She smiled and took a quick peek in the cabinets. “I hope you don’t mind. Since I’ll be over here and my son still eats off paper plates in his place…”
“Of course,” I answered. I really should have been offended by this woman coming in here and taking over, nosing through my cabinets, opening my fridge, but I was not. Not in the least.
“What time will Marcus be here?”
“Just about five-thirty,” I answered.
“You’re driving tonight?”
“First thing in the morning.” I cleared my throat. “So, Marcus will just crash on the couch tonight and we’ll—”
“Why?” Dawn cocked her head and looked at him.
“Why…what?”
“Why would my son sleep on the couch?”
“Because…you’re taking the bed…and…”
She smirked. “And you have a single bed?”
I choked again. “What?”
Pulling out two coffee mugs, she set about making the brew. “I graduated high school in 1979, Chase. I graduated college in 1983. I know all about sex. More, I know all about unmarried sex.”
“Holy TMI,” I mumbled.
“And if my son hasn’t gotten to know youin the Biblical sense, and make it worth your while, you walk away from him, you hear me?”
I wasn’t sure I could stop choking on the air—it was all me trying not to laugh and die from embarrassment at the same time. “The Biblical sense? Don’t they always say that God hates—”
“Figs, Chase. God hates figs.”
The laugh bubbled out of me and I didn’t want to stop it. There was absolutely no doubt in my mind why Marcus was the way he was. This woman was amazing, and whether he and I hung on and made it work, I wanted this kind of acceptance in my life.
“Okay, fine,” I said. “Marcus will crash with me. The animals can hang here, and this actually works better because we won’t wake you up. Are you sure that you’re okay with us taking the car?”
“I have his hostage upstate, so if he crashes, eh. I get the Shelby.”
My eyebrow shot up. “He has a Shelby?”
“Fully restored 1965 with his grandfather,” she said. “Metallic blue with a white racing stripe.”
My mouth fell open. “I had no idea!”
“That’s our insurance policy when he borrows one of ours. He can’t drive that to Illinois, so he borrows my Camry for the trip.” Dawn smiled and poured two mugs of coffee. “Works for me, I don’t mind driving the Shelby. Sexy ass car.”
“Ohgod, pleasedon’ttellme youanddad defiledmycar?”
Marcus was standing in the doorway with a hand over his eyes. Dawn lifted the mug of coffee and sniffed before taking a sip.
“Mom?”
She put the mug on the counter enthusiastically. “Oh, for God’s sake, Marc, of course we didn’t. Jesus. We only take it out to Make Out Point.”
“Mom!”
“When it comes to sex, my son is a prude.”
