Five Hours a Year novel · Chapter 5 of 24
Chapter 5: Hour One
"Go ahead," Alec had said, and I let the timer run for a full minute before I did.
He sat at the far end of the conference table with his hands flat on the wood.
He didn't check the watch.
I noticed that, and I told myself it meant nothing.
"My father is in the ground," I said. "You weren't there when they put him in."
"I know."
"Do you? He taught you to bait a hook on the pier at Cedar Point. You wore the wrong shoes and he gave you his boots."
"I remember."
"You stood at the church door and looked at your watch with my mother three steps away."
"Leah."
"I'm not done. It's an hour, and I'm billing."
He shut his mouth.
"She asked me where you were going," I said. "I told her you had a client. I stood in front of my own family and defended you."
"I'm sorry."
"I didn't ask for sorry. I'm telling you what it cost me."
My voice had stayed level, and I was proud of that, until the last word cracked.
Alec did something I had never seen him do.
He took off the watch.
He unbuckled it, set it on the table, and slid it down the wood until it stopped beside my elbow.
The timer was still running.
I could see the seconds going.
"Desmond texted me at the first hymn," he said. "The Brandt closing was moved up. He said if I wasn't at my desk by four, the client would walk and we'd lose forty people their jobs."
"Forty."
"It was the number he used. I stood there with your hand in mine and a man's livelihood in my pocket, and I picked wrong." He looked straight at me. "I'm not asking you to forgive it. I'm telling you I picked, and I knew it while I was walking down the steps."
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