Sasha wasn’t exactly sure what Kevin’s mom was talking about, but she smiled and nodded politely. Taffy glanced at her. Feeling compelled to speak, Sasha asked, ‘May I help?’
‘Nope, I got it covered,’ Taffy answered, the lightness of her tone disappearing when she addressed Sasha.
Sasha toyed with her scarf, feeling uncomfortably hot. An unpleasant vibe snapped between the two women. It seemed her luck with meeting parents wasn’t going to improve. She made a mental note to check her forehead for some sort of parental warning label.
WARNING: ALLOWING YOUR SON TO DATE SASHA MATTHEWS MAY DESTROY HIS LIFE. EXTREME CAUTION IS ADVISED.
‘Mom, we’re a little road weary. I think we’re going to shower and freshen up.’ Kevin went to his mother and kissed her cheek.
‘Grab some extra towels and shower kits out of the hall closet for cottage three,’ she said, tirelessly peeling her potatoes. The subtle hint that Sasha would not be staying in her house was not lost.
‘Great,’ Kevin said. ‘I’ll be back later.’
Sasha gave a small wave as she followed Kevin back through the house. Without comment, he paused long enough to grab a bundle of bath towels and a cloth bag filled with what Sasha assumed were mini bars of soap and shampoos. They slipped into their muddy shoes and went outside. When they were alone, she said, ‘I don’t think she likes me.’
‘She’s all right,’ Kevin answered, looking down as he picked his way through the mud. ‘I think she’s just busy right now with the extra work.’
‘She practically threw me into the cottage,’ Sasha persisted, giving up on trying to keep her boots clean in the impossible conditions. ‘I didn’t want to complain, but I don’t think I can sleep out in the wilderness by myself. I’ll be a nervous wreck.’
‘She likes to have things organized.’ Kevin’s words were mildly defensive. ‘She probably already made the arrangements to give you extra space in the cottage and some privacy. And don’t worry about the alone. I still remember how to sneak out of the house.’
Not wanting to start a fight, she said, ‘OK. Maybe I’m just being sensitive. I’m sure things will go smoother after I’ve had a shower and she’s done doing what she’s doing.’
Sasha inched closer to him, reaching her hand out to touch his lower back. Her fingers glanced along his spine. To her surprise, he pulled away, slightly quickening his pace as they neared the truck. Unsure what to make of the action, she matched his speed, hurrying into the vehicle. Kevin placed the towels and cloth bag between them on the seat. She stayed quiet as he started the engine and took them around the drive and down the narrow road they’d arrived on.
As the house slipped out of view, he reached for her, gently touching the side of her face in an easy caress. ‘I thought maybe we could go to the lake this week. I’d hate for you to miss the chance at seeing Champ.’
‘Champ?’
‘Yeah, Champ. He’s the Lake Champlain monster.’ Kevin chuckled. ‘My grandpa swears he saw him once.’
Sasha found herself leaning into his hand, even as she wondered if his pulling away from her at the house had meant anything. Then, silently scolding herself for reading too much into it, she gave into her intellectual curiosity. ‘What? Like a giant crocodile or shark?’
‘Eh!’ A shout from outside interrupted their conversation. Kevin slowed the truck near the fork in the road and rolled down the window. A weathered cowboy sat astride a dark-brown horse. Looking at him, there was no mistaking his relation to Kevin. ‘I didn’t know you were back, boy.’
‘Just in,’ Kevin answered. ‘Grandpa, this is Sasha, a friend from school. Sash, this is my grandpa, Stan Merchant.’
‘Just call me Grandpa,’ the man said, his voice flavored with a French-Canadian influence, ‘everyone does.’ The horse pawed restlessly at the ground. ‘We can expect you at the house later?’
‘I’ll be up after a bit. We’re just heading out to the cottages.’ Kevin waved and rolled up the window. Grandpa rode away, down the center road towards his house, as they drove onwards to the cottages.
The cottages were actually log cabins spread out campsite style over a lot of land. Several matching structures lined a main pathway, each with their own picnic table and barbeque pit. As they pulled into number three’s lot, Sasha frowned. A mud-covered green SUV was already parked in front.
‘She did say three, right?’ Kevin confirmed.
‘Maybe a neighbor needed extra parking,’ Sasha said. ‘Or maybe she thought I needed a roommate.’
‘Or my mother left the cabin unlocked and a few of the neighbors decided to expand their territory. I told her she needs to quit doing that, but she doesn’t listen.’ Kevin grabbed the shower bundles and tucked it under his arm. ‘Come on, let’s go evict whoever’s inside.’
Sasha stayed behind him as they took the cobblestone walk to the front of the cabin. Thick, rounded logs made the siding. It matched the patio furniture sculpted from tree limbs. The chairs looked uncomfortable with their twig-formed arms and seats. Above the front door, a lucky horseshoe hung. A loud laugh sounded from inside. Kevin slowed, his body tense as he reached for the doorknob. A shadowed figure moved across the hall beyond the door and Kevin called out, ‘Hey, I think you all are in the wrong cabin.’
‘Crap!’ the figure screamed, jerking. ‘Oh, Kevin, it’s you.’
‘Kat?’ Kevin glanced back at Sasha.
‘Kat?’ Sasha repeated, hurrying past Kevin to get a closer look. Seeing her sister, she frowned. ‘Kat, what are you doing here?’
‘You didn’t . . . ?’ Kat frowned. ‘Mother! I thought you cleared this with Sasha. You said you talked to her.’
‘What are you yelling about? I did. She said if there was room we could come up and stay. I called, they had room and here we are. I left a message on her phone.’ Beatrice’s voice rang from within. ‘Or I think I did. I meant to. Why? Did she call back?’
‘She’s here,’ Kat said wryly, giving Sasha an apologetic look that begged for forgiveness. Going to her sister, she whispered, ‘Sasha, I’m sorry. When Mom said you wanted us here, I should have known this wasn’t your idea.’
‘Sasha!’ Beatrice shouted in excitement. ‘This was a brilliant idea. The woods are gorgeous. I thought you’d be here earlier, but Taffy said you weren’t expected until this morning. We got in last night and had the greatest little chat.’ Seeing Kevin, she stopped. ‘Well, is this Kevin? Oh, come in, come in, and meet everyone.’
‘You met Taffy?’ Sasha asked in horror. No wonder the woman was standoffish. Beatrice probably terrified her with some embarrassing tales of Sasha’s childhood. Or worse. She offered to do a tea leaf reading.
‘Yes, and Stan and Irene Merchant. Oh, and Samuel, though he didn’t have much to say during dinner.’ Beatrice waved them inside. ‘Well, come in out of the doorway. Kevin, I want you to meet Zoe, Jackson and Vincent. My granddaughter is asleep, but we can peek in on her if you’d like to—’
‘Mom,’ Kat interrupted. ‘We’ve all met.’
‘Oh, well, then come meet Sasha’s father,’ Beatrice insisted.
‘I’ll just get my shoes,’ Kevin answered.
Sasha shot her sister a desperate look for help. Kat ushered their mother into the other room. Turning to Kevin, she whispered, ‘I am so sorry. I had no idea that they’d actually come. I swear I didn’t invite them, not really.’
‘Sasha,’ Kevin tried to interrupt.
‘I told them that everything was booked and tried to play it off nice,’ Sasha persisted, needing to explain, ‘but I guess it backfired and now they’re here and you really don’t have to meet my father if you don’t want to. I mean, I can tell them you had to go and I’ll figure out a way to get them to leave for the rest of the week so we can work.’
‘Sasha,’ he insisted. ‘It’s all right. I have no problem meeting the rest of your family.’
‘Are you sure? Because it’s really no problem if you want to run away and hide. I know I w
ant to right now.’ She gave a nervous laugh.
‘Do you want me to run and hide?’ His face gave nothing away and she hated not knowing what he was thinking. Inside, she trembled violently, scared and confused about what was happening. She wanted this week to be carefree and perfect. She wanted to show him his family liked her and that she was someone he’d want to have around always. Instead, Taffy couldn’t seem to get her out of his childhood home fast enough and now her parents were in the other room ready to pounce on the man of her dreams.
‘Yes,’ she admitted, keeping her words at a whisper. ‘Kind of.’
He stiffened.
‘They don’t meet many of my, ah, my –’ she hesitated, not knowing how exactly he wished to be defined ‘– male friends. I don’t want them to grill you about us, or about . . .’
‘Us,’ he finished for her.
‘Yes.’ She nodded, repeating, ‘Us.’
‘Sasha?’ Beatrice called from the other room.
‘You should take off your boots so you don’t track mud into the house,’ he said, pointing at her feet. Kevin walked in his socks down the hall and turned out of sight.
Sasha fumbled with her boots, taking longer than normal in her haste to follow him. The low sound of introductions carried over followed by polite laughter. By the time she’d joined them, Kevin was seated in a chair across from her father and Vincent, who’d taken residence on a blue and green plaid couch. Zoe and Jackson sat on a love-seat and her mother was perched on the brick ledge before a raised fireplace. Kat took a seat by her husband, slipping her hand on his knee in a loving gesture.
The cabin had minimal decoration. A few scenic landscapes were bolted to the wall by their frames, along with a clock and smoke detector. Rustic lamps matched the small antler light fixture. Sasha wasn’t too impressed with the use of animal horns in décor. Dark-blue throw blankets hung along the backs of the loveseat and couch. Next to the fireplace, the living room opened up to a small furnished kitchen.
‘I’m working on my doctorate in anthropology,’ Kevin was saying, his eyes respectfully fixed on her father.
‘A doctor.’ Beatrice nodded in approval.
‘Mom,’ Sasha interrupted, before her mother could embarrass her. ‘Got a second?’
‘In a minute, we’re talking to Kevin right now,’ Beatrice dismissed her daughter’s concern. Then, patting the ledge next to her, she added, ‘Here, come sit by me.’
Sasha didn’t move.
‘Very nice place your family has here,’ Douglas said. ‘When was it built?’
‘The main house and farmhouse were built in the late 1800s. These cabins were added between the 1920s and 1950s.’ Kevin motioned to the mountainous landscape on the wall. ‘Each one has that print and underneath them is the exact date of each cabin’s completion carved into the wall.’
‘Do you get a lot of weddings out here?’ Beatrice asked, her eyes sparkling. ‘It’s a very pretty place for a wedding, I think.’
‘Mom,’ Sasha interrupted. ‘I’m sure they have brochures with all that information in them.’
‘We do,’ Kevin nodded, chuckling. ‘I wrote them.’
‘Then you’ll know all about it.’ Beatrice gave her daughter an I-told-you-so look. ‘Kevin, you were saying?’
‘Oh, ah –’ Kevin glanced at Sasha ‘– under weddings it reads something along the lines of “the perfect seclusion for small private affairs, or spacious enough to handle the grandest of occasions”.’
‘Then you plan on being married here?’ her mother continued.
‘Do the brochures say anything about the floor swallowing me up?’ Sasha inquired.
‘Well, I think it’s very hospitable here. Business must be good. City folks are always looking to escape to the country,’ Douglas said. ‘Do you hunt, Kevin?’
‘I haven’t been for about three years, but before then my grandpa took us every year since I was nine.’ Kevin smiled.
Her father’s eyes lit up in pleasure, though he tried to contain himself. ‘Really.’
Kat stood, slowly making her way over to Sasha to link arms with her. Under her breath, she teased, ‘Good job, Sash. Dad’s been trying to find a son-in-law who hunts and Mom already has the wedding location picked out. You’d better watch out. Next she’ll be pulling out your wedding dress and demanding I take the pictures.’
Sasha stiffened. ‘Don’t.’
‘You don’t like the way I take pictures?’ Kat teased, pretending she didn’t know what Sasha referred to.
‘This is a nightmare. She’s going to scare him away before I even get a chance to . . .’ Sasha let her whisper taper off as she kept her eyes focused on what was happening.
‘You haven’t talked to him about how you feel, have you?’ Kat frowned. ‘I thought you were going to tell him.’
‘There wasn’t a good time.’ Sasha took in every detail of the interaction playing out in front of her. Her mother smiled, studying Kevin a little too intently. Her father tried not to smile, though the intellectual expression of interest could not be hidden from his gaze. Zoe glanced between Kevin and Sasha, as if she could read some invisible knowledge that linked the new couple. Jackson absently played with his wife’s hair.
‘Anthropology?’ Vincent nodded thoughtfully. ‘I’ve taken several seminars that focus on anthropology from a cultural entomological standpoint. The last one dealt with the sacred role of scarab beetles and buprestid beetles in Ancient Egyptian society, focusing on their funereal significance.’
‘I’ve read a little about that,’ Kevin said. Sasha had a feeling he was being modest. If he read about it, he probably knew more than anyone in the room.
‘One of the gods, Khephi, had a scarab head,’ Kat offered.
Vincent smiled. ‘You were listening.’
‘Only because I imagined that was you in another life, bug man.’ Kat laughed. ‘Kevin, did I tell you the first time we met, my husband yelled at me because I –’ she hid her mouth behind her hand, pretending to tell a secret Vincent couldn’t hear ‘– stepped on his poisonous pet spider.’
Kevin chuckled. ‘That’s not so strange. As kids, we had a pet skunk. It was descented and great for clearing the best part of the beach. People saw it coming and ran.’
Laughter erupted from her family.
‘Thank you,’ Vincent said, grinning at his wife as if finally vindicated in some longstanding argument between them.
‘Descented? They can do that?’ Zoe asked.
‘They remove the scent glands when they’re a month old,’ Kevin answered.
‘A man who knows many things.’ Douglas nodded at Sasha in approval.
Sasha didn’t move, feeling like she was watching a play. How did Kevin do it? He smiled, said a few things, and her entire family was charmed. He even kept up with the quick changes of conversation they were all used to, jumping from subject to subject with ease. She expected an interrogation from her parents and instead she watched an easy exchange. A small part of her was jealous of the talent, especially in light of her greeting from Taffy.
At her father’s expectant look, she joined the conversation, slowly making her way closer to where Kevin sat. ‘He was about to tell me about the Loch Ness monster of Lake Champlain.’
‘Champ is not Nessie,’ Kevin quickly defended, ‘and you might start a fight if anyone hears you saying differently.’
‘A lake monster? I’m intrigued.’ Beatrice straightened, her expression brightening.
‘Experts on the monster say it’s a descendent of the plesiosaur,’ Kevin continued. ‘There are even pictures.’
‘Plesiosaur?’ Douglas repeated. ‘That was an aquatic dinosaur.’
‘Douglas knows his dinosaurs,’ Beatrice said. ‘He reads about them all the time. An entire shelf in his study is dedicated to them.’
‘Surely an educated man like yourself doesn’t believe in such things,’ Douglas said.
‘You mean because if there were dinosaurs in the lake we’d h
ave found fossils of them by now, not to mention decomposing bodies as they float to the surface, and that reptiles would need to surface every once in a while to breathe?’ Kevin shrugged his shoulder nonchalantly. ‘What would be the fun in believing all that factual stuff?’
‘Bravo!’ Beatrice clapped. Standing, she leaned over and reached her hand out to Kevin. ‘Tell me, Kevin, have you ever had your tea leaves read?’
‘No, I can’t say I have, Beatrice,’ Kevin answered, ‘but I’d be fascinated to have it done.’
‘Sasha,’ Kat drew her sister’s attention. ‘Let’s go look around outside while the water is boiling. Zoe, coming?’
‘Oh, ah, sure,’ Zoe said, pushing up.
‘I’m going to stay here,’ Jackson said.
Zoe laughed. ‘I don’t think you were invited, sweetheart. It’s a sister thing.’ Then, to their mother, she said, ‘Mom, do me a favour and read Jackson, too. He has new dad worries about the baby.’
Jackson did not look at all put out by his wife’s request.
‘The baby’s going to be fine. I’ve already checked,’ Beatrice said. ‘But it can’t hurt to check again.’
‘Sash,’ Kat insisted. ‘Come on.’
Sasha gave Kevin one last look before letting her sister pull her out of the room. As she tugged on her muddy boots, she whispered, ‘What’s going on?’
‘Shhh.’ Kat shook her head as she glanced in the direction of the living room. ‘We’re getting you out of here. You look like you’re about to be sick.’ Zoe and Kat both slipped on their shoes. When the three sisters were outside, Kat said, ‘We didn’t know, Sasha, I swear.’
‘Mom said you were fine with us coming. That we needed to come,’ Zoe added. ‘She implied that you and Kevin were . . .’
‘Well, we’re not really anything. He wants something light and unfettered and I want him any way I can have him, so we’re supposed to be light and unfettered.’ Sasha pointed towards the cabin, stomping along the cobblestone to get away from the cabin. ‘This is not unfettered. This is very, very fettered.’
Degrees of Passion Page 19