19. Asher
19
ASHER
“I’ve got another one!” Wyatt called out from his office.
“Shit,” I muttered under my breath. We were slammed today. After the snowstorm crushed the city, we were swamped with work orders. I hadn’t even gotten lunch today. I had all of five minutes to take a piss and grab a cup of coffee, but the work was piling up faster than we could get through it, and we couldn’t pass up work like this.
“Any chance you can work late tonight?” Wyatt asked, the look in his eyes more pleading than asking.
“Yeah, I can do that.” I didn’t want to tell Holly that after her weird conversation last night where she basically kicked me out of the house because we were in the after stage of our first sexual encounter, then called me to tell me it was weird. Hell, I already knew it was weird. I just wished she had talked to me about it first.
My phone buzzed again in my pocket and I pulled it out, pretty sure it was Holly, but it was a number I didn’t recognize. “Give me five, Wyatt.”
“Yeah, grab something to eat.”
I nodded and walked just outside the office, answering the phone. “Hello?”
“Asher, it’s so good to talk to you.”
“Uh…who’s this?”
“Oh, I’m sorry. Where are my manners? I’m Holly’s mother, Carol Lane.”
Her mother was calling me? That was weird as shit. Unless… “Is something wrong with Holly?”
“Oh, no, dear. I’m simply calling to invite you to dinner tonight.”
“Tonight?”
“Yes. After all, I told Holly we should meet you. She told me it was too soon, but I said it’s never too soon to meet my future son-in-law.”
I grinned as she started rambling. I could see where Holly got it from. Did it freak me out that she called me her future son-in-law? Not at all. I knew it wasn’t coming from Holly. Not after what happened last night. Most likely, her mother somehow found out and took things too far.
“Is that right?”
“I have the perfect meal planned, and Nicholas is getting out his best wig for tonight. I’ve asked him to tone down the conspiracy theory talk for tonight, but you should know what you’re getting into. I’m afraid there are a few subjects you’ll just have to avoid. The government, for one. Just don’t bring up anything to do with it. Aliens, electricity, television, radio, brain waves, doctors, medicine, Christmas, swamps, wind farms, bees, Thomas Edison, the invention of the cotton gin, Communism, pavement, boats, and wheelbarrows.”
“Wheelbarrows?”
“You really don’t want to know.”
I was pretty sure I did. A person didn’t throw out a topic that was off-limits like that and then not tell you why. “What about Christmas? I thought Holly was named after Christmas? And come to think of it, you and your husband both have Christmas names.”
“I never said it made sense.”
“So, you’re not going to tell me?”
“We’ll save that conversation for another time.”
“What about the wheelbarrows?”
She sighed heavily. “About dinner, we’ll eat at six. Dress is informal. Oh, and could you be a dear and pick up Noelle on your way?”
“Uh—”
“We’ll see you then, dear!”
I didn’t even get a chance to say goodbye before she hung up. What the hell was I supposed to do now? I pushed Wyatt’s door open and winced when I saw the stress on his face.
“What?” he said, his face panicked. “What is it?”
“I just got a call from Holly’s mom. She invited me to dinner.”
“She invited you to dinner?”
“It was sort of an invitation. More of a demand, really. I didn’t really get a chance to tell her no.”
“What time are you supposed to be there?”
“Six. And there are all these rules I’m supposed to follow.”
“Rules? For going to dinner?” he asked curiously, leaning back in his chair.
“What not to talk about. Apparently, her father is a conspiracy theorist.”
“What kind of stuff?”
“Wheelbarrows.”
Wyatt’s brows scrunched in confusion. “Wheelbarrows?”
“I don’t get it either. And brain waves, pavement, swamps, bees, wind farms, and a whole bunch of other shit.”
“Wheelbarrows,” he repeated. “What the fuck would you even say about a wheelbarrow?”
“I have no idea.”
“I guess you could maybe compare them.”
“Aren’t they all the same?”
He shrugged. “Are there superior brands of wheelbarrows?”
“Hell if I know.”
He leaned forward and started searching on his computer, fully immersed in the discovery of what was so special about wheelbarrows. I strode around to his side of the desk and leaned over his shoulder, trying to figure it out with him.
“Maybe it’s one wheel versus two,” I pointed at the different selections.
“Could be, but who would even argue about that? Is that really something you would have a fight over?”
I shrugged. I wouldn’t argue over a wheelbarrow ever in my life. What could possibly be so fucking interesting about a wheelbarrow? “There,” I pointed at the screen. “Plastic versus metal.”
He rolled his eyes and looked up at me. “Seriously? You want me to believe someone would start an argument over that?”
“You never know. I think it’s all ridiculous.”
“Man,” he shook his head. “This is gonna drive me fucking insane.”
“You? I have to go to dinner with them and I can’t ask what it’s about!”
He sighed, leaning back in his seat. “Yeah.”
“Sorry about this, man.”
“No, I get it.”
“I could ask her to reschedule.”
“No, it’s fine. You’ve been busting your ass all day. We still have a few hours we can get in before you have to take off.”
I nodded, still feeling horrible for leaving him in the lurch. “I can work late tomorrow.”
“Hey, don’t worry about it, man. We’ll get the work done. They can’t expect us to work late every night to get their vehicles done. I’ll ask Massey and Gary to work late.”
“Gary? Good luck with that,” I snorted.
“Well, it’s worth a shot. Get out of here,” he chuckled.
I turned to leave, but the door burst open and Holly fell through the door, gasping for air, bent over and holding herself up with the arm of the chair next to the door.
“Don’t—answer—Mom—dinner—phone—psycho—engaged—bad—” She winced, pinching her side as she sucked in more air.
I hurried over to her, guided her into the chair, and shoved her head between her knees as I glanced back at Wyatt, trying not to laugh at her. “There you go. Deep breaths.”
She popped back up, still gasping. “Don’t?—”
“Yep, you need to breathe,” I chuckled, shoving her head back down. “So, Holly, this is my boss, Wyatt.”
“Nice to meet you. Well, the back of your head.”
She raised her arm in the air and gave a flimsy wave as I rubbed her back.
“So, Holly, why aren’t you allowed to discuss wheelbarrows?” Wyatt asked, crossing his arms as he grinned.
Holly popped up with a panicked look on her face. “No,” she whispered. “She got to you.”
“Yeah, she already called.”
Holly stood, nearly falling over. “I swear, I tried to stop her! I told her you weren’t my fiancé! I?—”
“Holly, it’s fine.”
“It is not fine!”
“You don’t want me to meet your family?” I asked, wondering why she was so adamant that I not meet them.
“It’s not that. My family is?—”
“Yes?”
She glanced at Wyatt, then back to me. “They’re a little odd.”
“You don’t say?”
“What’s this I hear about pavement being a topic that’s off-limits? And brain waves? I’m gonna need a list printed out.”
She groaned, flopping down in the chair. “I tried to get here to warn you. Why weren’t you answering your phone?” she asked accusingly. “I called you like fifty times!”
“I was working and we were really busy.”
“It looks like you’re chatting it up in here, being all chummy with your boss.”
“Well, now we are. But that was only after your mom called and gave me that list. We were both a little curious about the wheelbarrow and got sidetracked.”
“It was too good to pass up,” Wyatt shrugged.
“I’m gonna need to know the answer to that, baby.”
“Look,” she glared at me. “We are not going tonight.”
“I’m afraid we’re gonna have to. Your mom already called and didn’t exactly give me a chance to back out. Oh, and I’m also supposed to pick up Noelle on the way. Is there a reason she’s coming?”
“To make you feel less pressure,” she grumbled.
“Well, this ought to be interesting,” I chuckled.
“This is not funny, Asher Stone!”
“I find it perfectly amusing,” I grinned. “In fact, I think tonight will be one for the books.”
“And I want to know about this wheelbarrow tomorrow,” Wyatt added, “or don’t bother coming into work.”
“Asher, you don’t realize what you’re walking into. This isn’t going to be like a normal family dinner.”
“God, I hope not,” I snorted.
If she only knew what the last family dinner I had was like. Jade’s father came to mind, his brutal treatment of his daughter —how he basically sold her off to me. This would be a breath of fresh air by comparison.
I grabbed her arm and hauled her to her feet. “Now, you should go home and—Is that cocoa in your hair?” I leaned in and sniffed. “Is that peppermint?”
“Yes,” she grumbled.
“Do I want to know why?”
“Noelle,” she retorted.
“That explains a lot.”
“I think I’d like to meet this Noelle,” Wyatt grinned. “She sounds interesting.”
“Oh, she’s a handful,” I laughed. “She might be perfect for you.”
“No,” Holly snapped. “I wouldn’t wish her on my worst enemy.”
“She’s your best friend.”
“And it’s because she’s my best friend that I can tell you not to set any of your friends up with her,” she said, narrowing her eyes on me.
I turned to Wyatt. “So, you want that date?”
“Depends. Does she know about the wheelbarrow?”
Holly rolled her eyes. “I’m leaving.”
I walked her out, smiling the whole way.
“I’m glad you find this funny.”
“It is, baby.”
“It most definitely is not.”
“You’re too uptight.”
She spun on me and eyed me seriously. “If you think I’m uptight now, just wait until I turn out like my mother.”
That intrigued me. I tugged her into my arms. “Does that mean you’re planning to stick around for a long time? Your mom seems to think I’m gonna be her son-in-law.”
“I—that’s?—”
“Relax,” I chuckled. “I was just teasing you.” I brushed her cocoa-crusted hair back from her face and kissed her. “You should probably shower before tonight. Your mom said casual, but I doubt she meant with cocoa in your hair.”
“You know, you’re a little too calm about this whole thing.”
“That’s because I am.”
“Why?”
I shrugged. Maybe it was because I’d already been through worse. Or maybe it was because I was already in love with Holly and knew I wanted her in my life forever. The rest just didn’t scare me. Either way, meeting her parents wasn’t a big deal. “It just doesn’t.”
“Will I ever meet your parents?”
“You’d better get cleaned up,” I deflected. “I have to get back to work. I’ll see you tonight.” I kissed her and headed back inside before she could corner me and ask any more questions. I wanted to be an open book with her, but there were some things I just wasn’t ready to get into yet.
“I can’t believe I got dragged along for this,” Noelle grumbled.
“I hear you were the instigator,” I grinned, shifting in my seat.
“Who told you that?”
I glanced over at her pouting face in the passenger seat. For all her crankiness, she would do anything for Holly. This was all one really good act she was putting on.
“Holly messaged me. She said I had you to thank for all of this.”
“Well, I was only trying to get back at her for what she did to me.”
“Which was what?”
“She was taunting me about what phallic-shaped objects you might have played with while you were snowed in at the shop.”
I burst out laughing, finding the whole thing damn funny. That sounded exactly like something Holly would do. “I wish I could have been there to witness that.”
“I bet you do. I hope you know it’s because of the two of you that I no longer feel safe anywhere in that shop. Everywhere I look, I’m afraid I’ll get sex cooties.”
“Sex cooties? Is that even a thing?”
“Oh, it’s a thing, alright. And I’ll have you know that I demanded she unsexify the place, and I really doubt she did that.”
“How does one unsexify a store?” I asked, genuinely curious about how someone would go about something like that.
“There has to be some service you could call. Like a special cleaner or something.”
“You know, once upon a time, I actually could recommend someone like that to you.”
“Really?”
I nodded, remembering the cleaners we would call after a job went awry. They were great at cleaning up blood and any other messes that we needed taken care of to keep forensics from placing us or any victims at the scene of the crime.
“You’ve needed someplace unsexified before?” she gasped. “What aren’t you telling Holly?” She slugged me hard in the arm for good measure.
“Ow. It’s nothing like that. And stop hitting me.”
“I hit you once, you big baby.”
“Once is enough. You shouldn’t be hitting anyone.”
“Maybe you deserved it.”
“Really? I deserved to be punched?”
“For being a douchenozzle? You bet.”
That made me pause. “What exactly is a douchenozzle?”
“It’s a— you know what? It doesn’t matter.”
I chuckled, turning down the street to Holly’s parents’ subdivision. “You don’t know the answer.”
“Hey, it’s just one of those words kids nowadays are using.”
“Kids nowadays, huh?”
“Well, no normal person says these things,” she sighed, rolling her eyes.
“Noelle, are you admitting that you’re getting old?”
She glared at me, crossing her arms over her chest. As I parked outside the house, I checked out the dwellings. It looked perfectly normal. I wasn’t sure what Holly was so worried about. Sure, her dad might be a little eccentric, but weren’t we all?
My phone buzzed in my pocket and I pulled it out.
Chase.
“Who is it?”
“Uh…nobody.”
“Nobody is calling?” Noelle said, eyeing me suspiciously.
“Nobody important,” I said, shoving my phone back in my pocket. “I’m here to see my girlfriend and meet her parents. I would be an idiot to take a phone call from anyone right now. That would send the wrong signal.”
She narrowed her eyes at me. “Well played, but don’t think I’m not onto you.”
“Onto me in what way?”
“Oh, we’ll see.”
“See what?”
She did that finger thing of I’m watching you. Then she hopped out of my truck and slammed the door. That girl was weird, but I liked her. I got out and followed her up the walk to the house, grateful that Holly was already here. It would be weird to show up without her. As it was, I had wanted to pick her up, but she said it was too far out of the way.
Like I gave a shit about that.
I had the feeling that she rushed over here to set the tone of the evening before I arrived. I wondered what kind of shit she said to her parents before I got here.
As soon as my boots hit the doorstep, the door was open and her mom was flinging herself at me. I caught her just as her arms wrapped around me in a big Momma bear hug. Holly wasn’t kidding when she said her mom already thought we were engaged.
“Asher, it’s so wonderful to meet you.” She stepped back, holding both of my cheeks in her hands and squeezing my face. “Look at you. You’re too skinny. We need to fatten you up.” Her hands left my face and gripped my arms. Her eyes widened and she spun around to face Holly, who was shaking her head behind her mother, her face red and tinged with embarrassment. “Holly! Have you felt his arms? He’s got huge muscles!”
I burst out laughing, unable to stop myself. Her mother was hilarious, but clearly, Holly didn’t feel the same way. She stomped forward, tearing me out of her mother’s arms and into the house.
“That’s enough, Mom! Asher’s not a zoo animal!”
“Of course not. He’s a brawny man. You know, like Mr. Clean. Except without the bald head. I like it better this way,” she said, winking at me.
Okay, it was a little weird to have her mom fawning over me this much, but Holly seemed more embarrassed by it than me, so I let it slide so I didn’t make it worse for her.
“Mom, can you please stop?”
“Oh, I’m just admiring your beau. He’s so handsome.” She winked at me as she passed, walking over to Noelle and giving her a hug, then taking her coat. “Look at you. You’re too thin, dear. You need to eat more.”
“You just saw me earlier today,” Noelle reminded her.
“Well, I’m telling you now. Holly, take your fiancé’s coat and take him to meet your father.”
“He’s my boyfriend, Mom. Not my fiancé.”
Her mother looked at me sweetly, but I saw the calculation in her eyes. “Really? Hmm,” she hummed as she walked away.
Holly rolled her eyes as she faced me with a groan. “I’m so sorry about her?—”
“Holly Bear, relax. She’s just playing matchmaker.”
“Yes, but we’re already together. She doesn’t need to keep pushing.”
“Don’t worry about it. I can handle her. She can push as much as she wants.”
“You say that now. In an hour, you’ll be running out of here while I chase you down with a spatula, begging you to take me with you.”
I took off my coat, handing it over to her. “And why will you have a spatula?”
“Because that’s what all good wives have on them at all times. We’ve been trained from an early age to wear an apron, bake cookies, prepare meat properly, and carry spatulas.”
I eyed her curiously. “Tell me more about preparing meat.”
She smacked me on the arm. “This is not funny.”
“It sort of is.”
“It won’t be when she hands you her mother’s wedding ring and asks you to propose with it.”
“Do you like it?”
“Seriously, Asher, don’t encourage her.”
“I’m not,” I said, pulling her into my arms. “But you have to lighten up. The more you fight this, the more she’s going to push. Maybe you should try reverse psychology on her.”
“What? You mean…make her think we’re getting married?”
I shrugged. “Maybe she would back off.”
“But that would require me to tell her you proposed.”
I thought about it and that wasn’t right. If she was going to tell her mother I proposed, it was going to be real. “Okay, so that’s off the table, but maybe you could tell her we’ve talked about it or something. Discussing it isn’t the same as proposing, but it would let her know that it’s not off the table, right?”
She chewed her lip as she thought it over. “I guess, but it might make things harder on you.”
“In what way?”
“Well, she might start planning the wedding.” She winced. “I’d hate to think about all the reservations she’d make without us knowing.”
Chuckling, I shook my head. “Okay, maybe we put a pin in that for now.”
“Put a pin in that?” she asked, looking at me funny.
“You know, a grenade. You pull the pin and it explodes. You put the pin in it and it doesn’t explode.”
She rolled her eyes. “Men and their action movies. Best not to talk about your stint in the military with my dad, either. He’s not a fan.”
Right, probably best he didn’t know about my previous life.
“Come on, let’s go before they have our first child named. It’ll be something dreadful like Emmanuelle.”
I followed her into the other room. “We could always go with December.”
She shot me a lethal glare. “Don’t you even think about it.”