Once Upon a Friendship

CHAPTER ELEVEN

LIAM SPENT THE week in court. Just before the noon recess on Friday, the judge, who’d been expected to take the matter under advisement, ruled in favor of the parents of the seventeen-year-old Douglas boy.

He had deep compassion in his tone as he told the young man that while his convictions were important, the unfortunate truth was that he had a physical ailment that required medication. Liam wasn’t surprised by the ruling. He’d hoped that it wouldn’t come until at least Monday. He and Gabrielle were booked on a flight to Fort Lauderdale at eight o’clock that evening. Now, before packing and preparing to meet the sibling he’d never known existed, he was going to be writing about another teenager’s heartache.

But even if he didn’t have time to pack properly, he was going to meet Tamara. The thought had been creeping into his thoughts on and off all week. As he’d sat in court, he’d wondered how much she was like the teenagers taking the stand to testify to the character of the boy suing his parents.

He bade goodbye to his bodyguard via text as he and Gabrielle went through security at the airport. He hadn’t seen Tanner at the airport, but he was getting used to knowing that anytime he was out of his home, he had a shadow.

Nothing had come of the letter that had been left at Marie’s shop. The threat it conveyed hadn’t been specific—a wish for him to suffer as he and his father had caused others to suffer.

His father had apparently been getting hate mail on and off for years. Stood to reason that now that Liam was understood to be working at Connelly Investments, he’d inspire some of the same anger.

Whatever, it wasn’t something he was going to worry about.

“She’s probably going to think I’m an old fogy,” he told Gabrielle as they stood at their gate at Denver International, waiting to board the plane. He was flying coach for the first time.

“She knows how old you are.” Crowds were closing in on the door as the time to board grew closer, but they had no need to join in. Gabi had relented and let him pay extra for priority boarding.

He could still be in the lounge if he wanted to be. He’d never wanted to be.

For that matter, he could certainly afford to fly first class if he’d wanted to do so. But Gabrielle couldn’t. And she wasn’t allowing him to pay for her flight.

He was going to, when he paid her bill at the end of the month, but she didn’t know that.

And cutting corners where he could, financially speaking, wasn’t a bad thing. It had become very clear to him that money didn’t last forever.

&nb

sp; The surprising part about this discovery was that he was really doing just fine. With the financial changes in his life at least.

He wasn’t so happy about the weird bit of excitement that had accompanied thoughts of this trip all week—aside from that associated with meeting his little sister. No, he’d also been het up about the fact that he was going to be sitting alone with Gabi in the plane. Traveling with her alone.

They were going to be spending the entire weekend together....

“Knowing someone’s age and building an image of them in your head are two different things,” he said, forcing himself back on track.

He was going to have to make sure that he didn’t do something stupid on this trip. Like try to kiss Gabi on the beach under the moonlight. No matter how much the desire to do so was starting to plague him.

“You’re worried she’s not going to like you?”

“No.” Of course he was.

“The only thing I can recommend is...be nice to her mother.”

To date, Liam had refused to speak with the woman, leaving Gabrielle to make all of their travel arrangements, down to the two rooms in the medium-priced hotel she’d booked for them not far from Tamara and Missy’s modest beach cottage.

He didn’t reply now.

“Whatever else she might be, whatever choices she’s made, she’s been a good mother to your half sister,” Gabrielle said, her tone reminding him of sitting in that beanbag in her college dorm, confessing his sins.

“Besides, you don’t know her story. Maybe she didn’t know he was married when their affair started. Maybe she didn’t know until after she was pregnant and she found out he couldn’t marry her.”

He turned his head, trying to read those silvery-blue eyes that hid so many things. Things he was finding himself more and more curious about.

“Is that what she told you?”

“I didn’t ask.”