Well Suited (Red Lipstick Coalition #4)(58)

“I hate surprises,” Katherine said.

“I know. I was teasing,” Sparrow said, hooking her arm in her daughter’s. “But you’re always so busy. So I thought maybe if I didn’t make a big production out of it, you’d see me when it was convenient. I don’t need much in the way of attention, Katie. You know that.”

Katherine made a derisive noise.

“I really did need to get away,” Sparrow said a little quieter, a little calmer.

Katherine’s lips flattened. “Where will you stay while you’re here? Theodore and I have to leave for work.”

“Oh, I’ll figure something out.”

“Do you have a hotel booked? How long will you be here? Does Dad know where you are?”

“No, I don’t know, and yes. You worry too much, Katie-Bug.”

“Well, what are you going to do today?”

“Oh, I don’t know. Maybe I’ll wander around Central Park. Or there’s a mystic shop in the East Village I haven’t been to in years. I need to pick up some more sage. I ran out in Milwaukee. I swear, that hotel was a murder stop.”

Katherine’s eyes met mine in a plea.

I cleared my throat. “Sparrow, come meet my mother. Maybe you can stay with us for a bit.”

Katherine’s face tightened, and I swore in my mind for having read her wrong.

Sparrow’s face lit up like a firecracker. “Oh, Theo, that would be wonderful. You’ll have to let me read your tea leaves. Or I could clear your aura, though yours is solid,” she said, her eyes tracing the air around me. “Very masculine, very steady. You picked a good one, Katie.” She bumped Katherine’s hip with hers.

Katherine barely moved from the impact, like a cliffside against a hurricane.

I ushered Sparrow into the living room with Katherine following us like a wooden doll. Once I introduced Sparrow to my mom, they struck up a conversation, affording Katherine and me a split second of privacy. I reached for her hand.

“You okay?” I asked quietly, my mind tracing the crack that had, out of nowhere, split between us.

“No,” she answered definitively.

“Hey,” I whispered, stepping into her. The motion caught her attention, and her eyes locked on mine like a lifeline. “I’ve got you. Okay? We’ll figure it out.”

She nodded once, but her brows were drawn.

I wanted to pull her into my arms, to kiss her, to remind her she was safe. We were safe. But the display in front of our mothers would only make it worse, I knew.

I suddenly loathed the fact that I couldn’t see her at work today. Because even though her hand was in mine and she’d agreed with the words I’d spoken, I could feel the slip, a backward step that I hoped was temporary.

Because I wouldn’t lose the ground I’d gained.



?





Katherine

I watched my mother unroll her satchel of reiki crystals, chatting her face off to Sarah as she arranged them on the windowsill to recharge.

I was unable to get a handle on the situation. I had a checklist for today. One for the week. One for my pregnancy. One for me and Theo. And my mother was not on any one of them. I’d had no time to plan for her, no time to mentally prepare for her presence. And now, she was not only in New York, but she would be staying with us.

My mother, who was more unpredictable than an infant.

My mother, who was splitting up with my father. Again.

Last night, I’d let go, found myself glamoured into thinking that magic was real. That Theo and I were different, that he could be the exception to the rules I’d lived my life by. But as I tracked my mother as she fiddled with her crystals, I was reminded of those truths, the cold, sterile facts.

Magic was no more real than her crystals and tarot cards. Love was no more real than soggy tea leaves and sage smudging, and my off-again, on-again parents were proof positive. And if I’d been caught up enough to have forgotten that, I was in far too deep.

Theo was wound almost as tight as I was, though he was watching me. He checked his watch in a twitchy movement that was very much unlike him.

“We need to go,” he said quietly, cupping my elbow in his massive hand before addressing our mothers. “We’ll see you two tonight.”

“Have a good day, honey,” Sparrow called, hurrying over to invade my space once again with a crushing hug.

Theo stiffened next to me. I got the distinct impression he was both charmed by my mother and fighting an impulse to pry her off of me.

The second she let me go, he steered me toward the door like my bodyguard. I wanted to be mad at him for inviting my mom to stay with us, but I couldn’t find it in me. I’d have invited her myself, because if I knew my mother, she’d have ended up in a hostel or some seedy motel where she was sure to get held up or worse. She had no sense of danger—she trusted the universe to take care of her, and by her estimation, the universe typically provided.

In this case, it was certainly not the universe. It was Theo who’d provided.

I sucked in a breath through my nose as we stepped out of the house and onto the sidewalk where Tommy and Amelia waited. On seeing us, their faces bent in concern.

“What happened?” Tommy asked.

“My mother showed up unannounced.”

Amelia’s face opened up with compassion and concern. “Oh no.”