back to his father. “You seemed busy.”
She felt a rush of heat on her cheeks. This kid had her struggling to remember what happened when they walked in the door last night. How much and what he could have overheard. Something withered inside her at the thought.
“This just gets better and better,” she mumbled under her breath, as she hoped she’d disappear in a big puff of smoke. If only her CIA cronies could see her now.
“I think he figured out we’re having sex,” Gabe said in a dry, let’s-be-serious tone.
Talk about oversharing. She wrapped both hands around the mug and held on for dear life. “Are you guys always so chatty in the morning?”
Brandon shot her an apologetic smile. “You’re embarrassing her.”
“Which is weird.” Right when she was about to ask what the hell he meant by that, Gabe turned back to Brandon. “So, a party? Was that the plan?”
“No.”
“Money . . . oh, wait.” Gabe started nodding. “The car.”
That fast, Brandon switched from seemingly mature and in control to babbling. “Look, it’s no big deal. It really isn’t.” He was pleading now. “I just want it for a few days.”
She took in the byplay and tried to figure out what Gabe had said to trigger this reaction. The side of Brandon that was not quite adult and more focused on his needs came roaring to life. Natalie liked the reaction, because it made the kid, who up until then had come off as almost too perfect, seem pretty normal. Whining she understood. Didn’t love the sound and she never got away with it as a kid, but it fit.
But Gabe was having none of it. “No.”
“I’ll bring it back next weekend.” Brandon’s voice got a bit more singsongy.
“Still no. College freshmen don’t have cars.”
The math still astonished her. She couldn’t imagine Gabe at Brandon’s age, with a baby and no wife. She tried to image what kind of life that must have been then gave up and went with a question that had to be easier to answer.
Gabe didn’t ask so she did. “Why do you need one?”
He snorted. “I’m guessing a female is involved.”
“I didn’t want to go to the movies by bus,” Brandon said in full whine voice.
“If you knew how little sympathy I had for you on this issue.” Gabe smiled as he said it. “How did you get here?”
Brandon sighed and his shoulders dropped. He wore the look of defeat. “A few friends were going to D.C. this weekend. They swung by and left me off about a half mile away. I walked the rest.”
“A half mile?” She thought about the snow and tried to remember if there was any on the ground here. “How big is this spread?”
Brandon held his arms out wide. “Big.”
“Okay.” Gabe shook his head as he reached for the coffeepot again.
“I get to take the car?” Brandon asked, almost painfully hopeful.
“No, you get to live.”
“Funny.” The kid performed the perfect eye roll. “Fine, do I at least get to stay or am I cramping your style?”
“Don’t push it.”
But she didn’t sense any tension. They weren’t fighting. They were discussing. Gabe handled most of it with a firm hand and a bit of humor, something that must have felt familiar to Brandon because he didn’t balk. Didn’t make a scene. Natalie found the whole thing fascinating . . . except for the part where they talked about her and she still wasn’t wearing any underwear.
“Let me go make a call about needing a ride back tomorrow.” Brandon rounded the edge of the counter then stopped before smiling at her. “Nice meeting you.”
“You, too.” Strangely, she meant it. The insight into Gabe’s home life provided a pretty big window into Gabe, the man. She scowled at him anyway.
He peeked at her over the rim of his mug. “What’s that look?”
“You’re kidding, right?” This guy could win an award for subterfuge.
Gabe shrugged. “You assumed he was younger.”
Oh, no. She was not letting him bury the truth under a pile of that crap. “You let me think that.”
“In my defense, you’ve only known I even have a son for about six days. It’s not like I’ve been hiding his identity from you for years.”
“Is that really the argument you’re going with?”
“You seemed determined to think the worst of me.”
Fair enough, but still. “I wonder why.”
“It ticked me off that you thought I could abandon my kid.”
“Apparently, I was wrong.” And the relief nearly crushed her. Leaving Brandon off somewhere was the one piece