Rest & Trust (12 page)

When he could focus on anything else, he saw that Sadie’s shoulders shook. Fuck, was she crying?

“Sadie?”

“Holy shit,” she laughed, the side of her face still pressed into the mattress. “Fuck a duck, you’re good at that.”

“Fuck a duck?” He laughed, too, and they both groaned as it moved him inside her. He lifted up, pulling out of her as gently as he could, and then dropped to her side, completely exhausted. He barely had the energy to pull off the condom and tie it off. The thought of moving enough to throw it away in her bathroom was just too damn much, so he dropped it to the floor.

“Gross,” Sadie muttered without any conviction whatsoever.

There was a patterned throw over the back of the daybed. He pulled it over them and relaxed down at her side. Then he kissed her shoulder, hooked his arm over her back, and closed his eyes. There wasn’t a lot of room on what amounted to a single bed, and he had to let his feet dangle off the side near the end, but he didn’t feel like he needed more.

She rolled to her side and tucked herself snugly against his body, pulling his arm more tightly around her. Sherlock smiled. He enjoyed sleeping like this, in the warm comfort of companionship.

CHAPTER TEN

Sadie drove past the valet parking and found a spot on the street, around the block. Her car sighed and bucked as she cut the engine. It was more than thirty years old, but it had been her mom’s, so she wanted to keep it forever. But the time to take it in for another checkup and probable overhaul loomed.

She left the top down—she’d learned the hard way that putting the top up and locking a convertible was an engraved invitation for some asshat to slash the top open—and grabbed her bag, then headed back toward the restaurant, smoothing her hair on the way.

Blue Sky was a fancy-schmancy restaurant in Madrone that her father had discovered several years back, and now called his favorite. Sadie suspected it was where he took his dates. He’d dated since she was in high school, but she’d never met any of the women he fancied, not even to this day. She’d seen a few photos; occasionally, her father made the social pages of the local press. But he seemed to be a man who’d married once, for love, and never would again. Now, he sought only companionship.

Tonight, she would be his companion. It was her twenty-fifth birthday, and he was taking her to dinner and a play.

The maître d’ told her that her father was already seated and then led her back. They hadn’t seen each other since the night of her one-year anniversary meeting, which hadn’t been their all-time best time together, but he stood with a smile when he saw her approaching. He pulled out a chair for her, and the maître d’ made a little bow and went back to his station.

“You look beautiful, Sadie. Very elegant.”

“Thanks, Daddy.” She kissed his cheek and took the seat he’d held for her.

Her father didn’t like the way she normally dressed—honestly, there was a lot he didn’t like about the choices she made, even those that hadn’t nearly torpedoed her life. Sadie wondered how he’d feel about Sherlock. Not enthusiastic, she wagered.

But tonight wasn’t about all the ways he thought he’d failed because Sadie hadn’t turned out like her mother. Tonight was about letting her father be happy with her. So she’d worn a plain, sleeveless, little black dress—a sheath that nearly skimmed her knees—and basic black pumps. Her hair was solid black, her makeup was classic and lightly applied, her manicure undamaged and her polish red, and she wore her mother’s three-strand pearl choker and the bracelet that matched it. The six silver rings in each ear, and the ring in her nose, she left. They were too much of a pain in the ass to take out and put back in, so she never did.

Johnson Ballard was an executive with a corporate consulting firm. To this day, Sadie wasn’t entirely sure what he did, but he had a title—Senior Vice President—and a corner office, and he went off every day to do Important Things that, even in a world where more than half the corporate workforce worked remotely, from home, kept him at the office for ten and twelve hours a day.

When he was home, he’d tried to be a good father. Sadie’s mother had been a stay-at-home mom, but after she and Ben died, Sadie’s father had learned to cook and do laundry, and, when he was home, he’d helped with homework and taken her to movies and museums on the weekends. He’d tried.

She’d known he was doing his best. She could see that he was sad and lonely and trying to keep her safe and happy. So she had kept her shame and secrets to herself and let him think he was succeeding.

Nothing had been the same between them since he’d found out all that she’d been hiding, and Sadie didn’t know how to cross the new distance. Every time she tried to throw a rope to his side, he took a step back.

So tonight: no heavy talk, no weird clothes. She would be the Sadie he wanted her to be. She would be Sarah Elizabeth Ballard, who shared her mother’s name.

He was drinking a scotch and soda. When the server came for her drink order, she asked for a Pellegrino with lemon. Her father thought Diet Coke was too ‘prosaic’ to be part of a nice meal.

When the server left, he asked, “You’re not drinking? I’d thought we’d get champagne later to celebrate the day.”

“I don’t drink, Daddy.” Despite her best intentions, they were apparently going to the bad place right off the bat.

“Oh. But you’re not an alcoholic. Are you?”

“I’m an addict. I think they’re all kind of in the same pool of bad ideas.”

He nodded, then looked down at his own glass. “Sorry, should I—”

“No, it’s fine. I’m not tempted.” Scotch was gross, and she was feeling pretty okay, anyway. However, if he’d set out a fix kit on the table, or a bag of Oxys, that would have been a different conversation. But she kept that wry observation to herself.

For the next several minutes, they focused on their menus and didn’t talk. The server came back with her Pellegrino and took their orders—rare filet for him and portabella risotto for her—and then there was nothing left to do but talk to each other.

“How’re you—” Sadie started.

“Have you—” her father began at the same time.

They had the awkward laugh uncomfortable people have in a moment like that, and then Sadie sat back with a wave of her hand, indicating that he should go first.

“I was just wondering if you’ve thought more about my offer.”

He wanted her to come to work at his company; he thought her job was insufficiently serious and career-oriented. The thought that she spent most of her work days within sight of her bed fried his staid corporate head. If he saw the way she and her colleagues chatted with each other—including their boss—he’d probably throw a clot.

“No, Daddy. I like my job. It’s what I need.”

He sipped his scotch and shook his head. “It’s not a job for the future.”

“Daddy, I’m in tech. I’m constantly being trained in the newest consumer technology, and I have access to information about what’s next. My job is to understand how it all works. Short of building a wormhole generator, my job can’t get much more future.”

“I’m not talking about science fiction future. I’m talking about
your
future. Advancement in a company. Success. You don’t advance by sitting alone in your house.”

Her father was fifty-eight years old. He’d been working in the twenty-first century for most of his working life, and yet he had a strangely twentieth-century view of business and of the future. Not for the first time, Sadie thought that her father had locked his worldview in at the day before her mother and brother were killed, and he would live that life, and that world, forever. Sixteen years ago.

She absolutely could advance at her job. She could probably become a supervisor without changing anything. And there was a lot she could do if she were willing to relocate. Maybe she would be, someday. But for now, she liked where she was and what she was doing.

“I’m happy where I am. I’m paying my bills, and I like who I work with and what I do.”

“Would you be paying your bills without what your mother left you?”

Yes, she would be. After the down payment on her apartment—her unit was a condo—she’d left the rest of it where it was. Her job paid well. Well enough, at any rate. But this conversation had pissed her off. Here she was, trying to be Good Sadie, and all her father wanted to talk about was what she was doing wrong. On her birthday.

So that was what she said. “Daddy, it’s my birthday. Can we just have nice talk?”

Blowing out a sigh, he gave her a guilty smile. “I’m sorry. I just want you to be happy, Sadie. It’s all I’ve ever wanted.”

“I know.” She reached across the table and took his hand. “I’m happy. Things are going well. I promise.”

He cocked his head and turned her arm. “What happened to your arm?”

Fuck. There was just no way she was going to get out of impossible conversations with her father tonight.

She’d healed well. The round-ish wounds weren’t lovely, but they were in the meat under her shoulder, and the cut of the dress, she thought, hid them. The one Sherlock had stitched was just a thin red line; he’d done an excellent job taking care of her. She’d dabbed a little makeup on it, but apparently not enough.

But she was absolutely not getting into this topic with her father, not tonight and hopefully not ever. She smiled brightly. “Oh, nothing. Just a cut. Healed right up.”

He frowned, but before he could say more, the server arrived with their salads. Sadie devoted superhuman attention to her food for the rest of the meal.

~oOo~

“I am so sick of these fucking spiders. I swore I’d never be in this cave again.” She mashed on the keys, fighting four giant, poisonous spiders, and killed them all, but not before one did her serious damage. Sherlock’s toon ran up behind her just as she was done. He’d taken damage, too. They got out their bandages and healed themselves up.

“Sorry,” came Sherlock’s disembodied voice into her headset. “You’re the one who wanted to bring up baby toons together instead of the obviously better choice to bring your main over to my realm.”

They’d been together—like, honestly together; she was in an actual relationship—for three-ish weeks, depending on what start date counted. He counted from the day of the protest. She counted from the day he’d shown up at her apartment and fucked her silly. So about a month for him, and about three weeks for her. He came to her four or five nights a week, often enough that she no longer bothered to put the trundle away under her daybed. She hadn’t yet been back to his place.

When they weren’t together, they’d started gaming together.

“I’ve been in my guild for six years. And I know damn well you don’t need another hunter in yours.”

“You’re better geared than our first-string hunter. Better stats all around. I could’ve made a case.”

“Yeah, but I’m not going to bump somebody out of your raid. I’m not a bitch.”

“I don’t know…you’re pretty bitchy tonight.”

“Fuck you.”

He laughed in her ear. “Exhibit A. What’s going on tonight?”

They’d cleared the cave of giant spiders and now started gathering loot. “Shitty night. My dad took me out to dinner for my birthday—”

“Fuck. That’s today. I’m sorry.”

She shrugged, not that he saw it. “It’s cool. I never actually told you my birthday. You’re just a snoop.”

“Investigator.”

“Stalker.”

He laughed at that but didn’t push the point further. She went on, “Anyway, it was shitty, and we did this weird kind of…fighting, I guess, where nobody said anything mean but we both said things that pissed each other off. I don’t know. It’s been weird with my dad since he found out I was an addict.”

“When was that?”

“When everybody else did. The day before I went into rehab last year.”

“Seriously? You used since middle school and nobody knew? You sure about that?”

“I’m sure. I was a high-functioning addict. I kept my shit together right up to the day that I lost it completely.” She laughed. “It’s probably why my legs look like they do.”

Her headset was quiet. She watched the screen, but Sherlock’s toon wasn’t moving. Had he DC’d? “Sherlock?”

“Sadie. Come here.”

“What?” Their toons were standing right next to each other. They, on the other hand, were more than ten miles apart.

“Come here. Come to me. Here.”

“You want me to come to your house? Now?” It was nearly one in the morning.

“Yes, I do.”

“Why?”

“Because I want to see you. You’ve had a shitty birthday, and I forgot about it, and I want to make it up to you.”