Page 133 of Defending You

At a break in their conversation, she said, “Michael, I never properly thanked you for everything you did. With Gagnon and…”

“Don’t mention it.” He waved her off with a flick of his wrist. “Uncle Gavin beat me to the punch. His contacts are much higher level than mine are.”

The mention of Cici’s father made her stomach flutter with a familiar mix of anxiety and confusion. Since the incident, Dad had been…different. Gentler. More attentive. He’d called her every day, checking on her healing, asking about her business, actually listening to her answers. It was…bizarre.

She excused herself and made her way inside, finding Alyssa and Brooklynn in the kitchen. Brooklynn had a flair for making a charcuterie board a work of art.

Alyssa, ever the practical one, kept her from going crazy. “You don’t have to turn the pepperonis into flowers.” Her eye roll hinted at her exasperation. “It just makes people feel guilty for eating them.”

“But it’s so much prettier?—”

“What’s going on with Dad?” Cici interrupted.

Both sisters looked up, and she caught the meaningful glance they exchanged.

“Right?” Alyssa said, unscrewing a jar of olives. “I wondered if he was doing it to you too.”

“What, exactly?” Cici managed to shimmy onto a stool on the opposite side of the counter, ignoring the twinge in her ribs.

“He’s been…” Brooklynn wagged her head. “Nice?” She said the word as if it tasted foreign. “Like, genuinely nice. Not his usual ‘I’m-being-civil-because-your-mother-is-watching’ nice.”

“He apologized to me.” Alyssa looked behind as if someone might overhear a terrible secret. “After everything that happened with Ghazi and Peri.”

Earlier in the summer, Alyssa had been kidnapped by a terrorist. Well, Peri’d been kidnapped. Alyssa had allowed herself to be taken so she could save the little girl. No wonder Callan was head-over-heels.

“He apologized?” Cici clarified. “Dad?”

“Yeah. And told me he was proud of me.” Alyssa shook her head in wonder. “I was still in shock after all the…well, you know, and I honestly thought I was hallucinating.”

“He’s been the same way with me,” Brooklynn added, leaning against the counter, giving up on her pepperoni flowers. “Ever since the fire, it’s like he’s trying to…I don’t know, make up for something. He told me my picture—the sunrise one?”

She asked the question as if they might have forgotten the gorgeous photograph that’d won her a coveted prize. As if they didn’t all have a copy hanging in their homes.

Cici tapped her nose. “I think I know which one you mean.”

Alyssa laughed, and Brooklynn said, “Shut up.” But her cheeks were turning pink. “I’m just saying, he told me it was beautiful, that he was… yeah, like you said.” She flicked a glance at Alyssa. “Proud of me.”

Alyssa set a handful of cheese slices on the wooden board. “I think…I think he’s finally figured out that he’s been a terrible father.”

The blunt assessment hung in the air between them.

Brooklynn fixed the cheese, arranging it just so. “He wasn’t…terrible.”

Alyssa’s eyebrows hiked. Cici just stared at her.

Brooklynn laughed first, and Alyssa and Cici joined in.

“Well, it’s weird,” Cici said.

“But nice,” Alyssa said. “I mean, maybe you didn’t need it, but I did.”

“Hmm.” Brooklynn returned her focus to the charcuterie. “Maybe a little.”

Cici had needed it. She’d craved her father’s love all her life. Apparently, all it took was a little near-death experience to?—

“Girls.” Mom poked her head into the kitchen. “Hurry up with that. Forbes has some kind of grand announcement.”

Cici and Alyssa both looked at Brooklynn, who was careful not to meet either of their eyes as she grabbed the charcuterie and followed Mom toward the deck.