Girl Gone Viral (Modern Love #2)(72)

“And so are you! Go to the damn ceremony, Jasvinder. It’ll be in the high school auditorium, for crying out loud, in the midst of an event you know quite well. The only people there will be other people from this town, people you grew up with.”

He didn’t know any of those individuals anymore, but he couldn’t tell her that when she’d just criticized him for not keeping in touch with friends.

Tell her why you can’t go to the parade. “I can’t,” was all he said.

Tara collected herself and breathed deep. “You’re killin’ me, Smalls. One of you has to bend, and I can tell you from experience it will not be my father. I refuse to see you disowned over this foolishness.”

He folded his arms over his chest, in an effort to stifle the sharp pain that went through him at the thought of his grandfather cutting him out of the family. “I don’t want to be disowned.”

“Then do what he wants!”

“I can’t!”

A throat cleared, and he and his mom both looked to the doorway. Katrina’s hair was wet and slicked back from her freshly scrubbed face. She’d changed into a pair of leggings and an oversized sweatshirt, and she looked far younger than she was. “I’m so sorry to interrupt.”

“It’s okay.” Tara gave Katrina a wry smile. “You must think we only yell in this family. I heard you were present for the blowup yesterday.”

“I was.” Katrina took a step into the kitchen. Doodle wasn’t at her side, which meant her shadow had probably fallen asleep upstairs. The creature sure slept a lot. “I know it was hard on Jas.”

He rubbed his jaw, ill at ease with both the sympathy in Katrina’s eyes and this whole conversation. If they kept talking, he’d have to keep talking, and there were so many things he never wanted to talk about. “We don’t need to have this conversation.”

“Yes, we do,” Tara said firmly. “And we’ll have it tonight, at dinner, together.”

Another family dinner? He groaned. “No. Mom . . .”

“For me, Jasvinder.”

Damn it. He stared down at his feet. The thought of going back to the big house for another meal around that table. Ugh. “Fine.”

“Let’s do it here,” Katrina interjected.

He lifted his head. “Here?”

“We can have everyone come here for dinner. I would be happy to cook.”

Tara clicked her tongue. “Oh no. You’re a guest here, Katrina.”

“Right, and I would love to give you some small repayment for hosting me. Cooking is a pleasure for me, truly.”

Tara’s brow creased. “A pleasure? That I don’t understand.”

“If you’d rather not have it here because of my presence, I’m happy to give your family private time to talk.”

“No,” he said sharply. “Anything we say can be said in front of you.”

Tara looked between them with barely suppressed delight, and he realized immediately he’d made a tactical error. He’d been acutely aware Daisy had been subtly grilling Katrina last night in his mother’s absence. His mom was cool and relaxed and all, but she still wanted her eldest son married off with grandbabies on the horizon. “I mean . . .”

“We had dinner at the big house last night, is all,” Katrina noted. “It might be best to try a reconciliation in a different setting.”

Tara’s eyes widened. “Oh, yes. Without the negative vibes clouding anyone’s auras.”

“Ah.” Katrina cocked her head. “Sure.”

Tara nodded. “Excellent idea. This is so exciting, it’s been so long since we had a meal like this in the little house. I will help you cook, Katrina.”

“You don’t want my mom to help you cook,” Jas muttered, and glared at his mother when she reached up and tugged on his ear. Hard.

“Don’t be disrespectful,” Tara ordered. “I was thinking more along the lines of running any errands, acting the sous-chef. My mean son is right, I’m not the best of cooks.”

“Sure. I’d like that. Let me make you a list.”

Tara smiled sweetly at him. “In the meantime, Jas, why don’t you go get cleaned up? You have dirt all over your back. Those mishaps when you’re making hay can leave you filthy.”





Chapter Twenty-Two


IF JAS HAD been to a more awkward dinner, he couldn’t recall it. Starting with the fact that Jas was almost positive his mom had tricked her father into coming here, because Andrés had shown up in overalls with a tool box, and had seemed pretty surprised to find a full meal laid out in the kitchen. Jas was pretty sure his grandpa would have stomped out if it hadn’t been for Katrina’s presence.

The little house didn’t have a dedicated dining room, but Jas had added an extra leaf to the kitchen table so the five of them could sit there. He and his mom and his sullen, silent grandpa had instinctively taken the same seats they’d sat in when he was a kid. Bikram was on one side of Jas, Katrina on the other. Doodle sat at Jas’s feet, head on his leg, mouth open.

He fed the dog a tiny piece of bread, and she gulped it down. Some might say he was bribing his way into her affections, but this was an insurance policy. He’d never cared if any animal liked him before, but they’d never been Katrina’s before either.