Page 41 of Father Knows Best (A Family Affair #1)

twenty-four

. . .

sutton

The Reason

Smoothing my palms along her back, I watch as the cream blends into her skin, smooth and even. “Your Bora Bora tan is just about gone,” I tell Avery. She groans as my hands knead her sore muscles but turns her head enough to show me her pout.

“That makes me sad. I miss Bora Bora,” she hums thoughtfully before returning her focus to her phone, where she’s reading an email from a furniture company she often works with.

I push her hair off her neck, and work the muscles there, too. “I’ll have to take you back for our anniversary.”

Though she is focused on her phone, she doesn’t reply, and I know the email has little to do with that. She’s been off and slightly preoccupied since we returned, and I know why.

“Miss him?”

She twists, taking her bare back from me, but presenting me with her towel covered front. “Is it cruel to you if I say yes?”

I open my mouth, but before I reply with “no, of course not,” I take a moment and truly consider it.

Sitting down, I keep my focus on my feet as Avery pulls her shirt back on, and refolds the towel she used to protect the couch as I rubbed her back.

She pulls her long hair from under her shirt, and it spills down her chest, smelling like black cherries and vanilla.

I twist a strand of her hair around one of my fingers, enjoying how soft it is. How good she feels.

“It’s not cruel. I miss him, too. Obviously not in all the same ways that you do but… strangely, it doesn’t hurt me to hear that you miss him.” I let go of her hair and she slips her hand into my lap, curling our fingers together.

“You know that I love you more than anything and the fact that you’re secure enough for these sweeping changes only makes me want and need you more,” she tells me, but the truth is?

I know this. I know how Avery feels, because not a day goes by—not even in the last few weeks of missing my dad—that she doesn’t make me feel adored, loved, and like the center of her world.

I could see in his eyes that she made him feel that way, too.

“I am a bit surprised by my own security, I won’t lie.

I mean, when you and Brandon worked together, I found myself irrationally jealous sometimes.

But with him, I almost feel, I don't know, at ease? Maybe it’s knowing that you want him back, that you want what he has to offer, but that you want me too?

I don’t know.” I scratch the back of my head and peek over at her, finding her blue eyes locked to my profile.

She’s listening intently, and there’s no surprise there, because Avery is a good listener.

She’s perfect.

And I want her to have everything she wants. That’s the role of a husband, a partner, a provider.

“Thank you,” she says, tossing her phone aside to crawl into my lap and straddle me.

She holds my face in her hands, electric excitement zapping down my spine from her affection.

“I know we talked about the honeymoon already,” she says, speaking to our heartwarming two-hour talk the night we got home from Bora Bora.

She told me thank you so much for everything, and then we discussed a little more of what she wants to explore with my dad, and I shared with her my sense of disappointment with myself for not dialoguing any of this until our wedding night.

It was a good heart to heart, and I think of her tender affection during that talk while she strokes her thumb over my cheekbone now.

“But thank you again, and I’ll never stop telling you thank you, for being the man of my dreams and giving me everything that I want. ”

I sigh and enjoy the kiss she places on my lips. Her brows furrow. “Why the sigh?”

Uneasy, I rake a hand up the back of my neck and over my hair, mussing it further. “Come on, it’s late. You have a huge staging with Arnaud tomorrow and I have a showing in the Pacific Heights, and I need to grab my suits from the cleaners.”

Standing, Avery remains clung to me, and I carry her upstairs to our room, where I put her down on the bed.

She slips out of her clothes and into her favorite silk nightgown while I’m using the bathroom.

The room is dark and cool, with only the moonlight dripping over the bed in golden waves.

It’s beautiful, and after my eyes adjust to the lack of light, and find her, my chest tightens.

Holding the comforter back for me, the ring I gave her glittering on her finger, blue eyes blinking up at me, I know I have to get my dad back here.

I get into bed and press my lips to hers and we say our goodnights. I stay awake, and run through how I’ll work in a visit to my dad’s place tomorrow, amidst everything else I have to do.

It’s imperative.

“Tonight, can I come by? Maybe for half an hour or so? Quick talk,” I tell him, as he passes a stack of files to Birdie, who replaced Chanel when we thoughtfully removed Brandon from Mercer Properties. She touches his shoulder, asking, “Anything else?”

He looks between us, then at her. “Nothing.” He lifts his eyes to me. “Come in.”

I didn’t really plan on stopping in for a closed-door talk, not at work, but I step inside and close the door behind me nonetheless.

I guess Avery isn’t the only one who obeys my dad.

“I actually wanted to talk to you at your place, not at work, because, well, you know,” I tell him, because clearly the thing I want to discuss is how he promised to move into the guest room for an undetermined amount of time after we got back from the honeymoon, but instead has been somewhat avoiding the both of us at work for the last two weeks.

He’s been blaming his inability to move in on the remaining work that needs to be done at his place.

Avery buys it. That’s because she’s never been to Dad’s house.

His home needs no work, and even if it did, it’s not like Geo Mercer is going to strap on a tool belt and get it done.

He’d hire someone, and, for that matter, he wouldn’t stay home and monitor their work.

That’s why he has Birdie, who acts more like his personal assistant than the Mercer Properties front desk clerk that she is.

He clears his throat, dropping his eyes to a stack of papers that I’ve seen on his desk for the better part of three years, items that may have been pressing sometime ago but now are obsolete. Yet he studies them, as if they’re the most interesting papers in the world.

Fear clogs my throat and lines my stomach with sickness. Is he changing his mind? Did he come home and feel some type of way about our arrangement? I don’t know, but I know at work is not the place to push for answers. He’ll shut down if I push for more. I know, because I’d do the same.

Cut from the same cloth, after all.

“I can’t tonight,” he says, still flipping papers and not looking at me, the combination of those two things scary enough to have me on my feet, moving toward him.

I didn’t want to talk about this at work, but he’s shutting down, and shutting me out, so I’m out of options.

“You’ve been avoiding us all week. Actually, you’ve been avoiding us since we got home from Bora Bora.” I put my hand on the folder to prevent him from opening it, and finally he brings his focus up to me. “You’re pulling back. Why?”

His eyes search mine, and his mouth parts, like there are so many things he wants to say right there on his tongue, weighty and burning. Yet he says nothing, and the intensity in his eyes burns bright, holding mine, instilling me with a sense of worry, the back of my brain going numb.

“Dad,” I start, taking my time, feeling the utter role reversal of us in this moment.

After all, being vanilla is what led him into my relationship, and now, he’s hesitant to discuss the cacophony of flavors (his words) we’ve willingly run into together, all three of us.

“Avery adores you. She’s been really missing you. ”

A partial smile curves his lips. “I miss her, too. I mean, I see her here of course–”

I cut him off, because it’s important that he knows that the way in which she misses him has nothing to do with Mercer Properties, and everything to do with what they started building together in the wedding suite that night, weeks ago.

Something is on his mind, but when he finally speaks, I don’t push, and instead just listen.

“I didn’t mean to renege on anything,” he says slowly, almost cautiously, like there’s another truth inside him he’s protecting.

“I just… I guess I wasn’t sure how much you’d both really want to go through with everything once we were home from Bora Bora. ”

Nodding, I tell him the truth. “Avery wants everything we discussed that night in the hotel. And she had your room ready the day after we came home.” I clamp my hand to his shoulder.

“I realize it’s slightly unconventional, but I have to tell you, I love seeing her this way.

And I’m not too proud to admit that half of that is you . ”

My dad nods his head, placing his hand on my wrist, giving it a squeeze. “Okay. I’ll come by tonight.”

Avery is standing at the stove, swaying to the gentle rumblings of “Thru and Thru” by the Rolling Stones while she cooks chicken.

Her hair is up, and she’s already in her pajamas—she showers and gets in pajamas after work on the days she has long stagings.

A candle flickers on the counter, and the TV screen reflects on the wall of windows in the living room, where the news plays on mute.

With my hand at my tie, I loosen it. “Smells good.”

She turns, smiling. “You’re home. And thank you, it's curried chicken with rice and vegetables.” She returns her focus to the meal, but nods to the other side of the counter, where I’d missed the open wine bottle and partially full glass.

“I opened a red. Want some? Dinner will be done in about twenty.”

Stepping aside, I reach for two wine glasses, and fill them both, emptying the bottle. As I set the bottle down, my dad steps into the kitchen, lowering two large suitcases to the ground with a soft thud.

Avery jumps, spinning around, yielding her yellow spatula as her eyes come to rest on my dad. “G!” she exclaims, abandoning the spatula on the counter as she leaps into his arms, and buries her face in his neck. He holds her, his silver eyes cutting to mine.

I sip my wine. “I told you she missed you.”

He turns his head, burying his face in her all the same. “I missed you, too, honey.”

We eat Avery’s dinner, and enjoy a second bottle of wine. Dad retires to his room, but closes his door, and we go to bed, too, closing ours.

“I’m happy he’s here, even if his door is closed tonight,” she tells me when we’re cuddled up in bed not long after.

I kiss her forehead, and share her sentiment. In the back of my mind, I know there’s a reason why that door is closed. And for Avery, I’m determined to find out why.