family dinner. Now my mom had gone and bothered him at work.
She let out a long breath and ran her hands down her jean-clad thighs. “I went because I saw the two of you together.”
“You saw us at his house?” I was wondering what would’ve possibly possessed her to seek him out after that brief interaction.
“Yes, but I’m talking about seeing you two in the pictures that the detective Blaine hired had of ya’ll.” She pulled her phone out of her purse and unlocked the screen before handing it to me.
I scrolled through and saw pictures of Billy and I leaving the bar the first night with Cheyenne. There were shots of us in front of the boarding house, the day he took me to go look at his house. Some of us leaving the law firm together the day he took me for a picnic. Several pics of him carrying me down the stairs on the pier after the crab feed.
I cringed at how embarrassing those were. I had no memory of that night at all.
And then the last ones were of us standing outside the barn after Farm Strong. The final one was when he kissed me. In the moment, it had happened so quick, but the freeze frame looked really passionate.
“Did you show Billy these?”
“No. That’s not why I went. I went because I could see from the pictures that he wasn’t just a fling. I saw the way you looked at him. And the way he looked at you. But I had to look him in the eye and ask him face to face how he felt about you.”
Oh, sweet lord. NO! “Why? Why does it matter how he feels?”
“Because, when you told me to leave earlier, I didn’t. I stayed and listened at the door. I heard you asking Blaine those questions about yourself and I realized that I, your own mother, didn’t know any of those answers.” Her eyes started to fill with tears, but she sniffed them back and squared her shoulders, sitting up straighter. Normally, she really leaned into emotional breakdowns and milked them for all they were worth. So seeing her try and hold one back was new.
“I wasn’t a good mom. I know that. I remember when I found out I was pregnant, I thought that I would finally have someone in my life that couldn’t leave me. Someone that would love me unconditionally. And you have, despite how horrible I’ve been. But I don’t deserve you. And neither did Blaine.” She took in a shaky breath. “I went for a walk trying to figure out how I could possibly ask you to forgive me for what I’ve put you through, and I ended up at the bar. I needed to make sure that Billy deserved you. And sweetie, he does. I asked him all those things you asked Blaine and he knew the answers. At least, I think he did. He seemed pretty confident.” She smiled as a tear fell down her face. “He knows you, and he loves you.”
“Mama, he doesn’t love me.” I wasn’t sure what was going on with my mom, if she was having some sort of midlife crisis or something, but the last thing I needed was for her to get the wrong idea about a man that had only been my official boyfriend for less than a day.
“Yes, he does.”
“You don’t know that.” I shook my head.
“Yes, I do.”
“Why, because he knew what my favorite color was?” I wanted to tell her that he wouldn’t have known that if she’d asked him yesterday.
“No. Because he told me that he does.”
Even though this seemed to be a new and improved version of my mom, I couldn’t discount the last thirty years. She had a tendency to exaggerate. “He told you that he loves me?”
“Yes, Fancy. He told me that he loves you.”
I wasn’t sure what to say to that. Did I believe her? Even if I did, maybe he just said that to be nice. She was my mom, after all. It might be difficult to look at someone’s mother and tell them that you don’t love their daughter.
“But don’t take my word for it.” She sniffed. “He’s waiting outside.”
“What?” I stood up.
“He insisted on driving me back. He wanted to see you. I told him I wanted to talk to you, but he said he’d wait. He’s in his truck out front.”
I took two steps to the door when she grabbed my wrist