Page 58 of Confusing Cade
CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX
CADE
The Park City trip left me elated.
That was probably the right word for the sense of lightness and optimism I hadn’t known for a long time, maybe even decades. Everything felt better, and I was kinder. When Monday morning rolled around back in Palm Beach, I gave the barista at the coffee shop around the corner from my office an extra ten percent over my usual tip. I stopped at the security guard’s desk to ask George how he was doing and if his kids were still playing Select Soccer. Even Julie at the reception desk got a friendly greeting from me, and I had to laugh at the shocked expression on her face when she realized I knew her name.
Everything was going my way.
Everything.
My phone buzzed with an incoming text photo of Bella and me, on the balcony, the snow-covered mountains our backdrop. She typed the words:Wish we were still thereunderneath it, and my heart panged with longing for her. For her body. For...
Let’s go back again soon, I quickly typed back.
Then I blasted through the twenty or so emails in my inbox, returned the voicemails left on my office line, reviewed some construction updates, and then—
Lois chirruped on my office line just after ten. “I have Chris here. May I send him in?”
“Sure,” I replied and locked my computer.How strange.“Send him in.”
Chris walked through my door a few seconds later, his stooped shoulders further burdened by his ancient laptop. I stood when I saw him.
“Didn’t realize you were in the office today,” I said.
“Sometimes it’s easier that way. Get more done.” He sat in the chair across from my desk.
I sat too. “How have you been?”
“Busy.” He balanced the computer on his lap, and I couldn’t miss the concern pulling at the corners of his eyes.Something’s bothering him.
“I’m just going to get right to it,” he said.
“Good.” I was relieved I didn’t have to outright ask.
“I know things have been moving slowly on the Promenade project over the last few weeks.” Chris took a deep breath. “And none of us are happy about it.”
“I’ve worked enough of these to know some stuff is out of our hands.”
This wasn’t entirely true, but I wanted to hold some things close to the vest, even around my most trusted employees. Chris nodded and pursed his dry lips. For some reason, he looked much older than his sixty-three years. He wasn’t a young man, sure, but he’d always had a certain vitality. Now he was just... ashen.
“Whatever it is, you can tell me,” I said.
Chris blinked rapidly, his eyes darting to the stack of folders on his knee. His fingers clenched the top folder, creasing its edges, as if he were bracing to deliver news he knew would shatter something in me.
“Go ahead,” I prompted, irritation sharpening my tone, cutting through the heavy silence. His hesitation was grindingmy nerves, each second tightening the coil of dread in my gut. “I want to hear it.”
