I couldn’t even deny that was true. Not when we were walking into the lion’s den, and I couldn’t do anything to stop it. Lincoln was going to flirt with Sutton just to piss me off. Declan was going to encourage him. And my mom—well, I worried she’d see right through this whole charade.
Worse, I was afraid I wouldn’t remember it was supposed to be one in the first place.
“You gonna open the door, Daddy Grump, or are we supposed to eat out here?” Laurel asked, yanking me out of my thoughts.
“I’ll give you a hundred bucks if you don’t call me Daddy Grump in front of my brothers.”
She raised a brow. “Make it a new DSLR, and you’ve got a deal.”
“That’s a hell of a lot more than a hundred bucks, kid.” I pressed my finger against the scanner and unlocked the door, shooting a glance at Sutton. “Did you teach her how to be a hustler?”
Sutton held up her hands and shook her head. “Honest to god, she’s been like this since she could talk.”
Laurel offered me a serene smile so at odds with her personality, I nearly laughed. “Just one of my many talents, Da?—”
“Fine,” I cut in before she could finish. “We have a deal.”
And I couldn’t even be mad at her for it. Not when that serene smile turned into the self-satisfied one she usually reserved for her mom.
I opened the door and stepped inside, nearly running into my mom as I did so.
“Oh!” She jerked back before shooting a smile at the three of us. “You’ve been out there for so long, I was just coming to make sure everything was okay.”
“We told her you probably had your hands full, dragging them in here against their will,” Lincoln called from the dining room.
Mom spun around and pointed a finger at my shithead brothers. “You two, shut it.”
“I didn’t even say anything,” Declan grumbled.
Ignoring him completely, Mom turned back to us with a beaming smile. “Come in, come in. You must be Sutton. I’m so happy to finally meet you.”
Sutton held out her hand toward my mom. “It’s nice to meet?—”
Before Sutton could get the words out, my mom wrapped her in a hug and squeezed. From the wide-eyed look Sutton shot me, I could tell exactly what was going through her mind. First, my mom was a lot stronger than she looked—her hugs were bone-crushing. And second, how the hell did a five-foot-nothing ray of sunshine birth a giant ogre like me?
Mom pulled back, holding Sutton at arm’s length. “I am so happy to have you here. You can call me Holly.”
“Thanks for having us, Holly.”
“Of course, you’re always welcome.” She turned toward Laurel with a smile. “And Laurel, it’s so nice to see you outside of the library.”
“Um, yeah. Hi. Thanks.”
Mom hooked her arm through Sutton’s and led her to the dining room, seemingly oblivious to Laurel’s stammering. But I wasn’t. I caught Laurel’s attention as we followed, raising a questioning brow.
With a roll of her eyes and an elbow in my side, she mumbled, “Shut up.”
“Didn’t say a word.”
“I don’t know how to meet my mom’s boyfriend’s parents, okay? I’ve never had to, so leave me alone.”
Laurel’s whispered admission nearly sent me stumbling. While I’d been contending with the fact that this was the very first time I had ever brought a woman home, it hadn’t even entered my mind that Sutton had never experienced this either.
Something I couldn’t quite name filled my chest as I stared at Sutton, watching her hold her own while my brothers did exactly what I’d known they would. While my mom laughed and Laurel smiled and everything just felt…right.
Perfect.
And when Sutton reached back to grab my hand, lacing her fingers with mine and tugging me to her side, I shoved aside the whisper in the back of my mind that reminded me this wasn’t real.
