Page 1 of A Fool's Game

Chapter 1

Ainsley

“Home is great, Dad, but it’s not worth going to jail over.”

“You were never going to jail, Ainsley. It’s Christmas. I know you’re an adult, but still. I don’t like the idea of you all alone over there.” Even over speakerphone from thousands of miles away, the man’s voice still commands authority.

Luckily, I’ve spent my life strengthening against it. Or trying to, anyway.

“I’m not alone. I have Doc.”

“I could have a flight ready for both of you in an hour.”

“I’m staying here. We talked about this.”

“Yes, and I don’t see how one day makes any difference.”

“It makes a difference because I’ll be able to show up there first thing tomorrow morning and get started on my community service. The office opens at eight. I can put in a full day. I want to get as many hours as I can before classes start again in January. You know this already.”

“I know, I know. And I’m proud of you for taking the initiative on this. It’s just…Christmas, Ains.”

The first one we’ve ever spent apart.

Even in my vagabond gap years, when I spent most of my time avoiding him and hiding from my imminent future as a college student, I always flew back to New York for Christmas. It’s not a day I’ve ever been willing to leave my dad alone for.

The last few years, when he wasn’t alone at all, but in the company of his new fiancé, I still joined them.

And won the trophy for most awkward Christmas morning ever.

“Well, promise me you’ll go out and get a good meal, at least.”

“I’m getting ready to head out now.”

I’m sure he’s picturing me sitting in front of the floor to ceiling waterfront windows of Canlis, being served a full holiday meal by overenthusiastic hipsters, not the fish and chips dive bar on Portage Bay where I’m actually planning to go, but I’m not about to correct him.

“Merry Christmas, Ains. I love you.”

“Love you too, Dad. Give Victoria my love.”

“Will do. I’ll call you tomorrow.”

I toss my phone on the granite kitchen counter of my harbor-view townhouse and let out a sigh.

This year isn’t shaping up to be anything close to what I imagined for my senior year at the University of Washington.

After a teeny existential crisis and transfer to the other side of the country halfway through my sophomore year at Columbia, I thought I’d figured out what I wanted to be doing with my life. I settled right into my new engineering program and expected to be spending winter break finalizing my internship applications at the WHO and the CDC.

Instead, I’m scrambling to find enough community service hours that work around my class schedule so that I can digmyself out of the self-inflicted disaster I crashed into over the summer.

I’m familiar with the jokes people make about rich kids and consequences, and you know what? That shit is true.

Not that I was ever a delinquent teen or went on any crime sprees, but the few jams I found myself in over the years, my wealthy lawyer father always managed to make disappear.

And that’s the very reason I got the book thrown at me in court last month. Either I caught the judge on a bad day, or I got one who was sick of the inequality of it all. Maybe both. My dad was kind enough to point out that if I was still in New York, he could have gotten me off scot-free.

He didn’t stoop so low as to remind me that if I had just stayed in New York, I never would have gotten myself into trouble in the first place.But I know he was thinking it.

I pull on a heavy coat and step into my boots in the entryway just as a light dusting of snow starts to fall. Slipping gloves into my coat pocket, I decide to walk the six or so blocks down to the waterfront bar rather than call a car or pull my own out of the underground garage. I could use a few minutes to clear my head after that guilt trip from my dad.

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