seat,” he says.
“I’m fine.”
“Take a seat.” It’s the father tone and not the boss tone, so I begrudgingly slide into a chair at the complete opposite end of the table from him. If he’s angry at my failure, I have distance, and if he starts asking questions, I can hope the space might mask the emotions in my eyes.
“What did you need, Dad?”
“Nothing.”
“Nothing?” I laugh. “Then why did you ask me to stay?”
It’s his turn to lean back in his chair and stare at me. He fidgets with the pen in his hand as the time stretches. “What is it you want to ask, Dekk?” he asks in that way where he knows exactly what I’m thinking—and need—without me ever saying a word.
And I do.
I have so many questions.
Ones that run through my mind as Hunter’s soft snores fill my bedroom in the wee hours of the morning. Ones that nag at me as I watch him tear up.
“How come you never got remarried after Mom died?” He startles, and I know I’ve caught him off guard.
“I never found someone I wanted to marry.”
“But you never dated.”
He nods until his twisted lips spread into the softest of smiles. “I date plenty. I had girlfriends for months at a time,” he says to my utter shock.
“When? Who? How come I don’t know this?”
“Because the last thing I wanted was for you girls to ever think I was trying to replace your mother.” He sets the pen down. “And I went out at night. Sometimes client dinners weren’t really client dinners. Sometimes business trips were a little more than that.”