Page 9 of Time After Time

She didn’t give me the drama I braced for.

She gave me dignity.

Hell, she’d said goodbye with a flourish, refusing even to let me drive her home, claiming it was no longer appropriate. She’d delivered it like a joke, smiling, but I caught the tremble in her lips. I didn’t argue. She was going to cry. And she wanted to be alone. So did I.

I remember the first time I asked her out to dinner; she was surprised that it'd been a date. She couldn’t imagine I found her attractive.

I still do.

There’s something about her honesty, lack of artifice, that is so naïve that it makes her stand out in a roomful of people. I doubt she knows that.

“Isn’t she dating someone?” Bob, Tanya’s husband, muses.

The fuck? Ember is dating! Who? Did she find another man who finds her as captivating as I did…do?

“Who is dating?” Jean, Ember’s father, raises his eyes to meet Bob’s. He’s been reading something on his iPad and ignoring everyone around him. He does that a lot. But the minute you mention his kids, even if he seems like he’s not paying attention, he is.

“Ember has a boyfriend?” Calypso’s tone is overly curious, her brows lifting with interest.

There’s something too pointed about the question. Like she’s picked up on the way I’ve been watching Ember—how my gaze lingers when it shouldn’t—and now she’s trying to read the subtext.

She’s clocked it. And now she wants to know exactly who Ember Rousseau is and what she means to me.

“No, that ended, and he wasn’trightfor her,” Margot assures everyone.

“Why?” Calypso probes.

“For starters, he wasn’t very nice to her.” There’s distaste written all over Margot’s face.

What did she mean? What did he do? The son of a bitch.

“He was a musician, a bass player in a band,” Tanya adds, as if that’s a cardinal sin. “Andhe had a flexible zipper.Pig.”

“That asshole wasn’t worthy of my daughter,” Jean announces and goes right back to his iPad.

I take a sip of my champagne, wanting to get up and leave, not enjoying this continued discussion about Ember and her life.

“Margot, I could talk to Ember and…you know, help out with makeup andthings,” Calypso offers politely.

Jesus Fucking Christ!

“That’s an idea,” Margot says. She appears thoughtful, but she’s brushing Calypso off.

Jean snaps out of his reading again. “Who needs help with makeup?”

Ember doesn’t! She looks amazing first thing in the morning, fresh as dew.

“Ember,” Tanya says.

“Give it a rest, Tanya.” I can’t keep the irritation out of my voice.

“Well, I’d better check on dinner and Chef.” Margot rises, kisses Jean’s cheek, and sashays toward the kitchen like she’s on a runway. It’s her way of ending the discussion around her daughter.

I lean back against the velvet cushions of the comfortable couch in the glassed sunroom where we’re all ensconced for pre-dinner drinks.

“Ransom, we’re only being helpful,” Tanya continues once Margot is out of earshot. “Ember’s thirty…she should be dating and not hiding in her lab all the time.”

“She’s nothidingin her lab, sheworksthere,” Jean snaps, his eyes narrowing with irritation. “And Ember doesn’t need to find herself a man. She’s got the biggest balls in any room she’s in. When there’s a man who can handle her, be worthy of her, I’m sure she’ll?—”