Page 65 of His Wilde Little
We got dressed in nice, clean clothes. I wore a deep red cranberry shirt paired with my gold bolo tie and Jace wore a complimenting navy shirt. He said he’d wanted to wear cream but knew he’d spill gravy on himself and was planning ahead. It was smart, and reminded me I would need to fix a napkin to him collar acting like a bib which I knew he’d enjoy.
I still wasn’t able to get a look in at the desserts as he carried them both over large round cake boxes that were florally decorated to obscure people peeking inside. I’d smelled caramel, but the more I asked him, and the more I recalled the smell, the less sure I was about what it could’ve been.
“You’re gonna love it,” he said as we headed up the porch to his family’s home.
“How do I look?” I asked him, straightening the strings of the tie out.
“Good enough to eat.”
“Likewise, baby.”
Kissing on the stoop, the door opened and Diane’s grinning face stared at us. “Come on,” she said. “You’re letting all the cold air inside.”
My first Thanksgiving in such a long time, I almost didn’t know how to act.
27. JACE
Thanksgiving with my family was always a big deal, although in the past couple years, it had thinned out to justusand now Diane, and of course, Lorenzo. My mom went all out with the table decorations, displaying her tchotchkes of porcelain gourds and pumpkins, and some of them doubled as salt and pepper shakers, but you had to be careful you weren’t picking up one of the decorative ones. The table was laid with seven place settings, and each one had a name card on it. I was sat beside Lorenzo, of course, although he took his seat while I went back into the kitchen where my mom was still dealing with the turkey in the oven.
“I brought desserts,” I said, placing the cake case down on the counter. “And no, I’m not telling you what they are until after dinner.”
“You’ll tell me though, won’t you?” Diane asked. She handed me a wine glass. “Red or white?”
“I’m sure it’s lovely, whatever it is,” my mom said, walking around the kitchen, pointing at things and talking to herself. “And I’ll have a glass of red. Make sure it’s a full glass this time, Diane. I’m dealing with a lot in here.”
“You should’ve asked me to come over,” I said. “I’ll take a white, only a small glass, haven’t eaten much yet.”
My mom stopped for a moment to look at me and sigh. “I would have, but I don’t want to bother you,” she said. “You’re with your—your boyfriend,” she said with a huge smile, almost like she was unsure what to call him. “And I’m letting you do your own thing. But since you’re here, can you double check the mashed potatoes, let me know how they taste, and then I’ve just got to make sure the carrots are soft, you know how your father is about not wanting crunchy carrots.”
I nodded. It was suddenly all systems go, especially after Diane had poured me a splash of the white wine. And as much as I’d missed not being in the thick of it with her all afternoon, I was grateful to have done my own thing.
“I’ll go keep Lorenzo company,” Diane said.
“No touching,” I called after her.
Once she left my mum laughed. “Bless her,” she said. “I’ve told her to get on those dating sites, but I have no clue where to start, and your sister was being no help at all. So, I think she might just have to pine after Lorenzo for a little while longer.”
“As long as she keeps her hands to herself,” I said.
Finishing up what my mom started, we had a moment where everything was done and we stood beside each other at the counter. “So, does he have family that he speaks to?” she asked. “I bet it’s awfully lonely just taking work that’s offered and mostly working alone.”
“He doesn’t speak about them much, or to them,” I said. “I think they’re a bit conservative in their views, you know. Religious, maybe.” These were all questions I wanted to ask him, but I didn’t want to interrogate him with it. Like all good things, it would happen organically.
“Maybe one day we can all meet,” she said. “Maybe when we’re in Texas next year. I bet that would be nice.”
“Maybe, it would be nice to meet them, but if he doesn’t want that, then that’s fine as well,” I said.
She rubbed my shoulder and pulled me into her arms. “I just think, I don’t know what I’d do if either one of my kids didn’t speak to me or come home for Thanksgiving,” she said.
“We don’t have all that much choice,” I chuckled. “We’re all living here. But I would still come, even if I lived say, forty minutes away, heck, maybe even a full hour.”
Swotting my arm, she tutted with the biggest grin on her face. “I’m going to make sure that never happens,” she said.“You’ve got this whole place to look after, and with all things between you and Lorenzo, I bet you’ll be able to do what your father and I couldn’t.”
“What’s that?” I asked.
“Return it to its glory days.”
“Then we’re gonna need a whole lot of alpacas.”
