Page 71 of Snowed In with My Best Friend's Dad

He flashed me a grin that I felt all the way to the bottom of my heart. "I know, but at least tonight, it will be related to your kicking my ass with trivia."

He was right. I did kick his ass. But that wasn't what made me enjoy it. It wasn't what brought up the concern that I was losing the battle to keep him at a distance. What affected me were his responses to my answers. I not only got the questions right, but I was often able to elaborate on them, explain the greater context of the topic. When I did, he looked at me in awe.

I finally beat him six pies to four. He laughed as he shook his head. "Well, at least I'm improving. I got four pies this time."

I started to put the game away, wishing that he would leave while at the same time hoping he didn't. That was how I knew I was in trouble.

"What did you ever do with the piece of art that I got you?" He took the final drink of his beer.

"It's hanging in my room."

He had a look of relief.

"Did you think that I threw it out?"

He gave me a shrug. "It crossed my mind. I hoped that maybe you sold it, though."

It never occurred to me that the artwork was worth something.

"Can I see it?"

"You don't believe me?"

"I believe you. I just want to see it again. I want to see it with you when you're not pissed off at me."

I wasn’t pissed, and for a moment, I thought about what my answer was going to be tonight when he asked me if I still hated him. Being with him like this was making it harder and harder to hold onto my anger.

I led him to my room, thinking it was no big deal since he had been there before when I came home from the hospital. But as we entered my room and he stood next to me looking at the art piece on the wall, my room felt very small. He felt very close.

He backed up a bit, hitting the edge of my bed and sitting down. His hand clasped around mine and tugged, bringing me down to sit next to him. My heart ached with yearning while at the same time, warning bells clanged in my head.

"Do you like it?" he asked.

"You know I do. I wouldn't have kept it if I didn't like it so much."

He looked at me for a moment. "Meaning you liked it more than you hated me?"

I turned my attention back to the painting, not wanting to confirm his statement. He let out a sigh and turned his gaze back to the painting as well. For a moment, he just stared at it. "Have you shown it to Lindsay?"

"Yes. Sometimes, when she comes over to study, we work in here. She likes it too."

He gave a short nod. "She didn’t go with me to the gallery the night I saw this. In fact, we haven't been to a gallery together in a long time."

I wondered what he was getting at. "Did something happen between you and Lindsay?"

"I don't think so. But she's back to being totally consumed by Liam." He looked at me again. "It feels almost obsessive. Do you think I'm overreacting?"

I see-sawed my head, not quite sure how to answer. As a parent, he was probably overly worried, but he wasn't wrong that Lindsay was spending more and more of her time around Liam.

"I think that's what happens when people are in love. Everything becomes about the other."

His head swiveled toward me again. "It does, doesn't it?" Something in his eyes told me that his words held more meaning. But I was too afraid to believe them. He couldn't possibly be saying that all this time that he spent with me was because he was in love with me. If that was the case, why not just say so? So perhaps he was talking about the baby. There was definitely an all-consuming love where the baby was concerned.

"I'm just worried about her. There's something about Liam that strikes me as off,” he said.

I hadn't seen Liam since New Year's Eve. He had always struck me as somebody who was trying to move and shake in the right circles. Someone who was striving for money and power. But I remembered a few times Lindsay saying things that suggested that Liam was getting involved with the wrong crowd. When I asked her to elaborate, she'd always wave the concern away. She told me she was reading too much into the situation and everything was fine. I started to tell Brett that but then considered that maybe he and I shouldn't be talking about Lindsay in the same way that Lindsay and I never talked about him.

"Lindsay is smart. If there's something off about him, she’ll deal with it. But my guess is she won’t appreciate our talking about her."

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