Since I Saw You (Because You Are Mine #4)(46)

“Do you really want to get up and get dressed?”

“It depends.” She gave him a querying glance. “On whether or not you’re going to let me back in your bed after dinner. If not, I’d just as soon stay here and not forsake my claim.”

She laughed. His brows quirked and he palmed her jaw, running his fingers gently over her smiling lips.

“You have a very gentle touch when you want to,” she said, his fingertips moving along with her lips.

“Does that surprise you?”

Her smile faded as she considered him soberly.

“No,” she said at last. “It doesn’t surprise me in the least.”

•   •   •

They cleaned up and dressed, then went downstairs. There was a nice restaurant in her building’s lobby. When the host seated them at a cozy booth, Lin started to sit across from Kam. He grabbed her hand, however, and pulled her into the seat next to him. The host gave them a rather smug, patronizing grin, which Kam quelled immediately with a glare.

“Have you been dancing a long time?” he asked after they’d placed their orders and the waiter had left them alone.

“No. I just started it as a hobby four years ago.”

He gave her a sideways glance that made her go warm. “You look like you were born doing it.”

She smiled, flattered. “Thanks. My grandmother wouldn’t have liked my learning traditional Chinese dance. She would have hated knowing about the Kung Fu classes I took several years back. That was both traditional and inelegant—or at least Grandmamma would have thought so,” she said, and laughed. “I actually kept both hobbies from her in the last years of her life, which made me feel terrible. It was ballet Grandmamma encouraged. My mother, on the other hand, holds my Chinese dance hobby up to our family as a stellar accomplishment.” She gave Kam a wry grin. “My only one, mind you, because I botch my Chinese, I don’t work on my cooking enough, and worst of all, I’m still not married to a nice Chinese doctor.”

Kam smiled. “Your mother and grandmother sound really different.”

Lin rolled her eyes. “You have no idea.” She looked over at him when he placed his hand on her thigh. She’d pulled on a pair of jeans and a sweater after they’d washed up earlier. She could feel the heat of his hand through the denim as he moved it up and down, squeezing lightly as if he was experimenting with the sensation of her flesh in jeans.

“Tell me then.”

“Okay, I’ll try,” she said. His touch was distracting. It had the paradoxical effect of both lulling her and exciting her. “My grandparents and my mother were born in Hong Kong. For my grandparents, America truly was the promised land, and they totally embraced US culture when they immigrated. My grandmother especially was a very chic, modern woman. My mother never really seemed to assimilate here, though. My grandparents couldn’t understand why she was so resentful and withdrawn. It was a constant thorn in my grandmother’s side. She couldn’t comprehend why mother felt so out of place, when Grandmamma militantly embraced it and loved the life she built for herself here.”

“So obviously your grandmother wouldn’t have condoned your participating in traditional Chinese dance or anything else Chinese.”

“Oh no. Grandmamma wanted both a very westernized daughter and grandaughter. She got her way in my case.”

“But not in your mother’s?”

“No. Not in my mother’s,” Lin said, giving him a quick, sad smile.

“What happened between your mother and grandmother?” Kam asked.

“My mother rebelled against Grandmamma. She swung in the opposite direction, coming to despise Western ways and becoming extremely traditional. It was pretty confusing for me when I was little. We all lived in the same house together. My mother started insisting I speak Chinese, for instance, which I’d never learned, having been born here. She wanted to send me to a Chinese school and only eat Chinese food. It infuriated Grandmamma. Mother and Grandmamma officially went to war.”

“And you were their battleground.”

Lin blinked at his grim intensity. “Yes. That’s a pretty apt description. Although probably misleading in one respect. I never resented my grandmother. We were always close, and had this natural connection from the very beginning. I think my mother might have felt like an outsider in that respect, which always makes me sad to consider. After my grandfather died, my parents decided to leave the States. Grandmamma saw my mother’s choice as a betrayal.” She paused as the waiter brought their drink orders. “It only made matters worse that they planned to live in Taiwan, near my father’s family instead of near either of my grandparents’ relatives. Grandmamma absolutely refused to let them take me. I was nine at the time. Grandmamma threatened to take my mother to court, although she must have been bluffing about her likelihood of winning custody.”

“And so your parents agreed to leave you behind?” Kam asked, frowning.

She laughed softly. “You didn’t know my grandmother. Ask Ian. She was a force to be reckoned with. Besides, it’s common for Asians to want their children educated in the States, and so Grandmamma had that as her trump card. Even my traditional mother and father couldn’t deny that was a desirable outcome.”

They paused in talking when their waiter brought them their salads.