KING’S BAY METROPOLITAN INN

Sarah Fisher leans over to Graham Colville. “You should go talk to him.”

Graham turns back to her and feigns surprise. “Who?”

Sarah throws him a look that makes it apparent she is not buying his act. “He’s hurt, and he’s carrying around years of resentment. It might take some time, but you can get through to him.”

Appearing less than convinced, Graham double-checks that Tim, Cassandra, and Jason are engaged in their own conversation before he says quietly to Sarah, “I’m not so certain about that. Alex made it quite clear--”

“Because he’s hurting!” She wishes he wouldn’t be so stubborn; one less-than-successful encounter with Alex, months ago, should not be enough to deter Graham from trying to know his son. “You keep looking over at him. It’s pretty obvious you can’t just let it go.”

“I never said I could. Whether or not I can do anything about it, that’s another matter entirely.”

“Graham. He’s your son.”

He glances, concerned, at their tablemates, who do not seem to have heard. “I’m going to use the restroom,” he says suddenly, setting down his glass and his napkin. “Excuse me.”

She lets him go, knowing that it will not do any good to argue now. Graham might be a sharp businessman and a rock-solid support for Sarah when she is in turmoil, but he is not nearly as skilled at turning the lens back on himself. She watches him disappear into the short hallway that leads to the restrooms and tries to focus back in on the other conversation at their table.

“So I took the test with my other partner,” Jason is telling Cassandra, “and completely bombed. It was a mess.”

But she is too distracted to engage with them. Instead she finds herself rising from her seat and stepping across the restaurant, to the table where Alex sits with the Chases.

“Hey, Alex,” she says gently. “Could I have a word with you?”

“Um, sure.” He already sounds as if he knows where this is headed, but he nevertheless follows her to a more private place.

“I know this is asking a lot,” she says, “but Graham is... he wants a chance to know you. He understands that you feel you’ve been burned, but--”

“I have been burned,” he responds, with a great deal more force than she expects. “I grew up with my mom, and that was enough of a mess. I don’t have any obligation to the guy who abandoned both of us.”

“You know it was more complicated than that.”

His concession is reluctant. “Maybe. But I’m not going to turn my whole life upside-down on the chance that it’ll be all rainbows and sunshine and I’ll have a daddy or whatever. I’ve built my own family. I had to.”

“Alex--”

“I’m sorry. I can’t change how I feel.” And with that, he returns to his table and to the Chases, his surrogate family. Sarah scrambles back to her own table before Graham returns. This might require a little more creativity than she expected.

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