Oops. He’d forgotten that one was going to bite him in the ass.His mother had strolled into his office, lip curled in disdain as she had to climb around junk just to get close enough to passive-aggressively tell him she was so “happy” he was finally settling down with a “complete stranger.” Then she’d insinuated that he must have been too busy being a terrible son to remember to tell his parents anything about his life.
Nick had pointed out that if she cared enough to ask him where he was living and with who, he would have been happy to tell her.
She’d said, “With whom?” and clicked out of the house on judgmental stilettos.
“Okay. I know it looks bad, but I can explain,” he insisted.
Riley grabbed a second towel and wrapped her hair up in it.
He admired the efficiency of it and wondered how women managed to get out of the tub with that much water in their hair and still not leave behind the tsunami men did on the floor.
“Fine. I fucked up. I didn’t tell my parents about you. I’msorry,” he said a bit more aggressively than he’d intended.
She marched around him to the vanity. “Well, I suppose it’s better than ‘apologies.’”
Nick’s eyes narrowed. “Wait. Why aren’t you mad?”
Her eyes met his in the mirror. “How do you know I’m not mad?”
“My balls are still attached, and this is a ball-dismembering offense.”
Her lips quirked. “I wouldn’t have told my parents if I were you either.”
“Why the hell not?”
“Wait. Areyoumad atmefor not being mad at you?”
“Maybe. I don’t know.” Relationships were confusing.
Riley spun around and slapped a hand to his face, squeezing his cheeks together. “You’re sooo cute when you’re confused and pissed off.”
“Thorn,” he said in the most threatening tone he could muster with duck lips.
“Santiago.”
“Why aren’t you mad?”
“Oh, come on. What were you supposed to do? Call them up and say, ‘Hi Mom and Dad. I’m seeing someone. She’s a psychic, and she talks to dead people. She got me shot last month in the fountain, and she lives with a bunch of old weirdos who fart all the time and can’t remember the Wi-Fi password. What’s new with you?’”
For once in his life, Nick Santiago found himself speechless.
“I don’t blame you. But if Iwereyou, I’d be tearing open the shower curtain of your detective pal since he’s the one who told her who I was.”
He shook his head to dislodge the image of Kellen in the shower. The man probably used a loofah. “Hang on. I can only deal with one issue at a time. I’ll murder Weber later. Are you saying you’re not mad at me for not telling my parents that I’m living with you because you’re psychic?”
“Your mom doesn’t look like the type to believe in psychics,” she said as if that answered everything.
“My mom doesn’t believe in a lot of things, including tipping housekeeping staff in hotels. What does that have to do with me telling her about you?”
Riley reached for her moisturizer.
“Please. No one wants to tell their parents they’re dating a psychic who was plastered all over the news for getting their son shot.”
He was not liking this whole “psychic second-class citizen” attitude from her.
“You are going to regret this big time,” he warned, fishing his phone out of his back pocket.
“What are you doing?”
