Page 57 of Switching Places

She thought about her brothers. They fit the role Phil had described, talking about torque and RPMs and all sorts of things that weren’t a bit of interest to her. Logan had never said a word about his car.

“I take it this is not a private party,” Logan said, placing a plate on the table.

Emma looked up and smiled, shaking her head.

“I couldn’t wait to eat, though. We didn’t have lunch and brunch was a long time ago.”

Phil’s eyes gleamed at her remark.

“Maybe I’m the one crashing a private party,” he said.

Logan dragged a chair over and sat down, his knee brushing against Emma’s, resting against her leg.

“We’ll just leave if it comes to that,” he said.

Phil laughed.

“Where did you find this treasure?” he asked.

“Right under my nose. Lily has the house next door.”

“Ah, no wonder she’s not so impressed with your wealth.”

“Phil.”

There was a warning edge in Logan’s tone.

“I was just about to ask Lily for her life’s story.”

“You don’t want to hear it,” she replied. “I’d much rather hear about your firm, how you get contracts, how you decide what you’ll do for special effects, what works, what problems you’ve had, things like that. I know about me, I don’t have a clue about what y’all do.”

“Logan can go on all night if you get him started, so be careful what you ask for,” Phil said.

When a newly arrived couple paused on the steps, he rose.

“Duty calls. I’ll get back when I can. In the meantime, Logan, be sure to give credit where it’s due.”

With that parting comment, Phil shot across the patio to greet the newcomers.

“He’s funny,” Emma said, her eyes following him.

“He’s also brilliant. Though I don’t tell him often. He has a healthy ego and I don’t need to feed it to make it any larger.”

“He says you have the real brains in the company.”

“Politically correct to the end. I am the boss.”

“Somehow I don’t think he’d say that if it weren’t true. He also considers himself a friend of yours and vice versa.”

“That’s right.” Logan began to eat. “Why not?”

While Emma was on a cordial basis with her own boss, they were too far apart in experience, and age, to be friends. And they kept the chain of command very strict at the library. The friendship between Logan and his employees struck her as unusual. She shrugged.

“Nothing’s wrong with it. In fact, it sounds nice. But it’s a bit unusual, don’t you think?”

“No. It’s the way I wanted to run a company. We work together, sometimes days and nights if we get behind. If we didn’t like each other and respect each other, it’d be impossible.”

“I bet you’re a stickler.”

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