Page 41 of Reckless Love
My mom stops in her tracks when she sees me and looks me over.
“What are you wearing?” she asks, expressionless due to the Botox, but it’s all there in her tone.
She’s wearing a silk blouse and black dress pants despite making an Italian dinner. I know better than to show up looking sloppy, but I tried to make an effort with my sweater dress. Yes, it's a shorter length and has a lower neckline than what I would’ve been allowed to wear growing up, but I'm fully covered.
“A sweater dress,” I say, laughing awkwardly.
She tsks. “That’s an awful lot of cleavage you're showing,” she says.
I try to pull up the neck to hide the millimeter of cleavage I see, but it's no use. This material is not going anywhere.
“Can I help?” I change the subject.
“No, it’s all ready. Everything’s on the table, but this dish and the bread. Doug, it’s ready,” she calls. “Why don’t you head to the dining room?”
“Okay, babe,” he calls back from his office.
I pick up the bread basket and follow my mom into the dining room and am about to sit down, when my dad walks in.
With Bernard right behind him.
“Hi, sweetheart,” Dad says.
Bernard lifts a hand at me in a stiff wave, a sheepish expression on his face.
“What are you doing here?” I mutter.
“Bernard just stopped by and I invited him to stay,” Dad says, grinning his wideisn’t this amazing smile.
“That’s…something.” My voice is deadpan, as is the look I shoot Bernard, and he has the decency to look embarrassed.
My dad comes over to hug me and then lifts his eyebrows in exaggeration. “Goodness…who do we have here? Britney Spears?”
He thinks he’s saying something inflammatory, but he has no idea what a fan I am of that woman. I was a preteen when Britney Spears’ song “Toxic” came out and I watched the music video in secret so many times, eventually making up my own choreography that I taught Rhodes six years later in college. We also have a routine for “I’m a Slave 4 U” that we still pull out when we wanta good laugh. It’s sexy as all hell to see Rhodes shaking his fine body to that song. I like to think I’m somewhat responsible for the Britney dance numbers I’ve seen Rhodes and his Mustangs besties do over the years.It is gold.
“Elle?”
I blink and turn to my mom, who’s waiting for a response.
“I’m sorry. What?” I clear my throat.
“I was just asking if you’d seen Bernard’s new house yet,” she says.
“No.” I shake my head. Why would I have seen my ex’s house?
“It’s beautiful,” my mom gushes. “Four bedrooms, a nice big yard…”
“That’s great,” I tell Bernard.
“It’ll be the perfect place to raise a family,” she says, smiling at Bernard before directing her gaze on me. “It’s a much more practical space than that huge place Rhodes has. I worry about Levi near the lake...”
“Mom—”
“Well, you have to know we’re all worried about you…with this news about Rhodes,” she says.
I’d intended to set the record straight about Rhodes over dinner tonight…when it was supposed to be just the three of us. Now I feel cornered and it puts me on the defense.
“Yes, you mentioned that on the phone. I really wish you’d give Rhodes a chance. You said yourself that you love him…I know you do. So I don’t understand why this news isn’t being better received?”