I was fairly sure she was teasing me by immediately recognizing him when she claimed to not recognize me when we first met.
Zane grinned delightedly. “He’s probably worried you’d second-guess your choice of brother. Chicks dig musicians.”
“Since I would never make the mistake of calling her a ‘chick,’ I’ve got nothing to be worried about, little brother.”
Elena turned to Ryan and warmly said, “And you must be Ryan.”
He grumbled, “That’s me. The nobody brother who gets recognized by process of elimination.”
Elena laughed. “A man who doesn’t bullshit. I like it.”
I swore I almost saw Ryan smile. I didn’t like warning people he was on the spectrum as though there was something wrong with him and the last thing I wanted was for it to become a public discussion point. But somehow I’d known Elena didn’t need a heads-up. She met people wherever they were without judgment.
We got drinks and wandered out to the patio. The way Elena’s eyes lit up when she tasted the Malbec I’d picked out for her almost made me kiss her in front of my family, which she might’ve castrated me for.
Once we were all sitting, Maia's assistant brought out one artfully arranged platter after another until there was a veritable feast spread before us on the table. It looked and smelled incredible.
Zane, as expected, didn’t agree. “Dude, can you not afford a real chef? What is this hippie rabbit food?”
Maia had just emerged with a plate in her hand, but the scowl on her face made me wonder whether it would make it to the table or end up on Zane’s head. She kept glaring at him as she set the plate down in front of my mother. “Here you go, Linda. I knew you’d have a hard time using utensils with one arm, so I made you a plate with everything cut into bite-sized pieces.”
My mom gave her a huge smile. “Thank you. That was very considerate of you.”
Maia turned to me. “I’m gonna head out, boss. I hope y’all have a lovely dinner. Enjoy your hippie rabbit food.” The last part was directed at Zane, who I would’ve expected to at least look embarrassed, but he grinned at her and popped a carrot into his mouth.
We served ourselves and all conversation died down as everyone enjoyed the food. There was a little chatter while we ate, but I eventually accepted that I was just going to have to bite the bullet and tell my mom or I would miss my chance.
“We need to tell you something, Mom,” I said calmly. I could see the worry instantly appear on her face. I’d made it A Thing, but there wasn’t exactly an easy way to slide it into the conversation.
“You arenotengaged after being together for five minutes, are you?”
“No.” I took too long to start explaining, so she interrupted again.
“Are you pregnant?” she blurted to my utter horror. “I couldn’t help seeing a headline and I was sure it wasn’t true, but…”
Elena’s eyes twinkled with amusement. The same delighted horror was written plainly on my brothers’ faces and Rami was covering his mouth with a napkin.
“Mom, no! Ah! I thought you had news about me blocked. And that’s so insensitive. What if we couldn’t get pregnant?”
“Wait, who can’t get pregnant?”
“No one. Or I don’t know. It doesn’t matter. Just stop. This isn’t about that. Let me talk, Mom. Jesus.”
She looked grave and a little irritated I’d snapped at her. I was crashing and burning and hadn’t even started yet. My brothers looked thrilled.
I took a deep breath. “Elena is in an unusual line of work. It’s probably being sensationalized, so we wanted to tell you the real story.”
She looked over at Elena, curiosity alight on her face, but she didn’t interrupt me again.
“Elena works as a dominatrix.”
“Like what they do inCrown of Swords?”
Ryan snorted. “Gross, Mom. Why are you reading that trash?”
“Books for women are not automatically trash, young man. And I’ll read whatever I want. I’m as into Lucas Steel as the next woman,” she said, clearly trying to tease him. He screwed his face up and put his fork down with a disgusted noise.
Zane coughed. “I see there’s some more news you need to share with Mom…”
