“Owen and Blake will be there too,” Dad says, eyeing the glass in my hand, and I smile at him as he takes a sip of his own.
“I would assume he’d be there as the head coach of the team,” I say, and Mom chuckles.
Dad sets his glass down as Henry takes a drink of his water. “I’m sure as your uncle, he’d also be willing to help me hide a body if I told him what we walked in on earlier.”
My jaw drops as Henry chokes.
Mom gives him a look of annoyance. “Like you’ve never gotten yourself into trouble in a pool before. Leave them alone.”
“Love, that wassolong ago. Why do you have to bring it up?” he complains, and if I didn’t want to plug my ears so I didn’t have to hear another word of this conversation, I’d probably ask what Mom’s talking about.
“I’m only saying at least they’re together,” she says amused while Henry continues coughing into his elbow to dislodge the water he’s still choking on. I don’t think my face will ever turn a different color than bright red again.
“This is not aboutthat,” Dad says. Actually, maybe I do want to ask a question. “I’m just—”
“Bash, this conversation can wait until we at least eat our appetizers,” Mom interrupts, and I’m not sure Henry is even breathing. This is going to be the longest dinner of my life if Henry isn’t going to say more than one word at a time.
I take a longer than appropriate drink of my wine, wishing the effects were immediate as Mom raises her eyebrows. I clear my throat, looking both my parents in the eyes. “Well, we might as well get whatever conversation Dad wants to have over with so we can move on from it. Dad, you guys saw me and Henry, and I’m sincerely sorry you saw that. Someone—and by someone, I mean Henry—forgot to tell me you guys were coming. I wish I could promise it’s not going to happen again, but I think the only way I can guarantee that is if you give both of us a heads-up if you’re coming to visit. Is that it?”
Henry gapes next to me, stunned by my bluntness.
“For fuck’s sake, you are your mother’s daughter,” Dad says, dragging his hands over his face.
“And what exactly is that supposed to mean, Sebastian?” she asks, and I have to hand it to him, Dad’s fast at thinking on his feet. I guess that’s what two decades of marriage can teach you. He smiles at her, tucking a piece of her hair behind her ear.
“That she approaches awkward situations the exact same way you do, love:straight forward.”
My heart swells as I see my mother melt into my father’s touch. “Nice save,” she murmurs, and it’s moments like this that are to blame for my brothers and me being hopeless romantics. Dad clears his throat, as if remembering we’re in public.
“What I wanted to say was that I hope you are being . . . careful.” He looks like he’d rather die than talk about this, and honestly, me too.
Mom rolls her eyes, shaking her head at him. “What Bash is trying to say, is please make sure you’re using birth control. I don’t think either of you are in a position where you’re ready for a child, and there are means to prevent that, so use them. I’m too young to be a grandmother.”
I manage a nod as Henry finally speaks, probably scarred from this entire evening. I’ll be lucky if he ever dates me for real after tonight. “Yes, ma’am.”
Mom smiles at both of us, and maybe there’s a chance for us to have a normal evening. “Well now that we’ve gotten that out of the way, I want to hear everything.”
“Maybe not everything,” Dad mutters under his breath.
~
My parents left an hour ago, and I tried to lie down because I’m exhausted, but I kept tossing and turning, unable to get my mind to shut off.
I think I’m in way over my head with Henry, and I keep replaying everything that has happened between us.
He looks at me differently than he did a few months ago. He hired a fucking bodyguard for me after telling me how it would wreck him if something happened to me. It’s that he literally calls me his heart instead of a generic pet name like babe or baby. Henry could have picked anything other than a French endearment, but that’s what he went with.
The math isn’t mathing anymore, but maybe I’m confusing the difference between lust and love.
I drag my hands over my face, throwing the covers off me. I snag a sweatshirt to pull over my shirt before quietly escaping my room. I don’t feel like opening a new bottle of wine, so I snag one of Wilson’s beers, popping the top off before going out to sit by the scene of tonight’s crime.
Taking a swig of my beer, I sit down in one of the lounge chairs by the pool, curling my legs underneath me.
Maybe I’m just imagining everything, trying to see what I want to see because I’m in love with Henry and want him to love me back more than anything.
I don’t know what the hell I’m doing.
Maybe JJ’s right. I need to grow a pair and just tell him. For all I know, he could feel the same and be afraid to tell me, but at the very least, I would finally have an answer.
