“What does your grandmother have to do with it?” Felicia asked.
He had opened his menu, but his mind wasn’t on making his selection. An ironic smile twisted his lips at her question. “My grandmother is the kind of woman who, if you suddenly found yourself drowning, would happily hand you a big anchor instead of a life preserver.”
He was kidding, right? “You’re exaggerating,” Felicia laughed.
“No, I’m not,” he told her. “If anything I’m being kind. You have to understand that she was convinced that my grandfather was going to leave his wife and marry her, especially when she told him that she was pregnant with twins. My grandfather had always wanted a family and he had every intention of marrying my grandmother,” he explained. “But when my grandfather went to tell his wife that it was over between them and he was leaving her, his wife surprised him by saying she was pregnant with twins, as well. Nothing for all those years and then he suddenly hit the jackpot. Since he still really loved her—I gather that their only point of contention was that she hadn’t been interested in having a family—my grandfather decided to stay married to her.
“Being an honorable man in his own way, he told my grandmother, the mother of his illegitimate twins, that he would always provide for her and the twins, as well as take care of any and all bills that might come up. As you can imagine, that wasn’t good enough for her, but she made her peace with it—or so it appeared for the time being.
“Meanwhile, she waited to exact her revenge. Not because she loved him—or any of us as we came along in due time—but because she just felt as if she had been wronged, and she was determined to make him pay for it.”
For the first time, Felicia found herself feeling sorry for Nicole and her family. “That sounds positively terrible,” she cried.
“It could have easily been, if my mother and Aunt Vita hadn’t turned out to be such good, loving and honorable women. They were the ones who made my life and the lives of my cousins not just tolerable but good and decent.”
Realizing that he had gone off on a tangent, Aaron cleared his throat as he waved his hand to clear the air. “Sorry, I didn’t mean to go on and on like that.”
“Well, I’m not,” she told him. “It helps me understand why you behaved like a protective pit bull when you first met me—you were looking out for your mother.”
“About that,” he began, then told her simply, “I was wrong.”
But she shook her head. “No, don’t apologize.” She now knew what had driven him to behave the way he initially had. “It’s really nice to meet someone who is so protective of his mother. I find it refreshing and admirable. That’s why when you finally wound up approving of what I was doing, it meant so much more.”
Because he had just shared so much about his family, for the first time Felicia felt as if she had become part of that intimate circle, just the way Nicole had told her time and again that she was.
Chapter 13
Felicia had to admit that part of her was still amazed to find herself sitting here opposite Aaron Colton in a fancy restaurant, having what amounted to an exceptional meal.
“This is really good,” she said, leaning over her serving so that Aaron could hear her over the general din in the main dining area. She had only needed to sample a single forkful to come to this conclusion. The chicken parmesan she had ordered was probably the best she had ever had.
Aaron seemed amused by her declaration. “You didn’t think that it would be?”
“Oh, no, I expected it to be good,” she quickly assured him. She didn’t want to accidentally insult him or anyone in his family, since this was his cousin Tatum’s restaurant. “I just didn’t think that it was going to be this good. This is absolutely fabulous.”
“I’m sure that Tatum will be happy to hear that—I think,” he qualified, thinking of the way Felicia had worded her compliment.
Felicia caught her lower lip between her teeth. She realized that she hadn’t said that correctly. “I guess I should have left out that last part, you know, about not thinking that the meal would be this good.”
The next moment, she found herself caught up in the smile she saw entering his eyes. Aaron wasn’t exactly laughing at her, she realized. Instead, he seemed to be enjoying her.
She found the thought warming her.
“That’s probably a good idea,” he agreed. And then he leaned back in his chair for a moment, growing quiet as he studied her.
“So, tell me, is everything all right?” he asked Felicia out of the blue.
She looked at Aaron sharply. “Why wouldn’t it be all right?” she asked uneasily. Had he heard something, or noticed something? Worse, was he aware that she was being followed?
The expression on her face troubled him for a moment. He really wanted to get to the bottom of this and there was no way to approach this except honestly and directly. So he leaped in.
“My aunt seems to think that you’ve been a little jumpy lately—her words,” he qualified. “And she and my mother are concerned about you.”
Guilt washed over Felicia immediately. The last thing she wanted was to cause the two women any sort of concern or worry.
“I’m not jumpy,” Felicia denied. Then, because she had always found lying uncomfortable, she amended her protest a little. “Well, maybe just a little,” she admitted.
His interest was immediately piqued. Now he was getting somewhere, he thought. “Mind if I ask why? You can tell me that it’s none of my business if you want,” he told her. “Although I hope you won’t.”
Up until that moment, that was exactly what she was debating saying, just not in those exact words. But now that Aaron had opened up the door to that excuse, Felicia found she just couldn’t use it. She found the words to be too dismissive and blunt. He was obviously concerned about her, and she really was grateful for that, even if it put her in an awkward position.
But at the same time, she didn’t want to tell him about Greg, her defunct marriage and the abuse the man had subjected her to. Most of all, she was ashamed of the fact that she had been a victim at his hands.
Maybe she would be able to talk about that someday, but not at this point.
Still, she could see that Aaron was waiting and she knew she had to say something to him, so Felicia fell back on something she felt was credible and believable. “I’m just trying to make plans for my next job when that time finally comes.”
“Your next job?” Aaron questioned. At this point, he hadn’t thought that far ahead. Felicia had quickly become a fixture in his mother’s life and that was where the situation stood at this point.
“Well, yes.” Felicia felt that the term she had used was self-explanatory. “Your mother’s progress is going extremely well, a lot better than I had even anticipated,” she admitted. “If she keeps this up, she’s most likely going to be finished with her physical therapy routine sooner than later, and I’ve got to be prepared for that eventuality. After all, I can’t just have her doing her physical therapy exercises forever.”
An amused smile played on Aaron’s lips. Felicia caught herself feeling warm all over. The man’s effect on her seemed to be intensifying steadily.
“Why not?” he asked innocently.
Felicia wasn’t sure if he was just teasing her—or baiting her. In either case, she gave him an honest answer. “Well, for one thing, I would be guilty of milking the situation.”
Aaron’s eyes met hers. “What if my mother wants the situation milked?” He was asking the question in all seriousness.
Felicia blinked, speechless. “Excuse me?”
Aaron almost couldn’t believe he was saying this, since he had been so against having Felicia take over his mother’s care to begin with, but now he was looking at the situation from a completely different angle. At this point, he viewed having Felicia stay on as his mother’s therapist as someth
ing that would be beneficial for his mother as well as for Felicia.
And for him, he thought with a smile.
To make the explanation as simple as possible, Aaron drew on what he knew best. “You know how there are some people who have personal trainers?”
“A personal trainer,” she repeated. “You mean like what you’re doing?”
“Yes, in a way, although there isn’t a big match riding on the outcome,” he allowed. “You could see continuing here, working with my mother, as just keeping her in the best shape she has ever been in.”
Although she really liked the idea of staying on in Nicole’s beautiful, Victorian-style home, she felt it wouldn’t be honest of her to remain indefinitely—or even much longer.
“But I’ve already given her all the tools to be able to accomplish that,” Felicia protested. “She’s not going to need me, or she won’t very soon.”
Aaron shook his head in amazement. “You have got to be the most honest person to have ever walked the earth, bar none. Look, simply put, my mother likes your company. You’re doing her a lot of good motivating her with this physical therapy program. And unless I miss my guess, you don’t exactly hate the fact that you have a large house to stay in right now—do you?”
“No, of course not. Your mother has a lovely home.” There was no arguing with that. “But I can’t be there indefinitely. That would be taking advantage of her. That’s not something I want to be guilty of doing.”
Aaron raised a point. “What if she didn’t see it that way?”
Finished with her meal, she retired her silverware and looked up at him. Hope was dueling it out with disbelief. She found herself rooting for hope. “Excuse me?”
He rephrased his question. “What if she didn’t think of your being there as you taking advantage of the situation? What if, in my mother’s all-seeing eyes, you are both getting something out of this?”
She couldn’t see how he could view it that way. “Such as?”
“Such as you get a place to stay.” He had looked into her background to some extent. Aaron was aware that she had traveled from one place to another, making temporary arrangements rather than permanent ones—and she didn’t strike him as someone who was really satisfied living that way. “And I get to have the reassurance of having someone looking out for my mother without making her feel as if she’s an inept little old lady who needs to be taken care of.”
Felicia felt called upon to come to Nicole’s defense. “Your mother is definitely not anyone’s idea of an inept little old lady.”
“No, but you can understand that I do worry about her, and having you here, at least for the time being,” he qualified, to lay that argument aside temporarily, “takes away that concern.”
Felicia frowned slightly as she delicately wiped her fingers on her napkin. “I still feel as if I’m not being honest.”
He couldn’t understand why she would feel that way. “Felicia, if anything, you’re the most honest one here,” he pointed out. “Most people in your position would jump at the chance to continue making money doing what they were hired to do. They’d do whatever they could to prolong the situation, not attempt to put it to rest.” He paused for second, then asked, “You like my mother, don’t you?”
“Oh, very much.” How could he even think to ask that? From the bottom of her heart, she could only wish that she’d had a mother like Nicole Colton. “She’s a self-made woman who, despite the blows that life gave her, picked herself up and refused to be beaten down by her circumstances.” Admiration throbbed in her voice. “She’s just like your aunt, except that Vita found a life partner to be at her side while your mother had to forge this life for herself and her sons all on her own. I really respect your mother a great deal.”
“So it doesn’t sound as if you’d mind staying on awhile longer,” he assumed.
“Of course I wouldn’t mind. Your mother’s a dream client and a terrific person. But, like I said, I just feel guilty taking her money.”
“Actually,” Aaron pointed out, “it’s not her money. It’s mine. When this all started, I told her I’d pay for everything for as long as she needed it.”
Felicia focused on what he had just said. “That makes it even worse, because she’s quickly approaching a point where she won’t be needing it anymore.”
Again, he shook his head in awed disbelief. “You are the most stubborn woman I have ever met—outside of my mother,” he qualified—and even that was actually a compliment. “Stop fighting this, Felicia. One way or the other, you’re staying on for now.” Aaron put it that way to placate her. “It’s a given. I believe that my mother really needs this.”
She opened her mouth and he knew she was going to continue arguing with him about this, so in an attempt to point her in a different direction, Aaron asked her, “What made you get into physical therapy in the first place?”
That caught Felicia off guard for a moment, but only for a moment. “I wanted to help people and, very honestly, I didn’t have the time or money to go to medical school, so this was the fastest way that I could accomplish my goal.”
She had almost blurted out that she had met Greg that first year while taking classes in physical therapy, but she managed to catch herself just in time. So instead, what she said was, “Taking those classes and making a difference in people’s lives was the calling I was looking for. And, most noteworthy, if I hadn’t taken those classes, I wouldn’t have met your mother or been able to, in some small way, help her.”
He had listened to her without interrupting, but now he felt he had to say something. “Do you realize that you have a habit of diminishing what you accomplish?” he asked her.
She didn’t see it that way. Her throat dry, she took a sip from her water glass before answering. “I don’t want to come across as if I think too much of myself.”
That was partially due to Greg, who had ripped into her at one point, accusing her of being conceited.
Heaven knew there was no way she would ever come across as thinking too much of herself, Aaron thought. “A little self-confidence never hurt,” he said.
Felicia smiled at him. There was no point in arguing. And she did like his interpretation. “You’re probably right,” she agreed.
He caught himself thinking, out of the blue, that when she smiled like that, her whole face lit up, and he found himself totally captivated by her. He wondered about her, about things that went far deeper than just her background and her education.
He wondered about Felicia the woman.
“So,” he asked, switching subjects as he looked at her empty plate, “are you up for dessert?”
It had been a long time since eating represented something more than just survival to her. This had been the most leisurely meal she could remember having in a very long time. Oh, meals at Nicole’s table had been welcome and appetizing, but they had been a means to an end, something she grabbed quickly in order to get on to the next thing on her agenda.
Tonight it had been more of an event, a very tasty event.
“Yes,” she replied, not really wanting this experience to end just yet. “I think so.”
“Good,” Aaron said, thinking that she was in for a real treat. To him dessert had always been the best part of the meal.
Turning in his seat, he held up his hand to attract their server’s attention.
But instead of their server, it was Tatum who waved the woman away and made her way over to them. Apparently, Aaron thought, his cousin had been keeping an eye on them.
“I gather from the looks on your faces that you enjoyed your meal,” Tatum surmised, pleased, as she looked from her cousin to his guest.
“Oh, very much so,” Felicia answered enthusiastically.
“Good,” Tatum declared. “Could I interest either one of you in dessert?” she asked, tapping the dessert menus she had brought with
her and was now holding out to them.
“Oh, I think you might be able to talk us into it.” Aaron put his hand out for the menus and handed one to Felicia. “What do you think, Felicia?”
Her eyes darted across the menu quickly. One thing looked more tempting than the next. Making up her mind was going to be hard.
“Oh, definitely,” she agreed.
“Tell you what, why don’t I make a choice for you?” Tatum proposed, her eyes sweeping over the two of them.
“Sounds good to me,” Aaron told her, then turned toward Felicia. “Fee?”
Having Aaron use her nickname had a wave of heat washing over Felicia. Although it fit in as a substitute for the name she was using, it was actually short for her real name. A name she hadn’t used or heard since she had fled home and taken on this identity for her own protection.
Fiona.
Pulling herself together, Felicia smiled a little too quickly at the two people looking at her. “My mouth is watering already.”
“Be right back,” Tatum promised just before she turned on her heel and made her way into the kitchen.
Desperate to have something to say that would draw Aaron’s attention away from what she felt might be her flushed face, Felicia asked, “What do you think she’s going to bring back?”
Aaron laughed. “From what I’ve come to gather about Tatum, it’ll be something sinfully delicious and way too fattening.”
Felicia said, “Then maybe I should take a pass on dessert.”
“Why?”
“Well, if you think that whatever your cousin picks is going to be fattening...” Felicia’s voice trailed off, her meaning clear.
He almost laughed at her for that. “If there’s anyone who could stand to consume a few extra hundred calories, trust me, it’s you.”
A blush blossomed on her cheeks. “You’re just being nice,” she said.
“No,” he told her seriously, “I’m being accurate and honest. Besides, from what I hear, it’ll be well worth it. My own mother paid her the ultimate compliment by saying that Tatum can do unimaginably wonderful things with food,” he told Felicia. “As for dessert, it’s probably as close as you’ll come to going to heaven while still being on this mortal coil.”
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