Page 80 of Counterfeit Connection

“No. I mean it. Griffin, listen to her. She’s humming in the kitchen.”

“She always does that.” He places his strong hands gently over my cheeks. “It means that much to you?”

“It really does. The tone of her voice, her sense of humor. She reminds me of my own mother. Please?”

Chapter 24

Griffin

Kaitlyn curls into my arms quietly. I know how she is. Once her mind is set, changing it will take an act of government or force. I don’t want either. I guess I’d compartmentalized so hard with this not to feel what I’m starting to feel, I didn’t consider what it might do to my mother later. Seeing the crushing emotion radiating from Kaitlyn’s eyes, I think I would’ve done anything at that point to take her hurt away.

“Mum, is the cake on the rack? Kaitlyn and I have something we want to talk to you about.”

After a moment, she appears in the doorway. “If you’re telling me you’re getting married or I’m getting a grandchild in that manner, I hate to tell you that I pictured a grander gesture than this.”

“Oh God,” Kaitlyn says. “No, no. It’s nothing like that.”

I motion to my mother’s chair. “Will you please come sit? It’s rather important.”

“You’re scaring me a bit, Griffin.”

She said my name. She never calls me anything except Griffy. She hasn’t in years.

“Don’t be scared. It’s important, but not something to be scared of,” I tell her.

Kaitlyn looks at me with worry and relief in her eyes and mouths, “Thank you.”

Once she’s seated, she folds her hands on the table and waits. “All right, I’m listening.”

“This may be hard to understand, at first, but I promise we’ll try to make it as simple as possible. Father is involved.”

She rolls her eyes and scoffs, “Why am I not surprised?”

“Mum,” I sigh. “As you know, I’ve been working toward taking up the mantle at Orion since Joseph passed. Father hasn’t made that process easy. He tells me constantly that my flippant, playboy attitude could ruin what he so carefully built.” I see her eyes go wide, but she doesn’t interrupt me. “A few weeks ago, he sent me a contract with stipulations. One of which was that I needed to be in a serious relationship, or married, or he wouldn’t allow me to take my position.”

She sits very still and silent on the opposite side of the table. When my mother is silent, one of two things is happening. She’s either about to melt down in tears or she’s getting ready to burn something, or someone, down. Either way is not what I want.

“Mum? Did you hear what I said?”

Finally, she looks up from her thoughts into my eyes. “I should have grabbed a bottle of wine for this. Quel figlio di puttana. Lo ucciderò.”

“Holy shit, Mama. Non parlare così."

“I hate to say this, but English please,” Kaitlyn says. My mother gets up from her chair, wandering into the kitchen, muttering to herself in Italian as she works through her obvious initial anger. “What did she say? I thought I heard the word for bitch.”

I chuckle a little, to my surprise. “Don’t tell me you speak Italian.”

“No, fluent Spanish. The languages are very similar. I know swearing when I hear it.”

“Well, she called my father a son of a bitch and said she’d kill him.”

Kaitlyn puts her face in her hands. “We haven’t even gotten to the worst part yet.”

“Hey.” I pull her hands away so I can see her eyes. “I’m sure she is putting two and two together.”

My mother walks back into the dining room with a bottle of wine and a very, very large glass. It’s not even for wine. It’s a proper stout glass, and she’s filling it with very expensive wine.

“Let me make sure I understand.” She pauses to take a long pull from the glass. “Your father is threatening you into a relationship before he will sign some arbitrary contract with you? And I take that to mean that…” She looks at Kaitlyn. “You’re involved.”

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