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“We should get cleaned up,” I said with a groan, “and make our way to the big house.”
“Why does it feel like we’re being called to the principal’s office?” Ciaran teased.
“I mean, we can invite them here, but the second they walk in here they’ll smell Eau de Sex.”
Ciaran smacked my ass playfully and laughed.
With reluctance, and a bit of soreness in my hips, I climbed off Ciaran and offered him a hand, which he took.
We made quick work of cleaning up in the bathroom upstairs and changing into fresh clothes. I watched as he pulled a shirt over his head.
“Uh, maybe wear a hoodie,” I suggested as my eyes zeroed in on his hickeys.
“It won’t stop them from finding out, Matty.”
“No, I know.” I stepped into faded sweatpants and pulled on another USC sweatshirt. Without Ciaran’s heat against me, I needed something warm to ward off the chill rolling off the Pacific.
In the bathroom, I used a splash of water to get my hair back to rights.
When I returned to my bedroom, Ciaran was wearing one of my gray, nondescript Supreme hoodies. Why was it so hot that he wore my clothes?
“Ready to face the firing squad?” I asked.
“It won’t be that bad,” Ciaran said. “But just in case it is, let’s grab a brownie on the way out.”
71
CIARAN
Maybe Matty was onto something because it was like facing the firing squad. At least from Stefon, as he downright glared at us while pacing before the unlit fireplace.
Side by side, though not touching, Matty and I sat mute on the pristine couch. An elegant coffee table lay between us and our stern interlocutor. I couldn’t meet the older man’s determined eye as he lectured away, so instead I studied the white floral arrangements on the coffee table as if the petals held all the answers.
“What were you thinking, Matthias Vaulteneau?” Stefon said. Handsome and stylishly dressed in a designer suit, Stefon didn’t look mad. He wasn’t yelling. And I think that made it worse. “Look at your face. Getting into fights and dragging Ciaran off to Vegas. How dare you scare us like that?”
“Matty didn’t drag me,” I urged. Stefon threw a sharp look my way that told me to keep my mouth shut. I didn’t listen. I was just glad they hadn’t noticed the hickeys yet. “I pretty much forced Matty to drive me to Vegas.”
Mom, whose ethereal beauty was only slightly dimmed by the dark circles under her eyes, sat nearby on the matching loveseat. She wore a pale pink oversized blazer atop a bright pink satin top. Her wide-legged trousers were of the same hue as her blazer.
I could smell gentle hints of her usual fragrance, a warm floral musk blend of lavender, orange blossom, and vanilla. It reminded me of home, of safety and love, of hugs.
Her shiny blond hair was pinned up in a jewel-encrusted clip, though a few longish pieces framed her heart-shaped face, having escaped the pins.
She resembled an established movie star at a press junket.
Even after a long flight worrying about me, my mother was beautiful. I could barely remember the fatigued way she looked working long days behind the deli counter. She deserved this life. This lifestyle. She deserved to be happy.
And I was the asshole who made her worry.
I could see the anguish in her eyes, the way she studied me, as if she suspected something was dreadfully wrong but she was afraid to press me too soon or too hard.
“You forced him?” Stefon scoffed. He stopped pacing and turned those dark, almost ruthless eyes on me. In that moment, with his dark hair, tanned skin, and perfectly trimmed salt-and-pepper beard, he reminded me of a mafia king seconds away from ordering a hit. “Not even wild horses can force Matty to do something he doesn’t want to do, Ciaran.”
“I…” I hesitated, my heart climbing into my throat. What should I reveal? How should I reveal it? Part of me wanted to rush from the room and fling myself off the cliff just to avoid admitting what happened.
Would Stefon laugh at me and call me an idiot for wanting to confront Drew? Would Mom be disappointed in my inability to resist Drew’s charms? I knew I wasn’t to blame for any of it, yet I felt so conflicted.
“What is it, honey?” Mom’s gentle voice held a healing quality to it. No matter what happened, she’d always be my mom. She might be upset with me, but in the end I knew she’d be in my corner.
