“Did you know that according to Nordic legend, a troll has four fingers on each hand, and four toes on each foot, and can have as many as nine heads?”
Rebecca lifted her head at that and looked at Rachel as if she had lost her mind. Which, Robin thought, she most certainly had. What was it with her and make-believe?
Rachel nodded. “I was reading about them in an old Breton manuscript—”
“Do you mean to tell me I am paying a goddamn fortune for you to read about trolls?” Dad rudely interrupted.
“Well, I . . . It was just something I found interesting and I thought—”
“Here’s something interesting—just what exactly are you going to do with a degree full of useless nonsense? I swear to God, Rachel, you are wasting your life!”
“It’s not useless, Dad. The evolution of language tells us how the human race has—”
“Like hell it isn’t. What do you think you can do with something like that?”
“Teach!” Rachel exclaimed. But she was shrinking in her chair.
“Yeah, teach, teach about trolls, for Chrissakes,” he said, shaking his head. “If you ever finish. At the rate you are going, you’ll gain fifty pounds before you do anything remotely close to finishing school. But I suppose I am to blame—if I wasn’t so ready to bankroll your perpetual schooling, you might have made something of yourself.”
“Oh, Dad,” Rebecca said wearily.
“Wh-what does that mean?” Rachel demanded. “I am something! I teach graduate classes!”
Dad gave a shout of incredulous laughter. “You wanna try living on that? Maybe you think Brian is going to help out? Wake up, Rachel! That’s life out there, not trolls and fairies and castles!”
Rachel colored. “His name is Myron,” she muttered, dipping her gaze away from him, and dropped her fork onto her plate, her appetite apparently gone.
It was more than Robin could bear. “Jesus, Dad, you are in fine form tonight, aren’t you?”
Dad shifted his gaze to Robin, braced himself against the table, and leaned forward. “Just calling them like I see them, Robbie.”
“Look, we all know you are feeling terrible, but—”
With a snort of laughter, Dad cut her off. “You have no idea what you are talking about, baby girl.”
God, how condescending—she hated when he spoke to her like that. “Don’t I? You’ve been snapping at us for two days now, disapproving of everything we do.”
“Well, forgive me if I am a little testy, but I am dying of cancer.”
“Dad, you are feeling so bad that you think you can say anything—”
“I can say anything!” he roared, slapping his palm against the tabletop so hard that the silver clattered loudly against the china. “I can say whatever I want to say in the short time I have left. I can tell my children that I have ruined them! You’re all too weak and self-indulgent to make it without me!”
“Aaron—”
“Don’t, Bonnie,” he warned her. “I’ve had enough of her arrogance!” he shouted, gesturing wildly at Robin.
So now suddenly she was arrogant? “Oh, that’s rich!” Robin said indignantly.
“You don’t believe me? It was your damn arrogance that cost us the Herrera account!”
Robin felt the blood drain from her face. She hadn’t told him—Evan. Dammit! She suddenly came forward, her elbows hitting the cherrywood table. “That is so unfair! Whatever Evan told you, it was a mistake—”
“Your mistake! You were the one playing in London while one of my oldest accounts was trying to get something very basic and very fundamental fixed!”
“I wasn’t playing in London, I had gone there to check on two accounts—”
“No, to run away from Evan Iverson, just like you run from all of them—”
Robin gasped. “That is really none of your business, Dad!”
“Well in this case, it is my business, or are you so arrogant you have forgotten even that?”
Robin fell back against her chair, disbelieving. “Dad, when are you going to let me live my life?”
“Right now!” he exclaimed heatedly. “Don’t you see? I want you to live, Robbie! I want you to stop running away and take a risk, but I am afraid you are too goddam full of yourself—”
“Stop it!” Mom cried.
“No, Mom, let him go,” Robin said, her voice suddenly shaking. “Let him tell me what a rotten daughter I’ve been, how I’ve done nothing for the company, how I’ve failed to give it my all and marry his golden star Evan. Come on, Dad, tell me what a failure I am! And while you are telling me, let me tell you that I have been working around the clock to bring you a new client, one bigger and better than any you have! I’ve been working like a dog to bring you Atlantic Cargo and Shipping!” she cried, almost shouting in her triumph.