by Reese Ryan
Sinking into the couch, I press my hands to my forehead. “Even Priscilla isn’t that evil,” I say. Leslie purses her lips and tilts her head. “I don’t have any food allergies anyway. The only thing I’m allergic to is cats.”
“You’re allergic to cats?” Leslie says. She bites her lips and thinks. “Do you think—”
“Priscilla with a cat? That would require her to take care of another living being.” I scoff, rubbing my eye again. “Not likely. Besides, she’s a scheming little bitch, but I don’t think she’s a homicidal one. That’s crossing the line, even for her.”
“Stop rubbing your eyes. They’re gonna be the size of grapefruits if you keep that up,” Leslie says sternly. Then she takes a deep breath. “Okay, has this ever happened to you before?”
I nod. “A few times, usually caused by cat dander.”
“So what did you do?”
“Take an antihistamine, usually Benadryl.”
“Do you have any now?”
“No. Besides, if I take Benadryl now I’ll barely be able to keep my eyes open for the meeting later. They’ll think I’m wasted.”
“Well, you certainly can’t go looking like this,” Leslie says. “Can you reschedule the meeting?”
“It was hard enough to pin Guy down to a date, and he’s flying to L.A. tomorrow morning,” I say. “This is my only shot.”
“My gosh! What happened to you?” Priscilla is standing in my office. I wonder if she’s a cat. I didn’t even hear her come in. “Did you have some sort of allergic reaction?”
“What makes you say that?” Leslie’s hands are on her hips.
“It happened to her once before,” Priscilla says calmly. “We were at a coworker’s house for a little party. Linda has three cats and her housekeeping standards are...a bit loose, shall we say. Gordon’s face blew up like a balloon. She couldn’t get out of there fast enough.”
“So you knew she was allergic to cats,” Leslie says accusingly. She looks at me with “I told you so” written all over her face.
“Everyone at that party knows, and they’ll never forget it,” Priscilla says matter-of-factly. “But you haven’t been around any cats, have you, Gordon?”
“Of course not!” I rub my eye again when Leslie isn’t looking.
“Then it has to be something else she’s allergic to.” Priscilla shrugs. “The important thing is that we get her something, and quick. Before she swells up like a balloon in the Macy’s parade.”
Leslie sighs, unconvinced. “She needs some Benadryl.”
“I have some,” Priscilla volunteers. “I’m allergic to shellfish. I always keep some with me.”
Leslie and I exchange looks.
“Oh, come on. You two don’t actually think I had something to do with this, do you? Now that’s just silly.” Priscilla laughs at the notion. “Do you want the Benadryl or not? You certainly can’t go to your meeting tonight looking like that.”
“What choice do I have?” I say finally. “Yes, I’ll take the Benadryl.”
“But I thought you said—”
“I’ll go home and take a little nap.” I interrupt Leslie. “Just call me an hour before the meeting, and everything will be fine.”
It isn’t.
When Leslie calls to wake me from my nap, I’m barely comprehendible.
“You sound like you’re drunk. You can’t make your presentation like this.” Leslie groans. “What’re we going to do?”
“Let me speak to her,” Priscilla says in the background. Leslie sighs then puts her on the phone.
“Hey, Gordon,” she says. “I know this happened at the worst possible time, but like I said this morning, I’m here to support you any way I can. This is an important meeting. We can’t afford to blow this. You’ve worked too hard for it. Let me handle it for you. I’ve made tons of presentations and my closing rate is excellent. Give me a shot at it. I’ll land this account, no matter what it takes. I promise.”
My eyelids feel incredibly heavy and all I want to do is go to sleep. “Fine,” I hear myself say. “The files are on my desk. Brief me in the morning.”
Leslie sighing in the background is the last thing I remember before drifting off to sleep again.
Chapter Twenty-Two
I watch Marcus’s face as he studies a menu at Taza—a Lebanese restaurant—he’s invited me to for lunch. His eyes—dark, close-set and always far too intense for the task at hand—move from one side to the other, like a typewriter cartridge. I can barely keep from laughing as I lean across the table and whisper loudly, “You do know we won’t be tested on this, don’t you?”
Relaxing his shoulders from their perch near his ears, he lowers the menu to the table and shoves his glasses up the bridge of his nose with his index finger. “Right. I know. I’m just...not very fond of Lebanese food.”
“But this was your idea,” I remind him. Even for Marcus, he’s acting a little weird today.
“Mimi said you liked this place.” He picks up the menu and reviews it again.
Yesterday he called and asked to meet for lunch. Since the last time we had lunch together alone was at the hospital after Mickey was born, I was a little surprised, to say the least. When he asked me not to tell Mimi, I got downright worried. I take the menu from his hand. “Marcus, do you trust me?”
He shrugs. “Yeah, I guess.”
Thanks for the vote of confidence, dude. I motion the server over. “We’re finally ready to order,” I say. “We’ll take an order of hummus for the table with extra pita, beef shawarma for him and chicken shawarma for me. And two colas.”
Marcus looks relieved as the server takes the menus away. It only lasts a moment. When he looks at me again his face immediately draws into a grimace. He swallows. “Thanks for meeting me for lunch.”
“Sure,” I say, watching the bronze skin across his cheeks turn six different shades of red. I lean across the table and speak in a low voice. “Now will you please tell me what the hell is going on?”
He has a panicked look on his face. “What makes you think something’s wrong?”
“Seriously?” I fold my arms, mouth twisted. My patience is growing dangerously thin.
He shifts in his seat and leans across the table. “I wanted to ask you a favor.”
I brace my back against the seat, grazing my teeth across my bottom lip. “So ask me.”
He puts his fist to his mouth and clears his throat twice. This is gonna cost me. Big time. When he finally speaks, his voice sounds warbled. “I wondered if you could help me...I mean, I thought maybe you could...”
“Marcus,” I say. “Please, just spit it out. I have a meeting with a client in an hour.”
He sits up taller and places his hands flat on the table. “I wanted to know if you could help me find a job.”
“Is that all?” I laugh, relaxing for the first time since I walked in the door. “Of course I will. I would’ve offered, but I didn’t think you’d want my help. Geez, why the big production?”
He shrugs. “I thought you’d feel like your loser brother-in-law was begging for help.” He finally raises his eyes to mine. “Don’t pretend you haven’t been thinking that.”
My face is warm. I glance at the door, then back at him. “You’re not a loser,” I say, not exactly answering the question. “A lot of people are looking for work. It’s a tough market.”
“I know what your mom thinks, that I don’t want to work, that I spend all day playing games on my computer.”
I give him a look that surely reveals she isn’t the only person who thinks that. “So what are you doing?”
“Working on my graphic design skills and trying to get things going with the business. I’m a really good designer. I’m just not a very good marketer.” He shrinks down in his seat. He l
ooks much smaller than his five-foot-nine-inch frame. “I’ve tried, I really have. I guess I’m not cut out for business the way Miles and Raine are.”
I sigh, tapping my fingers lightly on the table. “Maybe you should try working with a start-up first, you know, learn by osmosis rather than trying to reinvent the wheel.”
He leans in, his brows shifting upward, a hopeful glint in his eyes. “I never thought of that. I’d like that.”
“Good,” I say, taking a business card out of my purse and sliding it across the table to him. “Email your résumé to me. I’ll float it around to some of my contacts at a few start-ups.”
“Thanks, Mel.” He jams the card in his pocket, nodding fervently.
“I can’t promise you anything until I see what I’m working with. Do you have an online portfolio?”
“Yes, of course.”
“Show it to me.” I snatch my tablet out of my bag, open the cover and shove it across the table.
Marcus picks the tablet up and enters the URL. He turns it around and slides it back across the table.
With my mouth hanging open, and one hand to my chest, I thumb through the samples. I’m stunned. It’s like discovering your idiot brother is a world-class concert pianist. “Wow, these are good, and these—” I indicate four in particular, “—are truly exceptional.”
Marcus watches my reaction. He raises his chin, shoulders back and chest forward. His small mouth and thin lips form a knowing grin. His eyes gleam. “I told you, I’m no amateur. I just need some clients.”
Resting an elbow on the table, I grip my chin with my thumb and index finger. “Would you be opposed to working with some of these companies on a contract basis?”
“No,” he says. “Actually, I’d prefer it.”
“Good.” I close the tablet and slip it back inside my bag. Biting my lip, I place my hand on his. “I’ve underestimated you, Marcus, and I shouldn’t have.”
He nods, and an involuntary smile creeps across his lips. “Oh, and if you could please—”
I hold my hand up. “We’ll keep it between us.”
“Thanks.” His shoulders relax and his smile deepens. “I know you’re doing this for your sister so—”
“You’re wrong.” I point a finger at him. “I’m doing this for you. You’re family, too. I know we haven’t always made you feel that way, and for that I’m sorry.”
“I haven’t always made it easy,” he concedes. “But you have to admit, it’s kinda fun fucking with your mom.”
I laugh conspiratorially. “That it is.”
When our food arrives Marcus takes a bite of his shawarma. The moan that escapes lips makes a few other patrons look over and stare. I laugh. “Now do you trust me, Mr. I’m-not-very-fond-of-Lebanese-food?”
“Yeah,” he says. “I do.”
“Then you’ll believe me when I say that if you try to pick up that check I’ll break your arm.” I smile, and so does he.
We enjoy the rest of our lunch. He tells me about the design projects he’s worked on recently, even though they didn’t pay much, and a concept he’s been dying to use. His eyes light up as he makes his point with animated gestures. For the first time in a long time I see the man my sister fell in love with and I remember why she did.
Chapter Twenty-Three
It’s the day before Thanksgiving. Thankfully, Priscilla returned to San Francisco for the holiday. Leslie and I close the office early so she can get a head start on her cooking and I can pick Raine up from the airport.
Aside from the drama of my mysterious allergic reaction on the day of my big meeting with the Crushers, the past two weeks have been good. Priscilla nailed the account, as promised. Though the frequent flirtatious communications she’s had with Guy since then makes me wonder if she isn’t nailing him, too.
The thought of Raine and I spending our first holiday together makes me feel slightly giddy. I haven’t seen him in a month. We talk nearly every night. Still, I miss him terribly. So it’s no wonder my tongue is down his throat the moment he gets into the car.
“It’s good to see you, too, babe,” he says when I finally let him up for air.
Treating the speed limits as more of a suggestion, we get back to my place in record time. We ignore our ringing phones and spend the rest of the evening enjoying each other’s company and getting reacquainted with our favorite parts of each other’s bodies.
* * *
I lay with my cheek pressed against his naked chest, tracing the heart and dagger tattoo and each faded letter of Forever. Lifting my head so our eyes meet, I ask, “I think I remember you promising to tell me the story of this tattoo.” I tap two fingers lightly on his chest.
He slides one hand beneath his head and pulls me closer, tucking my head underneath his chin. “Lauren Romano.” He sighs. “My first real girlfriend. I was crazy in love with her. We dated the first two years of high school. Her parents tolerated me at first. They figured it was just puppy love, no big deal. But her father was afraid we were getting too serious, especially since I wasn’t the Italian stud he hoped his daughter would marry. He sent her to boarding school in Italy for her junior and senior years of high school. I got this tattoo right before she left to show her how brokenhearted I was about her leaving, but that my heart would always belong to her. No matter what. Obviously, it took her a lot less time to forget about me.” A raspy chuckle makes his chest rise and fall.
I touch my fingers to the word Forever and smile. “It could have been a lot worse. It could’ve been her name.”
He laughs. “What do you think the phoenix on my back is covering?”
“Oh, no!” I hide my eyes and cringe. “She certainly left her mark on you.”
“You could say that.” He kisses the top of my head.
I lift my head again, looking deep into his eyes. “Why’d you choose the phoenix?”
Grimacing, his eyes trace the ceiling. His shoulders tense as he clears his throat. “After Lauren, I was...a little wild. I made a lot of bad choices. After one particularly bad episode people kept saying I was lucky to be alive. That I was like a phoenix rising from the ashes.” He shrugs. “It seemed like the appropriate way to close that Chapter of my life.”
I want to ask him more, about his relationship with Lauren, and what made him feel like he had a second chance at life. The sorrow in his eyes and the rising tension in his body tell me that we’ve visited this particularly painful period in his life long enough.
“Thank you,” I say, “for sharing that with me.” I crush my mouth against his, sliding my fingers into his hair.
He responds by pulling me on top of him and sucking on my lower lip before slipping his tongue inside and running it along the roof of my mouth. A soft moan emanates from the back of my throat as I feel him growing hard beneath me. He rolls us over in one quick move and continues kissing me. I press my hand to his heart, hoping that our story will have a better end than his and Lauren’s or mine and Jax’s.
* * *
We arrive at my mother’s house at eleven on Thanksgiving morning to watch the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade together. It is a long-running Gordon family tradition.
Mom, Mimi, Jamie and I jostle for elbow space in the kitchen. We each cook separate portions of the meal. Even Jamie is making something this year, rather than being the roving “assistant” to everyone else.
Mimi peeks through the kitchen door. “Raine’s playing with the boys. He’s really won them over.” She smiles. “They’re so excited about going to the basketball game with you guys on Saturday.”
“I gave him every opportunity to opt out of his promise. He wouldn’t hear of it. He really wants to take Mickey and Dusty to the game, and he even insisted on paying for everything.”
“He didn’t have to do that. I could’ve finagled a f
ew tickets from someone at work,” Mimi says. “I hope he bought cheap tickets. They’re kids, for chrissake. They won’t remember half the night anyway.”
“I told him that, but I get the distinct feeling he didn’t listen. We’ll see. He won’t tell me anything.”
“He’s an outstanding young man.” My mother beams. “I couldn’t have handpicked a better husband for you.”
“Mom!”
“What?”
“You’re doing it again.”
“Doing what?” My mother shrugs and goes back to fussing with the turkey.
“No one has said anything about marriage.”
“He loves you. Of course he wants to marry you.”
“How do you know he loves me?” I put one flour-dusted hand on my hip.
My mother looks at Mimi, who bites her lip and puts her head down. “I can tell by looking at him. Everyone but you can see that.”
“Um-hmm.” I give my sister the stink eye. “Well, we certainly haven’t discussed marriage. We’ve only been seeing each other for a few months.”
“At your age, every month is like a year,” Mom says. Mimi and Jamie snicker. I open my mouth to object, but Mom continues. “Besides, I count the year you two pretended not to be dating.”
I look at my sister again.
“I think I hear one of the boys calling me.” Mimi disappears through the swinging door.
“See, that’s why I can’t tell her anything,” I tell Jamie.
“Don’t be so hard on your sister,” Mom says. “She just wants you to be happy. We all do.”
“Then stay out of my love life. That would make me happy.” I return to the dough I’m kneading for the dinner rolls.
“Of course, dear.” My mother plants a kiss on my temple. “I’m sorry.”
“Me, too.” Mimi peeks her head through the kitchen door. “I’m excited for you, that’s all.”
“Okay, fine.” I sigh.
“Poor Raine,” Mimi says. “The boys have latched on to him. He’s really good with them. He’s going to make a crazy good dad.”