Burn for You (Slow Burn Book 1)(81)

Okay. This was really starting to get weird. I consoled myself that at least he hadn’t set the dogs on me.

As if my thought had summoned them, Zeus and Apollo appeared in the doorway, then flopped on the floor in a mass of black fur, muscular limbs, and lolling tongues, effectively blocking that exit.

“Thank you.” I smiled tentatively at Brig. He turned to Jackson, and his smile faltered exactly as it had when we’d first arrived.

“Jackson.”

“Brig.”

Brig’s eyelid twitched at hearing his son using his first name. He struggled for a moment to find a topic of conversation. Jackson watched him do it with a ruthless slant to his lips.

Brig decided on, “Thank you for changing out of that dreadful leather jacket.”

Jackson went stiff. “That was Christian’s jacket,” he snarled.

My ears perked up. Christian? His dead friend Christian? Cody’s father Christian? I had a terrible suspicion that jacket might mean a lot more to Jackson than an item of clothing normally would and suffered a bout of guilt that I’d asked him to take it off. I thought of all the times I’d seen him wear it, thinking what a crappy old thing it was, and my heart sank.

“I made him put on a dress shirt for dinner,” I said into the thundering silence. “But I think that jacket looks great on him. Not everyone can pull off the vintage look.”

Brig stared at me for a hair longer than was comfortable. “Indeed.” He cleared his throat.

Oozing fury, Jackson stood beside me, a plank of wood bristling with rusty nails. I squeezed his hand. He squeezed back so hard I thought he’d crush my bones.

“So. Bianca. Jackson tells me you’re a chef?”

“That’s right. I recently opened my first restaurant in New Orleans.”

“How marvelous. I understand your mother was also in the restaurant business?”

I glanced at Jackson, wondering exactly how much he’d told his father about me, and nodded. “She had a spot in the Ninth Ward for about twenty years before Hurricane Katrina wiped it out. She retired after that.”

Brig looked distressed. “I’m sorry to hear that. She didn’t want to rebuild?”

“We didn’t have the money to rebuild.”

At the mention of money, Brig’s eyes glazed over. “Well. It’s wonderful that you’re carrying on the family tradition. Your mother must be very proud.”

If I thought Jackson was stiff before, now he became an icicle. But he didn’t say a word. It was like he’d shut down all cylinders except the outrage one.

I knew I was in the middle of an ancient family drama and was ticked at Jackson for not giving me a compass to navigate my way. Judging by his silent performance so far, I’d have to float the conversation for the rest of the night.

But no matter how ticked at Jackson I was, I’d be damned if I’d let him get picked on. Especially by his own father. And there was no mistaking that last comment was a pointed jab.

I looked Brig dead in the eye. “Oh, she is. But she’d be proud of me even if I were unemployed and living on food stamps. She’s not the kind of person who only loves her child unless she’s following her own definition of success.”

I know I didn’t imagine the low intake of breath from the gathered servants or the way the room went electric. But I pretended I did, and so did Brig.

He said quietly, “Of course not. Parents always love their children, even when they make it hard for us to do so.”

He and Jackson locked eyes.

Hello, giant squirming can of worms, please sit down and make yourself comfortable. If things got any more tense, I might shatter.

With a squeak of wheels, Jackson’s mother rolled into the room.

She was pale, blonde, and fragile looking, with the exception of her blue eyes, which were lioness fierce. One side of her mouth pulled into a grimace, one hand curled to a claw on her lap. Her hair was scraped severely off her face into a low bun. Around her neck she wore a triple strand of pearls so tight it was probably cutting off her circulation. Pushing her wheelchair was a stout, middle-aged woman in a starched white nurse’s uniform and rubber-soled shoes who looked like someone had threatened that everyone she ever knew would be murdered if she smiled.

Jackson’s mother was even more terrifying than Dracula’s dining room. I had to physically force myself to stand still and not turn and run screaming from the house.

“Ah!” said Brig. “Clemmy, come and meet Bianca.” He acted as if Jackson weren’t even in the room.

Clemmy cut her gaze to me. Her eyes were like ice in an ancient arctic lake that never thaws. A cat’s hiss rose in the back of my throat, and I swallowed. Then she turned her eyes to Jackson. I glanced at him and found him white-faced and tight-lipped, in deep distress.