Mirage - Alice Tribue Page 0,28
in around me, molding himself to me. He keeps me cocooned in his arms, surrounding me with his heat.
I like it. I like it so much that I don’t hesitate to relax into his hold and close my eyes, making it easy for me to fall asleep. I don’t care that he interrupted an important meeting and pulled me out of there like a complete lunatic. I don’t care about any of it because I know that when I wake in the morning, Nathan will still be there.
CHAPTER SEVEN
“Fuck,” I murmur, trying to stay upright on my heels as I sprint down the street. I’m already running fifteen minutes late. The fucking client bitching to me because his assigned escort is unavailable to him this week kept me in the office later than I had anticipated. I’m sorry she got her fucking period, asshole, is what I wanted to yell at him over the phone. Instead, I offered him a discounted rate for their next encounter. He would have liked me to offer up another girl but, unfortunately for him, that’s not how I do things.
To make matters worse, the construction on this street prohibited my driver from dropping me off in front of the restaurant, so he had to let me off a block and a half down. Now I’m late to meet my father, who drove in from New Jersey just to have dinner with me. I run into the restaurant like a madwoman, thinking how remarkable it is that I didn’t break my neck sprinting here.
I squeeze my way through the crowd of people waiting to be seated and reach the hostess station “Hi, I’m meeting someone. Samuel Powell.”
“Of course. He’s already been seated. Right this way.” I follow her to the back of the restaurant and spot him instantly. I can’t help the smile that breaks out on my face when I reach him.
“Daddy.”
“Hey, baby,” he says, standing up and pulling me into a hug. It feels good to have him hold me like this; it’s been a while.
“I’m so sorry I’m late. I got held up at work and then I had to run here.”
“You running?” he questions sarcastically, holding onto my forearms and pushing me away slightly so he can have a good look at me. “I’d have paid to see that.”
“All right, all right, don’t start in on me already,” I joke as he releases me. I take my seat across from him and shrug. “Sports were never my thing.”
“Right,” he drawls, taking his seat and laying his cloth napkin across his lap. “Make-up and boys were always your thing.” He tries to mask the humor in his voice but fails because teasing is just his way. It gives me a sense of familiarity that maybe I’ve been missing for a while now. He always tried to make my life lighter; filled with more humor, more laughter, is what got me through my sadder moments.
“So, tell me, what’s new?” He probes the way he always does. A question that anyone might ask, but his features say so much more. He’s here to do a fatherly investigation.
“Nothing. Just working all the time.”
I can tell he thinks I’m full of shit when he leans back in his chair and cocks his head to the side. “All work?” he questions with an arch of his eyebrows.
“Pretty much,” I answer with a nod.
My reply earns me a grin. “Who’s the guy?”
“What guy?”
“You think I don’t know my own daughter?”
“No one knows me better.” Sad but true. Sad because even he doesn’t know me as well as he thinks he does.
“So, who is he?”
“His name is Nathan.” I let out a sigh. “He works in security.”
“Nice guy?”
“Seems to be. It’s still new.”
“Why didn’t you bring him?”
“Because it’s still new, Dad.”
“Doesn’t mean you can’t introduce him to your dad.”
“It does if I want to keep him around.”
“You’re still a brat,” he quips.
“You’re still ridiculous.”
“Look at your menu and decide what you want. I’m starving.”
“Yes, sir.” I giggle and pick up the menu. This is what he’s always given me—comfort, the silly banter, and a lot of love. At times, I think that it might have come just a little too late, and the damage had already been done. I’d already seen too much—seen men at their worst. My dad is one of the good ones, one of the few good ones, and I wonder if I’ve finally found that in Nathan. At times, I think I have, but can