Page 6 of On Thin Ice

Now, though…I knew it truly was a kindness—and, had Edna not been there, I might have jumped up, gone to the other side of the table, and hugged him, kissing him on the cheek.

Still…I had to ask the question. “Will I…have to repay you?” If he said yes, it wouldn’t be a deal breaker, but it would mean that I’d find an affordable school online if it cost less than the University of Denver or Metro State.

“That was not my intent. I pay for my employees’ continuing education on occasion. I don’t see why your education should be any different.”

That admission made it feel less special…but maybe he was just saying that to make me feel better about it.

When he stood, he said, “So do some research and let me know the results at our Sunday meeting.”

I nodded, feeling warmed by his genuine smile as he picked up his phone and planner and left the kitchen. It would have been easy to think of this as a ploy or another way he could keep me indebted to him…but somehow I knew that wasn’t the case. This was truly a genuine gift, one he understood I desperately wanted—and it helped me see that, even though I had ten years to serve here, it wouldn’t be for nothing.

I would leave with a degree and experience—and it was so odd that it would all be thanks to the man who was the son of my father’s enemy.

Although I should have been working, my conversation with Sinclair had made me so excited that I’d begun my research on the laptop downstairs.

It didn’t take me long to discover I would probably need a master’s degree to really be able to do what I thought I wanted. But even if Sinclair was only willing to pay for a bachelor’s degree, that would be a huge step.

As I continued researching, I found that there were several degrees I could earn in order to qualify for working in a museum, but I determined that a master’s degree in museum studies was the best. So my plan was to get a bachelor’s in art, history, or archaeology and a master’s in museum studies.

Making that decision helped me with looking at schools. The University of Denver topped Metropolitan State, but I found several online programs that could fit the bill as well. I wasn’t quite sure which to go with.

It wasn’t until Edna called downstairs to let me know lunch was ready that I realized I’d lost hours researching rather than working. But in my mind, I could justify it easily. If I were earning a degree to work in a museum, then those studies would help me here.

Of course, I’d probably be done working in the dungeon long before I finished school—and it made me wonder what project Sinclair would have me working on after I was done here.

Soon, I was enjoying a salad with Edna on the east patio and we enjoyed our usual banter…until she changed the subject. “Lise, I don’t want to make you feel uncomfortable, but I do want to impress upon you what a generous gift Mr. Whittier is giving you.”

Nodding quickly, I said, “Oh, I know it. School is expensive.”

“That’s not what I’m getting at. Mr. Sinclair is generous—but to a point. You know that girlfriend he was telling you about earlier?”

Like I could have forgotten. “The personal trainer?”

“Mm-hmm. That little piece of work. She’d wanted to open her own business—a combination gym with some kind of nutrition tie-in. They’d been sitting in the dining room one night discussing it and she presented her business plan to him, something he’d asked for before. And then after he looked at it, he told her it was too big a risk. She was too big a risk.”

I had so many questions, especially because I hadn’t known the woman, but I didn’t think Edna knew what she was talking about. Sinclair had said it himself: he paid for employees’ education on a regular basis.

But Edna was about to blow that thought out of the water too. “And what Mr. Whittier said about paying for his staff’s education? That’s only half true…he pays for half their tuition. They pay the other half, plus books and expenses. But, in your case, Mr. Whittier plans to pay for everything you need.”

Although I’d picked up on the fact that Edna listened in on conversations—that hadn’t snuck past me—how could she know all of this with such certainty? I asked her as much.

And she replied, “Because he told me so. He thinks you’re pretty special.” Please, I thought, please don’t let my face give away my delight. “Eat up, child. We’ve still got an entire afternoon of work.”

Work buoyed by the thought that maybe he really did feel about me the same way I felt about him—it made for a light afternoon.

Chapter 3

At dinner that night, Sinclair wore a crisp white long-sleeved shirt and tie without a jacket, and I was nearly floored at how the white fabric changed his face, making him handsome in yet another way. Sometimes it was hard to gauge his mood before he spoke because his face was an emotionless mask, something that had long been practiced and had become ingrained. I had a lot I wanted to tell him, but only if he wasn’t in a bad mood.

As Edna began setting various items on the table, reminding me of when I’d done that same job just days earlier, his eyes seemed to soften as if her presence was soothing. And I imagined it was, considering I felt the same way about the woman. And, of course, considering their history.

So I decided to move forward.

“I started doing some research,” I began, hoping he wouldn’t comment on the fact that I must have done it during “work hours.” But he said nothing, giving me only the slightest of nods to let me know he was paying attention. “And I found four different schools that would suit my needs. If I chose DU, I’d have to attend in person.” I wasn’t going to tell him about my plan to get both a bachelor’s and a master’s degree—at least not yet. If I chose DU for both, the master’s degree could be completed online—which would be perfect, because I imagined that if I were working full-time and attending school, I might have to take classes here and there as a part-time student…which meant a bachelor’s degree could take me ten years rather than four. And I was okay with that, because I could work on that master’s degree no matter where I lived at the time.

But DU was just one of my choices.

I proceeded to tell him about the other three and the reasons why I was torn among the four schools—and it mostly had to do with the classes themselves. One of the schools required that I take a foreign language and I’d struggled with Spanish in high school. I’d done fine with nouns and adjectives and present tense, but once we got into conjugating verbs in past and future tense, I’d flailed. And, although I knew college wasn’t easy, I didn’t want to set myself up for failure. Two of the other schools had classes that sounded fascinating but neither offered all the same courses.

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