Page 48 of Love & Rockets

“Pot roast. My mother left a bag of leftovers yesterday.”

“Left it?”

“I came home and there was a cooler parked in front of my door.” And a note. One laced with a hefty dose of mom guilt.

Straightening, she fixed him with a comically incredulous glare. “Your mother leaves food on your doorstep?”

“Only when I haven’t been coming around as much as she’d like.”

Peeling back the lid, she hummed her approval of the meal. “Poor little foundling pot roast. At least you had your potatoes and carrots to keep you company.”

She turned to him, eyes widening with expectation. Snapping his waistband into place, he stepped past her to open a cabinet. “Plates are in here.”

“Utensils?”

“Drawer next to the dishwasher.”

Darla pulled a fork from the drawer, then turned to the plates he’d laid out, her forehead wrinkled with what he feared might be disapproval. It was. “You’ve been avoiding your mother?”

“Avoiding makes it sound more intentional than it is.” He carefully removed the fork and the container from her hands and began to divvy up their supper. “I’m a grown man. I don’t see my parents all the time.”

She turned and rested her hips against the edge of the counter. “But she’s leaving food on your doorstep in an attempt to lure you out.”

“I’m not a stray cat.” He busied himself with tearing off strips of paper towel and covering the plates with them before popping one into the microwave. “I’ll call her. She probably wants me to come to dinner on Sunday.”

“You didn’t call her to thank her for the pot roast?”

“I texted,” he answered, a tad too defensively.

The thing was, he couldn’t risk seeing his parents in person. Jake knew without a doubt his mother would take one good look at him and know there was someone. His mom could read him like a book. Always had, always would. Then, she’d want to know why he hadn’t brought the new woman in his life home to meet her. And while he’d dated a few women he wouldn’t have been anxious to introduce to his mother, that wasn’t the case here. He would have happily taken Darla and Grace to Sunday supper at his parents’ house. Actually, he’d caught himself picturing the scene fairly often in past few weeks. But Darla made it clear she wasn’t up for any kind of outward acknowledgment of their relationship.

“Oh, well, you texted,” she said with mock solemnity. “You are every mother’s dream.”

She tipped her chin up and leaned over so she was directly in his line of vision. Though he knew she was trying to get into his head, he was a little grateful for the effort. This way he wouldn’t have to keep giving her the side-eye to check her reaction. “Do you want to go to dinner at my parents’ house on Sunday?”

“I’m not the one she’s trying to lure,” she retorted.

“Right, but if I go over there, she’s going to take one good look at me and know about you.” The microwave dinged, and he jabbed at the button to open the door. “Well, not you-you, but there’s someone.” He switched the plates and set the timer once more before turning to look her full in the face. “And I don’t think that’s what you want.”

She cocked her head and blinked up at him. “You’re an expert on what I want?”

Her question tripped a trigger of hope deep inside him. Damn, she looked so cute it made him want to pick her up, stuff her into his pocket and run away to someplace no one would find them. Well, after they grabbed Grace, he amended in his head. He’d take them far, far away. Someplace where no one would ask who their people were or speculate about what ‘that Dalton boy’ might be doing with ‘the Kennet girl who got herself in trouble.’

“You keep telling me you don’t want things to get messy.”

“So naturally, with your superior intellect and excellent deductive reasoning...” She made a slow, circling motion with her hand, inviting him to fill in the blanks.

Seeing the light of challenge in her eyes, he felt the flicker of hope sputter and fade. His back stiffened as the microwave sounded the alert again. He looked down at the steaming plate he’d removed moments ago. Logically, he knew there was no way this discussion would reach an end he found satisfactory. The whole thing felt like a trap.

Resentment simmered inside him. He wasn’t the one who’d felt the need to make this relationship something less. He was the one who’d wanted more. He wanted to take her to dinner and the movies like any normal couple. He wanted to spend evenings with her and Gracie in the same room, and have Darla tell him things about herself rather than having to play twenty questions with her kid to find out her middle name. He’d wanted more than this from the very start. He still did. And he shouldn’t feel like he had to apologize or make excuses.

“Do you want to meet my family?” he asked bluntly.

“I’ve met them.” She backed her retort up with a smirk. “Your mama is a sweet lady. She made the best cookies of any room mother. And you get your thing for extra sauce from your daddy.”

“Darla—”

She snatched the cooled plate from the counter and pulled another fork from the drawer. “I still think Brian is a bit of a jerk, but I might have some leftover resentment from high school.” She stabbed a bit of carrot and shoveled the morsel into her mouth. Her eyes widened and her hand flew to her mouth. She danced as she moved the food from cheek to cheek, waving her hand in front of her mouth to cool it. “He always wrecked the curve,” she explained with her mouth full.

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