Love the One You're With(59)

There was food everywhere.

“Now, Grace, I’m not sure what you kids drink in the city. I wanted to make some fancy cocktail, but Jakey told me not to bother.”

“She wanted to make Manhattans,” one of the twins said with an eye roll. “Because I’m sure everybody in Manhattan actually drinks them.”

Grace obediently sat on the chair that Jake’s mother pointed commandingly at. “Can’t say I really care for them,” Grace said. “But my friend Riley swears by them, so I guess it’s all a matter of taste.”

“Well, never say we didn’t give you options, city girl.” This from the other twin. “Here we have beer, some of my mother’s favorite pinot grigio, or some sangria that Jill likes to call her ‘special mommy juice.’ ”

“That sounds revolting,” Jake said, coming into the kitchen.

His eyes found Grace’s, and he lifted his eyebrows as though to say, Surviving?

She smiled back. Yes.

“Wine would be great,” Grace said, helping herself to some of the veggies and dip in front of her. “Where are Jackson and Matt?”

“I sent them off with their father to fetch the balloons for the party tomorrow,” Jill said, pouring herself a glass of sangria. Of all the sisters, Jill looked the most like Jake. Same dark hair, great jaw, and expressive eyes. The twins had their dad’s blue eyes, and then poor redheaded Jamie didn’t look like any of them.

“We’ll talk about the monsters later,” Jessica—Jennifer?—said. “Can we please talk about the elephant in the room?”

“What, you mean the fact that our brother finally brought a woman home?”

“He’s never done that before?” Grace asked, taking a sip of wine and carefully avoiding looking at Jake, who was deep in conversation with his dad about something-something quarterback.

She’d been wondering about her role in all of this ever since he invited her along—wondering if he always took his current fling home with him, or if she was different.

Grace 2.0 cleared her throat. Don’t read into this.

The Malone females exchanged a look, but it was Jill who finally answered. “Let’s just say the only thing we know about Jake’s love life is what we read in the gossip columns.”

“I would never read those!” Jake’s mom said, sounding scandalized.

“And by never, she means she cuts out every single thing she reads about her baby boy and keeps the clippings in a box in the hall closet,” Jennifer said.

“But I don’t believe everything I read,” Nancy said.

Jill nodded solemnly. “Of course not. Jake is still a virgin, right, Mom?”

Grace wisely took that moment to take a sip of wine. A big one.

“Hey, Dad, didn’t you want to show Jake your new power drill or something? Or some hammer, or lawn mower, or …?” Jessica prodded.

It didn’t take an expert to see that this was a blatant manipulation of the male species, but apparently Bob wasn’t as evolved as his son in terms of catching on to women’s ploys. Instead of demanding to know why he was being gotten rid of, he merely started rambling to Jake about “horsepower you have to see to believe” and was out the door.

Jake, however, had his lady radar on, because he gave his sisters a warning look and a muttered “Be nice” before kissing his mom’s head on the way out the door with his dad.

Grace’s palms became a little bit sweaty at the too-innocent expressions on the female Malones’ faces. Had the welcome-to-the-family routine been an act? Was she about to get grilled?

She couldn’t even answer her own questions about what she was doing here. How was she supposed to answer to his family?

“So, Grace,” Jamie said the second the door was closed. “Jake’s always made us swear never to read his stuff. Says there’s nothing we could possibly need to know about shaving or his sex life, or how to wow her with a frittata the next morning.”

“I hope he credited his mother with that one,” Nancy mumbled.

“He’s right,” Jessica said. “We don’t need to know any of that.”

Her twin nudged a tray of pigs in a blanket toward Grace, who dutifully plucked one off the plate.

“Let me guess,” she said with a wary glance around the kitchen. “You read everything anyway.”

“Every last article, guest post, and interview,” Jill said with glee. There wasn’t an ounce of guilt on her face, or any of her sisters’ faces. Even Nancy looked completely unperturbed by their blatant dismissal of Jake’s request.

Yup. This was family, all right.