“Yes, now if you don’t mind, I’m busy,” Maggie shot back. “You should have called.”
That’s the moment Patricia noticed Anatoly and her eyes narrowed suspiciously. “So I see… Really, Maggie, again with the priest?” She turned a disapproving look to Maggie like it was a broadsword she was wielding.
Feeling more than a little awkward, Anatoly offered the friendliest smile he could muster given the circumstances. “We were working on case,” he explained and it wasn’t far from the truth. The kissing had been a distraction after all.
“In the bedroom?” Patricia waved Maggie to silence and fixed Anatoly with that harsh stare of hers. “Seems a rather inappropriate place for a priest to be, given my daughter is single and lives alone.”
“Mother, I asked him to put the file away in there,” Maggie cut in.
But Patricia wasn’t backing down. “You mean the file that you were supposed to turn over to Declan’s taskforce?”
Anatoly and Maggie exchanged a glance and he wondered how her mother could possibly know about that. Maggie seemed less surprised and more annoyed, but it was clear Patricia had connections enough to know what was going on in Maggie’s life and that ruffled Anatoly’s feathers in a way that surprised even him.
“How do you know about that?” Maggie was demanding, even as Anatoly resisted the urge to move to her side. Her mother had already determined something was going on and he didn’t want to give her any further ideas.
“It’s on the news, Maggie.” Patricia waved her off as if it didn’t matter, but Anatoly could tell she was hiding the truth. With one glance he could see, Maggie wasn’t about to let go and he could hardly blame her either.
To his surprise, Maggie moved to stand beside him, facing her mother head on. It drew a raised eyebrow from the older woman, but before she could comment, her daughter doubled down. “Me turning over files was not on the news, Mother. Spill, who have you been talking to?”
Patricia hesitated only a second before dropping a bombshell. “Don’t be mad, Maggie. You really are entirely too sensitive about these things, but I may have reached out to Declan when I saw the news. I knew you wouldn’t tell me and he was always such a sweet young man…”
The silence was tight, uncomfortable, awkward. Anatoly wanted to take Maggie’s hand to reassure her somehow that he was there and he wasn’t going anywhere. Once again, circumstances didn’t allow him to openly comfort her and that drove home to him just how complicated their relationship was.
When Maggie stood there in stunned quiet, her mother kept talking. “It was one conversation, Maggie. Just to check up on you. I don’t know why you ever let Declan get away in the first place. I think he misses you, if we’re being honest. There might be a chance there?—”
“Mother, he’s married,” Maggie finally blurted and even Anatoly couldn’t hide the incredulous expression that took over his features momentarily. “Even if he wasn’t, there isn’t a chance in hell that I’d go back to him.”
Her declaration sent a wave of heat through the vampire, warming his undead body in a way only Maggie could. It made the situation more bearable.
“Don’t act all affronted, young lady. I’m just saying there’s always trouble in paradise and if you put in a little effort, you might be able to win him back from that tramp who cut in!” Patricia didn’t seem the least bit apologetic as she said it.
To think that someone like her had raised Maggie into the wonderful woman she was baffled Anatoly. Then again, if his mother had been so crass, he would not want to be anything like her either.
“You mean, his pregnant wife?” Maggie pointed out, not backing down.
Anatoly wished he could tell what she was thinking, wished he could do more than just stand there like a fool. But what could he possibly say to smooth things over? This was worse than when she had lost the case, but just like that moment, he would be truly damned if he abandoned her now.
“Perhaps it would be better if we change subject,” he tried to interject, but Patricia just fixed him with a glare.
“Why is the priest still here?” she asked Maggie, flicking her gaze back to her daughter. “This is a private family matter…”
To Anatoly’s surprise, Maggie laughed at that. “He’s more welcome here than you are.” Her words seethed with venom and to her credit, Patricia actually appeared hurt by them if only for a brief moment.
“Why are you so hostile, young lady?” Patricia scolded her adult daughter like she was a child. “I raised you, clothed you, fed you, changed your diapers… Is that any way to show thanks?”
Maggie just shook her head, exhaustion evident in the tenseness of her shoulders and the expression on her face. “Mother, please just leave. I’m sick of fighting with you.” She sounded so defeated it broke Anatoly’s heart.
To his surprise, however, Patricia seemed to realize she had swiftly worn out her welcome. She reached into her purse, pulled out a small package and held it out. “Fine, be dramatic. This is for your birthday. Not that you’ll be grateful for it, either.”
When Maggie didn’t accept it, Patricia thrust it at Anatoly who was far too polite to refuse the little white box, even though it was the last thing he wanted to do.
Like the storm she was, Patricia blew back out the door, slamming it in her wake. Anatoly turned to Maggie, intending to ask what she wanted him to do with the box, but to his horror she had crumpled to the floor.
Chapter Thirty-Four
Maggie knew Anatoly was still there and she could sense his alarm even as she slumped to the floor in a human shaped puddle on her knees. Confronting her mother over anything was always a chore, but tonight she hadn’t been prepared for it.
One minute she was being pleasantly kissed into a state of mind-numbed bliss, and the next, Patricia was trying to urge her to break up her ex’s marriage - after he had dumped her!
