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“This shit? This is my life, Mother!” I realized how loud I was and lowered my voice. “And if you want to continue to be a part of it, then I don’t care how you deal. But you have to.”
“I know!” Mom sighed. “Do you think I don’t know that? I’ve been with you through all your twists and turns.”
Oh, Mom. I had to admit, I occasionally felt bad for her. When she’d had me, she’d had no idea what she was getting into. I’d always been headstrong, even as a child, and my wants had hardly ever lined up with hers. But this wasn’t an argument over an Easter dress or my curfew. I couldn’t compromise to keep her happy. “Then don’t give up on me on this one.”
I had her, and I knew it. She was silent for a long time before she said, “You know I’m not entirely comfortable with your situation. But if you’re happy, I’m gonna try to be happy for you. You just have to give me a little bit to warm up.”
“I am happy.” I took a huge gulp of air in relief. “Neil and I are really good together, Mom. You just have to get to know him better.”
“I don’t suppose I have a choice now.” There was a pause. “So. No grandkids then?”
“Sorry.” Even if I had wanted kids, it was pretty much a non-issue, now that Neil had gone through so much chemotherapy.
“Well, Marie’s kids will have babies, and they’ll probably need a sitter some of the time.” There was Mom’s always-looking-on-the-bright-side attitude. “I really will be happy for you. Even if I’m not the world’s biggest Neil fan—”
“I think I have that covered.”
“—I know he loves you. Because every day when you two were out, I cut another spring in that sofa bed frame, and he never once complained,” Mom said with no small amount of pride at her own craftiness. I wasn’t entirely sure why she believed that proved anything, other than the fact that she was a total nutjob.
“That’s horrible!” I scolded. “What is this, a white trash community theatre version of Once Upon a Mattress?”
“It’s a mother looking out for her daughter,” Mom insisted, and I had to bite my cheek to keep from pointing out that if anyone needed looking out after, it was a crazy woman who went sick house on her own sofa bed with a pair of wire cutters to prove some demented point.
But I had to love that she was willing to go to furniture-wrecking lengths over my happiness.
CHAPTER SIX
The next day, Neil went back to Elwood & Stern. Officially, that is. He’d been logging major hours from home on both Porteras and Auto Watch since November, despite his doctor’s instructions to take it easy and give himself time. He was itching to get back to work.
His alarm woke me at six-thirty, but I stayed stubbornly cuddled under the duvet until I heard him emerge from the bathroom after his shower. The master bath in the New York apartment was so cool. It was accessible only through a dressing room, a bigger, more organized version of a walk-in closet, with floor level heaters.
Seriously, how did I ever live without special vents to heat my feet in the mornings?
I scooped up the shirt I’d sort of—okay, totally—ripped off Neil the night before, and slipped my arms into it. It was going to need a lot of new buttons, so I closed it by wrapping my arms around myself. I went to the dressing room, leaned against the doorjamb, and looked in. Neil was buttoning the cuffs of his blinding white button down shirt. His gray hair was mussed and sparkled damply in the overhead can lighting. He caught sight of me. “I’m sorry, did I wake you?”
“I can always go back to bed.” Squinting through my just-woke-up haze, I noticed there was something different about him. It took me a groggy minute to realize what it was. “You shaved the beard off.”
With great concentration, he picked out a navy blue tie with white pin dots. “It made me look middle-aged.”
“The fact that you’re about to be fifty in March makes you look middle-aged.” I flipped my bed hair to one side of my head and yaw
ned.
He looked up with his half-smile. He really did appear younger without the facial hair. “Shut that smart mouth and come help me with my tie. I have an assignment for you today.”
My tummy fluttered. “An assignment? Is this some naughty student, hot professor role-play? Because I have to say, I’m kind of down with that.”
He placed me in front of the big, built-in trifold mirror.
“Hands to your sides please, you’re obstructing my view.” He lifted my hair to lay the tie over the back of my neck. “Stand up straight.”
I put my shoulders back, and the shirt parted, revealing a long swath of my nude body beneath. He stood just a little too close behind me, the silky fabric of his navy trousers brushing the backs of my thighs. When he reached around me, I fought the urge to rub my face against his sleeve; I hadn’t taken my makeup off before tumbling into bed the night before, and I didn’t want to mark his shirt.
“What are your plans for today?” he asked, his hands moving smoothly beneath my chin, looping the tie around itself. He didn’t need my help at all, he just wanted physical proximity.
I met his eyes in the mirror as he cinched the knot loosely around my neck. “I’m going to have lunch with Holli today. And Deja, so make sure Rudy gives her a lunch break at noon, okay?”
“Darling, I am returning to my company after a year away. I may be unable to devote time to micromanaging lunch breaks at Porteras.” He leaned down and sniffed the hair behind my ear. “I love the way you smell in the morning. Like sweat and sex and hot skin.”
