is in a foul mood, I’m sorry, but she would like to meet our girl. My sister would too.”
I swallowed that our girl.
“If you don’t want to, or can’t, it isn’t an issue,” he clarified. “I just thought….”
I looked from one eyeball to the other. “Why weren’t you answering your mom’s calls before? Is there something wrong with her?”
The fact that it took him a second to snort said everything. Then his words after that were super liar, liar, pants on fire. “Yeh, nah,” he tried to say even as his cheeks went pink. “She’s a bit intense is all.”
Intense? More like bish level 100. But I kept that to myself to share it with Grandpa later.
“Liar.” I smiled at him. “You should probably know that I didn’t exactly get off to the best start with her.” And I was worried your sister was really your secret girlfriend, I thought but didn’t say either.
“It’s all right.”
Something told me most people didn’t get along with his mom, but my goal was to find out firsthand why he didn’t answer her calls.
And now that I thought about it, I’d never even heard his phone ring around me. Not ever. Not even at night when he was at the house for hours. Even my phone was constantly bing-bing-binging, and that’s why I set it on vibrate.
I wasn’t that fucking popular.
But he was.
I’d ask him about it later.
“Are you sure you want me to go with you? Because you can go get Mo by yourself if you want, since you’ve got your own car and everything now.”
If I was surprised by how easily the offer popped into my head, then Jonah was just as surprised to hear it. Those light-colored eyes just bore right into me before bouncing from one of mine to the other and back again. And even with his pink cheeks and the lies in his eyes about not being worried about his mom, he was still too cute. Handsome. Just fucking handsome.
“I want you to come,” he said, looking right into my eyes.
He wanted me to really meet his mom? AKA spend time with her?
I made myself not glance at her because that would have been weak as hell, and instead did the same thing to his eyes that he’d done to me: like I was searching for something in them that said bullshit, bitch.
But there was nothing there even close to that. Not a single thing.
He wanted me to meet his mom. And sister. Wanted us to spend time together.
Fuck it.
“Okay,” I agreed. “I want you to tell me the whole story later.” Because I had questions. A few of them.
“I will,” he agreed easily.
I hated how much I liked him. “Okay, I’ll go with you.”
He gave me that tiny little smile.
I smirked back at him. “Why do you look so relieved?”
“I’m just glad you’re coming,” he replied. “Let me introduce you, eh. I’ve got my ute—”
I tried to process that.
He caught it. “My car.” He flashed me that trademark smile. “I told you I was hiring a car. We can go together to get Mo, or if you’d like, we can meet somewhere instead.”
I felt like a pussy considering option B, but I took it. “We can meet somewhere. That’ll give you some one-on-one time with your mom and sister.” Poor sucker.
The smile he gave me didn’t make it clear whether he knew why I’d chosen that option or not, but he didn’t tease me over it. Jonah tugged me forward, and I went along willingly, noticing that his palm slid down my arm as we turned, and he gave my wrist a light hold for a second before dropping away.
He really was a good guy.
And as we headed toward his mom, and I took in the look on her face, I could tell that I wasn’t going to be saying the same thing about her cranky ass.
In three seconds we were in front of the two women, and Jonah’s hand was at the base of my spine, his palm halfway on my jeans and halfway over my shirt, which I knew was crazy sweaty, and he was saying, “Mum, Natia, I’d like you to meet Lenny, my girl’s mum.”
Somewhere inside, I flinched. Not his friend. Not… anything else. His girl’s mom.
That’s what I was, I guessed. My most important title. It wasn’t like that should be a surprise.
And I had no reason to feel disappointed.
“Lenny, this is my mum, Sarah, and my middle sister, Natia.”