“Are you finished talking?”
“For now, yes. I feel better, if that matters at all. Thank you.”
“It does matter. To me, it always has.”
“What?” she asked.
I stood quickly. “Come on. We’ll start with the backyard. That’s my favorite place on my property.”
11
Olivia
I sat in my car after work, gazing down at my father’s number. After getting home from Brett’s yesterday, I took the next step. I slipped that piece of paper my mother gave me into my purse so I could carry it with me wherever I went. My hands trembled as I looked at the number, then at the name. Daniel Wilson. Forty-six. The man that had walked out on his family. I spent the entire day thinking about the fact that his number was in my purse. That I knew his name. I had tried looking him up on social media in my spare time but hadn’t found anything. No Facebook. No Instagram. No Twitter. Nothing. Not even a few pictures that would give me an inkling of what he looked like now. I pulled my cell phone out of my purse, guided by a presence I couldn’t see, smell, or hear.
But I felt it.
And it was telling me to dial the damn number.
Before I knew it, the phone was at my ear, and it rang. And rang. And rang. I leaned back into the seat of my car, wondering if I should hang up. If this was a mistake. If I needed to backtrack and try this again another time.
Then, a gruff voice on the other end of the line picked up.
“Hello?”
I felt a shiver work its way down my spine.
“Daniel Wilson?” I asked.
“Who wants to know?”
I snickered. “It’s Olivia Masters. Your daughter.”
“Olivia?”
“Yeah?”
“I… can’t believe you actually called.”
“Honestly? Me neither,” I said.
“How are you?” he asked.
“Is that a serious question?”
“I’m sorry. I… uh…”
I hadn’t gotten this far with my plan. I hadn’t planned out what I was going to say to him if he did actually pick up the damn phone. I sat there in my car like an idiot, underneath the building of Greyson Consulting, like a fuckwad. I pulled the phone away from my ear and dropped my hand in my lap. What the hell was I doing, going into this without a plan?
“Olivia?”
I heard his voice through my cell phone, and I put it back up to my ear.
“Yes?” I asked.
“I’m sorry. I thought you might have hung up,” he said.
“Seems that you make it a habit of apologizing for the wrong things.”
“Can we talk? Face-to-face?”
His gruff voice became weaker. Like asking the question simply drained the life out of him.
“If you want, sure,” I said.
“Well, I’m staying at the Marriott downtown if you want to drop by.”
“I think this conversation would temper well with food. Why don’t we get dinner?” I asked.
“There’s a restaurant right beside it. Some sort of steak house.”
“Ruth Chris’s? It’s pretty swanky,” I said.
“I’ve got the money to treat my daughter to a steak.”
“But not to help Mom out over the years, right?” I asked.
I heard him sigh, and it bubbled an anger within me.
“I’m sorry, this was a bad idea,” I said.
“Dinner? Six? In like, thirty minutes?” he asked.
“You really want to do this, don’t you?”
“I really do, Olivia.”
I shrugged. “Fine. I’m leaving work now. I’ll head that way.”
“What do you do for work?”
“I just got hired on at Greyson Consulting. I’m the new consultant manager.”
“Sounds important.”
“I think it is,” I said.
“Thank you for agreeing to have dinner with me tonight. Will it just be me and you? Or is there someone special in your life?”
“I… don’t really know how to answer that question right now,” I said.
“Well, I want you to know that if there is someone special, you can bring him, too. Or her. Or whoever.”
“Thanks. I appreciate it,” I said.
“I’ll go on over and get us a table. Just give the hostess my name. Okay?”
“I’ll uh… see you soon, then.”
“Thank you for doing this, Olivia. I know I don’t deserve it, but it means a lot to me.”
“You really don’t. But I have some things I want to ask and some things I want to get off my chest.”
“I still really appreciate it,” he said.
“Me too.”
And I meant it.
I hung up the phone with him and immediately dialed Brett’s office number. I had it memorized after punching it in so many times from my own desk phone, though I had yet to set up the speed dial or some sort of direct line of communication with him. I sighed as the phone rang in my ear, and after a couple of rings, I heard his voice come over the line.
“This is Brett,” he said.
“Hey, it’s me.”
“Olivia? Something wrong?”
“Is it that obvious in my voice?” I asked.
“Well, not really. But we just got out of a meeting, and you said you were going home. Did you forget to tell me something?”