Games of the Heart (The 'Burg #4)(32)
She didn’t know what to say. If she said what she should, he’d get angry. She liked her Dad loving on her, not angry at her.
“Reesee, honey, I gotta go. You got somethin’ to say?” he prompted.
“Uh…what do you want for dinner?”
His head tipped to the side and his brows drew together.
“You cookin’?”
She hated to cook. No loved it but made a mess that she had to clean up if he cooked so she hated No to cook too.
Still, if you loved someone, you found ways to show it and her Dad worked hard. She knew he took overtime a lot because they needed the money seeing as he was raising two kids on his own. But he’d always done that. Before they broke up, she heard her Mom and Dad fighting about it more than once. Mom up in his face about never being home, Dad reminding Mom that he took the overtime the other detectives didn’t want because he had to pay Mom’s bills. She wasn’t supposed to hear this but she did because she left her room and sat in the hall outside theirs and listened. It wasn’t hard to hear her Mom, even all the way back in Clarisse’s room. Mom was loud anyway but she also shouted a lot. But if Clarisse wanted to hear Dad, she had to sit outside their room since he talked quiet.
He still took overtime. Not as much but he took it. He shouldn’t have to come home and cook most nights.
“Uh…sure,” she told Dad.
He grinned.
She’d done good.
“Me and No’ll eat whatever you make, sweetheart.”
“Mac and cheese and hot dogs?” she asked.
“Sounds perfect,” he said softly.
She smiled at him.
“Homework, Reesee,” he reminded her then, “See you soon.”
“Bye, Dad.”
“Bye, beautiful.”
He left. She grabbed brain food and a pop and went directly to her Dad’s office to switch on the computer. Then she went to her room to get her books and drag them to the office. Layla followed her throughout her movements and then settled on her side by the desk chair in the office while Clarisse got down to work.
She was done with her homework and had the pasta in the water by the time he got home.
*
Thursday late evening…
Mike listened to the phone ring but didn’t have a lot of hope.
This was his ninth call since Tuesday morning. He hadn’t called any of her other numbers because he knew she was busy and if she was in her shed or at the gallery, he’d disturb her. He’d only called her cell.
Now it was ten his time, nine hers and he’d just got no answer on her cell so was trying her house.
And he was trying not to have a knee-jerk reaction and think she was playing games. Since divorcing Audrey, he’d found that bullshit missed calls and ignoring voicemails were games women liked to play. Games of the heart. Games he’d learned the hard way not to play.
“Hello?”
She answered.
He made an effort to control his temper.
“Dusty,” he replied.
“Finally!”
He blinked at his cocked knees. He was sitting in nothing but pajama bottoms, back to the headboard in his bed.
“Is everything okay?” she asked.
“That’s what I’ve been wanting to know from you for three days.”
“What?”
“Dusty, I’ve called nine times and left four voicemails.”
“Oh, honey, God. I’m sorry. I lost my cell phone. Didn’t Clarisse tell you?”
His neck got tight.
“Clarisse?” he asked quietly.
“Yeah. I lost my cell and didn’t have any of your numbers memorized. Hunter only has your cell. So I called it yesterday. Clarisse answered and I gave her a message. Told her to ask you to call me on the home phone or at the shed.”
“Reesee answered my cell?”
Dusty was silent.
“Dusty,” he called. “My daughter answered my cell?”
“If I say yes, are you gonna get pissed at your girl?”
“Uh…yeah.”
“Then I decline to answer.”
Fuck.
His eyes went from his knees to the closed door of his bedroom. Why would Clarisse take a call? And if she did, why wouldn’t she give him a message?
Fuck.
“Mike?”
“I use my cell for work. She knows she’s not supposed to touch it,” he explained.
“Maybe it was a mistake.”
“Right, then, if it was, why did she not give me your message?”
“Well,” she said slowly, “I don’t have an answer to that.”
“Fuck,” he muttered.
“So, you’re a super gorgeous hot guy. My guess, you didn’t practice celibacy since you divorced your ex. How was she with the other women in your life?”
“She wasn’t any way since I never connected with any of them in a way where I felt the kids would need to go through that shit,” Mike told her.
Her voice was vibrating with humor when she asked, “Any of them?”
Mike lost some of his anger and answered, “Yeah.”
“How many of them were there?”
He grinned and replied, “You don’t wanna know.”
“Oh yes, yes I do. I need a detailed list with addresses and phone numbers so I can personally thank each one of them for topping up your experience so I get the ultimate one every time.”