Page 94 of Puck Drop
“I’m here to see my father,” I say as soon as I am close enough. “He called me that he’s in here. His name is…”
“Elizabeth!”
I turn on my heels at hearing my name, surprised to come face to face with Leyla, my father’s PR manager for the Sliders.
“You got here very fast,” she smirks. “Just like he said you would.”
I press a hand to my chest. “Is he okay?”
“Yes.” She frowns at me. “Why wouldn’t he be?”
“Well, this is a hospital.” I don’t even know why I have to point out the obvious. “He said to be here as soon as possible. I thought something happened to him.”
Leyla shakes her head and looks up at the ceiling. “He is so damn dramatic sometimes, I can’t deal.”
Nothing makes sense right now, and I am out of breath. Between the panic and the running from where the Uber dropped me off, you could knock me down with a feather.
“Come with me.”
Leyla grabs me gently by the arm and walks me with me until we stop in front of some elevators. I give her a side eye, wanting to say something, but then changing my mind. Once again, I remind myself that I don’t know her well enough to be a smartass.
The doors to a car finally open, and we step inside together. I watch as she presses her manicured finger onto number eleven, and the doors close.
“It’s like we’re in a spy movie,” I comment. Leyla, to her credit, chuckles softly. “Why all the secrecy?”
She shrugs at me. “He likes the dramatic effect. Always has.”
The way she talks about my father speaks volumes. It’s as if she knows him really well, more on a personal level rather than professional. I’ve been suspecting that for a few days now. My father made little comments here and there about Leyla. There’s a definite undercurrent there, but I’ve been too busy with my own relationship to ask questions about his. If there even is one in his case. I’d bet money that there is, though.
“But he is not in the hospital because he’s hurt?”
She smiles again. “No.”
I frown and look ahead, unsure of what other questions to ask.
“Asking me to rush to the hospital just for him to talk to me is very odd.”
“It sure is,” Leyla agrees. “But when he wants something resolved, he wants to do it that very moment. Patience is not his forte.”
I raise an eyebrow in surprise. However, she is correct. My father, when impatient, does not like to wait. That means that whatever he’s got to tell me could not wait a second longer. Still weird he asked me to meet him here of all places.
The elevator stops on the eleventh floor without any incidents. We both walk out, and since I have no idea where I am supposed to go, I have no choice but to follow Leyla down the hallway she takes us on. She makes a sharp right, then stops in front of a door.
“Conference room for friends and family,” I read the words on the door out loud. “Whose friends or family?” I ask Leyla.
She raises her hand and knocks but doesn’t wait for permission to go in. Instead, she opens the door and steps to the side for me to follow suit.
“Yourfriends and family in this case,” she replies.
My eyes widen in surprise when I notice the two people sitting at the table in the middle of the room. My father and Logan are across from each other, but I don’t sense any tension in the air, which would be expected given the circumstances.
“Logan,” I whisper. I haven’t seen him in almost a week, and I am dying to rush to him. I am tired of chasing after him, though.
After talking to my father about this the other day, I realized that I’ve been putting all the work in since he was banished from New York. I’m tired. This doesn’t mean that I am ready to give up on him, only that I need him to make more of an effort.
He was ready to support you reach your dreams of being an artist, a small voice speaks inside my head.And he’s been telling you how much he loves you.
All that is true, but he was also ready to let me go at the first sign of trouble. What kind of a foundation is that?
