Somebody to Love(49)

“Nothing wrong with getting knocked up,” said a male voice. “Chantal never would’ve married me if I hadn’t knocked her up, right, babe?”

“Jonah, shush,” Maggie and Christy said in unison, then laughed.

“You shush, girls,” he retorted. “You’re both love children, too. I’m the only child Mom and Dad really wanted.” He turned to Parker. “Hi. Jonah, long-suffering brother of the idiot twins here. I’ve seen you out on your dock.”

“Go away, Jonah,” Maggie commanded. The pink-beaded tiara she was wearing was slightly askew. “Go to the boys’ section. This is for women only. Shoo.”

“You two are ugly when you drink.” He bent down and kissed Chantal. “See you at home, gorgeous.”

“Bye, honey.” Chantal beamed up at him and patted his ass as he walked away.

“Disgusting,” Christy said.

“So gross,” Maggie added. “So anyway, you were telling us, Parker, before my brother so rudely interrupted?”

“Well,” Parker said, “let’s say I have this thing for emotionally unavailable men.”

The table burst into laughter. “Please. You have no idea who you’re talking to,” Maggie said. At Parker’s questioning look, she added, “I was in love with a priest.”

“Okay. That’s hard to top,” Parker acknowledged.

“And I shtupped my best friend’s baby brother. Have I mentioned Jonah is thirteen years younger than I am?” Chantal said, smiling. “Cougar, baby. The only way to go.”

“And I slept with a certain married Massachusetts senator whose last name starts with K,” Lavinia said. “Wasn’t really worth the effort, I’d have to say.”

“So how was your guy emotionally unavailable?” Maggie asked.

“It sounds worse than it is, but he was in love with someone else,” Parker said. “And I didn’t figure it out until after Miss Egg and Mr. Sperm met, so I have a five-year-old, and we have joint custody, and it’s all very friendly and civilized.”

Huh. Her second mojito was gone. The last time you had two drinks and Sweet Baby James was around, you did the drag-and-shag, Spike, now in his early twenties, pointed out. Speaking of cougars. Just sayin’.

“So have you dated at all?” Beth asked. “It’s hard to find a decent guy these days.”

“Nope, haven’t really dated. Maybe a first date every few months, but nothing real,” Parker said.

“You haven’t had sex since your five-year-old was born?” Chantal asked, her mouth hanging open in horror.

This was, of course, the moment that James brought another round of drinks over.

“That’s awful,” Lavinia said, shaking her head. “Thank you, James, darlin’.”

Parker didn’t answer. James put a glass in front of her. “Thanks,” she said, not daring to look at him.

“Anything else, girls?” he asked, his voice warm and smiley.

“Would you take off your shirt?” Christy asked. “We didn’t get Maggie a stripper.”

He laughed, and the sound scraped something deep down in Lady Land. Something that liked being scraped. James had almost kissed her the other night. Right? It had seemed to her that a kiss had been possible, there on the dock, before the thunder, when she’d bolted like a scared little baby horse.

Okay. No more mojitos. Who referred to themselves as scared little baby horses? Mojito-enhanced people, that’s who.

James looked down at Parker, who decided that now would be an excellent time to drain that mojito. The straw stuck her in the eye, but she squinted and managed a swallow or two.

“I’ll walk you home when you’re ready,” he said.

“No need, Thing One,” she said sweetly. “I’m fine. I can canter on home all by myself.”

He laughed, and there it was again, that scraping. Meow. “I’ll do it anyway.”

All righty, then. If he insisted. He could walk her home. He was paid by Harry to walk her home, she reminded herself. No matter how cute he was, no matter how smiley were those eyes, he was in Harry’s pocket, and Harry was in jail and not a nice person, and James was here to babysit her and assuage Harry’s conscience. Sex would not be part of the equation.

A while later, the party broke up. Maggie had to open the diner early, Christy’s baby didn’t yet sleep through the night, and Jonah was giving Chantal the look of love, according to her. Parker stood, too. James was nowhere to be seen, but after the sobering thoughts earlier, she really didn’t want to wait. She was thirty-five years old, for heaven’s sake. Didn’t need an escort.

The air was surprisingly chilly, thick with the salty smell of the ocean. The bar had been loud, and as Parker walked toward the harbor, the quiet of the night settled around her companionably. Mackerly was pretty quiet, too, and also surrounded by water, but it wasn’t like this. This was a place where livelihoods were still made on the sea, a town that was remote and craggy. So far, she hadn’t seen any condos or McMansions on the water; the Pines was it as far as it went for posh real estate.

Waves slapped briskly against the hulls of the lobster boats in the otherwise quiet night. In the far distance, Parker heard an eerie, laughing noise; a loon, perhaps, not that she’d ever heard one before.