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Poor Deb just got caught in the crossfire. Another casualty of war.
Julia leaves her perch at the head of the table and moves to sit directly next to Deborah. She takes the other girl’s hand in hers and twists their fingers together, holding hands on top of the table.
“Thank you for standing up for him,” Jules says sincerely, her free hand resting gently on her belly.
“You don’t have to thank me for doing what’s right.” Deb squeezes Julia’s hand then meets my gaze across the table. “I’d do it again, Remi. I’d do it again tomorrow.”
I flex my hands under the table and breath out through my nose, desperate to keep my bubbling emotions in check. My throat thickens, and my eyes go blurry, so I jerk my head, hoping she knows without words what she means to me.
To us.
“You know, Remi,” Justin says in a playful tone, thankfully breaking the tension. I rotate my shoulders and swallow again, trying to clear the lump in my throat without bringing attention to myself. “My folks would be overjoyed for you to join their firm.”
“Oooh!” Jules squeals, nodding her head enthusiastically. “Deb too,” she adds. “Don’t you think so? Bri would probably prefer Deborah over Remi. Girl power and all that.”
Justin chuckles, but Jules certainly has a point.
“Yeah,” I laugh and shake my head, leaning back in my chair. J stands and moves a seat over so that he and I sit alongside the girls across from us. He stretches, distracting me as he points his toes and his arms lift over his head before he rises, again, like a puppy with too much energy, and flips the chair around to straddle the seat facing backward. I shake my head to clear it of the image of a taut Justin stretched out underneath me.
I make a point to look anywhere besides at Justin, straddling the chair.
“I don’t think Bri would be all that enthusiastic about me hitting her up for a job. Maybe I’ll change fields altogether. I’ve gotten rather good at washing dishes the last few weeks.”
I flush as Amelia chooses that moment to come back into the dining room, scoffing at my declaration with disdain.
“How about it Mrs. Jones? Are you interested in an apprentice?”
She pats my cheek affectionately as she places another plate of chocolate chip cookies on the table. Between Julia’s pregnancy-induced baking and Mrs. Jones trying to…I don’t know…out-wit Justin? I’m going to gain as much weight as Jules. They’re trying to make me live at the gym.
“Don’t take it personally, dear, but you couldn’t cut it.”
Justin bursts into laughter. Deb drops her head onto her arms, giggling into the table. Our housekeeper pulls out a chair and helps herself to the remaining muffin.
“Lunch break,” she says pointedly to Justin. I bite my lip to keep from laughing at his petulant pouting.
“It seems to me, love,” Mrs. Jones says, “that this would be an ideal opportunity to discover what it is youdowant to do with your life, rather than falling into another line of work that you have very little passion for simply because another person who felt they knew what was best for you said you should.”
What an innocuous statement.
Has anybody outside of my lovers ever taken the time to ask me what I want? Hell, Justin asks me at least once a day. Though, he means it in more a physical, emotional, and spiritual manner rather than the banal generalization of how to be a productive member of society.
What doIwant to do? I knock my knuckles on the table, rolling the thought around in my head. Justin has started a text tree with Deb and Bri, beginning the introductions.
“The truth of the matter is I loved what I did.”
Justin gives me a bland expression; eyebrows tilted up in disbelief.
“You didn’t seem all that happy to me,” Jules pushes, her brow marred with confusion.
“I didn’t say I loved my job or that I loved where I worked,” I insist. “But the work itself? I really enjoyed it. I liked finding struggling businesses to bring under the Lancaster umbrella. It was fun, and challenging.”
“We were good at it,” Deb concedes. She twirls her phone in her hand, a soft tilt to her lips. “We made a good team.”
Yeah, we did.
“Really, if I could have changed one thing, I wish we would have had the ability to help a lot of these businesses rather than absorbing them and robbing them of their individuality.”
“How so?” Jules asks, wrapping her hands around her empty coffee mug and leaning over the table.
