Chapter 10
Chapter Ten
Deacon
Cody had put us at a table right by the bay windows, perfectly framed for him to take a photo through. I spied him sitting in his car, busy typing on his phone while we waited for Dove to arrive.
Uncharacteristic nerves coiled in my stomach as I wondered if she’d stand me up. Even with Evelyn’s help convincing her to come, I wouldn’t put it past the purple-haired storm cloud. She thought I was a womanizing millionaire content to sell my soul to the highest bidder and leave a path of ecosystem destruction in my wake like some villain off of Captain Planet . But I wasn’t really that guy, was I?
It hit me like a punch to the gut: maybe I was. I hadn’t done anything to make myself worthy of her forgiveness . . . not yet at least. I hoped this lunch would change things.
Looking anxiously out the window, I prayed no paparazzi would show up. I hoped we'd make it through lunch with just the not-so-subtle photos the other diners were taking. One woman to my left tried to prop her phone in her bag and point it at me. I gave her a friendly but curt wave and she put it away.
I normally didn’t like dining on display like this, but Cody wanted to snap a pic through the windows to make it look less staged. Et voilà, we would have the photo that would save my ass.
Luca walked in, flashing an apologetic look at me that told me enough about the state of mind that Dove was in. She blustered in after him, hands balled at her sides, her purple-dipped hair swinging adorably around her shoulders as she stomped over to me.
I stood, placing my linen napkin on the table and adjusting my skinny tie. “Dressed up just for me?” I taunted.
“Argh!” She scrunched her face in frustration. Something about me always seemed to have Dove’s temper on a hair trigger. “You know what? I've changed my mind.”
She was about to turn away when I caught her by the elbow. “Wait,” I pleaded, trying to keep my voice low and not make a scene. “I've already ordered the Lobster Thermidor and the saffron risotto, and if you don't sit and eat with me, they'll throw it all away.”
Her eyes widened through her wire-rim glasses in momentary surprise before she scowled at me again. “Curse you for using my hatred of food waste against me.”
“They also have a salted caramel cheesecake on the menu,” I added, knowing that would seal the deal.
“Fine,” she bit out. “One meal. And just because I really want that cheesecake.”
I smiled and pulled her chair out for her. “I know you.”
She grumpily sat and strangled her napkin like it was the current substitute for my neck. “You don’t know anything about me.”
I let out a contemplative hum. “We both know that’s not true.”
“You knew a nerdy, little twelve-year-old,” she said, adjusting her glasses. “Now I’m a nerdy, larger twenty-seven-year-old who has no time for celebrity bullshit.”
“I was there when you and I were awkward tweens trying to figure out who we wanted to be in the world,” I said. “Maybe I don’t know you now. But I know who you wanted to be once.”
Dove grabbed the already poured glass of wine on the table and drank the whole thing back in one giant glug . But when she lowered her glass from her lips, she found I was already holding the bottle, ready to refill it again. If she was trying to prove I didn’t know her at all, she was failing. We’d once shared everything with each other—our dreams, our fears. She’d been there at the inception of Deacon Harrow, and I’d been there at the dawn of the curmudgeon who sat before me now.
“Thank you for agreeing to meet with me,” I said, nodding to Luca. He wandered off to tell the servers we were ready for our first course. Still within range if I needed him, he perched at the bar, waiting for his own lunch.
“I didn't really have a choice,” Dove replied tightly, staring daggers around the room at anyone who dared to look at us. She was certainly more effective at making people put their phones away than I was. “But my mother seemed convinced that this was a good idea. I still have no idea why because she said it was for you to tell me, whatever the hell that means. Great job scheming with my mom behind my back by the way.”
“I wasn't scheming,” I countered— I definitely was . “I just had some questions for her.”
“What questions?” she asked, picking up a breadstick and angrily biting off the end. Leave it to Dove Lachlan to make eating lunch an act of aggression.
I took a sip of sparkling water from my Champagne flute. “Questions about my new charity.”
The masticated breadstick flew from her mouth onto the plate, and I looked around to see how many patrons had noticed. Two by my count. At least she didn’t inhale the chunk of food and make me have to Heimlich her in front of everyone. Although, a part of me thought that would make for a great headline.
“Your new what ?”
“I’ve founded a new conservation charity,” I said warmly. “Feel free to congratulate me.”
“As of when?”
“As of yesterday.” My smile broadened. “It’s going to help fund breeding and reintroduction programs for critically endangered wildlife, starting with the Almadran skink.”
“I . . . you . . . what?” was all she could manage to say. I could see the cogs in her brain grinding together as she tried to catch up.
“We will be working with local charities and helping assist them in their conservation efforts through grants and funding. We’re trying to put the money in the areas that matter most and with established local organizations that know better than us what to do with said funds.”
“Wow.” She blinked, slowly nodding as she came back down to earth. “That's actually a good idea.”
“It was yours,” I replied. “I'm just trying to implement it, but I'll be honest, I would be terrible at running a nonprofit. I can barely run my own life.”
“No shit,” she said with a huff.
“Which is why I'm appointing an interim director until I can find a permanent one to run the charity.”
“Oh,” she mused with another approving nod. “That's also a good idea. I’m impressed.” She looked perplexed, as if she couldn’t believe she’d just said that aloud. “What are you naming it?”
“Lucky Role Conservation Trust,” I said, and I was rewarded with a genuine smile from her. “I don’t know if you remember, but it was actually you that inspired the stage name?—”
“I remember,” she cut in, her face softening in a way I hadn’t seen since we’d been young.
I watched it in her eyes as she thought back to those days. We used to always joke that everything in our D&D campaign was the name of our future band. First, it had been Misty Step, then it had been Mage Hand, and when we’d realized that most people would have no clue what we were talking about, we’d decided on Lucky Role. So when I’d started my singing career, I’d adopted the pseudonym as an homage to those days.
She remembered.
The moment had been unimportant—just two tweens talking about gaming. I hadn’t expected Dove would’ve held onto the memories as tightly as I had.
I lifted my glass of wine, and, confused, Dove lifted hers and cheers-ed me.
“To Lucky Role Conservation Trust,” I said.
“To Lucky Role Conservation Trust,” she echoed, still not quite getting it. “Could you explain to me why it was imperative for you to tell me this over lunch?”
“I thought I'd treat my new interim director to a celebratory meal,” I replied, watching the realization dawn on her face. “Congratulations, Dove.”
I’d anticipated the fact that she'd completely release her glass and had already grabbed the stem before it crashed onto the pristine white linen. It made me look like I had supernatural reflexes, but really I just knew Dove Lachlan better than I knew myself.
“You've appointed me as the interim director of your new charity?” she asked, her words slow as if dissecting each one.
I tipped a pretend hat to her. “That I did.”
“Without asking me.”
My smile tightened, but I was determined to remain aloof. “If I’d asked, you would've said no.”
“Deacon.”
“Dove,” I countered in the same scolding tone. “You are the perfect person for the job. You already knew exactly what this charity should be before it even existed. You will lead us in the right direction until we can find permanent leadership.”
The food arrived, granting us a momentary reprieve from the tense conversation. Dove’s Lobster Thermidor looked so good that she instantly dove in, pausing our argument, to my great relief.
We ate for a minute in companionable silence, and I gave her a moment to mull over everything I’d just said. I glanced out the window, and Cody was standing across the road, swiping a dramatic hand across his face in an instruction to smile like the most insufferable stage mom. I fought back the urge to roll my eyes and smiled at Dove while she was too busy eating to notice. I loved that she devoured her meal, not giving one flying fuck about being demure and delicate, not performing for anyone, least of all me.
When she finally spoke, she asked, “How long?” and I was very relieved it wasn't “absolutely not, you insane weirdo.” There’d been a 50/50 chance of that.
I sighed in relief. Moving my risotto around with my fork in contemplation, I mulled it over before answering. Maybe this will work out after all.
“Only a few weeks until we can organize some interviews,” I assured her. “But I didn't want to wait to get started.”
“Because you're trying to cover your ass.” She spoke through a mouthful of food, and even though she clearly had more to say, she took another bite before speaking again.
I didn’t blame her. The food here was amazing, and I’d eaten at Michelin star restaurants all around the world. Maybe it wasn’t entirely the food though. Maybe it was the company. Despite her overt anger toward me, twelve-year-old Dove and Deacon would’ve been high-fiving each other in disbelief that we got to eat in a restaurant like this.
My inner child smiled even as I wore a casually bored expression in an attempt to neutralize Dove’s ire. So far it seemed to be working.
“The girl in the viral video being your interim director is damage control,” Dove pointed out.
“I’ve already donated a large chunk of money into the trust for specific allocation to the skink breeding program,” I said, blotting my lips. “Here’s your chance to spend all my money on something you deem worthy .”
“Tempting.” She tossed her head back and forth. “But I don’t want to be your scapegoat. You only want to make the situation look better. You don’t actually care about fixing anything.”
That was a wallop of an accusation. Worse, she was right. For a long time, I’d only wanted to deflect the blame onto someone else. It was still my first instinct. I cared so much about being perceived as a good guy that I allowed bad things to happen without taking any action. But ever since Dove’s video, it was like a hurricane of reckoning had stormed into my consciousness.
Dove reached for another breadstick, and I covered her wrist with my hand before she could retract it. I swept a thumb over her warm skin and waited until her deep brown eyes met mine to speak.
“Despite what you think, I actually care about making this right,” I admitted. “Now more than ever. You made me see how selfish I was being and I’m trying to fix it. Please, help me? When it comes to this, I don’t trust anyone more than I trust you.”
She seemed pleasantly surprised by that statement, and I felt momentarily victorious in cracking an inch through her icy exterior.
“Well, I mean, I would be an excellent interim director,” she said with an uncomfortable laugh, as if she weren’t quite boastful enough to admit it. “I was born into conservation work. This is the kind of opportunity my parents dreamed about. My dad always wished he could’ve made an impact on this kind of scale, but we never had the funds.”
“Exactly,” I encouraged. “And you can make that dream a reality.”
“With your money,” she added smugly. She retracted her hand from my touch to nibble on her breadstick. “Me holding your purse strings? I kind of like the sound of that. So what now?”
“Cody will handle all of the press releases and announcements.” I nodded out the window to where Cody stood with a baseball cap and sunglasses, snapping photos of us on his phone. “It would help us both out if you smiled at me just once.”
“Absolutely not.”
“You know, I knew I was pushing it.” I gave her a wink.
Dove waved through the window as three more cars pulled up onto the sidewalk. “Are they part of your entourage too?”
Before they even got out of their cars, I knew that they were paps. Uncaring that they were illegally parking, nothing else mattered but getting close enough to snag the perfect shot. I didn’t know how they did it. There was nowhere in the world I could randomly appear that wouldn’t be swarmed with cameras after an hour.
“Actually, let's have lunch in the private room.”
I flagged down Luca to tell the staff to move our table. If the paps got a shot of us, Cody wouldn’t be able to control the narrative the same way. I wanted the news to be about the conservation trust and not about the angry, viral zookeeper.
“Ooh, fancy pants with the private room,” Dove jeered, doing little jazz hands as she stood, holding her plate of lobster.
“The servers can bring the plates,” I said, rising.
“You will take this plate from my cold dead hands,” she countered, biting the air between us and making me guffaw. “As your interim director, I order you to bring yours too.”
I couldn’t hide the laughter in my voice as I said, “That’s not how this works.”
Dove shrugged. “Fine. Let your food get cold.” She sauntered off, swirling another forkful of pasta as she moved deeper into the restaurant.
I laughed as I watched her go, hope blooming in my chest as I wondered if maybe we might actually have a chance of being friends again.
Well, I’ll be damned. This just might work.
I picked up my plate and followed her.