Page 50 of Mile High Ex's Dad
“Do I want to know where?”
“No.”
She studies me for a moment, then makes the mistake of letting her hand slide farther up my arm, a little more intimate now, an old reflex dressed up as comfort. “You know,” she says, softer,“we do not have to perform estrangement every minute of this weekend. For Ethan’s sake, at least.”
I remove her hand gently. “Alina.”
A warning, mild but unmistakable.
She sighs. “I was only being friendly.”
“No. You were being nostalgic.”
“And if I was?”
“We were better on paper.”
Her smile fades briefly before her façade appears again. “You always did know how to charm.” With that, she walks away.
I see her before she sees me.
She’s coming in from the side path that leads back toward the house, arms full of garment bags and a flat white box balanced against her hip, moving faster than she should for someone carrying that much. She’s changed into lighter clothes for the morning, a soft dress under a cardigan, nothing heavy over it now, and I notice at once what I missed in the dark last night.
Or tried to miss.
She has been dressing to hide it.
Not perfectly. Not from someone looking. The lines are softer, easier to mistake if you don’t know what you’re seeing, if you’re not standing there with your hand having already found the shape beneath the fabric. But now that I know, I can see the care in it.
She shifts the weight in her arms and keeps going.
I set my coffee down and cross the lawn before I can think better of it.
She spots me halfway there and, for one brief second, I watch the exact moment she considers turning around.
Too late.
When I reach her, I take the box from her hands without asking.
Her eyes widen. “What are you doing?”
“Saving your back.”
“It was fine where it was.”
“It was slipping.”
“It was not slipping.”
I glance at the box. “It was thinking about it.”
That gets a look from her. Tired, wary, unwillingly amused around the edges. “I’m fine,” she says.
“Yes,” I say. “You keep saying that.”
She shifts the garment bags higher on her shoulder and gives me a level look. “Maybe because it happens to be true.”
“Maybe because you’re stubborn.”
