Chapter 155

Lake POV

The door closed, shutting me out completely.

I stood there for a moment, feeling hollow. Then I returned to the kitchen where Ollie was pushing his cereal around his bowl without eating.

“Is that Papa’s work friend?” he asked.

“Yes,” I said. “They have important business to discuss.”

“More important than us?”

I didn’t have an answer for that.

The morning dragged by. I could hear voices from Ramon’s office—conference calls, video meetings, Jennifer’s professional tones mixing with Ramon’s responses. At one point, I heard him laugh at something someone said, and the sound was so jarring, so unlike the tense silence he maintained around me, that I had to grip the kitchen counter to steady myself.

He could laugh with his colleagues. Could be personable and engaged and present for his business. But with me and Ollie, he was distant and cold and barely there at all.

Around eleven, Rafael showed up at the door.

“He