Take a Chance on Me(83)

Pink? Mitch pinched the bridge of his nose. He needed to get the hell out of here. Maybe Charlie or Sam could play pickup. A game of vicious, no-holds-barred basketball would help to alleviate his agitation.

“Do you mind?” Maddie asked. “Since it’s technically yours.”

“It’s technically mine,” Mitch said dryly. He’d increasingly started to resemble a petulant six-year-old, but no matter how much he tried he couldn’t seem to stop.

“What is your problem?” Maddie snapped, then shot Charlotte an apologetic glance. “I’m sorry.”

“No need, dear.” Charlotte raised a brow, her face cool and polite, with none of the warmth she reserved for Maddie. “He is being quite a bear.”

“Don’t apologize for me,” he said in a growl.

The phone rang, and he got up, happy for an escape. The chair scraped over the linoleum floor harder than he’d intended.

He snatched the receiver.

“Yeah?” he barked.

“Geez, someone got up on the wrong side of the bed,” Gracie said.

Great, just what he needed. The only person who possibly loved Maddie more than his mother was Gracie. “What can I do for you?”

“Is Maddie there?” Over the line, the sound of dishes clattering was like nails on a chalkboard to Mitch’s ear.

“Yeah.” He made no move to hand the phone over to her. Now she was getting calls?

“Can I talk to her?” Gracie asked, sounding like a teenage girl talking to her father.

“One second.” The words were spoken through gritted teeth he turned to Maddie. “It’s for you. Gracie.”

Maddie jumped up and grabbed the phone.

He glowered at her.

She scowled back. “What is wrong with you?”

“Not a thing, Princess.”

For the past week they’d talked about their days, bickered, and had fan-f*cking-tastic sex, but they’d avoided anything real. She was there, right in front of him, but he’d already lost the thing he’d loved best about her. He wanted it back, but couldn’t figure out how to bridge the gap.

With a glare, she pulled the corded receiver into the dining room, leaving him alone with his mother.

An uncomfortable tension filled the room.

They hadn’t seen each other in three years, and they still had nothing to say.

Charlotte ran a long, tapered finger over her iced tea ring. Finally, she lifted her chin. “I really like Maddie.”

“I can see that,” he said, for lack of anything better.

“She’s wonderful.” Charlotte looked up at him. “I wouldn’t have made it through this ordeal without her.”

“She’s got that way about her.” Mitch propped a hip on the counter.

She cleared her throat. “You’re different with her.”

“I’m different. Period.” He was trying to make it clear that she didn’t know jack shit about him.

She nodded, and a sadness that had not been present a couple of minutes ago clouded her eyes, the same color as his own. “You know, I wanted to call.”

“And what stopped you?”

“I didn’t think you wanted to talk to me.” The fine lines deepened at the corners of her eyes.

“Yeah, that’s a good reason,” he scoffed.

“You don’t exactly make it easy.”

He shrugged. “Doesn’t matter much now, does it?”

She opened her mouth to speak, only to snap it shut when Maddie came into the room. With her hand covering the mouthpiece, she held the phone out to Mitch. “You have a phone call.”

“Who is it?” Mitch wasn’t in the mood to talk to anyone.

Maddie swallowed, her gaze darting first to him and then to his mother.

Dread had his stomach dropping. What now?

“He won’t say, but I’m pretty sure it’s your father.”





Tequila hummed through Maddie’s veins as the beat of a country song blared too loudly. The patrons of Big Red’s Bar & Tavern did a complicated two-step in the middle of the converted barn, and Maddie could almost convince herself she was having a great time.


Almost.

Those Rileys were pieces of work. Not fans of the emotional outburst.

Mitch had talked to his father for two minutes, handed the phone to his mother, and stalked off without a word. Concerned, Maddie had gone after him, but he’d claimed there was nothing to discuss and shut the office door in her face. Pissed as hell and determined to find out what was going on, she’d sought out Charlotte, only to find that she’d locked herself in the bedroom.

That had left Maddie to wander a house filled with closed doors, which was how she had ended up at Big Red’s with Gracie, downing margaritas as if she were aiming for first place in a drinking contest.

Gracie whacked a guy on the back. He was wearing a wifebeater and a trucker’s hat. “Sure, Billy, we’d love another round.” She smiled at him as though he were Brad Pitt in Fight Club and shoved him toward the bar.

Maddie yelled over the noise, “Did it ever occur to you to say no?”

“Why on earth would I do that?” She looked Maddie up and down as though she might have a screw loose. “See, that’s your problem.”