Page 109 of Rinkmates

“Lovely to meet you, dear. I’m Eleanor Elise Huntington.” She air-kisses both my cheeks and a wall of sweet perfume hits me right in the face. “Shame on you, Riley, for not bringing her around sooner! Let’s have a mimosa, shall we?”

She doesn’t even wait for an answer and struts off, her high heelsclick-clackingloudly as she goes.

Who introduces herself with her second name?

I just blink and blink again, but Riley saves me and leads me along as I stumble behind him like a toddler learning to walk for the first time.

This woman managed to insult Riley twice in less than five minutes.

This isn’t a mother.

I watch her swaying hips and start to feel a twinge of sadness for Riley.

“It’s just that these rooms are so much bigger,” Riley says, guiding me through spaces easily double or even triple the size of my small trailer. There are pictures of people and places I don’t know all over the walls, with shiny frames catching the light of fancy chandeliers. And there are big bunches of flowers everywhere, each larger than my head.

“You don’t need to apologize,” I say.

“It’s just…” He takes a deep breath and restarts. “I know they’ll try to make you feel inferior, like you’re insignificant compared to their accomplishments. I’m sorry for bringing you here and potentially subjecting you to their belittling ways, but just having you by my side makes me feel…better.”

My heart swells and I stand on my toes to give him a kiss. “No matter what they say, they can’t change how much I like you, Ri.”

Eleanor leads us through a round marble archway, and thank goodness, I didn’t know how rich he is earlier. I was already impressed by his penthouse. But this villa—it’s like those mansions in movies that make you wonder what rich people do with all those rooms.

Riley grew up like a prince.

I feel like my ten-dollar shoes shouldn’t even be walking on this ground!

We enter a formal dining room with a long oak table. At the head sits a distinguished older man in a dark gray suit—Henry Huntington. Picture a man in his sixties with impeccably styled salt-and-pepper hair, the kind that looks effortlessly perfect yet undoubtedly requires regular trips to an exclusive barber.

He’s reading the newspaper and doesn’t glance up to us until he seemingly finished reading the article, but when he looks at us, I feel like I’ve time traveled.

Riley is his spitting image.

But where Riley is smug, there he is, contained, where Riley’s hair is wild and sexy, there is his, tamed and solid, where Riley’s gaze is full of life, there is his father’s, deadly.

He stands up, straightening his gray suit jacket, and an icy glare washes over me. Same whiskey eyes.

Riley clears his throat. “Dad, this is—”

“You couldn’t be bothered to dress up, son?” he interrupts gruffly, eyeing Riley’s jeans and untucked white button-down. I feel Riley tense beside me.

When Henry looks at me, he raises an eyebrow and swiftly goes back to Riley. Not saying a word.

“It’s just a family dinner,” Riley says.

“You introducing your first girlfriend to us is something special, don’t you think?” he says, and finally nods at me, and that’s all I get for a greeting. So I nod back. Prick.

“It sure is, but I don’t need to dress as posh as you to welcome people into my life,” Riley says.

“No, you do it naked and weekly. We know.”

His mother laughs in a high-pitched voice, sitting down across from him, and since no one chimes in, I feel awkward. Why would she laugh at a comment like this?

Riley lets out a sigh that seems like he saw it coming, almost like he knew this was bound to happen.

“Why don’t we all take a seat?” Eleanor suggests.

Riley walks me over to a wooden chair at the long side of the table. With a gentle gesture, he pulls out the chair for me and I sit down. His father takes his seat at the head of the table once more, his eyes still locked on Riley’s every move.

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