Her Naughty Holiday(29)

“I think they’re coming now,” Erick said, glancing out the window to see a black Audi driving down the gravel road toward the house. “Someone is.”

“That’s Hunter’s car,” she said.

“Hunter’s the older brother,” Erick said, looking at her parents, who seemed to be eyeing him very carefully. “Wife is Lisa. Three girls—Paige, Zoe and Skye. Did I get that right?”

“Very good,” Val said. “Clover’s been quizzing you?”

“She has. I wanted to make a good impression. I think she likes me.” He smiled in the hopes of warming them up, charming them. Her mother only smiled tightly in reply.

“Any friend of our daughter’s is a friend of ours,” David said.

“Well, I’m her boyfriend, sir, not her friend. I hope any boyfriend of Clover’s isn’t a boyfriend of yours. No offense,” Erick said. Clover laughed. No one else did.

Tough crowd.

Erick was relieved to hear car doors opening and closing. Hopefully the house would be full of kids soon and he could focus on them. He was good with kids. Kids loved him. Even better, kids weren’t passive-aggressive and they usually laughed at his corny jokes.

Clover opened the door to greet Hunter and Lisa.

“Could you live anywhere more remote?” Hunter said as soon as he stepped across the threshold. “I hope that gravel didn’t get in my undercarriage.”

Something’s in your undercarriage, Erick wisely did not say aloud.

“Gravel has never hurt my car,” Clover said as she hugged Lisa, a pretty petite brunette. Another woman had accompanied them, a blonde just like Clover but taller and with shorter hair.

“Hey, sis,” the woman said, stepping into Clover’s arms for a hug. “Good to see you. You look great.”

“Thanks. You, too.” Clover turned to Erick and smiled. “This is Hunter, Lisa and Kelly, my sister. This is Erick, my boyfriend.”

“Great to meet you all,” Erick said, shaking hands with the women first and then with Hunter. Hunter was a big man, looked like a former football player, and when he shook Erick’s hand he gripped it to the point of pain. Okay, then. Erick knew guys like this all too well. White collar suit with a need to prove his manhood since he worked behind a desk. Fine. Erick could handle that.

“Where are all the kids? Are they coming with Mike?” Clover asked. “Mike is Kelly’s husband,” she explained to Erick.

“Oh, did we forget to tell you?” Kelly asked. “My four are with Mike at his parents’ house today.”

“And our girls are with my sister,” Lisa said. “Paige gets so carsick, you know.”

Erick was grateful that Lisa at least had the decency to look guilty about not bringing her daughters to their aunt’s house. Her sister? Not so much.

“I thought they were all coming,” Clover said, looking wounded. He could see the hurt in her eyes, hear it in the crack in her voice. “I made them the brownies they love and we have stuff for s’mores.”

“I can’t believe we forgot to tell you,” Kelly said. “That’s my fault. Anyway, you don’t have kids, Clo. Your house isn’t childproofed. I didn’t think you’d have anything for them to do.”

“Erick brought stuff to teach them how to make their own bird feeders,” Clover said. “We had planned for them to come. I really wanted to see them.”

“Aww...that’s so sweet of you,” Kelly said. “But you’ll see them at Christmas.”

“I was planning on spending Christmas with Erick and his daughter.”

“Oh,” Kelly said, looking the slightest bit sheepish—for once. “I hadn’t thought of that. Well, you’ll see them eventually. Lots of pics online in the photo album. Hey, Mom. How are you?”

“Happy to have all my kids under one roof,” Val said, embracing Hunter and Kelly and smiling. “All my babies back together.”

“You sent me fifteen text messages in the past two days and you couldn’t have told me in one of those messages that you weren’t bringing the kids?” Clover asked. Kelly pulled away from her mother’s embrace.

“I just forgot, I swear,” Kelly said. “I didn’t think you’d care.”

“Why on earth would I not care?”

“Well, you’re not really a kid person,” Kelly said.

“I love my nieces and nephews. You know that.”

“Loving them and wanting them in your house full of breakable objects and poisonous plants are two very different things,” she said.

“The only toxic plants are up in my bedroom,” Clover said. “I don’t care if they break stuff. Nothing here is really valuable.”

“We’ll bring them next time, I promise,” Kelly said. “I just got so excited to meet your boyfriend I forgot to tell you. So what do you do, Erick?”

“I’m a contractor,” he said. “Mainly cedar, decks and siding. That sort of thing.”

“He owns his own business, too,” Clover said, and the pride in her voice made him stand up a little straighter.

“That’s great,” Kelly said. “I always thought it would be fun to run my own business.”

“Lots of work,” Erick said. “But Clover knows that better than I do. I work alone. She actually has employees, and since one of them is my daughter, I know how hard she works at it.”

“Too hard,” David said. “Working her life away.”

“I don’t work that much, Daddy,” Clover said.

“Gotta take time for yourself,” he said. “Family is just as important as work.”

“I took time for myself this week, and I enjoyed every minute of it,” Clover said.

“Running off with a man and leaving your phone behind isn’t exactly what I meant,” David said.

“But it’s exactly what I needed,” Clover said, and Erick could see how shaky that plastered-on smile of hers was. There was only one thing for it.

“Who wants wine?” Erick asked. He did.

Erick went into the kitchen and poured out seven glasses of wine—two whites and five reds. Lisa slipped in and picked up two glasses for her and her husband.

“Let me get these,” she said. “You only have two hands.”

“Thanks for the help,” Erick said.

Lisa glanced over her shoulder at the family talking in the living room.

“Word of advice,” Lisa whispered, leaning in close to him. “Get out while you can.”

“Too late,” he said. “I’m in too deep.”

“You have my sympathies,” she said, then mouthed the words, “Save yourself...” before putting on a fake too-wide smile and returning to the party. Apparently Lisa had about as much fun at these family gatherings as Clover did.

With that, she walked back into the breach, and Erick wondered if both glasses of wine were for her. For her sake, he hoped they were.

“Can I help in the kitchen with anything?” Val asked when Erick passed the wineglasses to everyone. He took a long deep drink of his red. Drinking might not be the best idea around this crowd but it would certainly help him put up with their sniping at each other.

“We’ve got it under control,” Erick said. “Turkey’s almost done. Everything else is warming in the oven.”

“It all smells wonderful,” Lisa said. “Thanks for having us. I wanted to host this year but then Hunter decided we needed to remodel the kitchen. Again.”

Erick sensed they were drifting into choppy waters.

“Your fault you won’t let me buy a bigger house,” Hunter said. “So we remodel. Gotta look good for the bigwigs, right?”

“You finally learn how to cook?” Kelly asked Clover.

“Erick did most of it,” Clover said behind her glass of chardonnay that she held in a white-knuckle grip.

“I admire a man who is good in the kitchen,” Kelly said. “Mike is useless.”

“Before the kid, I couldn’t boil water,” Erick said. “I had to learn fast after my divorce, and I got full custody of Ruthie. Kids have this weird obsession with eating real food multiple times a day.”

“Mr. Mom,” Hunter said, raising his wineglass in a mock toast. “Good for you.”

“Not Mr. Mom. Just Dad,” Erick said, putting on his most harmless smile. “Normal dad. That’s all.”

“Some men actually help around the house,” Kelly said, leaning against her brother’s arm. “Wild, right?”

“Sounds awful,” Hunter said, shuddering in horror. “I work until six every day. I’m not going to come home and cook and clean, too.”

“That’s what I’m for,” Lisa said with a too-bright smile. Her glass of red was already empty. “Plus dealing with contractors and decorators all the time...”

“Erick, do you think everything’s ready?” Clover asked.

“Let’s go check,” he said. “You all will excuse us?”

Soon as they were alone in the kitchen, Clover put her forehead against the center of his chest.

“You’re doing great,” he said, stroking her hair. “Better than I would be.”

“There’s not enough wine in all the world,” she whispered.