CHAPTER SIX
Neil
I’m making coffee when Tabitha steps through the door. She looks at me in shock for a moment and just stares.
“Hello, little girl,” I say softly.
“Daddy,” she breathes out. “I thought you would still be asleep.”
“Come sit down a moment, princess,” I say. As she walks toward me tentatively, I notice that even now, when she’s behaving like she just got caught at something and when she’s reluctant to meet my gaze, she’s still so damned cute and enticing I can barely stand it. I let her get as far as the table and say, “Have a seat, little girl.”
She obeys woodenly, still afraid to look me in the eye. I wait until there’s enough coffee to pour two cups. Then, I carry both to the table. I sit down and put a cup in front of her. A glance at my phone tells me it’s four-thirty in the morning. She takes the cup and mumbles, “Thank you, Daddy.”
“You’re welcome,” I say. She looks so terribly nervous and I’m nervous, too. To ease both of our minds, I get started. “Little girl, honesty is important in a relationship and we need to talk.”
“Yes, Daddy,” she says and she seems so ashamed. I grow even more nervous.
“Are you…” I take a deep breath. “If there’s somebody else, little girl, I need to know. I’ll be hurt but not as hurt as I would be if we stayed together and I found out later.”
“No, Daddy!” she exclaims. “No, there’s nobody else!”
“Princess,” I say, “this isn’t the first time you’ve sneaked away at night. In fact, we’ve been together for what, six months? A little longer? Almost every night you leave in the middle of the night. I just couldn’t keep pretending you don’t.”
“Daddy, I’m not…” she looks at me desperately. “I’m sorry.”
I feel my world disappear. “Do you love him?”
“No!” she says. “I mean, there’s nobody I’m seeing!” She looks like she’s going to cry.
“Tell me what’s going on, princess,” I say softly.
She bites her lip and says, “I have a second job, one that’s not at the diner.”
I look at her in shock and say, “Well, that’s… that’s nothing you should be ashamed about.”
“I’m…” She sighs and says, “I have a secret, Daddy. I should have told you but I’m… I’m ashamed.”
“Tell me.”
She closes her eyes and then, after ten or fifteen seconds, nods firmly. “In college, I was trying to join a sorority. We had to do crazy things during pledge week and… Well, all of the girls, the pledges, broke into a store. We were supposed to just take pictures. Then, two years later, the sorority would send the pictures to the store as part of a fundraising thing, like donate money to this thing or that thing because we could have robbed you and we didn’t.”
“Two years because breaking and entering probably had that as the statute of limitations.”
She nods. “They’d done that for years. Anyway, this time, there was a problem and a security guard was there. Everyone freaked out and some expensive vases were broken as they ran away.” She shakes her head and says, “but I didn’t get away. The security guard was right in front of me. Anyway, the police wanted me to tell them all the names of people involved and I wouldn’t so they charged me. They knew I didn’t mean to do anything so they didn’t arrest me but just told me to go to the police station in the morning.”
“Okay. Go on.”
“Anyway, my uncle’s a lawyer. He came with me and made a deal. We went in front of a judge. The charges would be outstanding but I didn’t have to be arrested. I would make payments until all the damages were paid and then the judge would just dismiss the charges.”
“Did the sorority pay for the damages?”
She shakes her head. “No. They should have but they were afraid of the bad press. Five of the pledges just quit pledging. I quit school and moved here to be close to my uncle. My best friend, one of the pledges, did too. She tried to help me pay but she wasn’t there that night and I wouldn’t let her. She works for my uncle now. I’ve been making payments and that’s why I have a second job.”
“You have nothing to be ashamed about, little girl,” I say. “How much were the damages?”
“Just over eight thousand dollars,” she says, “about.”
“Expensive vases,” I say.