Chapter 39 Avery #2
When the diner door opened and closed, she glanced over automatically, looking for a distraction from the sudden tension at their table. And she found it.
The new customer turned out to be the well-dressed but unexpected figure of the ex-mayor of Pine Springs.
Her father.
“I’ll be right back.” Sliding out from the booth, Avery spared a second to hope that Gemma and Leo might clear the air between them in her absence.
Her dad only noticed her when Avery touched his arm. “Hey. What are you doing here?” she asked.
“Avery.” He bent to kiss her cheek with an affable smile, his “public persona” twinkle in his eyes. “Just stopped by for a matcha latte, if that’s not expecting too much from Delia’s little establishment.”
“I meant in Pine Springs.”
“I’m meeting up with some old council friends.” Her father checked his watch. “Soon, in fact.”
“We could have had breakfast.” If you’d told me you’d be in town, she thought, with the familiar bristle of being not only unimportant, but practically invisible, too.
“I don’t do breakfast.” Her father patted his flat stomach with fake self-deprecation. “It takes resolve to stay toned when you reach my age. You’ll see.”
He was in amazing shape and he knew it. Maybe there was someone new in her dad’s life who was currently appreciating his trim physique, but Avery found she just didn’t care—if only he’d stop making other people deal with the collateral fallout of his lies.
“Yes, you prefer evening meetups, don’t you?” she said sharply. “Only, last time, you forgot to warn me that I was providing your cover. How did that end up working out for you?”
Her father’s eyebrows kinked in a perfect arc of surprise. “Sorry? I’m not sure—”
“Oh, please.” With no patience or respect for his duplicity, Avery’s temper began to fray at the edges.
“I don’t want details or explanations. Just leave me out of your messed-up games.
I’ve paid enough and my life is complicated already—not that you’d care.
I have a stalker to deal with. I don’t need anything more on my plate. ”
A huff of air escaped from her dad’s nostrils and a muscle jumped in his cheek. “You’ve always been a magnet for drama.”
“What the hell . . . ?” Avery seethed at his dismissive tone. “I’ve just told you I have a stalker and your response is that I’ve brought it on myself?”
“I was just saying—”
“Well, don’t!” she bit out. “Maybe try ‘God, that must be awful’ or ‘Tell me more’ or ‘Are you OK?’ Then I might think you give a shit.”
“Look, I don’t have time for this right now. You’re obviously overwrought.” Her father held up placating hands. “I want to hear more—of course I do. But I’m meeting people as I said, and I don’t want to be late.”
“Of course not,” Avery said, stepping back, her fingernails digging into her palms. “Heaven forbid I hold you up.”
“I’ll settle your check when I pay for my drink.” He moved toward the counter and placed his order with one of the teenagers.
“There’s no need. I’m with Leo and Gemma. We’ve got it.” She wanted absolutely nothing from him.
“I insist. Your breakfasts are on me.” It was a standard Joseph Delgado gesture. Off-hand and lacking in depth. He was already turning away from Avery with an air of relief when he made the mistake of adding, “Shout if you need anything.”
The steam hissed in her midriff, locked down tight under firm pressure but ready to blow.
“And you’ll do what?” she asked coldly.
“Hmm?” Her father glanced over his shoulder with a quizzical frown.
“If I shout, what will you do?” After rephrasing her question with careful emphasis on each abrupt syllable, Avery didn’t wait for his answer. “Only you have a habit of saying things that mean nothing, so it’s hard to see how shouting would benefit me.”
“Darling . . .” Her dad attempted to use the weary endearment as a sweetener. A beleaguered expression hovered on his face, as if he was bracing himself once more for her to make a mountain out of a molehill.
“I can’t even count the number of times when I’ve called you over the years needing your help—a girl does need her dad now and then.
But you’ve never actually come through for me.
” Avery realized it didn’t even hurt anymore.
She was just bitterly and blazingly angry.
“Mom and I went through hell and you weren’t there.
You packed your bags and left us to it.”
“That’s what happens when you get divorced, Avery. Your mother had to learn to stand on her own two feet and so did you. You were nearly an adult.”
“I was seventeen and you were selfish and unkind. You cauterized your marriage and moved on so fast that you left us floundering.” The furious words spilled without thought, long overdue. “I needed you then and I’ve needed you since.”
Her father tapped his foot, his eyes wandering around the diner rather than holding Avery’s gaze. “This isn’t really the place . . .”
“No, you’re right. But you brought it on with your ‘Shout if you need anything.’” She let out a snort of disdain. “You can’t blame me for pointing out that I’ve learned not to waste my breath.”
The waitress set her dad’s drink on the counter and he closed his fingers around the takeout cup, his mouth a clamped line.
“I’ve been there for you,” he contended. “You seem to forget it was my intervention that kept you in school after your spot of careless driving.”
And there it was. The obligatory mention of the only time she’d ever gotten into trouble. She was surprised her father hadn’t brought it up until now.
Avery took a step closer, more than ready to lay that particular ghost to rest. “It was your intervention that gave you the opportunity to scout out your next family.”
Behind the counter, Delia rifled noisily through a selection of coffee syrups.
With an icy smile, Avery continued, “And it wasn’t me, that night in the school parking lot. It was Tanner.”
“I beg your pardon?” Her father stilled.
“Tanner hit the floodlight and smashed up the cars. It was a freak accident like I said, but his truck skidded in the rain, not mine. His scholarship was at risk because Ottoline had put him on his last chance, so I stepped in.”
“He had drugs in his locker—”
“Tyson Dax put them there,” Avery said, “because Tanner made him look stupid when he stood up for me.”
He’d had her back then and he still had it now. The teenager who’d protected her honor at school had turned into the man scared of heights who’d climb a ladder in the rain with a fucked-up shoulder so she didn’t have to. Because she needed help.
A frown pinched her father’s forehead. “And you never told us any of this because . . . ?”
“I felt guilty. I thought the crash and my lie was the catalyst that turned our lives on their heads. But actually it was you. You and Ottoline. And it seems some things don’t change.”
Damn, it felt good to get it off her chest.
“Take a long, hard look at yourself, Dad—or you’re going to end up alone, wishing someone was around to answer your calls.”
Avery watched him through narrowed eyes as he smoothed his perfectly styled hair, opened his mouth and closed it again. It was rare to see Joseph Delgado lost for words, but she didn’t wait for him to rally.
Reaching over to tap his watch, she said, “I’m glad we had this chat, but I guess you’d better run if you don’t want to be late. And I need to get back to my friends.”
Her father cleared his throat a couple times. “Yes, well, time is ticking so I’d better—” He gestured toward the door. “I’ll call you.” And he strode away just slow enough, she guessed, to convince himself he wasn’t fleeing.
Avery jumped when Delia crashed a tray load of clean mugs down on the counter.
“I’ve been waiting a long time to hear you put that smarmy sonofabitch in his place,” her aunt grunted. She eyed Avery with something that looked a little like respect. “All mouth and no trousers, he is. Your mom’s better off without him. Tell her I’ll be in touch.”
“I will.” With a shaky smile, Avery turned away to rejoin her friends.
“And he didn’t settle your check so you still need to pay,” Delia shouted after her.