Northern Rebel Daring in the Dark - By Jennifer Labrecque Page 0,30

there any place in town where I can find a bathing suit?”

“Good Riddance isn’t exactly brimming with fashion stores.” Delphi had always appreciated Skye’s dry sense of humor. “You’d have to order something like that.” Skye hesitated. “I have two if you want to try them on. They’ve been washed and I haven’t worn them since last year.”

There was no way she was going swimming without a suit. “You’re sure?”

“Positive. Dalton is running by Donna’s place later to pick up a tool. He’ll drop them off, if that’s okay with you.”

“You’re a lifesaver, Skye.”

“It’s my job,” her friend deadpanned on the other end of the phone.

“Ha. Seriously, thanks for asking me to come and thanks for lending me a bathing suit. I haven’t felt this good in a long time. Today was fun.”

“I’m glad you like it here. Have fun tonight.”

“That’s the plan.”

Full-steam ahead...for five days. And while Delphi no longer trusted her own judgment, Skye couldn’t be wrong.

* * *

LARS SHIFTED IN HIS SEAT, impatient for dinner to be over. Thank God Merrilee and Bull were here, too, and he wasn’t stuck with only his mother. They were all sitting at the kitchen table in Bull and Merrilee’s kitchen above the hardware store. Merrilee’s spaghetti with a salad and bread was incredible.

Despite Merrilee’s best attempts, Dr. Jane Reinhardt had commandeered the conversation from the get-go. Actually, there was no conversation involved—it was strictly a one-woman monologue. As usual, his mom was playing to a captive audience.

“So, I very quickly told the dean that I wouldn’t be a part of...”

Blah, blah and blah...who gave a righteous crap? He didn’t. It was the same shit, just a different day. Lars’s mind drifted to later on tonight—to moonlight, warm water and the cool blonde who had felt anything but cool in his arms as they’d danced away the afternoon.

“Lars would you care to join us?” his mother said with her famous quelling glance, her tone sharp. Both warning signs were ones he knew all too well, having learned them at an early age. Tread carefully, or Mom would explode and it wouldn’t be pretty.

Damn, she got under his skin. “Present.”

“I beg to differ,” she said. “I see you so seldom, you’d think you could actually be here instead of Lars Land.”

Damn if she couldn’t reduce him in a few seconds to being eight years old again. From the time he was a kid and had ever let his mind wander while she was prattling on, she’d disdainfully referred to his daydreaming as Lars Land. Damn, he hated that term.

So he, Liam and Jack went out of their way to avoid her because nobody ever knew what was going to set her off. And whenever Dirk spent time with them, he seriously walked around on his tiptoes. Lars could detonate bombs all day, every day. He could set off Delphi. But he’d go out of his way to avoid setting off his mother. Even now, dead-ass silence reigned at the table. You could’ve heard a flea fart.

Enough. He was thirty-two years old. He had a successful career. He’d had too many years of walking on eggshells around her.

So Lars called his mother out.

“Okay, Mom, you’ve got my undivided attention. You’ve got everyone’s undivided attention, which is what is always required.” He nudged his plate away and leaned back in his chair, crossing his arms over his chest. “Please, continue.”

“Sarcasm is totally uncalled for, son. But, as I was saying, I took my curriculum change to the dean—”

“When are you leaving?” Lars interrupted his mother with the question, even though he knew the answer. If she was going to treat him as if he was eight, then dammit, he’d act like it.

She graced him with a scathing look. “Tomorrow morning, which of course you know, which is why we planned this dinner tonight so we’d have an opportunity to spend some time together before I left.”

Lars nodded. It probably wouldn’t change a thing but he was going to say what he wanted to say and the consequences be damned. He was fed up holding his tongue. “You know, Mom, last night you talked about your gardening, your trip to Spain, the book you’ve decided to work on and how you’ve had to set the new member of your teaching staff straight.”

She appeared somewhat mollified. “Okay. I suppose you do pay attention.”

He continued, even though he knew she wasn’t going to like what he had to say. “Not once did you ask Liam or Tansy