Chapter 9
Brooke slumped over the kitchen bar. Mornings were never her best time. She smiled gratefully at the male who put a steaming cup of coffee in front of her.
“Thank you, sir,” she said, taking the first lovely sip that would bring full consciousness back to her brain. “You’re a true hero, Brandon. Shane needs to make you a character in The Winged Protector series.”
“Only one problem, they all have tattoos or piercings. I have no tats…or piercings. Since I’m majoring in business, I probably will never get any either.”
“Why not?” Brooke asked, her gaze twinkling at his mature reasoning. “Business suits and dress shirts cover up most everything. Look at what your father wears to work.”
Brandon laughed. “Those are his professor clothes. He has different ones he wears to art shows…well, at least he used to. Although he did dress very conservatively for the art gallery opening. He has a lot of artist clothes lurking in his closets.”
Brooke giggled and set her coffee cup on the counter. “Fascinating…like what, for instance? My mother wears short skirts and peasant blouses to art shows. She likes to look Bohemian and poor.”
Brandon grinned and glanced at the bedroom door to make sure it was still closed tightly before answering.
“Dad owns a ton of Nehru-collared shirts and textured silk vests to wear over them. He wears them outside jeans or slacks, instead of tucked in. Sometimes he also wears sandals. He says people expect artists to look like that.” Brooke’s giggle made it worth ratting out his father.
“So…did you and Dad make up?” he asked, glad to have finally found an opening to do so.
Brooke sighed and sipped her coffee to buy her some pondering time. Nothing like a straight question to bring reality crashing into your morning after.
Had she and Drake made up? If so, from what?
From her poor pillow talk? From his drunken passes?
From him begging her to stay and wrapping her arm around him?
It wasn’t like they’d had a real fight. Oh, maybe she was still a bit pissed at being tossed on the bed and attacked by a drunken heathen last night. Did that count as a transgression worthy of making up?
“You don’t have to tell me if you don’t want. I just know Dad was upset over your…date,” Brandon said cautiously.
“It’s not that I don’t want to talk about my relationship with your father—if we have such a thing as a relationship. It’s that I don’t know. We weren’t mad over anything at the same time. He’s very…confusing.”
Brandon nodded as he flipped pancakes. “I know what you mean. Dad is very…” he drifted off, looking for the right word.
“Passionate?” Brooke offered, sipping her coffee.
Brandon laughed. “I was going to say intense, but I guess that’s a more poetic word.”
Brooke laughed again, truly charmed. “Are you intense like your father?” The question earned her a loud laugh in reply.
“No. I’m easygoing. I’m the artist’s Alex P. Keaton kid…very conservative…very calm…and incredibly average. I watch the news and follow stock reports. Dad took me to vote with him when I was seventeen and let me make all the choices. He’s responsible, but I’m…”
“Thoughtful and caring,” Brooke finished, smiling as she interrupted the boy-man cooking her breakfast. “Your father is very proud of you, Brandon. He likes you just as you are…and he tells the world all the time.”
Brandon shrugged and dished up the food. “I hope so because I can’t tell lately. He’s glared at me every time he’s looked at my black and blue face the last couple of weeks.”
“Glaring is part of being a parent, I think,” Brooke offered.
“Can I just put something out there? If you two plan on having babies together, I’d be okay with you giving me some siblings,” Brandon declared.
Brooke gagged and spit the sip of coffee in her mouth on the counter.
“Thanks,” she said, when Brandon handed her a towel. “I’m not sure we like each other enough to have another date yet. But thanks for sharing how you feel about…all the rest of that.”
“I figure if an older man wants to marry a woman your age, babies would be part of the deal he would have to accept. Me—I’m planning to wait until I’m way older to get that serious. Dad has been a great father. I think he’d love being one again before he gets too old.”
“Okay…now I just have to ask. How old would too old be?” Brooke asked, dipping her head to hide her smile.
“I don’t know. Fifty? Yeah, that sounds about right.”
He dished up a plate of pancakes and put a couple strips of bacon on the side before setting them in front of Brooke. “Shane and Reesa make these. I’m trying to copy.”
Brooke looked at the smiley face of chocolate chips adorning the top one. “I’m sure they’re great. These were obviously made with love,” she declared. Having been to her fair share of Larson pancake breakfasts, she knew exactly how to praise the cook.
“Absolutely. Love is the secret ingredient,” Brandon agreed, coming around to sit beside her at the counter.
Brooke ate in silence, looking occasionally to her side.
“Please. Just tell me what you’re thinking,” Brandon said after a while. “You and Shane are spooky with your uber serious eyes that do their own talking.”
Brooke grinned at the backhanded compliment and winced at being compared to Shane. “Okay. I’ll tell you then, but it’s kind of inappropriate. You’re barely over eighteen.”
She snickered when Brandon made a gimmee sign with his fingers because his mouth was full.
“Okay. I was thinking you had a hella start on developing morning-after etiquette. Your father should take lessons. He’s in there still snoring off his cognac while his teenage son is the one cooking me breakfast.”
She was delighted by the pleased male laughter she had effectively coaxed out of him with her flirting. This was comfortable ground for her. She knew how to appeal to the sensibilities of younger male egos.
“I know. Dad is lame with women. I guess that’s what he gets for not dating all these years. He’s out of practice.”
“Hmm…I’m not so sure I’m buying that story anymore. What about the booty-call woman in Louisville?”
Brandon looked so shocked, she almost choked on her pancakes trying not to laugh at his surprise. Why was her mouth spewing her thoughts unchecked? She put a hand on his arm while she swallowed what was in her mouth before speaking.
“I’m so sorry. I was teasing, but that went over the top. It was a rumor I heard from two of his students, and one I should never have repeated—especially to Drake’s son. I’d like to blame my blurting out on a sugar rush this morning, but the truth is my mouth sometimes gets away from me. It’s not one of my more sterling traits.”
Brandon chuckled. “It’s okay. I know you’re part Larson now, so that’s not helping either. Besides…I can understand you being jealous. Dad gets his share of attention from the babes. He just doesn’t act on it. Or at least he didn’t until you came along. When he started talking about you all the time, I knew he was more than just a little interested.”
Brooke sighed and went back to her pancakes. “Now I feel petty for being so curious about other women. I will admit to feeling a tad bit jealous, which is a new emotion for me, let me tell you. He’s never said one word about her.”
“Probably because she was only a friend…and she got married a year ago. That’s really all I can share. If I tell you anything else, it would be a violation of the man code. My card would be pulled.”
“Man code?” Brooke repeated, grinning at his term.
Brandon shrugged. “It’s my way of saying I’m not going to rat out my Dad…even after he got dog-ass drunk on his lady.”
Brooke blinked at both the boy’s defense and criticism. Both were in the same tone. The son was as complex as his father.
“Drake has no idea how amazing you are. All right, I
rescind my all curiosity questions. Pretend I never mentioned the other women in your father’s life. Since I’m the one he dog-ass drunkenly begged to stay with him last night, perhaps I’ll just hold that highlight uppermost in my mind for now.”
She smiled and held out her empty cup. “If I keep all future curiosity about your father to myself, can I have a coffee refill?”
Brooke was surprised when Brandon hugged her on his way to fetch it. She rubbed her chest at the warmth growing there and wondered what she was going to do about how much she liked both Barrymore men, despite their faults.
***
When he finally joined the living again, Drake sat at his kitchen bar with his head in his hands. Light hurt his eyes this morning—which was nearly afternoon on the clock—so he covered them with his fingers. It also helped him to pretend his situation wasn’t as bad as he feared.
“So tell me again what happened. You said Brooke stayed for a little while after she woke up and you fed her breakfast?”
“Yes,” Brandon said slowly and distinctly, laughing at his father’s question about Brooke, which was being voiced for the third time. “Since we never had this situation in the house before, and you were still out cold, I was winging it this morning. Was I not supposed to feed the woman who spent the night with you?”
“Stop being a smart-ass about this before I try to kill you for giving me shit this morning. Brooke might have slept with me last night, but I was passed out cold and didn’t know she was there. I don’t even remember what we talked about really…it was something about poetry…no wait, I think I remember asking her questions. Now I don’t even remember what they were. God…what she must think of me today. I can’t believe I did that to her.”
Brandon chuckled at his father’s true remorse. “Well, Brooke definitely knows you’re a liquor lightweight now…and that you snore.”
Drake removed his fingers and pried his eyes open so he could glare at his tormentor. “I do not snore.”
“Dad, I love you…but dude, you snore…loudly,” Brandon declared. “She was very cool about it.”
“Damn it. Now I’ll never be able to look at her again,” Drake grumbled, picking up his coffee.
“This regretful morning-after crap is the reason I restrict myself to one beer when I party.”
“What do you mean one beer? You’re nineteen, Brandon. You’re not supposed to be drinking at all.”
Brandon grinned. “I always heard parents taught by example. I guess that even works with bad ones. Hope the next kid you have is as smart as I am. I won’t be around much to give him or her any pointers about you.”
Drake lifted his head and stared. “What in hell are you talking about? What next kid?”
“Dad…Brooke is a lot younger than you. She’s going to want babies. I can’t believe you’re not obsessively thinking about it already. I’m being more grown-up than the grown-ups in my life.”
“Brandon…I’ll be lucky if Brooke ever speaks to me after last night. I doubt she’ll grace my mattress again after listening to me snore. Besides, the woman makes me insane with her prudishness. We are obviously not well suited. I’m sure all future dates are out of the question.”
Brandon sighed and walked the freshly filled coffee pot to his father’s cup. “Dad, she makes you alive. You’re just having trouble adjusting. Anxiety is normal when you’re dating. You’ve seen how stupid Sedrick is with girls.”
“I don’t believe I had any anxiety dating your mother.”
Brandon frowned as he walked the coffee pot back to the maker stand. He slowly turned back to face his father. He let the twinge of sadness he felt fade away before he spoke.
“I know we don’t talk about Mom as much as we used to, but maybe we should talk about her more. You seem to remember nothing of the bad and only the good about her. I can understand that because I did that too…for a while. But eventually I realized Mom was just a normal person like the rest of us, Dad. I’ve let her go…and you should too. You don’t want to blow this chance. Brooke is already worried enough about your booty-call woman.”
“Lacy? Why would Brooke be jealous of Lacy? Who told her about her anyway?”
“Hey, don’t yell at me. I’m just repeating what Brooke called her. I liked Lacy. I don’t know why you never married her. You guys saw each other for years.”
“Marriage was never on the table. I liked her, but I didn’t love her. And she didn’t love me. We were just friends.”
“With benefits…I’m not a kid anymore,” Brandon inserted sternly, liking how grown-up he felt around all the adults in his life today.
“Our relationship suited us both…that’s what’s important. Now she’s happily married to Jason. Did Brooke actually bring Lacy up to you?”
Drake shook his head wondering how a woman who wouldn’t admit to wanting sex with him could care about the other women in his life.
“Some of your students told her about Lacy. Don’t worry…I kept to the code.”
“What code? The Pirates’ Code?”
Brandon bent over laughing. “Pirates, Dad? Where did that come from? I’m talking about the man code. I didn’t tell her about Lacy because of the man code. She totally understood my vow of silence. Brooke is cool that way. I can see why you like her.”
Drake snorted, rubbed his face, and lifted his coffee. “You took a vow of silence? Since when?”
Brandon grinned. “Since my dad started sleeping with the sexiest teacher at UK. Now I won’t be able to take her class next semester. I can only brag about the fact she’s sleeping with my father. You better make an honest woman of her before somebody like me ruins her reputation.”
Even though it physically hurt, Drake shook his head at his son’s teasing. “When I feel better, we are going to discuss this again. If I hear any rumors about the two of us, you’ll be the first person who suffers my wrath.”
“You’re going to need a couple pots of coffee before you take me on, old man. Face it. You can’t handle your cognac anymore.”
Having had enough of his son’s smart-mouthed scolding, Drake raised his middle finger before sliding off the stool to take his sulking elsewhere.
Chapter 10
“You can sit up now, Brooke.”
Brooke rose to a seated position, refastened her bra, and pulled her shirt back down. The doctor waited patiently and then smiled kindly before launching into the explanation she had come to get.
“After palpitating the area, I don’t think the lump has grown much in two weeks, but the results of the mammogram were inconclusive. I’m seeing some things that still concern me, so I’d like to do a biopsy of the lump. As small as it is, let’s remove it altogether so we can exam the whole thing. At the very least, this might tell us what is contained in these lumps you keep getting.”
Brooke nodded numbly. Surgery. It was a scary word. Someone cutting open her body was a scary concept…and one that had never been applied to her until today.
“Will I have to be put under for the surgery?”
Brooke frowned as she watched the doctor nod and look even more solemn.
“Yes, but the lumpectomy is outpatient and done completely in one day. You’ll come in early in the morning and be sent home that evening. We’ll have a local lab take a look at part of the lump, but we’ll also send it off to be examined as well. That way we have two results to compare. It will help us make the best decision. We’ll have the findings about two weeks afterward.”
Brooke nodded again. “How soon do you want to do the surgery?”
“Since the lump doesn’t appear to be growing rapidly, it can probably be delayed a short while, but I wouldn’t put it off too long. If it isn’t benign, it could suddenly take off growing. We don’t want to let that happen since you’ve caught it so early.”
Brooke nodded yet again. It seemed like all she could do was move her head. “My classes end in two weeks. Can we wait that long?”
“We can schedule it after that time
. Keep checking the lump each day to be sure it’s not changing. Choose a tentative date before you leave. That way you’ll be on my list and the staff can start working you into my surgery schedule. We’ll confirm the exact date with you a week before it’s due to happen.”
“Is there anything I need to do…or not do…in the meantime?”
“Just live your life and enjoy it. There’s no need to worry until I say so. The lack of growth is a positive you can focus on for now. Removing the lump is the next best step for us to take to obtain the information we need.”
Brooke nodded one final time, and then the doctor left her alone with her thoughts.
Once she let out what was going on, her mother would start to worry along with her. God only knew what the rest of the Larson clan would do or say. She wasn’t quite ready for that much attention to be put on her problem yet, but like the surgery, she knew it was something she couldn’t put off much longer.
***
Brooke sighed when the doorbell rang and set down her pen. After the bad news from her doctor earlier that day, she couldn’t handle much more drama. If the interruption was someone selling something, she might be tempted to kick their ass out of the building. If she didn’t get more focused on her work and soon, her grades were going to be late, and her chair was going to give her bloody hell about it. He was not the most understanding of males and likely wouldn’t care how hard it was to think about students and papers when her mind had bigger things to worry over. Finding out she needed surgery made her recent self-discovery about having poor taste in men seem petty.
Brooke looked through the door’s view portal and saw a huge bouquet of flowers. Looked like the guy behind her epiphanies about men had sent a peace offering after forgetting about her—again—for yet another two weeks.
“Who is it?” she yelled.
“I have a delivery for Brooke Daniels.”
Sighing and rolling her eyes about being right, she reluctantly opened the door. Behind the massive bouquet was a man she didn’t have the time or energy to deal with today.
Covered In Paint: Book Five of the Art Of Love Series Page 9