Page 103 of Tame Me

‘They’ll go to their graves fighting. The bitterness is next level.’

‘I thought they divorced when you were—’

‘Fourteen, yeah.’

‘That’s a while ago.’ She draws in a deep breath. ‘How will you introduce me? Am I a friend, casual acquaintance, captive?’

Oh, she makes me smile. ‘We don’t need to define anything. They can think whatever they want.’

‘And how’s that controlling the narrative?’

She’s right but I don’t like considering these details too closely. The complications my fractured family could bring stress me out. ‘We’ll fake it.’ I snap decide. ‘No reason they won’t believe us. Like we did with Ava. You’ve only just agreed to come back with me. I’ve had to work at it. You took some convincing.’

‘No one’s going to believe that.’

‘You don’t think you exude cool indifference? That you’re not an impervious, powerful woman?’

‘Cool indifference?’ She looks sceptical.

‘Yeah. Infinitely capable and needing no one.’

‘That’s not possible. Everyone needs someone sometimes.’

I’m distracted by her. ‘Do you ever need someone?’

She angles her head. ‘Sometimes in a dark, dangerous, life-threatening moment I don’t want to be alone.’

Her mouth mocks but her eyes flicker and I know she actually means it.

‘You want someone’s hand to hold?’ I ask quietly.

She stares intently at me and her smile slowly softens. ‘Brief me on how you want me to handle them.’

I feel a wave of gratitude for her attempt to make this easy for me and suddenly I don’t hold back on the truth. ‘They’re coming tomorrow night.’

‘Tomorrow?’ Her eyes widen. ‘Decisive.’

‘Best-case scenario it’ll be a stilted and uncomfortable Cold War situation. My mother will ask me directly for money. My father will have a business idea he wants to run past me after dinner. A quick pull aside. It won’t be quick. They’ll both be disappointed. They’ll each blame me for being too much like the other. It’ll devolve into an argument between them.’

Honestly, it’ll be a timely reminder of everything I don’t want.

‘You don’t want to invite them individually?’ she asks.

‘And have one outraged because they weren’t the one to meet Lukasfirst?’

‘That would happen?’

‘Absolutely.’

She looks wary now. ‘Do you want them to be a big presence in Lukas’s life?’

‘I need to show respect and let them know he exists, but he won’t become a pawn between them. Ever.’

She nods but her tension doesn’t lessen. ‘Will they disapprove of me?’

My skin tightens. She’s vulnerable. ‘One will, one won’t. Purely to disagree with each other so it doesn’t actually matter what you do or say, they’ll just take a side as soon as one stakes a claim either way. Don’t worry about it and for heaven’s sake don’t take it personally.’ But of course there’s no way she won’t take it personally. I’m hit with a tardy premonition that this is a bad idea. ‘You know, maybe you don’t have to be there...’

Now she looks even more tense.

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