Blending In

by RJ Blain

  It always helped when I looked on the bright side of things.

  Chapter Fifteen

  If Chase asked if I was all right one more time, I’d snap. I’d snap so hard they’d hear my frustrated wailing in Jersey. I doubted auditioning for a gig as a banshee would help me accomplish anything beyond potentially helping Chase crash his luxury family car, which had no business on snowy roads.

  To make it clear I wasn’t impressed with the effort, I flipped my middle finger at the windshield.

  “I’m not sure what the windshield did to you, and I’m afraid to ask.”

  “The snow. I’m flipping off the snow.”

  “Being itchy makes you grouchy, doesn’t it?”

  I gave up any hope of maintaining my dignity and howled my disgust over my situation. “After I’m done clawing off my flesh, I’m going for them! I swear, I’m going to flay the flesh from their bones and sew myself a hat.”

  Chase pressed a button on his steering wheel. “Call Gavin,” he ordered.

  His car obeyed, and a moment later, his speakers rang.

  “Hello, Chase. How can I help you?” Gavin chuckled. “Miriah.”

  “You’re a cheating bastard of a divine,” I grumbled.

  “Someone dropped a bag of almond flour on her head. She’s very itchy. I wanted to ask you how concerned I should be if she wants to flay the flesh from someone’s bones and sew herself a hat.”

  “Well, I recommend you don’t give her a knife and an excuse,” my former-lover and father of my son replied. “An hour following exposure, you’ll need to put mittens on her hands, Chase, or she’ll claw herself bloody. If you give her anything for the allergies, you’ll need to put her to bed within about five to ten minutes. It doesn’t really hurt her, but she’ll be uncomfortable and grumpy until the reaction stops. How badly did you get hit, Miriah?”

  “A pound bag to the head, and it exploded in a cloud of flour. In good news, dinner wasn’t ruined. In bad news, I haven’t gotten any. His mother bought me tiramisu.” The bright side had great things, including chicken and tiramisu. “But because someone did it on purpose, I have to go to the hospital so they can tell me what I already know. Guess what? I’m allergic to almonds, I’m turning redder by the minute, and the fucking police claimed my favorite pajamas as evidence.”

  While I liked to think of myself as a rational woman, I really would snap if Chase asked if I was all right one more time.

  “A piece of advice, if I may?”

  I grunted, and Chase arched a brow before asking, “What?”

  “She’ll be fine. If you want her to be happy with you, instead of asking if she’s all right, tell her you’re going to tuck her into that chair she likes near the fireplace, give her some hot chocolate, and put that cat you adopted on her lap. If you insist on having the hospital treat the developing rashes, be prepared to care for a zombie. In good news, she’s not actually a zombie. She just does a really good impression of one. I wish you the best of luck convincing her to take anything for her allergies.”

  “As I control the chicken and tiramisu supplies, anyone who is having an allergic reaction in my presence gets to take medication to limit the damage it causes, but I’m sure I can arrange some chair time, hot chocolate, and a cat.” Chase chuckled and shook his head. “Anything else I should know?”

  Gavin chuckled. “Sunday is sacred because she’s shopping for Caleb. If anyone screws with her Sunday, she really might go off the deep end. If you value your life, you’ll make Sunday perfect. Also, I have adjusted the terms of her curse temporarily to allow for her to enjoy her Sunday. It would be cruel of me for you to spend all of Sunday as a karma chameleon, however amusing it might be. I’m taking Caleb out for the weekend, so don’t be surprised if you get some excited phone calls either tomorrow or Sunday night. He’s packing for the trip right now, so I’ll be very surprised if he remembers to call you.”

  I wondered if Caleb’s tendency to forget about the world around him—and his mother while on visits with his father—came from Gavin’s genetic contributions. “Tell him I love him, and I’d prefer if you didn’t tell him about the flour, please. He’ll obsess.”

  “That’s my fault. Sorry, Miriah. He’ll be fine. He just needs to learn how to better control that part of his personality. I’ll work with him on it. Once he has some direction and finds his passion and purpose in life, he won’t drive you as crazy organizing things to his liking. It’s just a matter of focus.”

  “Focus? You mean he needs a hobby?”

  “He needs a specialty. I’d say it’s a bit more than a mere hobby. I’ll help him explore his options. And don’t beat yourself over it like you usually do. Caleb doesn’t need to be fixed because he isn’t broken, so you haven’t failed him in any fashion. He is how he is because I am as I am.”

  Jerk, jerk, jerk. Not only had he been poking around in my thoughts—long term—he’d blabbed right in front of Chase. “Go ahead, Gavin. Come near me while I’m still itching. I’ll flay your flesh from your bones and sew myself a hat.”

  Gavin laughed. “I was giving Chase a fair warning of what he has in store for should he decide to stick around.”

  “Considering my mother is probably screaming at my father over formally legalizing a verbal agreement to pay for a wedding and compensate Miriah fifty grand per chameleon incident he induces to pay for Caleb’s education, I’m feeling confident I’ll be sticking around. She’s already whipped both my parents, and I’m waiting for my turn.”

  Gavin sighed. “You’re supposed to whip him first, Miriah. After you’ve finished whipping him, that’s when you’re supposed to manipulate his parents. You’re doing this backwards.”

  “Do you know how much weddings in New York cost?” I demanded.

  “I have a rough idea. And as you refuse to go into debt for anything other than our son, it comes as no surprise you’d find some way to either skip the ceremony or just not get married. I suspect an opportunity knocked, and as you’re a skinflint with the objective of putting our son above all else, you wanted to secure everything you were worried you can’t provide. In this case, your real goal was Caleb’s college fund since you conveniently forgot I’m a divine and am perfectly capable of putting our son through college.”

  I scowled at the irritation in Gavin’s tone. “You’ve never offered.”

  “You never asked.”

  “Fuck you, you egotistical sex demon on steroids!” I howled. My face burned to go along with my head-to-toe itching. “Sorry.”

  “That’s definitely a contribution to your coal mine,” Chase informed me. “But you’re not supposed to apologize when you start the tirade. Try again, but with a little more cursing and a little more description of the standards I need to live up to. The sex demon on steroids portion of this conversation is a little concerning, but I’m game to do my best and work on improvement.”

  “Are you after a coal mine, too?” I muttered.

  “If I wanted a coal mine, I’d just buy one, but I’m not sure what I’d do with it, so I can’t say I’m after a coal mine. All that said, watching you do your best to earn one is the most entertaining thing I’ve done in my adult life, and I can’t wait to see what you do next.”

  Gavin chuckled. “What I find absolutely fascinating about this is he’s telling the complete truth. I never thought I’d see the day you actually had good taste in a man.”

  To dodge my wrath, the bastard hung up. “Can I flay him?”

  “No; he’s responsible for Caleb when we want to go out of town just the two of us, and trust me when I say you don’t want to recruit my parents as extended babysitters. We’d return to the world’s most spoiled child with no hope of taming the beast afterwards.”

  “That’s a part of the spoiling package,” I reminded him. “We get a babysitter, but we come back to a spoiled child.”

  “But if anyone can watch a child, it’s a divine.”

  “This is true.”

  “If we have
children, think he’d watch over them, too?”

  “Call the fucker back. Let’s find out.”

  Laughing, Chase pressed the button on his steering wheel again. “Call Gavin.”

  “You’re not going to let me escape, are you?”

  “No. If we have children, are you going to agree to babysit them when you take care of Caleb? Should you agree, I won’t flay your flesh from your bones and sew myself a hat.” I thought my offer was a reasonable one.

  Gavin erupted into laughter, which took him several minutes to contain. “Okay, Miriah. Sure. Should you have more children, I’ll babysit them for you when you go out of town. I’ll even be generous and watch the pets, too. I expect you’ll have a lot of them for some reason. You should be careful about that, Chase. She’s got a soft heart for the furry ones.”

  Chase’s chuckles rumbled in his chest. “That’s because she’s a nice woman who cares for others. It’s a price I’m willing to pay as required, although I hope she’s willing to accept there is a limited number of space for new animals in the house.”

  “You’re going to need a bigger house,” Gavin predicted. “I wish you luck with that. Caleb’s done packing, so if you’ll excuse me?”

  “Thank you, Gavin.” Before I had a chance to add anything, Chase hung up. “I’m going to win the medications at the hospital argument, but I’ll make it up to you with something a little better than time to sit in a chair and drink hot chocolate. You’ve been twitching since you got in the car, and you’ve put lobsters to shame. I’m worried you might develop blisters, and those can take a long time to heal and are painful. I don’t think it’s worth having an argument over. You don’t deserve to be uncomfortable, and if you’re a zombie tomorrow, I can live with that. Caring for zombies is easy.”

  “It is?”

  “Sure. I’ll tuck you, my zombie, into your new favorite chair, put Goliath on your lap, and feed you chicken and hot chocolate all day. See, I’m already ahead of Gavin. I didn’t forget your chicken. Honestly, he must be an idiot for not suggesting chicken be a part of the bribe. That said, if you want something other than chicken for dinner, I make a mean steak. I also know how to make lasagna from scratch. I even make the noodles myself. From scratch.”

  My eyes widened. “You know how to make lasagna from scratch?”

  “Since tending to a zombie isn’t typically time consuming, I can make it for you tomorrow and feed you light snacks of fried chicken so you don’t ruin your dinner.”

  Who the hell needed common sense or a heart anyway? “I will take any medications the doctors decide to shove down my throat even if it turns me into a zombie.”

  “I’ll still make sure you get fried chicken at least once a week, remember this: Gavin didn’t bar you from asking for your favorite food. Nothing in his rules says I can’t explore the world and find you a food you love even more than your chicken. I heard him very clearly. His curse covers your chicken. If I find you a new favorite food, that curse won’t be so bad, will it? And yes, I’ll even put it in writing; I’ll provide your favorite fried chicken, barring unforeseen circumstances, at least once a week. I might even beg the restaurant to teach me how to make it.”

  “You’d need one hell of a bribe to get that recipe out of their hands,” I muttered. “I’ve tried.”

  “I bet you have. But I’ll try, even if they laugh me out of town.”

  “It’s not fair,” I complained.

  “What’s not fair? I mean, beyond the almond assault, someone throwing a glass at you, and the other crap you’ve been put through lately?”

  “You’re perfect, and that’s just not fair. In comparison, I’m a hot mess. I’m such a hot mess I’ve been trying to earn a coal mine because every time I try to be good, it blows up in my face. Tiana’s going to hear about this on Sunday, and she might laugh herself to death. Don’t underestimate Tiana. She will find out. She’ll make me blurt it out. I’ll humiliate myself in public, too. Just you wait and see. I hope you don’t have any secrets. She’ll learn them, and she’ll make sure you suffer.”

  “Yet you’re friends with her.”

  “Well, yeah. She’s fun, and she’s willing to babysit, and when she’s done with Caleb, he isn’t a little demon. She’s just a little evil sometimes.”

  “Did it occur to you she might have tips on how you can earn a coal mine?”

  I thought about that for a while. “No, but I can make some guesses what she’d suggest.”

  “Do tell.”

  I laughed, as her solution to my life’s problems might land me in hell for all eternity. “She’d just tell me to keep walking in on you while you’re in the shower until I verified my tramp stamp. I only got the damned thing because it’d annoy Gavin. He kept bothering me and asking me to marry him.”

  “Well, I promise I won’t be bothered if you ask me to marry you. It seems somewhat important I inform you of that. I’m also taking this as a hint not to bother you with repeated requests unless you tell me otherwise.”

  “Stop being so damned perfect,” I complained, grabbing handfuls of my hair and tugging. “You’re driving me crazy.”

  “No, I’m driving you to the hospital. We’re even being tailed by the cops, but for once in my life, I’m not worried about being pulled over. Honestly, it’s creeping me out a little. The only times cops follow me is when they’re waiting for me to speed. I don’t even know why I drive this car. It makes cops want to pull me over for speeding all the time. When I got this car, I thought I was picking a model that wouldn’t get me the attention of the police because it’s technically not a sports car!”

  “You shouldn’t have picked ‘make it go faster’ as your color choice. That was a mistake.”

  “But ‘make it go faster’ is such a pretty color.”

  “Next time, I recommend a classy silver.”

  “They called the silver one ‘makes it go so fast you’ll be cited before you leave the parking lot.’ It didn’t seem like a good idea. I saw it and wanted to test the engine.”

  I laughed. “You need a new car, one that isn’t an open invitation to be ticketed.”

  “I really thought I was picking a family car to avoid that,” he mumbled.

  “It looks like you’re driving a million dollars, and honestly, it’s comfy enough to be worth it. This is a really nice car.”

  “I could repaint it. Think that’d help?”

  “Maybe? I don’t know. I’ve never had a car like this before. Don’t even look at my car. It’s sad.”

  “I’m thinking we’re going car shopping immediately following marriage. There’s more rust than paint on yours, and it makes me worry for your safety just looking at it.”

  “It’s not that bad!”

  “I nudged the wheel well and part of your car flaked off. Sure, the rest of the body is sound, but there’s a lot of issues around the undercarriage.”

  I frowned. “You were poking around my car?”

  “Tiana showed it to me on one of my visits to the office. She really wanted you to work with me so you’d have a backup plan if you were fired. Initially, Alex wanted to bring her in for checking the base marketing issues, but she suggested you because you have a knack for the reporting and an understanding of how marketing works so you’d be in a better position to evaluate what was going on at my company. She was right, too. How do you feel about being poached?”

  “You want to poach me?” I blurted.

  “I was going to offer you being poached as a Christmas present, but I came up with a better idea.”

  Chase wanted to hire me? “That breaks every company policy I’ve ever heard of regarding fraternization in the office.”

  “My company has a history. Mom was Dad’s assistant from early on. Officially, she was his executive secretary, but in reality, she was his partner. We’re capable of sharing space working for more than an hour with either one of us wanting to attempt murder, and I’ll allow you to bring pets to the office as long as you clean up aft
er them. Call it a hiring perk. But marriage may very well be a hiring condition.”

  “Have you lost your mind?”

  “No, but I might lose my life when Alex finds out, but he’ll forgive me if I marry you as part of the deal. He’d probably have to fire you due to potential for becoming a corporate spy. I’m just sparing you from being fired. I’m trying to be generous here, but I honestly never believed I’d use Dad’s tactic.”

  “This seems to be a case of ‘if it isn’t broken, don’t fix it.’ Your father’s already foolishly agreed to pay for a New York wedding. Your mother’s on board. And Caleb’s college fund should be covered; I only need him to pay out twice.”

  “You’ve been saving up for his college since the day he was born, haven’t you?”

  “You kidding? I started the day I found out I was pregnant. I’ve been scraping pennies since I couldn’t nickel and dime it to death. I didn’t want him to be unable to pick the school he wants because of money.”

  “And you’d rather pull your own teeth than ask Gavin, I take it?”

  I shrugged. “He pays child support. I put as much of the check as possible in the college fund. Caleb might want to live in the dorms, and that’s more expensive—or he might want his own apartment. I don’t want him to have to work through school.”

  “How many pennies have you scraped together?”

  I reached down, grabbed my phone, and logged into my banking app to check. “Three hundred thousand. Do you think that’s enough for his college education? If he gets a good school? What if he wants to become a doctor?”

  Chase opened his mouth, closed it, cleared his throat, and tried again without making a sound.

  “What’s wrong?”

  “Your son isn’t even in high school yet and you’ve squirreled away three hundred thousand for his college fund?”

  “Well, yes.”

  “Tiana keeps complaining how you’re utterly convinced you have no money. But you have three hundred thousand for his college fund.”

  “That’s his college fund! I can’t touch that.”