After Ronan returned to his bedroom, Janice went to report to him, "Mr. Evans, Ms. Cordelia has gone to the nursery to sleep again."
Ronan raised an eyebrow slightly. "Let her be."
Tomorrow, Cordelia had a lecture to attend, plus a meeting at Empower Operations in the afternoon. She needed to hit the hay early and beat the morning rush.
The next day, in the living room.
"I've got a meeting back at Empower Operations this afternoon. Are you coming?" she asked Ronan, who was lounging on the couch with a book in his hands.
"Heading out?" Ronan looked up at her, eyebrow quirked.
"Yeah. If you're going, I can hitch a ride with you." Cordelia figured Ronan probably wouldn't be leaving, considering he was still in his pajamas.
Ronan pulled out his phone and dialed a number. "Nope." While waiting for the call to connect, he looked up at Cordelia and said.
Cordelia went back to Callum's room to pack her stuff.
The call was picked up on the other end.
"Aren't you supposed to be in Birchwood today?" Ronan spoke into the phone. "Peter asked you guys to go house hunting."
"I already picked out the ones I liked from the brochures..."
"Alright, swing by later to pick up Cordelia. She's heading back to Birchwood."
"Bro, come on, that's not fair..."
Ronan hung up. Soon after, his phone pinged several times. He kept his eyes on his book, not bothering to check. Even without looking, he knew who was messaging and what about. It would be Emerson.
Cordelia got in the car, her heart no longer set on returning to Birchwood. She wished she could stay home and spend more time with the child.
"How much longer until you make professor at Birchwood College?" Emerson tried to lighten the mood, deliberately avoiding the topic of her child.
"Well, it depends on the number of papers I publish. I'm leading a national project right now, so it should be pretty quick."
"That's my girl, bright as ever. You were my student after all, weren’t you?"
Cordelia cracked a smile, though she wasn't too keen on dredging up the past. "Oh, by the way, how big a house are you planning to buy? What made you decide to get one in Birchwood?" she asked Emerson.
"Lumos Enterprises is behind the construction. You can bet on top-notch quality. Plus, Mr. Evans is in talks with the city to bring in new schools, so these are going to be prime school district homes. I reckon the property values could shoot up to sixty or seventy grand. He's offering us an eighty percent deal, so I'm thinking of snagging three units, each a thousand square feet, for investment, and one two-thousand square footer for myself." Emerson was beaming, feeling like he had finally caught a break.
Cordelia looked at Emerson in disbelief. "You're loaded, huh?"
Comments
The readers' comments on the novel: The Contracted Ever After (Cordelia and Ronan)