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I closed my eyes. “Oh, God, Mom.”
“Bring him to dinner on Sunday,” Mom said. “I want to meet him.”
“No way,” I said, my panic rising even higher. “Absolutely not.”
“Well, I’m cooking for four,” Mom said. “That’s what I was calling you about. I was asking if you were going to bring Josh on Sunday. I was hoping to catch you before work. But now you’re bringing—what did he say his name was?”
“Mom, please.”
“Evie.” My mother was never stern or angry, but for some reason when she said my name like that, I always caved. “This is surprising, I admit, but I wasn’t born yesterday, you know. This young man is obviously very important to you. Tell me his name and bring him to dinner.”
“His name is Nick,” I said weakly.
“Five o’clock on Sunday,” Mom said. “I hope he’s hungry.”
NINE
Nick
While Evie hid in the bathroom, trying to explain me to her mother, I got out of bed, pulled on some sweatpants, and fed Scout. She did another happy jig around her kibble bowl—happy jigs were Scout’s specialty—and dug in, pulling each kibble out one by one and dropping it on the floor before eating it.
I put on some coffee, made toast, poured some juice. I wasn’t too hung over, because I’d had less to drink than Evie did. Someone had to keep their head, and last night, it wasn’t Evie.
My instinct had been right. Evie knew how to party, and she’d learned it somewhere. I wondered where.
Eventually she came out of the bathroom. She was dressed—no more sexy, curvy ass on display, though it was burned into my memory now—and she still had my shirt on. She had no bra on, I knew. I had spent a lot of time with braless Evie, considering I’d just met her. I approved. Her tits were smoking hot under there.
“You answered my phone!” she said, her cheeks flushed.
I had. Why had I done that? Curiosity, maybe. Also, I had half hoped it was Bank Boy calling. “It was just your mom,” I said. “No big deal.”
“No big deal!” She closed her eyes and pinched the bridge of her nose, and I realized she had her uptight expression back on, her jaw tight, her brows furrowed. That expression had disappeared right before the shots last night, and I didn’t like the fact that it was back. “My mother doesn’t understand.”
“Understand what?” I asked, pushing a piece of buttered toast across the counter at her. “That her grown up, single daughter might fuck a guy? It seems pretty understandable to me.”
“I didnotfuck you,” she said.
“Believe me, I know.”
“She thinks I’m bringing you to dinner on Sunday! I was supposed to bring Josh, and now somehow I’m bringing you!” She glanced away, panicked. “It’s fine,” she said. “I can control this. I’ll just make up an excuse.”
“Wait a minute.” I leaned a hip against the counter. “Why am I coming to dinner? You actually said yes?”
“No. I didn’t. I mean, I said—” She blew out a breath. “I didn’t say anything, and she just assumed you’re coming. That’s what she does.” Her gaze traveled down my bare chest, my stomach, and sort of froze there, distracted. Then she pulled herself together and dragged her gaze away. “It’s a bad idea, right? Like, really bad.”
“Yeah I’d fucking say so,” I said.
She pulled her gaze back up to my face. The corner of her mouth twitched. “Never been to a girl’s mom’s for dinner before, huh Nick?”
That was putting it mildly. I’d rather go to Guantanamo Bay. “No,” I said.
“Yeah. You’re right. I’ll just tell her you have leprosy. Or that you’re an astronaut, and you took a five-year mission to Mars. Otherwise she’ll bug me about you until Christmas.”
“Or just sayHey, Mom, I’m a grownup, none of your business,” I said. “What does it matter what she thinks?”
That just made Evie look panicked again. “What my mother thinks is important,” she said. “You don’t understand.”
She had sounded like a normal enough lady to me. But I knew nothing about having parents, since mine never talked to me if they could help it. “Never mind,” I said. “I’m not the guy to ask for advice. Do you have anything on your phone from Bank Boy?”
