I shook my head. “I don’t know. But I’ll be honest, I can’t help but think that Valkyrie might have coordinated it simply because he could, simply to show that he could get to the family members of a congressman and the FBI Director. It fits the profile Lien-hua drew up on him last winter.”
“To prove that he’s untouchable.” Ralph nodded. “To show that he can do what he wants, when he wants, to whoever he wants.”
“We should get Lien-hua’s take on this.” I rose.
“Hang on, buddy.” He grabbed my elbow. “I’ll go fill her in. You sit down. You’re the dad. You’re not supposed to see your daughter until she’s all ready for her prom.”
“How do you know that? You only have a son and he’s not even out of middle school yet.”
“Brineesha tells me these things. Stay here. I’ll be right back.”
68
A few minutes later, though, it was Brineesha, not Ralph, who ascended the stairs. “You should go talk with your daughter. Encourage her. She’s really nervous. She doesn’t think she’s pretty.”
“She said that?”
“Not in so many words. But there are other ways people communicate. Especially girls.”
“And she wants me to talk to her?”
“She needs you to. Lien-hua and I have been telling her that she looks fine, but it might mean more coming from her dad. You know how important this night is to her. Go on. That boy is going to be here in just a couple minutes.”
Downstairs, I found Tessa standing on the edge of the living room beside the open bathroom door, eyeing herself uncertainly in the mirror. A clutter of makeup paraphernalia lay spread across the bathroom sink’s counter.
Lien-hua and Ralph were in the bedroom, presumably so Tessa wouldn’t hear them conferring about the case. Ralph’s dumbbells and weight sets had been pushed to the side of the living room to make room for Lien-hua to stay down here.
One glance at Tessa and I knew my daughter had nothing to worry about. She looked amazing. Maybe too good. I remember being a teenage guy. I remember how they think.
“Hey, Tessa.”
“Hey.”
As it turned out, Lien-hua had great taste and the dress accentuated Tessa’s figure without being too tight or seductive. It reached the floor and I wouldn’t have seen her red Converse shoes if she hadn’t been fluffing the dress to the side, trying to see what it looked like at different angles.
The black raven tattoo curling around her left upper arm served to gently accent the dark allure of the dress.
Her right arm bore the line of straight scars from her cutting days, but she’d become used to them and, for the most part, seemed to accept them as simply another part of her life’s story.
She wore her hair pulled back into a loose bun with a single crimson ribbon woven into it, and had on her typical black fingernail polish and dark eyeliner. A leather clutch purse that I hadn’t seen before sat on the edge of the couch. It matched the color of the ribbon. I guessed she and Lien-hua must have picked it up while they were dress shopping.
“You look great,” I told my daughter. “Really. I’m not just saying that. The other girls at the dance are going to be blown away.”
“Huh,” she scoffed. “I doubt that.”
“Don’t.”
She was cute, no, way beyond cute.
Elusive, mysterious, gorgeous.
She’s beautiful. Your daughter is beautiful.
Man, this guy Aiden better treat her right.
She hesitated, studied her hair in the mirror. “I don’t know if I should wear it like this. You think it’s okay? Really?”
To put it mildly, Tessa was not one to worry about how she looked, and seeing her so concerned about it right now just underscored to me how much this boy meant to her.
I put my hand lightly on her arm to reassure her. “I know you’re going to have a great time. You’re very pretty. Your mom would be proud to see you tonight.”
At last she turned from the mirror and looked at me directly. “I need to tell you something, Patrick.”
“What’s that?”
“I know I’ve always been sort of weird about boys — never really hooking up with, well, the best guys in the universe. You know what I mean.”
“There’ve been a few times, yes.”
“Anyway, Aiden’s different. I really like him. And I just wanted to say thanks.”
“Thanks?”
“For trusting me.”
“For trusting you.”
“I mean, last week we were talking about guys. Remember? At the picnic? And I told you how I didn’t like it when you met them at the door and scared them off or checked up on ’em or intimidated ’em, or anything like that. Thanks for trusting me with Aiden, for not probing or asking me all about him, things like that. It means a lot.”
An uncomfortable itch began at the back of my neck and crawled down my back.
She leaned up on her toes and gave me a light kiss on the cheek. “Mom would be proud of you too.”
That did it.
“Listen, Tessa, there’s something I should probably…”
Upstairs, the doorbell rang.
“Oh, that’s him.” Her eyes grew large. Nervous. Excited. “What is it? What were you gonna say?”
“Hey, listen, I’ll tell you later. Why don’t you head—”
“No, don’t do that. You know I hate it.”
“Do what?”
“Bring up something and then tell me we’ll talk about it later. Tell me now or else you know how much it’ll bug me and I don’t want that. Not tonight.”
I heard Brineesha answer the door and invite Aiden into the living room. Her words were faint, but I could just make them out: “You must be Aiden. Tessa’s been looking forward to seeing you. She’ll be right up.”
“In this case, Tessa, I think it might be—”
She placed her hands on my shoulders. “What is it, Dad? I need to get up there.”
“I did.”
“You did what?”
“Check up on him.”
She lowered her hands slowly. “What does that mean: you checked up on him?”
“I called the school’s safety officer. Just because I love you and I was—”
“You what? You called the cops to check up on Aiden?”
“No, well, I mean… the safety officer—”
“Just say what he is. He’s a cop.”
“Aiden seems like a great kid. I wasn’t even going to bring it up but—”
“You knew how I feel about that.” Something deeper than disappointment crossed her face. “I told you.”
I almost wished she would slap me or sling her hands to her hips and yell at me, anything like that, but she didn’t. Instead, the look of affection she’d had for me just moments ago had evaporated, and all I saw on her face was a look of betrayal instead.
“I’m sorry, I wasn’t trying to hurt you or anything.”
“That’s not the point.” She shook her head fiercely. “The point is, you didn’t trust me.”
“No, I do trust you. It’s just—”
“Tessa!” Brineesha called cheerily from upstairs. “Aiden’s here.”
Now my daughter’s anger became evident. She snatched up her purse, but the top was open and her lighter and a pack of cigarettes tipped out.
Before I could say anything, she blurted, “Do not even go there. I know how you feel, okay?” She held her hand up, palm toward me. “Just don’t.”
She retrieved the lighter and the cigarettes, then stood, her eyes showing a mixture of fire and pain. “If you would have asked me I could’ve told you he was a great kid.” Her words bruised the air between us. “You didn’t have to call the cops.”
“I’m sorry, I—”
She whirled away up the stairs.
As she disappeared, Ralph poked his head out the doorway of the room where he and Lien-hua had been consulting with each other. He rubbed his forehead in empathy.