There hadn’t been a TV in here before. He must have set this up especially. “Are you serious?” I said, sliding my arm around Dexter’s waist. “This is insane.”
“I thought this was what you’d want to do on your birthday? Stay in bed all day, eat ice cream and watch TV with your sister.”
Dexter’s thoughtfulness was off the scale. It would have been easy, and very generous for him to buy me a Chanel bag. But this? This was a thousand times better.
“Oh,” he said, pulling away from me and putting his head into the walk-in closet. “There are matching pajamas, slippers and robes in the wardrobe,” he said. “If you get sick of ice cream, we can order in tonight. Tomorrow, I’ve arranged a chef for the day to make you anything you want. I figured you wouldn’t want to go out if Autumn was here.”
The last thing I wanted to do was go to a fancy restaurant. But having the fancy restaurant come to me? Who was I to complain?
“You are a very special man, Dexter Daniels,” I said, grabbing his hand and kissing him.
“I’m going to leave you two to it. Gabriel’s going to stop by any minute on his way to a charity thing. He needs to borrow a bowtie.”
“Is he single and as handsome as you?” Autumn asked.
“He’s red hot,” Dexter said with a wink.
I turned to her as Dexter left us in the guest room. “I can’t believe you’re here. When did you get in?”
“Around lunchtime. Dexter arranged everything, Hollie. That man is gold, let me tell you.”
We headed into the closet and found matching silk pajamas, gorgeous robes and the most beautiful fluffy slippers.
“How did he even know how to get in contact with you?” I asked, kicking off my shoes and trying on the slippers. Of course they fit perfectly.
“He emailed me. Got my address from HR. You put me down as your emergency contact.”
“Sneaky,” I said, as I began to undress. I couldn’t wait to change into my jammies and catch up with Autumn face-to-face.
“But amazing.”
That was a good way to describe Dexter Daniels—amazing.
“How’s school?” I asked, slipping the pajamas on. Autumn was an adult, but part of me was a little concerned that once I’d taken off, she’d stop studying quite so hard or she’d get distracted by some worthless guy. Or even more likely, she’d end up spending her time sorting out Mom and Dad.
“Are these silk?” she asked. “Oh, and I made the Dean’s list this semester.”
I scrambled to grab her in a hug and ended up half falling over, tangled in lengths of silk. “Are you serious? That’s completely amazing.”
“Yeah, I’m pretty happy about it,” she replied.
“When did this happen? Why didn’t you tell me?” Now properly pajamaed, I held her at arm’s length as if I were inspecting her to see if she looked more intelligent since the last time I’d seen her.
“Because I wanted to tell you in person. I’ve nearly let the cat out of the bag a thousand times. It’s been hard to keep it from you.”
“I’m just so happy for you. Sounds like you’ve been studying extra hard this semester. I was obviously a distraction.” I was so proud of her. Dexter was right—she was a grown woman. Perhaps she didn’t need as much taking care of as I thought. And that was great, obviously, but also . . . unbalancing.
“I didn’t want you to feel any more guilty about leaving than you already did.” She crouched on the floor and slid on a pair of slippers. “What can I say? Seeing you chase after what you wanted made me want to do the same. I haven’t found what I’m passionate about yet, but I will, and when I do, I want to be in the best shape,” she said. She couldn’t have said anything that would have made me any happier. The fact I could be some kind of role model for my sister was all I could ever want. “And honestly, Mom still has that job at Trader Bob’s, which means they’ve had money and they haven’t been bothering me.”
I couldn’t remember the last time my mom held down a job for three months. “I can’t believe she’s still there. What happened?” We pulled the robes off their hangers and headed back into the bedroom.
Autumn shook her head. “I don’t know. I think Jenny working there helps because she has someone she can ask if she doesn’t know what to do, rather than just quitting like she normally would. A group of them from the store went out for breakfast last weekend.”
I couldn’t ever remember a time when my mom had money for waffles. “She’s holding down a job, has money in her pocket and is socializing? What is happening to the world?” Both my sister and my mom were doing better than they ever had since I’d left.