Hidden Page 9

  “Little of both,” Patsy drawled with a Mae West hand bump on her updo.

  Oh my god—what’s happening?

  The sound of slow applause rang out when David clapped his hands. “Bravo. You’ve managed to scare my girlfriend shitless.”

  Girlfriend? Holy shit. He said it out loud. To his aunt. Amy’s head gave a little spin.

  Patsy waved a dismissive hand in her direction. “Oh, pfft. She’ll recover.”

  David looked at her with a wide, toothy grin. “Honey,” he said softly. His hand came out, and he gestured her forward. “Come here. It’s all right. She won’t bite.”

  It sounded like he was introducing her to a guard dog. As she stepped forward the comedy of the whole situation took her under, and an involuntary snort of jeering amusement ripped out of her.

  Horrified, Amy slapped a hand across her mouth just as Patsy shook all over with laughter and high-fived David.

  “Shit Stinky Pants,” she cackled. “She’s perfect for our crazy family.”

  David slung his arm over her shoulders. The move was casual and lovably possessive.

  “Amy Peters, this is my certifiably nuts aunt. Forget ever meeting her crazy ass before this, okay?”

  What was she supposed to do? Nodding her agreement, Amy noticed that Patsy was eyeing them with undisguised curiosity.

  “As long as you remember to move carefully when she’s around and never to attempt to steal her spotlight, you’ll be fine.”

  “Aaaand?” Patsy smirked.

  “Oh yeah, and she either knows where the skeletons are buried or hid them herself so watch your step.”

  “Quinn’s skeletons,” she added with snarky emphasis. “Which is why I’m here.”

  “One thing at a time you bossy bitch. I was doing the introduction.”

  Patsy’s arched brow and her mock incredulity was damn funny.

  “He wears big boy pants now, I suppose?” she asked with so much snark that Amy snorted again.

  “Aw, come on,” David answered sulkily. “You could at least pretend to be normal for five minutes, couldn’t you?”

  Patsy made a gesture of surrender. Amy noted that her manicure was not nail salon perfect—a sure sign of someone who worked with her hands. She was intrigued. Maybe David’s aunt was more than a powerful, society business woman.

  “No, you’re right,” Patsy agreed. “Don’t want to scare your little plaything away right off the bat.”

  Amy found her voice in a goddamn hurry at the implied putdown. With a brittle chuckle, she gave Patsy her own arched brow and asked, “How do you know it’s not him who’s the plaything?”

  After a short laugh, Patsy replied with a joyful smile. “Yes, yes. You’ll do fine.”

  “Patsy Loman, say hello and be nice. This, as you know, is Amy Peters and in case this isn’t abundantly clear by now, she’s the one.”

  “Do I curtsey or is a handshake enough?” Amy wasn’t entirely sure where the words came from. It was a little like the first time she met Quinn Sanderson when her instinct had been to use humor.

  “Curtsey?” Patsy asked with horror. “Handshake? Are you crazy?”

  David murmured a warning. “Patsy…”

  Instead of the rejection Amy feared, Patsy Loman came at her and initiated a fearsome hug complete with back and forth arcs that stunned her for a second.

  “This family hugs.”

  “We do?” David asked. His laughing response sounded genuinely happy.

  “Well, we do now,” Patsy declared. “Matter of fact, it’s starting to seem like the whole fam-damily is on a love boat cruise so get used to it!”

  “Please tell me Missy and Tom are on board.”

  Patsy shooed them into the seating area. “The real question, Amy, isn’t about Missy. Or you guys.”

  She didn’t understand and sent her eyes to David’s face.

  He seemed to be considering something and then suddenly said, “Judge Karalis?”

  Oh, wait a minute, she thought. Hadn’t Missy mentioned something about a judge trying to hold Quinn’s hand?

  “We all know what a hard ass Quinn has been. Her bullshit drove you two into hiding and made poor Missy a nervous wreck.”

  She felt a strong compulsion to add her two cents—so she did.

  “Melissa is my friend, and David is—well, you know what he is. They both love their mother, Mrs. Loman.” She turned a smile on her man. “I admire that trait. In both of them.”

  Patsy brushed invisible specks off her skirt. “Well,” she sniffed. “I believe I just found out why Quinn kept her tongue for so long.”

  David beamed at her as if she’d just announced the winning answer. Her brows bumped together in confusion.

  “She’s fucking awesome, isn’t she?” He drawled.

  Then he hesitated a moment. His chin tilted up, and he made a face when something occurred to him. “Hold on. For so long? What the hell does that mean?”

  Patsy wasted no time getting to the heart of her visit.

  “That’s why I’m here, Stinky. I’m like that meteorologist on channel five. The one who likes to prognosticate about the weather in crude terms. When I spoke to your mom this morning, she made a confession, and the second it came out of her my radar pinged. I don’t know the details, but it’s a sure thing that she’s known about you two for a while.”

  That sound? It was her composure shredding. “Oh, no,” she gasped. “David. She knows we lied.”

  “I’ve got this,” he assured her. “Why a confession?”

  Patsy sniggered. “Oh, goody! And look. We’ve circled round and stopped at the perfect spot. Why a confession? Judge Karalis.”

  They were speaking in code or something because she wasn’t following. Throwing up her hands she motioned a ‘T’ for a time out and let loose with a shrill whistle. David and Patsy immediately stopped and looked at her.

  “Sorry,” she admitted. “Habit. Sometimes it’s the only way to get a word in edgewise at the dinner table. Can one of you please help me read between the lines? I’m confused.”

  Patsy chuckled. “Your family whistles. This one just talks right over each other.”

  “Hey,” David quipped. “I’m with Amy on this. Give us the four-one-one. Help us understand.”

  “It’s simple, really,” Patsy assured them. “I told you already Stinky—your mom smells the coffee. She knows she went too far. You have Adrian Karalis to thank for that. He’s been breaking down the wall she put up, stone by stone.”

  “Whoa.”

  When he reacted, Amy looked at David. He wore an expression of absolute wonder.

  “Exactly. Anyway—Adrian made her see how bitterness and a cargo-ship of wounded pride set your family on a perilous course. You and Missy became victims of your parents’ fucked-up-ness over and over and over.”

  They sat in silence for a few moments, presumably so each could think about the ramifications of Patsy’s revealing explanation.

  “That uptight witch you call a mother is my oldest and closest Ya Ya sister. She’s a handful, I’ll grant you that. But she loves her kids to the moon and back. Quinn expressing regret isn’t the long shot you might think. That’s what I came to say. Just give her a chance.”

  “Is that why she had her assistant call me?”

  “Are you serious?” Patsy asked with a sniggering titter. “She had Garrison do her dirty work? What a shit.”

  “Would you have survived an actual person-to-person with my mother?” David gently asked.

  He had a point, so she shook her head with a tiny shrug.

  “Be that as it may, if my opinion counts for anything I just want to say that I’m thrilled for you and Melissa. It takes a lot to come out the other side of an ugly, emotional family break-up and be anywhere close to normal. I’m proud of you both. You turned out okay—and the choices you’re making now, well…” She ended with a smirk and a shrug. “Good work.”

  David leaned closer and mock whispered loud enou
gh for the whole room to hear, “I think that was the Loman Seal of Approval.”

  “Shut up Stinky.”

  Amy laughed and then asked the obvious. “Um, hey. Would one of you like to explain the stinky pants thing?”

  David groaned, and his head flopped back on his neck. It was comical surrender.

  Patsy stood up and smoothed her appearance with sure, steady hands while smirking all the while.

  “If she’s going to be part of the family,” she said with meaningful emphasis, “she’s gonna have to know.”

  Amy glanced between aunt and nephew, enjoying the relaxed and amusing way they had with each other.

  “She is going to be part of the family—right, David?”

  He glared at her and said, “There’s clearance for your broom on runway three.”

  Laughing, she bent over and kissed his cheek before giving the same cheek a nasty pinch and a sharp slap.

  “Smart ass.”

  “You better go,” he drawled. “Your cauldron is bubbling over.”

  “Amy,” Patsy said with a hearty laugh. “I like you, and as long as you don’t take his shit, I’ll continue to like you.”

  She laughed. “Ah, well then, Mrs. Loman. It looks like we’re going to be the best of friends because I’ve totally got his number.”

  David looked back and forth between them and laughed. “Man, I’ll tell you what. Tom better ball up fast because you ladies are scary as shit when you’re on the same page. I need some back-up.”

  The weird encounter drew to a close. David kissed her sweetly at the door to her office and explained that he was going to walk his aunt to her car.

  Patsy Loman watched them with a knowing smile.

  A long time after they left she was still thinking about how fast things were moving. After a few years of slow, steady and secret, her head was swimming.

  She looked at the sapphire bangle and touched the delicate earrings.

  They never had anything that resembled a real plan for how they were going to come out as a couple. Maybe this was the way it was supposed to happen, and she should stop worrying about the timing and get with the program because there wasn’t a doubt in her mind that by the time she left the office for the day, the Beck Industries gossip channel would have been on fire for hours.

  Today, when she shut the door of her office and headed for home, everyone she passed and spoke to on her way out of the building would know she was David Sanderson’s girlfriend.

  Chapter Eight

  “Relax, you look beautiful.”

  “Says you.”

  “No one else matters but me.”

  Amy turned hooded eyes on him and expressed her incredulous frustration with a cute little grunt. “Is there a switch you throw that makes you unable to hear yourself when you talk?”

  David chuckled. They’d been verbally going at each other for hours. It was her way when she was nervous. Not quite raving bitch but definitely snippy and belligerent. Even when his dick was nudging the back of her throat.

  “Your mother matters you dipshidiot. I want to make the right impression.”

  He tried to take her hand, but she snatched it away. They were in the back of a luxury town car on the way to his mom’s favorite Italian restaurant.

  “You do realize this isn’t the first time you’ve met? Or even the twentieth time.”

  “Well, it’s the first time I’ll be your girlfriend you boob.”

  He teased her because it was funny and she was making it so easy.

  “It’s not too late to swing by Pilgrims-r-Us and pick up a long dress with an apron.”

  “Oh sure,” she scoffed. “Wouldn’t that pair well with crotchless lingerie.”

  It was a toss-up between cringing at the thought that the driver heard what she said and sliding his hand up her short skirt to fondle what was his. He was making her wait till later for the orgasm she’d be eagerly anticipating all evening.

  The sloppy, gagging, toe curling blowjob was her idea and who was he to deny a gorgeous naked woman when she was begging to suck his dick?

  Not him, that’s for sure.

  But this was his Amy, and she didn’t do anything half way. In fact, she got so into it that they lost track of time. After demanding every drop, she became a wild glutton until she got what she wanted. There wasn’t enough time once he recovered to even the score so… she waited.

  He smiled. Anticipation was a powerfully erotic aphrodisiac.

  “What time is it?” she asked.

  Checking his watch, he looked at her and smiled. “Time for me to say I love you.”

  “I’m nervous.”

  This time when he reached for her hand, she let him have it. “I think my mother is more nervous. This is about Quinn more than it’s about us.”

  “Did you know there’s a photographer coming this evening?”

  His head did a jerky double-take. “A what?”

  “I’m serious, David,” she quietly grumbled. “Do I look okay? Pictures!” she added with a shudder.

  Searching his brain for every likely reason why his mother arranged for pictures, he came up empty. It didn’t worry him too much though because whatever Quinn was up to it wouldn’t be malicious. Uncomfortable—maybe. Petty or mean? No.

  So he focused all of his attention on calming his date down before she worked herself up into an episode.

  “Honey,” he gently drawled, “you look like Jennifer Lawrence dressed up for a red carpet. Whatever the fuck you did to your hair is awesome and you know I’m a knuckle dragging fan of black lace.”

  The beginning of a smile made the corners of her lips quiver.

  “If Quinn needs pictures, I sincerely hope my mother doesn’t mind taking a back seat to your beauty—and I’m not saying that because I’m supposed to.”

  The smile became real. He watched her cheeks bloom with a blush.

  “Why didn’t you wear the sapphires?”

  Amy hugged his arm and dropped a kiss on his shoulder. “Out of respect for your mother. I don’t want to test my luck. If she’s okay with us being together, that’s all I care about. Rubbing her nose in the bigger picture isn’t necessary. Or nice.”

  Some part of him couldn’t understand why she gave a shit about being nice after they’d spent the last couple of years acting like they were breaking every goddamn social convention just to save his mother’s ridiculously over-sensitive feelings.

  But that’s why it was Amy Peters clinging to him in the back of a town car. Because she was that awesome, that big-hearted, that caring.

  He cherished her presence in his life. She was the only girl he’d ever loved, and nothing could change that one simple fact.

  “Oh, hey,” she suddenly blurted out. Her head shot up, and she hugged his arm tight. A cheeky grin helped light up her face.

  “Guess what! We got an okay for the project location in Puerto Rico. You were right. The hurricane recovery has been such a challenge for them. All we had to do was throw in some incentives and bam—green light.”

  “The school tie-in?” he asked.

  “Uh huh. That’s what did it. Your instincts are miraculous. And I’m not saying that because I’m supposed to.”

  He chuckled when she used his phrase.

  “Cultural identity is a powerful force. That’s why each location will be successful on its own and help power the whole.”

  He loved the excitement in her voice. “The first shipment of subscription boxes came in too. My team has already started the venue set-up. It’s going to be amazing.”

  David smiled into her eyes. “We’re going to knock this one out of the ballpark and help struggling communities in the process. I’m glad we did it together.”

  The car made a left turn into Paolini’s well-lit parking lot and stopped at the valet stand. He quickly glanced around outside the car while Amy gathered her things.

  Was he surprised to find Garrison hovering nearby? Uh, yeah—he was.

  The vale
t came to his side of the car and to help him out as he saw the driver head towards Amy’s door. He slid out of the car and scooted around the trunk with haste to reach her before both feet hit the pavement. No matter what else happened tonight, his number one priority was her. If anyone fucked with his girl, he wasn’t going to be a gentleman about it, and that included his mom.

  David’s surprise over Garrison’s presence turned to bewilderment when the woman disappeared into the shadows and didn’t approach them. It was as if she was waiting for something.

  Or someone.

  As they made their way into the landmark Italian restaurant and approached the hostess stand, a cheery voice raised in greeting. “David Sanderson!” .

  It was Davinia Paolini, the portly grey-haired wife to the current proprietor of the fourth-generation family owned business. Where Paolini’s was concerned, the recipes really had come straight off the boat.

  “You came on a good night,” she told them with a smile. “Chef Nono is trying out some of his grandmother’s Tuscan favorites. Your mama has a special penchant for the Coccoli prosciutto and stracchino appetizer.”

  “Davinia,” he said warmly. “It’s good to see you again.” He took Amy’s hand and held on tight. “Darling,” he drawled.

  Amy looked at him and bit her lip. She was trying not to laugh at his use of the old-school term. He continued with the introduction but struggled with his need to laugh.

  “This is Davinia Paolini. She’s responsible for keeping a family of Italian men in line.”

  Amy laughed and put out her hand. “You’re my new hero,” she said. “All I’ve got is a brother and one sister to boss around, but they’re enough to drive a reasonable person to drink.”

  “Davinia, this is my girlfriend, Amy Peters.”

  The older woman released a hearty laugh while shaking Amy’s hand. “A girlfriend, you say? Why David, do you know what this means for my poor waitresses?” She tsk’ed and shook her head while never stopping the laugh. “Hearts will be breaking tonight.”

  “Is my mother here?”

  “Of course,” she told him with dry snark. “We’ve rearranged the seating three times.”

  With a flourishy wave, she said, “This way children,” and took them through the main dining room until they came to a cozy alcove with a large, single table. Seated in the middle, so she faced anyone who approached, his mother presided in all her regal glory.