Where work thing won't take long. She looked at him with those serious eyes she'd inherited from nobody he could identify. Certainly not him. Certainly not Melissa. Just her own particular brand of 9-year-old skepticism.
Is it really work or are you just saying that it's really work? Okay. She closed her math book. Can I bring my book? Bring whatever you want.
He got her into the truck, drove across Charlotte with the radio off because Amara said she was reading and the music bothered her concentration and dropped her at the Whitmore estate where Mrs. Patton, the housekeeper, took one look at Amara and immediately offered her cookies and the television remote. Amara looked at Daniel. He nodded. She went inside without looking back.
He drove downtown. The Meridian was the kind of hotel that existed primarily so that wealthy people could attend events without having to acknowledge that the rest of the city was right outside the door. Valets and red jackets, a red carpet that somebody had rolled out and then partially rolled back up, suggesting the main event was winding down. Three black SUVs idling near the entrance with drivers who all recognized each other by the particular blankness of their expressions. Daniel parked sent a text to the number Richard had given him.
Lauren Whitmore. He'd seen her name on company memos. Seen her once or twice from across a parking lot at company events where Richard brought her to represent the family. He didn't actually know her. The reply came back in under a minute.
Coming out now. He got out of the truck and stood by the passenger side because that was the correct thing to do. And he'd been doing the correct thing for long enough that it was automatic. She came through the lobby doors alone. No assistant, no bodyguard, no group of people orbiting her the way wealthy young women at events usually had.
Just Lauren Whitmore, 29 years old, in a simple dark blue evening dress that probably cost more than his monthly rent, but wore like she'd forgotten what she had on. She was tall. She had her father's jaw that particular set to it that communicated certainty, but her eyes were different. Her eyes moved around the front of the hotel, the way people's eyes move when they're looking for something wrong. She spotted him, walked straight over.
You're Daniel. Yes, ma'am. Don't call me ma'am. She said it without heat, just matter of fact. I'm not 60.
Sorry. She got into the truck before he could open the door all the way. He got in on his side. She was already looking out the passenger window at the valet, the SUVs, the men in suits still drifting out of the lobby in small clusters. You know where the estate is?
Yes. He pulled out, got them moving. The Friday night traffic in Uptown Charlotte was the usual tangle of people trying to get somewhere else. And he navigated it the way he always did, methodically. No aggression.
The kind of driving that nobody notices because there's nothing to notice. She was quiet. Not uncomfortable quiet. Not the kind of quiet where someone is thinking of something to say. It was the kind of quiet Daniel recognized from long drives with people who just come out of something and hadn't yet decided whether to talk about it.