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Rider accepted his drink, Elle hers, and Pen offered a shaky smile in response. Elle’s right eyebrow was curved so high on her forehead, it’d been lost in her hair.
No one said a word until Pen had a club soda in hand. Elle went first.
“And here we thought you’d come to tell us that your engagement was a sham to distract from your ex-wife.”
“Eleanor, for the love of—” Rider let out an exasperated huff and swallowed a mouthful of his martini.
“You’re only allowed one of those, don’t forget. Savor it.”
Pen stiffened, but the comforting weight of Zach’s arm was around her back in an instant.
“We’re due in December. We wanted to tell you in person before you found out from someone else.”
Elle pursed her already pursed lips, her cool green stare assessing and, from Pen’s vantage point, not all that approving.
“I think it’s great,” Rider said with a huge smile. Pen latched on to the man’s sentiment like a lifeline. “We already wrote you a check.” He reached into the pocket of his slacks and came out with a folded paper. “It’s for the wedding, but now I suppose you can include it with preparing for our first grandchild.”
He let out a hearty laugh and embraced Elle’s hand. “Better than croaking of a heart attack before I get to meet my grandkids, eh, Elle?”
“I suppose that’s true.” She narrowed her eyes again and Pen shifted in her seat. “What interested you most in my son, Ms. Brand? His money or his DNA?”
Next to her, Zach went on alert, but Pen stayed his retort by touching his arm.
“I can understand how this information comes as a shock to you, but there’s no need to be rude, Mrs. Ferguson. I’m neither a gold digger nor a woman who expected to get pregnant. Trust me when I tell you that you don’t want to know the part of your son that most interests me. I simply saw someone I liked.” She paused to take in Zach, whose mouth flinched like he might be fighting a proud smile. “And had to have him.”
She snapped her attention back to Elle, who’d dropped her jaw. Likely no one dared speak to the Oil Queen of Dallas the way Pen had, but the older woman had started it.
“Mom.”
Elle turned her stunned reaction to Zach.
“We’re not asking your permission, or for your approval. But I expect you to be much more gracious when the baby is here. He or she will be the first-born grandchild in the family.”
Elle drank down her martini in hearty gulps, then retrieved the spare martini left behind when Pen refused it and gulped that one, too.
Rider, his good humor intact, let out a crack of laughter. “Guess she’ll be having my second one, then.”
