“And honey, you didn’t have to hide anything from us. We have never disapproved of your boyfriends. We trust your judgment.”
I stopped on the bottom step to stare at my mother. Normally the woman made perfect sense. But since I hadn’t had any caffeine yet, maybe I’d just misheard her. “Um…what—” I asked, but then my father came into the hallway carrying his book on WWII pilots.
“You’re up. How are you feeling?”
“Fine, Dad. The shower helped a lot.”
“I’ll bet.” He pressed a kiss to my forehead. “And while you’re in town, how about we have Jake come over to dinner? Connor doesn’t have to come. It’ll be just us family.”
“Us family,” I echoed.
My father nodded, his smile genial.
“Plus Jake.” Who wasn’t family. Who wasn’t even remotely family.
“Yes,” my mother said, a forced smile brightening her expression. “I’ll make lasagna. Everybody likes that. Do you think Jake will have time after the game? Or does he have to head back to Indy right away?”
“Um, I don’t know.” I stared at them for a moment, my head spinning. Clearly, I was missing something huge. “Where’s my phone?”
Neither parent said a word, and it took me a moment to remember. My phone was now burned to a crisp. At some point during the fire, I’d set it down, and now it was gone, along with my purse, credit cards, and ID. I would have to replace all of them, and the magnitude of doing that had me clenching in horror.
My mother touched my arm, her caress soothing. “If you hurry, we can stop by the phone place and buy you a new one before the game.”
The game. What game? But I didn’t ask that aloud. I realized that I needed something more than a phone right then. So I headed for the kitchen and the coffeepot. My parents trailed behind me. As if I weren’t freaking out enough.
I reached for a mug, but Mom was there before me. “I’ll get it. You sit down.”
I would have argued, but there were blueberry muffins on the table, and I was suddenly starved. There was nothing like my favorite breakfast treat to keep the world at bay. The problem was that right next to the muffins was a huge pile of Bobcat paraphernalia. Jersey, hat, watch, and even a designer across-the-body purse.
“What’s all this?” I asked.
“Well, that’s for you,” Mom said as she brought me my coffee. “We’re already wearing ours.”
It must have been the lack of caffeine that made me so oblivious, but sure enough, I noticed that the two of them were sporting matching Bobcat jerseys. I knew Dad had one because of Connor, but I hadn’t expected Mom to proudly model a shirt and…
“Are those Bobcat earrings?”
“Yup!” she said as the stylized cat flashed in the sun. “There’s a pair there for you, too!”
I looked and sure enough, there were earrings set on top of the jersey. I touched them gingerly, thinking they were pretty, but I had a good idea how much all this stuff cost. No way would my frugal mother buy all this.
“How did you get this?” I asked.
“Well…” My father began to say something, but he didn’t finish. He just cleared his throat and looked awkward. Which left my mother to fill in the silence.
“It was this woman from the Bobcats. Such a nice woman, wasn’t she?”
Dad nodded. “Very nice.”
It must have been Gia. The woman had boundless energy and would be on top of getting me all this Bobcat paraphernalia. But why?
My father grinned. “Gave us tickets to today’s game. All four of us.”
Mom nodded. “We’ve got special seats. And she said it would be great if we could look like true Bobcat fans—clothing at all. And it’s very comfortable, really.”
“Right, Mom. But let’s get back to why they’re doing this.” I didn’t have a suspicious nature. Not really, but this situation was raising red flags all over the place. “Were these from Jake?” That was weird, too, but at least I could understand it. After all, we’d…um…bonded well last night.
But my mother looked confused. “Oh, well, as to that, I don’t know. I guess they probably were, since you two are almost engaged. Now that your relationship is public, he must have figured you’d like to show everyone. Though that bracelet does tell it all, doesn’t it?”
