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10
“So is that okay, Dad? Dad!”
Gavin’s impatient tone finally got through to Ian. He hadn’t been listening since he’d been watching Sofia as she moved around the den, choosing some board games and bringing them to the coffee table.
Ian couldn’t believe how quickly the week had passed, a week with Sofia living in his house. She fitted in seamlessly, in the house and in his and even Gavin’s lives. He was still amazed at how the two of them joked around in the mornings, getting ready for school, or how Gavin seemed interested in learning a few simple recipes from her.
Ian could still taste the cottage cheese pancakes they’d made this morning, even if he couldn’t recall the name for them, with caramelized fruit and honey on top—sweet because it was the weekend.
With an effort, he tore his attention from her to Gavin. “Explain again?” he asked.
With an almighty eye roll, Gavin spoke slowly, spacing out his words. “Tonight’s the sleepover at Cal’s. I told you about it ages ago. He’s one of the first to get the new League of Monsters game. He’s gonna livestream his unboxing, then we’re all gonna play it. So I can go, right?”
Ian hesitated, considering, while Gavin stood in front of him, waiting. “One minute.” His phone was in his jacket pocket, in the hall, so he made the call to Cal’s parents while he was standing there. He didn’t know the couple well enough to have their personal cell phone numbers, but Cal was Gavin’s best friend, and he’d stayed over there before, so Ian had their landline number saved in his phone.
“Yeah, some sort of boxing party?” David confirmed. “Funny, as I thought Calvin was more into those computer games than contact sport, but…”
The out-of-the-loop guy wasn’t even attempting a ‘dad’ joke, but Ian was still half-grinning as he went back to Gavin. “Fine,” he announced to Gavin. “Cal’s mom’s picking you all up in the minivan, right?”
“How do… Wait. Did you just call his mom?” Gavin swung to Ian.
“No. His dad. And of course I’m going to check it’s all above board.”
“What?” Gavin looked genuinely angry, and maybe even a little hurt. “It’s sick you don’t trust me! I did my detention, I put up with being grounded. How long are you going to punish me? Is it going to be like this forever? You don’t respect me or my rights. I have no privacy—”
“Hey.” Ian raised an eyebrow. “Keep the volume down and let’s respect our guest, huh? And for the record, I trust you, but yeah, you’re still earning back your privacy.”
“That is such bullshit!” Gavin exploded.
“Hey!” Ian yelled back. “Do you want to get grounded again for rudeness, kid? Because I’m this far from doing it.”
“Guys…” Sofia butted in, drawing their attention. “If I can have a vote, I think the sleepover’s a good idea, a nice step for Gavin transitioning back to a social life. Cal’s a great kid, and it’ll be fun and safe.”
With a sarcastic “Thank you!” Gavin stomped from the room.
In the silence left behind, Sofia turned to Ian. “And we can take the chance to go over some things about the fire, without any risk of Gavin overhearing.”
“Sure,” Ian replied after a pause. Sofia stepping in had caught him off guard. He wasn’t sure he liked it. Yeah, she’d stopped the fight before it could escalate—but he wasn’t crazy about her taking over like that, making the decision for him. Still, he couldn’t really argue with anything she’d said. “I’ll go tell him it’s fine.”
“Good.” Sofia picked up the board games she’d deposited and returned them to the shelf.
He hoped he’d get the chance to quiz Angie, Cal’s mom, about the sleepover, but she honked the horn of her car from the street and just waved to him, then drove off as soon as Gavin rushed out and jumped in. He could always call them later, he supposed.
“In here,” Sofia called from the little-used dining room as he closed the front door. She was using it for her lesson prep and grading, and had her laptop on it—safely retrieved from her apartment the previous day, when she’d finally been cleared to go in and get some of her things. “Let’s watch that video Charlie sent, okay?” she asked.
“Sure.” He seated himself beside her, close enough to see the screen as she pulled up the security camera footage from her house during the fire. They’d watched the feed, and very briefly the segments of video Charlie had isolated and enhanced. Now they watched them again, slowly, three times, and Sofia peered hard at the figure in the hoodie and ski mask who had clearly started the blaze, asking him to freeze on the clearest image.
“I’ve been thinking about it, and the height and build match Scotty Wagner,” she said.
“The kid you spotted selling drugs outside Southwest?” Ian questioned.
“Yes. Look.” Sofia opened a web browser and pulled up the webpage with the school’s yearbooks. She clicked through until she got to the page she wanted. “Here.”
Ian studied the picture of the goofy-looking kid. The height and build seemed accurate. “So, drug dealer and arsonist.” He whistled.
“I don’t know.” Sofia wound the end of her braid around her finger. “Something doesn’t add up. Someone called to warn me to get out, even before I got the alert from the security equipment. If that wasn’t Scotty, who would it be? And Scotty? He’s a screwed-up kid, but he isn’t violent, Ian. Someone might have forced him to start that fire, but I think it was his decision to warn me. Otherwise, I could have easily died in there.”
She shivered. Reliving that night and seeing the video of the person lighting her house on fire had upset her. Of course. “Hey.” He put an arm around her. “You doing okay there?”
