Fortune and Glory (Stephanie Plum, #27)(35)

“How did you get here?”

“My mom brought me. She was going out to the market anyway.”

I opened the door and Potts followed me into the kitchen. I gave Rex a pretzel, and I gave Potts a bottle of water. I turned the television on and gave him the remote.

“I have work to do in my bedroom,” I said. “Don’t move off the couch. If you decide to go home, leave me a note.”

“I’m not going home. I’m here forever.”

“You’re a nut.”

“I know,” Potts said. “I can’t help it.”

I closed my bedroom door and flopped onto my bed. I didn’t have work to do. I needed a nap before I tackled the Morelli-Gabriela connection.

Grandma called at 5:45 PM.

“Your mother made too much spaghetti,” she said. “Do you want to come to dinner?”

I cracked my door and looked out. Potts was still there.

“Is your mother expecting you to be home for dinner?” I asked him.

“No, I told her I was working the night shift.”

“Can I bring a friend?” I asked Grandma.

“You can bring an army. Your mother was hitting the hooch, and next thing, poof, we got two weeks’ worth of pasta.”



* * *




“This is getting serious,” Potts said from the backseat of the Buick. “You’re taking me to meet your parents. Do they know about us?”

I cut my eyes to the rearview mirror and glanced at him. “What’s to know?”

“That I protect you. That we’re life partners.”

“We aren’t life partners. I bailed you out of jail and now I can’t get rid of you.”

“Good thing, too. I already kept you from getting shot, and then I took a syringe in the thigh for you.”

This is why I don’t keep a loaded gun. I might have been tempted to shoot one of us.





CHAPTER FIFTEEN


Grandma was waiting at the door when I arrived with Potts.

“You remember George Potts,” I said to Grandma. “You met him at the Mole Hole.”

“I’m her bodyguard,” Potts said. “It’s my life’s work to protect her. And we might eventually be a couple.”

I kicked Potts in the shin.

“Ow!” he said. “Why did you do that? I have thin skin and my blood vessels are very close to the surface. I’m going to have a bruise. I might even get a hematoma.”

“It was an accident,” I said. “It was an involuntary action. And I didn’t kick you hard.”

“I’m very sensitive to pain because of my PTSD.”

“PTSD is serious,” Grandma said. “Where were you stationed?”

“Newark,” Potts said.

Grandma nodded. “That explains it.”

My father was already at the table. “It’s after six o’clock,” he said. “What’s the holdup?”

“We were waiting for Stephanie and her guest,” Grandma said.

My father looked up. “Guest?”

“This is George Potts,” I said, seating him in the chair next to me, putting myself between him and my father.

My mother came in with two big bowls of spaghetti, and Grandma and I went to the kitchen to help with the rest of the food. Meatballs in red sauce, Italian bread from the bakery, a bowl of fresh grated Parmesan Reggiano, an antipasto platter, red wine.

Potts took a few pieces from the antipasto platter and passed on everything else. “I break out in hives if I eat tomatoes,” he said. “And I’m allergic to hard cheese and gluten.”

“Is that from the PTSD?” Grandma asked.

“No,” Potts said. “It’s genetic on my mother’s side of the family. We’re all allergy-prone.”

“That must be terrible,” Grandma said.

“It’s a cross to bear,” Potts said.

My mother poured herself a goblet of wine. “God bless,” she said.

Grandma filled her wineglass, Potts and I passed on the wine, and my father kept his head down, forking in spaghetti and meatballs.

“This is very good antipasto,” Potts said.

“You can take some home with you,” Grandma said. “Where do you live? Are you local?”

“I live with Stephanie,” Potts said.

Everyone stopped eating and looked at me.

“Pay no attention,” I said. “It’s the PTSD.”

My father accepted that as a decent explanation and returned to his meatballs. My mother poured herself more wine. My grandmother wouldn’t let it go.

“I understand some of those PTSD people are homeless,” she said. “Are you one of those?”

“Potts lives with his parents on Porter Street,” I said.

“That’s a nice neighborhood,” Grandma said.

My father picked his head up. “Cheese!”

I grabbed the bowl of cheese and passed it over to him.

“Have you had any luck getting the tunnels mapped?” Grandma asked me.

“I’m working on it,” I said. “It might take a while.”

“I don’t know if I got a while,” Grandma said. “I need us to find the treasure soon, so I can get to Hawaii during the whale season.”