Mother, Please! - By Brenda Novak & Jill Shalvis & Alison Kent Page 0,85
as conflicted as they’d once been—but about how to react to the truth of the new man in Suzannah’s life.
Funny how after no more than a week of intense kisses and phone conversations in the wee hours, when Avery was up already and he should’ve been in bed, that he was able to read her moods, to tell where she was coming from.
But they had a long evening ahead to get through, and it was going to require a big fat jump-start for this party to make it from here to there considering Suzannah and Leslie were carrying the bulk of the conversation while Avery mostly nodded and smiled.
Since David’s plans for Avery wouldn’t fit into any socially acceptable dinner discussion, he launched into the next best thing. “You much of a baseball fan, Les?” he asked, watching Avery’s eyes roll back in their sockets.
“No. No sports talk. Please,” she begged, though she did so with an honest laugh.
This time it was Suzannah’s eyes rolling, which caused Leslie to glance from mother to daughter before looking to David for help. He feigned ignorance and shrugged.
Leslie cleared his throat. “I take it the ladies here aren’t much on sports?”
“And living in West Texas at that. It’s gotta be some kind of sin,” David said with only a half effort at a straight face since at long last everyone was talking. “The excitement spurred on by Friday-night high school football is contagious beyond belief. You hang around long enough, you’ll see.”
“It is only contagious to those who have not been inoculated,” Suzannah said sagely. “And usually those are the same ones who do not teach at the districts in question and have to battle the sports-over-education mentality.”
“And to a lesser extent,” Avery went on, “it’s a relief, when the season is over, to those providing doughnuts for the booster meetings and cakes for celebrating all the wins and cookies for the pep rallies and—”
Leslie waved a hand and, laughing, cut Avery off. “Okay, okay. I surrender. Sports will forever be off-limits when I’m around either of you two ladies.”
David tossed his napkin to the side of his empty plate. “Well, hell. I see where I rate around here.”
Gray eyes twinkling behind round, wire-rimmed glasses, Leslie leaned to the side, raised his hand to hide his mouth and spoke in David’s direction. “I’m considering season tickets for the fall Tornadoes schedule. We’ll have to finagle a guys’ night out. Maybe two or three.”
“Season tickets.” Avery glanced from Leslie to her mother, her gaze skating over David only briefly before returning to the older man. “Does that mean you’ll be in Tatem more often from now on?”
“Actually,” Leslie began, hedging a bit as he pulled his glasses from his face. While he crossed his legs and cleaned both lenses with the corners of his napkin, he cleared his throat and continued. “Yes. I took an editorial position this week with the Brewster County Press.”
Suzannah fairly beamed, her elbows on the edge of the table, her chin resting on her laced hands. “As if they would’ve let you get away once you stepped foot inside the door and offered your services.”
“Roaming the world has become tedious,” he replied, his expression as besotted as hers.
“Oh, I don’t know.” Avery laughed, though David sensed a hint of the reaction being forced rather than genuine. “I’d like to give it a try. Then again, traveling outside of Texas sounds good to me.”
“Then you should. And I think this summer would be the perfect time for the two of you to get started.” Leslie fought a smile. The corners of his eyes crinkled all the way to the dark gray of his temples. “Maybe you could talk David here into showing you the West Coast. Especially since he has a good eight weeks off coming up, am I right?”
David grinned. No matter that somehow he was going to end up paying for this one, he could’ve hugged the older man for planting the seed. Showing Avery the world was the least of what he longed to do.
Avery reached for her glass of red wine, her hand amazingly steady, before turning an expression of friendly accusation on her mother. “I think my mother may have misled you as to the nature of my involvement with David.”
“To tell you the truth, she hasn’t said anything leading me to believe one thing or another. If I’ve spoken out of turn, the fault is my own and I apologize,” Leslie replied, and David