Page 32 of The Awful Truth

He shrugged one shoulder. “Of course. There’s nothing we can do about it now, so it’s best to carry on as if everything’s fine.”

She chewed her bottom lip, a leftover habit from when she was an overly anxious child. “Chances are it will be. I doubt Oliver heard, and even if he did, he’s probably not going to go up to his boss and upset him. And Miguel and Winslow have no reason to hurt us. It’s not like we’re competing with them or something.”

Nodding, he said, “Right now they need us more than we need them. Let’s just keep it that way.”

She felt bothered by how transactional he could be. He called it strategic, but the truth was her husband had hints of being a sociopath himself. “I actually do want to help them. I really like them both, and I don’t think they understand what they’re getting themselves into.”

“Winslow does. Miguel however…”

Antonia nodded. “Yes, he seems a little naive. All the more reason to try to help.” Feeling as though the conversation was over, she said, “Oh, I texted Charlotte. She’s working in her room.”

“Yeah, I know. I went to see her.”

Antonia offered him an easy smile even though a quiet alarm was going off in her head. “Did you?”

“Yeah, I wasn’t about to take someone else’s word that she was fine.”

“And how did she seem?”

“Fine.” He leaned back and placed his hands behind his head. His forearms flexed when he did it, and she felt a brief sense of attraction to him like she had the night before. “She looked a little worse for wear though.”

“I wonder what they got up to last night,” Antonia answered in a sing-songy voice that implied maybe Charlotte had slept with Oliver. She would never normally concern herself with the personal life of a staff member, but part of her wanted to test her husband. Test him—how healthy. “Maybe she is going to have that fling after all.”

“No, she’s not.”

“You sound sure of yourself,” she answered, studying him from behind her sunglasses. This is exactly how he was with their daughter. He couldn’t bear the thought of a man getting anywhere near his little girl. Men were so strangely protective, even of their adult children. Or staffers, in this case. She found some primal part of herself attracted to that too. Good lord, what was going on with her? It must be some new hormonal shift that happens at this age.

“First of all, they have literally nothing in common. Second, Char’s not the type for some meaningless fling.”

Antonia wrinkled up her nose. “How could you possibly know whether they have anything in common?”

“I can just tell,” he answered in that manly ‘I know best’ way he had.

She shifted on the chair and lifted her legs back up so she could recline. But also so she could put more distance between them.

“You’re annoyed because I’m so sure I’m right.”

She glanced at him and smiled. “Well, it is annoying.”

He grinned a little, then said, “It’s annoying when you do it, but when I do it, it’s called good leadership.”

She laughed, knowing he was trying to irritate her on purpose. It was their favorite game—trying to get a rise out of each other. “The 1950s called. They said you should come back where you belong.”

That worked. Ted laughed, then shook his head. “I almost forgot you knew how to make a joke.”

She nodded, the reality of the pressure of their lives coming back to her. “Same. I’ve completely lost touch with her now, but I’m relatively sure there’s still a very fun woman hidden inside me.”

“Let her out once in a while. She was pretty terrific.”

“I’ll try.”

They sat in silence for a few minutes, Antonia drinking in her surroundings. There was something wonderful about being on a yacht with the azure sky when she should be at the studio. “This is really nice, isn’t it?”

“It’s the life I’ve always wanted,” he said.

She sat with his statement for a second, at first insulted that he was suggesting he didn’t want their life. But then she remembered she didn’t want it either and she decided to get off her high horse. “What do you think? Maybe someday we sell the Seattle property and the apartment, and buy a small yacht?”

He chuckled at the idea. “I’d rather make enough that we keep it all and add to the collection.”