Page 110 of He's The Reason Why

They’d made it through the prerequisites. Hi. How are you. Fine. You?

Now, it was time to move along to the rest of his dad’s family. If he stayed on task, he could get off the phone in under three minutes.

“How’s Michelle?” He could fake polite with the best of them. His stepmother wasn’t a horrible person. He didn’t hate her; he just didn’t know her at all.

“She’s good. Hey, Mickey, say hi to Blake.”

His dad had a habit of giving all the women in his life male nicknames. He’d never understood why.

There were scuffling noises in the background, and then his stepmother said brightly, “Hi, Blake! Merry Christmas!”

“Merry Christmas,” Blake said on automatic. “How’s Jenny?”

“She has the flu,” Michelle said. “It’s put a damper on things around here tonight, but we’re having a big New Year’s bash. You should come! We’d love to see you.”

That would be the last place he’d ever spend New Year’s Eve. “Sorry, I can’t. I’m in the middle of a project.”

“Oh. That’s too bad,” Michelle said. She sounded resigned. “Here’s your dad.”

“How’s the movie going?” Dad asked. “What was it,Conned? Love that name.”

“We start shooting in January.”

“Oh. That’s good.” His dad sounded as stiff as Blake felt.

Awkward silence filled the static between them. Two minutes, thirty seconds. That was how long it took for them to run out of things to talk about.

Blake searched for something to say that wouldn’t sound rude. “Saw your name on the billboard at Ceasars.”

“Oh yeah?” Was the pleased note in his dad’s voice because Blake had noticed, or because he was happy he had a good gig? It was impossible to tell. “I haven’t seen it yet. We kick off a series in February. We’ll all be moving there for the summer.”

“Oh really? Nice.” That meant Dad, Michelle, and Jennifer would be in Vegas at the same time Blake was trying to oversee the biggest project of his career.

Great.

“How’s Frankie?” Dad asked.

Blake glanced at the closed bedroom door. They’d just gotten back from dinner and his mother was “getting comfy” as she called it. “She’s good.”

“Did her project wrap? Heard it was dicey there for a while.”

“Yep. It’s in post.” He’d been on the phone long enough. “Well, Merry Christmas to everybody. Hope Jenny feels better soon.”

“Blake, before you go, I wanted to tell you I saw a video of you on stage with Piper Bellamy.”

His stomach clenched. The last thing he needed right now was a critique of his performance from Eddie Ryan, the legendary crooner. There was a reason he never sang in public, and this was one of them. “I should go.”

“Hang on. I wanted to say…I’m proud of you.”

Blake’s breath caught. It wasn’t what he’d expected to hear at all. He couldn’t remember ever hearing those words from his dad before.

“I know you don’t put much stock in my opinion, but I wanted you to know you sounded really good. Better than good. You were great. Really, really great. And…well, I just wanted to tell you that.”

Blake’s throat constricted, making it hard to push words out. “Thanks, Dad. That…means a lot.”

“Ah, it’s the simple truth, son.” Dad’s voice was thick and heavy. “The two of you together were yin and yang. The way she looked at you…I got shivers. Reminds me of when I met your mom.”

Just like that, the warm, fuzzy feeling vanished. “Don’t go there.”

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