Page 41 of Donner

This was my first job with an actual office. I couldn't keep the spring from my step as I followed Mize around my new workspace.

Chapter 23

Jax

We'd barely made it home from the grocery store when my phone started ringing. And ringing. And ringing. I knew from the ringtone it was my parents. I thought I could put it off long enough to pack away the cold stuff, at least, but when the song started playing for the fourth time, Beau waved me away with a swat on the ass and said, "Answer it!"

"Hello?"

"Finally, he answers!" My papa elf laughed awkwardly in the background while my dad grilled me for not calling them immediately when I returned home from vacation. There was a hint of concern in his voice, too, which was unusual. I wondered if he heard any rumors about Beau. Derek was terrible at keeping secrets. Besides, I didn't want to keep Beau a secret. Derek, and Santa 30, for that matter, were free to say whatever they wanted about my mate.

"Papa heard some news," Dad said. "Here. You want to tell him?"

"You tell him," I heard in the background.

"We heard you brought a mate home from Miami," he said. "We want to meet him over dinner tonight. I don't suppose you have any food at your place, and we're a quick bus ride away."

I didn't tell him we'd just returned from the grocery store. That would only piss him off. He'd say we didn't want to eat dinner with them, I'd volunteer to make dinner instead, and they'd be coming over in an hour. They already hated my apartment. I didn't want to remind them of even more of my poor life choices while also defending the choice to mate with Beau. I agreed to dinner at their place in an hour.

"Are you ready to meet my parents?" I asked Beau.

He grinned. "I've never met the parents before."

"Never?"

"Not someone I was dating." He shrugged. "I haven't dated much since I left the army, and deployment kinda puts a damper on meeting anyone back home. By the time we'd returned to the states, we'd broken up."

"I'm sorry."

Beau grinned at me. "Don't be. Where does the coffee go?"

I laughed. I'd always bought coffee by the cup or made it at work, but Beau had talked me into buying a coffee maker, a bag of beans, and a French press from the little specialty coffee place within the grocery store. He promised to make me coffee every morning until I got the hang of using the French press myself. It beat stopping at the shop outside the bus stop to grab a cup each morning. It also meant I could drink coffee on the weekends without leaving my apartment. I grinned at Beau just thinking about it. Tomorrow was already Saturday, and I looked forward to sharing a lazy weekend with him before his first day at his new job upstairs on Monday.

First, we had to get through dinner with my parents.

Papa was his usual charming self, and the wonderful smells coming from the kitchen said dinner wouldn't be a problem. Dad, on the other hand, was intense, as usual. He locked eyes with Beau from the moment we stepped through the door and led him away with an arm around his shoulder, his voice low, and his free hand gesticulating about something.

"Oh, you know how he is." Papa gave me a hug and kissed my cheek. "How was your vacation, or did you leave your hotel room after you found that fine man?"

I laughed to hide the heat in my cheeks. "Miami was beautiful. We went to the beach and the zoo. We even kayaked around the Everglades."

Papa clasped his hands to his chest. "Kayaking sounds wonderful. It's like cross-country skiing, only sitting down?"

I laughed. "That's one way to look at it." It wasn't like that at all, but I didn't want to break my papa's heart. I hoped Dad took him on a vacation soon, so he could experience his outdoor dreams for himself. "I thought of you when I booked it. Remember when we used to take paper boats to the lake?"

He laughed and nodded.

Dad and Beau returned. Dad's arm was no longer around Beau's shoulders. He looked like he might even see my mate as an equal. When Dad's gaze met mine, he smiled at me. A genuine smile, too, not one of his sarcastic, "you thought this was a good idea?" smirks.

"You've found a decent mate in this one, Jax. A keeper."

I cleared my throat, but it still didn't want to work, so I nodded.

"He's got a job at the Community Center in Jax's building," Dad said. "Former military, EMT training, and he used to be a bouncer. He'll keep those kids in line."

"He's worth far more than his job qualifications." I squared my shoulders and faced off with my dad for the first time in a long time. Was this a battle I should be picking with him? Probably not, but it was one I thought I might have a chance to win, and if I won here, he might look back and understand all the other times I'd tried to make him see me as a person instead of a resume.

"He's funny. He's kind. He doesn't mind sitting in silence if we have nothing to say." Derek had to fill every possible moment with conversation, which was exhausting sometimes. "He has a way of making me feel like I'm the only person in a crowded room, like I matter."

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