Page 94 of Games We Play
Sloan waited until Janet was firmly settled in her seat before discussing what brought her to the Vaughn household. Simply put, she wanted to invest in Leah’s dreams of her own bakery. “I’ve already purchased a location around the corner from here,” she said with her matter-of-fact demeanor that always served her well in the business world. “All that needs to be done is remodeling it in her vision and perhaps offering her a mentorship with an established businessperson in the city.”
Janet sipped her coffee while keeping a steady eye on any of Sloan’s movements. Wiping a lash out of her eye. Crossing her legs. Sniffing. Rubbing her fingers together, because God knew the awkwardness was rising in that little kitchen.
“Why are you telling me this, Ms. Sloan?”
“Ah…” Well, that wasn’t what she expected to hear right away. “You’re her mother, yes? Leah’s currently struggling to accept my offer. She seems to be under the impression that she isn’t ready for this venture, and I was hoping you could…”
“My daughter is bright, when she opens her eyes.” Janet stirred more milk into her coffee. “I don’t disagree that she’s not ready to start her own business. She now recognizes when her faults will get in the way of her life. One of my daughter’s greatest faults is that she can be quite the irresponsible girl. I’m sorry if you’ve been lead to believe otherwise.”
Sloan was completely smacked with disbelief. “I actuallydodisagree with that, Mrs. Vaughn. Leah is one of the most responsible people I’ve ever met.”
Janet glanced at the girl in the living room.Are you kidding me? You’re still holding a child’s ignorance and hormones over her head eighteen years later?No wonder Leah had so many difficulties accepting praise and believing in herself!
Sloan didn’t need Janet to push her daughter into accepting the bakery. That wasn’t what this trip was about.I wanted to meet the woman who raised Leah. Well, here she is. Now I have most of the answers I need.That didn’t mean Sloan was on her way out the door, though. There were still a few more questions she needed to ask before her curiosity was truly sated.
“My daughter has been learning a lot of life’s hardest lessons from an early age,” Janet said. “One of those lessons is knowing a bad relationship for what it is. It’s my experience that a bad relationship can lead to… unfortunate decisions. Are you not the woman my daughter was seeing until a couple of weeks ago?”
Still flabbergasted, Sloan replied, “I was dating your daughter until recently, yes.”
“The one flying her out to Chicago, no less?”
“She told you that much, huh?”
“My daughter and I have a genial understanding. I understand that she’s an adult with her own love life, and she understands that she still lives in my house and must tell me where she’s going so I don’t have to needlessly worry. So, yes, she told me that the woman she dated was flying her out to Chicago for choice weekends. I figured that such a woman must have some means, but I wasn’t expecting…” She pursed her lips. “Forgive me, Ms. Sloan. It’s not my place to judge appearances.”
Sloan was about to choke!
“I try not to judge appearances, either.” If she were to judge Janet’s appearance, though, Sloan would note that Mrs. Vaughn had a plain way of dressing and wore her hair as if she no longer cared about what other people thought of 1995 chic. Such women tended to be the biggest pains of asses Sloan could ask to deal with.Why? Because they’re allergic to change and things being out of order.Sloan loved to bring chaos to such women’s lives, but not when they might be a potential mother-in-law. “Leah is…”
“Leah is who she is,” Janet interrupted. “Honestly, I’m not sure what you see in my daughter, Ms. Sloan. She’s not much to look at. Unfortunately, beauty is not a heavy trait on either side of her family, but I suppose she is good at following direction. That’s why she does so well at the bakery she currently works at. Enid runs a tight ship, but it’s not a ship I worry about my daughter jumping from.”
“Yes.” Sloan could hardly contain her true opinion of this exchange. “Well, I’m not here to ask for your daughter’s hand in marriage, Mrs. Vaugh.” As if. Sloan would abscond with Leah to Vegas and be done with it.Not until my divorce is finalized, though.Assuming Leah would ever say yes. She was the only one who had to say yes, after all. “I was merely prodding you to think of Leah’s potential. I would love to invest in her talents. You say she’s doing well at her current place of employment, but I think she’s stagnated. She has so much talent, and little opportunity to express it.” Sloan had seen Rose City’s website, particularly the portfolio. Enid was kind enough to label which baker did what design, but there was something… withheld… to Leah’s. Probably due to the constraints Enid put on her. Oh, the cakes and cookies were perfectly nice to behold, and Sloan was sure they were worth how much they cost, but why should Leah be so limited? She was born to make delicate macarons and create cupcakes that were twice their size in frosting alone. Leah’s defunct baking Instagram showed plenty of dormant talent. Why shouldn’t she be given the proper opportunity to hone her craft and share it with the world?
“Stagnated… Ms. Sloan, Leah is the type of girl who does best with routine. I’m afraid that running her own bakery would prove… a struggle in adjustment.”
Why does she keep calling a thirty-year-old woman a girl?Leah was a woman, inside and out. Sloan would know. She had inspected both.
“By the way,” Janet continued, “I would like to apologize if my daughter has been a handful in any way. She’s been known to make brash decisions from time to time.”
“She is hardly a handful.”I wouldn’t mind her being a bigger handful.Sloan wasn’t generally interested in prim and proper ladies who rarely spoke their minds. She much preferred a woman who knew what she wanted and wasn’t afraid to vocalize it – like herself. “She’s one of the most agreeable people I have ever met.”
Sloan chose to take her leave then, but not before stopping halfway across the living room to glance at Karlie, who stared back at her with reverent awe.
“Are you the woman Leah was dating,” she timidly asked.
“Yes.” Sloan lowered her sunglasses and straightened her jacket. “Was.”
“I saw you in the news recently. About your… never mind.”
“Indeed. That’s why she broke up with me.”
“She broke up withyou?”
“Like I said,” Janet interrupted on her way by, “she makes brash decisions. Particularly when it comes to matters of the heart.”
I think you and I have very different definitions of brash.Leah followed her heart, but not hard enough.She loves me, after all.A fact Sloan hadn’t taken seriously until it was too late. And a fact she never mulled over for herself until Leah was long gone.
“You’re crazy,”her financial adviser had said, when Sloan asked for real estate suggestions in Portland.“Why are you wasting your money on this? You’re going through a divorce and about to dump the company you’ve helped established. Now is not the time to frivolously spend!”No, her investment into Leah’s bakery would not make her millions. She would’ve been better off investing in medicine or bike repairs, but it was important for her to see that Leah was set up with one of her dreams coming true.
