Five Ways to Fall (Ten Tiny Breaths, #4)(37)

“Just a friend,” I answer with hesitation.

“Hi, Mrs. Morris!” Reese chirps like an innocent church girl, batting her eyes playfully at me. “My name’s Reese.”

There’s a pause for one, two, three seconds and then, “Why, hello dear.”

Ah, f*ck. I hear that inflection. That’s my mom getting excited that some woman may have pinned her baby boy down. She’s going to be searching out china patterns after we hang up, or whatever the hell it is moms do when they think they’re getting a wedding. “Just a friend, Mama,” I reiterate. “We were out at a paintball field with a bunch of other friends and now we’re heading in to work after we grab a bite to eat.” For good measure, I throw in, “She couldn’t drive herself. Her motorcycle wasn’t working properly.” Maybe that’ll turn Mama’s little fantasy upside down.

“Oh, well you two should swing by first! I need you to take a look at the tractor anyway, Ben. It sounds funny and I don’t want to call Bert out here unless I have to. You know how much he charges.”

Swing by? I love my mama, but the grove isn’t exactly down the street. That’s part of its appeal. “Can’t it wait until next Sunday? I have a ton of work to do.”

“I suppose. Though I could have lunch ready for you when you get here . . .” Her voice is thick with disappointment.

“That’s nice, Mom, but—”

Reese cuts me off with, “We’d love to come over, Mrs. Morris. We’ll see you soon.”

“Wonderful!”

Yeah, wonderful. I’m pretty sure I just heard wedding bells in her voice.

Dead Mau5 fills the car as the phone call ends. Reese controls herself for all of five seconds and then bursts out laughing. “You call her Mama? What are you, ten?”

“You know her place is a hundred miles away. You’re now stuck in the car with me for the next two hours.”

Shifting in her seat, she closes her eyes. “Wake me up when we get there.”





Chapter 13




REESE





“Not what I expected,” I murmur as Ben’s Jetta turns past the large “Bernard Morris Grove” sign and creeps along one of the longest driveways I’ve ever seen, lined with oak trees big enough to create a tunnel-like cover. With strands of Spanish moss hanging elegantly from their limbs, it looks like something out of a movie setting. One of those dreamy places that feels magical and you’re sure has been doctored heavily by a stage crew.

“It looks like more than it is,” he denies.

“It looks like a giant house on an orange grove,” I retort as the sizeable white house with two levels of wraparound decks and stately pillars comes into view, windows flanked with black shutters staring down at us. The Confederate flag hangs limply from one corner, reminding me of a soldier, standing motionless as it awaits our approach.

“It is a big-ass house,” he agrees. “My mama’s great-grandparents, the Bernards, moved here from Louisiana and wanted to feel like they were back home, so they built a plantation house. Kind of out of place, but it was a cool house to grow up in. Needs a lot of work, though.”

As we get closer, I see what he means. The exterior is in bad need of a paint job, shingles have begun to lift, and the front porch leans just slightly to the left. Still, it’s beautiful in a historical, haunting way. And I’ll bet it’s brimming with all kinds of stories to tell—both joyful and heartrending.

Turning the ignition off, Ben half-turns in his seat to regard me with a rare serious expression.

“You’re nervous about me meeting your mother, aren’t you?” I knew the second he didn’t answer his mother’s call what was up. When he blows a mouthful of air out, I can’t help it; I laugh. “Please don’t tell me you have your mom convinced that you’re a virginal disciple of Jesus.”

“No, pretty sure that ship sailed when she caught me with the neighbor’s daughter behind the barn,” he answers with a wry smile, adding, “but please just don’t give me any grief, MacKay.” His eyes flicker over to the front door in time to see a small woman in a floral sundress and apron, identical to the photograph on Ben’s desk but older, emerge.

I follow his lead and climb out of the car as a hound dog lets out one long bay before it waddles down the porch steps and toward Ben, its belly almost dragging on the ground.

“What are you feeding this dog, Mama? Hey, Quincy!” Ben crouches down to let the dog put its front paws up on his knee. He grabs both ears and scratches, mumbling something under his breath about a “good girl.” With that greeting out of the way, the dog turns her attention on me, a little more cautious as I bend down to offer my hand. After taking a few sniffs and accepting a friendly pat, she turns and sways back toward the house and Ben’s mother, who’s watching me intently.

I wonder what this woman is going to think of me. I wonder why I suddenly care. I certainly didn’t when I willingly walked into this trap.

I haven’t done a lot of “meet the parents” scenarios. In fact, there was only one: with Jared’s parents, just after we eloped. Considering their son hadn’t had the heart to tell them that he had broken up with Caroline—the future daughter-in-law they would have hand-picked for their only child—I’d say that meeting went exactly as expected. A catastrophic explosion.