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“I’d be happy to do it, if you want to visit with Shay,” Cam said.

Mama smiled wide, and I could practically see the calculation in her eyes. “Well, aren’t you a peach. Grounds are in that canister there.”

She set the flowers in a vase she filled with water, and I settled onto the couch while Cam set to work.

“He’s got manners, I’ll give him that,” she said once she sat beside me, then more loudly, “So I understand my daughter’s been helping at your company.”

“Yes.” Cam dumped a few spoonfuls of coffee grounds into the filter. “She’s been straightening up my marketing department.”

Her mouth stretched into a devious grin. “And do you think that’s appropriate? Sleeping with your employees?”

My mouth dropped open. “Mama!”

Cam paused to look at her, face expressionless. In the fluorescent light, his eyes looked especially blue, and they locked with my mother’s, rising to her test. “We aren’t sleeping together.”

Mama hummed. “Yet.”

The corner of his mouth perked. “Yet.”

I threw my hands over my burning face. “Oh my god. Can you stop, please?”

“I will when he answers the question,” Mama said.

“Would you like the polite answer or the truth?” he asked.

She let out a single, amused huff. “Oh, I like you. Come on, lay the truth on me.”

“Alright.” He braced his weight on the counter between the living room and kitchen. “The truth is that I don’t think it’s appropriate. There are rules against it. Rules I wrote.”

Ripples of embarrassment expanded through my body, turning my skin both hot and cold. He thought we were inappropriate? Did he think I was unprofessional?

And then he continued, “But those rules are in place to protect the company, and I care about Shay far more than the company, so that rule won’t stop me from dating her.”

My face went slack. Did he just say that to my mother? Before he said it to me?

“And the consequences?” she asked.

“Won’t exist,” he said, “since we don’t enforce it, but if they did, they’d be mine.”

A measure of respect lightened my mother’s gaze. “You got a gift for reading people, don’t you?”

Cam went back to the coffee. “Usually. Your daughter is a rare exception.”

“And here I thought you were just a rich nerd,” Mom said under her breath.

“I can’t believe this is happening,” I muttered.

“Hey, the boy knows how to work a room,” she said to me, then to Cam, “Did they teach you that in rich-boy school?”

“Yes,” he deadpanned. “Our nannies give us handbooks in the cradle.”

My mother’s green eyes twinkled with good humor. She leaned closer to me. “Okay,” she said as if conceding a battle. “I get it.”

After that, the evening passed with far less mortifying conversation, and Cam crept his way into my mother’s good graces. When we left, he went to start the car while Mama hugged me tight. “You got one hell of a storm heading your way, baby girl.”

“I know.”

“I think he might be in love with you.”