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After a minute, she seemed to decide that Drandbabies Maybe the fact that there were two cops in the rooet us soht back” She was physically incapable of having guests in her hooods

“Thank you, Mrs Nolan,” Daze

She hesitated for ahim closely His expression was open, sincere I could see her war ever-so-slightly “You’re welcolance atto the kitchen

I turned to my father then and blurted, “So Dad, we’re here because I need your advice”

I heard ht the urge to roll my eyes Ok, so I’d never actually uttered those words before, but did it really warrant the dropping of pots and pans?

My father was fairly shocked, too, which he conveyed with a single raised eyebrow “You do? You’ve certainly never wanted lance at my boyfriend Last time I’d seen my father, he’d not soout with Dmitri

My usual response when dealing with o now, but I made myself say calmly, “I really need your help, Dad”

That was another combination of words that had never actually passed from my lips It had a curious effect on et ain Finally he seemed to concede that ere both in totally uncharted territory here, and leaned back in his chair as he said, “Ok What do you need?”

“Maybe we should talk in the kitchen,” I said, glancing at my nephews

My father nodded and hauled hiot up and held a hand out to Dmitri

“Me too?” he asked softly I nodded, and he deposited the kids on the carpet with that ic phone app and took my hand The boys didn’t even look up as ent into the kitchen, and the dog curled up to go back to sleep beside them

My s out of the cupboard e calanced at D out I was gay hadn’t been the highlight of their year, butFar better than I could have hoped for, actually

My father and I sat at the kitchen table, and e over the flowered vinyl table cloth D my dad and me to shame in the sexisently cajoled her until finally he was given the task of arranging the cookies on the platter while ar and crea theht have her doubts about Duest, and that was nice to see

When finally ere all seated around the table, I gave my parents a concise summary of Dmitri’s involveor Sokolov and the veiled threats he’d delivered this afternoon When I got to the part about not being able to get a search warrant because Sokolov had a couple cops in his pocket, a vein bulged out in rowl, “I need nao on in my department”

“Ifor my uncle,” Dmitri said quietly It was the first time he’d spoken since we’d sat down at the table I looked at hily, and he told me, “Joe Rudin He does the payroll, he’d have names Maybe he’s bribable Orhim”

My father stared at D moment And then he nodded He liked that But he wasn’t ready to welcome Dmitri to the family with open arms just yet Instead, he turned to me and said, “See? This is exactly what I orried about when I found out you were dating soot lowlife criainst your family I know Sokolov He’s been on my radar for more than two decades He’s a total sociopath and a slippery son of a bitch We’ve never been able to pin anything on him”