They Chose the Daughter I Found, So I Called In Their Loans novel · Chapter 23 of 24

Chapter 23: The Man in the Snow

I went down in the elevator in my gown and Gabriel's overcoat, with my hair still tangled from the pillow.

He came with me as far as the lobby desk, and stopped there, and put a hand on my back.

"I'll be right here," he said.

"I know."

The night manager unlocked the front doors for me and stood back.

Snow lay a hand deep on the sidewalk.

My father was standing on it in his good overcoat, with his shoulders white and his hands at his sides and no hat.

He had been there a long time.

He turned when I came out.

"Jacqueline," he said.

"Dad."

"I won't keep you. I want to say it standing up." His voice shook, and he waited until it steadied. "I told you to leave in front of thirty people. I had your bags packed in the hall. Gwen wanted it done, and I let her, because it was easier than being the one to say no. I'm not offering you a reason. I'm telling you what I did."

"I heard you."

"I never asked who you were," he said. "When you came. A little girl with one shoe in her hand, and I thought, how kind we are. I didn't once wonder whose child you were. I didn't wonder tonight, in that room, until Ulysses Norcross read out a card." He looked at the ground. "I'm ashamed of that more than the rest."

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