“I’m going to enjoy my day off,” I tell him.
Lie shakes his head. “I’m going to help Laiken clean up and head to Cash’s.”
“Okay.”
Miranda kisses the side of Lie’s head, holding him there for a minute with her hand on the other side. “Love you, baby. Have a good afternoon.”
Lie nods. “Love you, too. Good luck with your fundraiser.”
Miranda smiles brightly. “Thank you.”
Nason takes Miranda’s hand, and they walk through the side yard separating our houses. I watch them go before looking at Lie. “I really thought she was getting better about saying stupid shit to you.”
Lie shrugs. “Whatever. Not a big deal.”
“Itisa big deal,” I disagree. “She’s your mother. She has no problem supporting everyone else in however they express themselves, but for some reason, that doesn’t apply to her son.”
He meets my eyes, and that same small smile touches his lips. I want to lick it off. “You and Dad have always tried to protect me from the things she says.”
The first time I heard Miranda comment on something like his nail polish or the things he wore or tried to set him up with a girl after he’d already said he liked guys had absolutely floored me. I’d stared at her, horrified and dumbfounded. And then promptly lost my shit.
When Nason got home, he’d echoed my reaction.
That was six years ago. It hasn’t stopped, though she hasn’t tried to set him up with a girl again.
“I’ll forever protect you, Lie.”
His smile spreads a little as he looks down. A beat passes before he slips from the bar stool.
“I nearly had a freaking heart attack when I thought you’d told your father,” I say, keeping my voice down as if there’s someone around to overhear us.
He chuckles. “I know. I forgot to tell you the other day, but he said he thought you were hiding a lover or something. I hadn’t thought about it again until he just brought it up, or I would have warned you.”
We pile plates and glasses into two piles while we talk and head into the house.
“What am I doing that he suspects something?” I muse. “It’s not like I’m sneaking around anywhere. I go to work with you. I come home with you.” I set my pile of plates on the counter and turn to take Lie’s stack. “If he’s going to suspect me, then why isn’t he also suspecting you?”
“I’ve been sneaking out since I was fourteen,” he says, amused. He shuts the sliding glass door behind him and leans back against it. “It’s nothing new.”
“He knows you’ve been sneaking out since the very first time,” I tell him. “We followed you.”
He looks at me with his mouth open. “What?”
I chuckle. I grab the front of his shirt and pull him to me. “He stormed into my house, freaking out that you were sneaking off somewhere instead of just telling him you wanted to go out and do something. I suggested we follow you. So we did.”
Lie huffs. “That’s crap. Let a teenager teen!”
Quiet laughter makes me shake as I press my lips to his. “Believe it or not, he was really proud that all you did was meet Cash and lie in the grass talking all night. He stopped following you after a while when he realized you weren’t doing anything wrong.”
“Except sneaking out.”
“Except that, but as you said, let a teenager teen. Besides breakingthatrule, he was happy that you didn’t find the need to set the island on fire or vandalize.” I run my hand along his ribs, bringing his shirt up as I go. “He’s always been so proud of the good, intelligent kid you were.”
“Maybe that’s why I feel like such a failure,” he says, sighing. “I feel like I’m letting Dad down.”
“You’re not at all. I promise.”
He smiles. His mouth hovers in front of mine, so close that we’re sharing oxygen. I drop my hand to his ass and pick him up. I love how his long legs wrap around me.
