Page 96 of Snake

“That boss of yours said something that really ... well, my Nana would have said it got my goat. The more I thought about it, the madder I got, and I finally called your Pops and asked what he thought of that spray-tanned Neanderthal.”

It was beyond the point, but Autumn laughed anyway. “I think Chase comes by his tan naturally, Pom. He golfs like three whole rounds every weekend.”

At that point, Pom delivered a look that could not have been more emblematic of who he, Eliot March, extremely gay interior designer, was, and that looked screamed, Honey, please.

“I don’t know what to think about the fact that my only child cannot recognize an expensive fake tan from the glow bestowed by Ra himself, but that’s a crisis for another time. But the nose on that man? Babygirl, Chase Isley III does not actually play thirty-six holes of golf on any weekend, I guarantee you. He sits at the Nineteenth Hole and drinks his rounds.”

Honestly, Autumn was a little shocked. “But he’s got an athletic body!”

Pops chimed in there, and loudly. “How do you know what kind of body that man has?!”

“No, no—I mean he looks fit dressed.”

Pops actually said, “Phew.”

“Why are you both focused on my boss? I haven’t been upset because of my job, my job is fine. It’s great, actually. Chase hasn’t given me any trouble at all about taking time off, or working from home all week.”

She’d been shocked by Chase’s restraint, in fact. Ever since Signal Bend and his tantrum at the groundbreaking. She’d left a message that she was taking personal time effective immediately, and she had expected another tantrum from him, and probably threats, but he’d simply left a message saying Understood. Keep me posted. Every contact with him since had been straightforward and wholly professional. No slimy side comments, no weird looks, no attempts at condescension.

Her fathers were having an eye-contact conversation again. This was becoming absurd. And irritating as hell.

“What. Is. Going. ON?” she yelled. “What did Chase say that started all this?”

Pom turned to her. “As we were leaving, he said, ‘Don’t forget dessert, you could use a little more on the back end.’ When I turned to see if he had actually said that right out, and in front of your dad, he was watching you walk away.”

Oh, that was nothing. Autumn waved her hand to convey as much. “That’s just Chase. He’s all talk. I can handle him.”

Now Pops gave her a look. Pops was not the honey, please type. Autumn didn’t think he’d ever intentionally affected a rhetorical expression. His face just happened to him, showing what was going on in his head at any given moment. Controlling that in the courtroom had been one of his greatest challenges as a young attorney.

At this given moment, shock and disappointment was going through his head.

“Autumn Rooney.”

“March-Rooney,” Eliot corrected. They’d done two full years of working through the ‘March erasure’ of her chosen professional name. Apparently he’d retained a thread or two of discontent.

Pops acknowledged him with a conciliatory nod. “Autumn Renee March-Rooney, I want you to play back what you just said, and I want you to imagine Ida saying it.”

She did as he asked, but she started with a dramatic release of air, too loud and rhetorical to fit in the small box of the word ‘sigh.’ “Fine.”

That’s just Chase. He’s all talk. I can handle him.

All true. She wasn’t in denial that he was a boor who rode the line between cringey and illegal, but she knew how to, essentially, neuter him so she could do her job without his interference.

Except that hadn’t been the case when he’d joined her in Signal Bend, had it? Then, she’d struggled to keep him in his place, and she hadn’t succeeded, had she? She had actual hours of recording from that weekend. Most of it was unimportant, but some of it was ammunition if he ever came for her job, or made her job untenable.

If he truly was all talk, if she truly could handle him, why had she needed evidence?

And he’d actually assaulted her in Signal Bend. Cox had beaten him bloody for it.

Cox.

Oh, Cox.

No. Nope. Not dropping into that abyss again. She forced her focus back to Chase—not a pleasant topic, either, but less painful, and the actual focus of this uncomfortable dinner.

Imagine Ida saying it, Pops had instructed her. Ida was a teacher, so she had her struggles with her administration, but nothing that rode any kind of line between unpleasant and criminal. If Ida excused a boss, or any man, the way Autumn routinely excused Chase, how would Autumn react?

She’d be mounting up to ride at dawn.

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