Dad wasn’t wearing Christmas ornaments over his ears anymore, but his hair wasn’t as ruthlessly controlled as usual and he wore the very slightest of smiles when Jack pushed open the study door, taking in the terrain with a brief glance before allowing his demie to come into view.
demieIt was, after all, traditional.
Trevor Rouje’s study was a wonderland of shelves lined with leatherbound spines, ranks of books broken every so often by an antique curio—an ivory statue of a snarling jungle cat, a gilded cedar box, a globe of rock crystal with a single vertical crimson flaw in its heart, and others. Dad sometimes returned from business trips with yet another small, priceless thing, and it went into a handy space with no trouble at all.
The furniture was chunky and likewise antique, dark w
