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Their Cold War had to cease—he knew that. Especially with him returning to work.
“Hello,” he said.
“Welcome back, son,” Nicolette said.
Someone had alerted her to his presence. The concept of Big Brother had nothing on a curious mother—especially a powerhouse like Nicolette Lavoie-Cress.
“How can I help you, Mama?” he asked, aware that his tone was still cool and distant with her as he made his way down the wide hall to his office. He gave his brothers Luc and Sean a wave through the glass wall of their offices.
“The family is doing an interview and cover shoot forScrumptious,” she said of Cress, INC.’s flagship magazine.
He entered his office, pausing to take in the sight of the Manhattan skyline outside the floor-to-ceiling windows. The sun was bright and its rays almost blinded him.
Jillian had loved the feel of the sun on her naked body. He remembered mornings she would lie on a yoga mat beneath the loft windows to relish the beams as they warmed her body, giving it a golden glow. Never had he seen anything more beautiful.
“Cole?”
“I can’t make it,” he said, jarred from his memory. “You know I run my food truck on the weekends.”
The chair behind his deck swiveled to the front, revealing his mother sitting in it.
“Rather dramatic. Don’t you think?” Cole asked as he walked over to his ebony desk and set his phone facedown upon it along with his keys.
Nicolette stood, looking beautiful in a tailored black-silk pantsuit. “Not unlike you disappearing,” she said before opening her arms wide and bending her fingers to beckon him. “I haven’t hugged my son in months. Let’s fix that ASAP, Cole.”
He stepped into her embrace, towering over her height.
Nicolette rose on her toes in her heels. “I did things wrong, but I meant well,” she said. “Forgive me?”
Cole stepped back and busied himself pushing his shirtsleeves up his arms before claiming his seat. “Forgive? Yes. Forget? Not yet,” he said.
“Even if my actions revealed the flaw of blind ambition in Jillian?” she asked.
He stiffened as he stared at his mother hard. “You and I will never discuss Jillian Rossi,” he said.
Nicolette held up her hands as if conceding. “We need you at the interview,” she said, switching gears.
“I’m available at any time outside of the weekend,” he said, logging on to his computer.
“Your food truck wasn’t important to you during your...sabbatical,” his mother pointed out as she walked around to claim one of the seats in front of his desk.
“So, you could imagine my urgency to get back to it as soon as possible,” he countered.
Nicolette eased her hands into the pockets of her pants. “When you were a toddler, you clung to me more than any of your brothers—even Lucas once he was born,” she said.
Cole steeled himself. She was going into full guilt mode and pulling at heartstrings. His mother was the best at it.
“You would love for me to pull you in my lap and read to you,” she continued with twinkling blue eyes and a genuine smile. “It was the best. Just me and my little Cole Man. The sound of your little raspy voice asking me to read some more was better than a flawlessly cooked soufflé. Just perfection.”
She sighed.
“What went wrong, Cole?” she asked.“Pourquoi me deetestes-tu?”
He chuckled and tapped his fingers atop his desk as he eyed her. “I don’t hate you,” he answered her question. “I was angry at you for interfering in my life, and I need to make it clear to you not to do it again. It feels disrespectful as a grown man.”
She nodded in understanding. “It is not easy to accept that your boys—”
“Sons,” he interjected.
