I’d almost forgotten that Sacha’s mom was supposed to drop by to see her baby boy.

Two days before the end of the Australian leg of the tour, I was completely caught off-guard by the stunning, intense woman who came into the venue while I was helping Julian put together his drum set.

Mrs. Malykhin—if her last name was still that since she and Sacha’s dad were divorced, from what I gathered—was a delicately boned woman with the same color hair as her son. Tall and slim, her carriage was erect. Seriously, if there was someone that looked like an ideal queen it would have been her.

She also seemed to speak the way I imagined royalty would. I could hear her from across the venue as they headed in our direction.

Sacha answered with something I couldn’t hear clearly, but he did reach over and put his hand on her shoulder as the beginning of a smile curved over his mouth.

The “ugh” that came from my side had me turning my head to glance at Julian who was busy setting up his kick drum while I did his cymbals for the first time. As a late birthday present, I’d offered to help him set up from time to time. His attention was on the same people, except his nose was scrunched. When he realized I’d caught his expression he poked at the inside of his cheek with his tongue, his face unapologetic. “His mom is…” he trailed off with a whisper, “a snob.”

“Really?” I whispered back.

“Yeah.” He glanced back over at his band mate and visitor. “You’ll see.””

“You’re scaring me.”

“She’s a famous opera singer,” he quickly explained. “In her mind, Sach is throwing away this amazing talent she gave him and it’s all our fault, and she lets us know that each time she shows up.”

I grimaced and Julian nodded.

He paused before adding quickly, “Don’t call her Mrs. Malykhin.”

Before I could thank him for the warning, the husky female voice called out. “Hello, Julian.”

The TCC member plastered a smile on his face as he walked around the part of the drum set he’d been working on. “Hi, Miss Viktoriya.” He gave me a meaningful side-glance that I took to be a sign. “It’s been a long time.”

Taller close-up than she looked from across the venue, she had to be at least five-ten and definitely didn’t look old enough to have her youngest child be almost thirty, much less have five kids. The elegant woman held out a slim hand in Julian’s direction. He took it and kissed it.

Literally. He kissed her hand. I’d never seen that happen in person, and I suddenly wondered why.

My eyes shot over to Sacha who was standing a few feet behind his mother. He smiled at me, opening his mouth at the same time. “Mom, I want you to meet someone,” he said as he closed the distance between him and me.

Miss Viktoriya turned her entire body to face me. The similarities between mother and son were striking. They had the same cheekbones, the same transparent gray to their irises, and the same kind of extraordinary beauty. All that attention and confidence was now on me, and I lost the fight to not fidget.

But wonderful Sacha must have sensed or seen my anxiety because he cut in. “Mom, this is Gaby. Gaby, this is my mom.”

Damn it. He’d called her by what he knew her as but that didn’t give me a clue whether to call her Miss Viktoriya too or not.

I smiled tightly at the woman and held out my hand in her direction, making it clear—at least I hoped—that I wasn’t going to be kissing her hand like Julian had done, no matter how famous she was. “Hi, it’s nice to meet you.”

Even as she took my palm in hers in a handshake that was absolutely not limp-fish in any way, shape or form, she eyed me up and down discreetly. “It’s a pleasure to meet you as well. I’ve heard so much about you.”

So much about me? What the hell was up with that?

I knew I wasn't exactly at my best, but I'd opted to wear jeans instead of sweats and a formfitting kids’ sweater I'd picked up in Brisbane that had a koala on it with Australia written in rainbow letters. Eli had been nice enough to braid my hair after I'd promised to give him Tylenol in return for his headache, like I wouldn't have given it to him regardless.

I glanced expectantly at Sacha who was just standing two feet away by then with a pleased expression on his face, smiling this grand, beaming thing that made my chest shimmer on the inside. We hadn't gotten a chance to talk since the whole kiss-on-the-neck thing the night before. I'd fallen asleep on the ride home and barely made it to my room intact.

"We're going to eat. Do you want to come with us?” he asked me.

“I can’t, I promised Carter I’d help him count merch.”

He nodded but it was his mom that spoke up. “That’s too bad. Maybe next time,” she said but I couldn’t tell if she was being sarcastic or if she really meant it.

"Sach!" Miles started yelling at him from the back door to the venue.

He frowned and said something about being right back while his mom stayed where she was, her attention on me. The second Sacha was far enough away from us, she took a step forward. Her entire demeanor turned serious and tense.

“Is this all you do?” she asked coolly.

“Do you mean sell merchandise?” I made sure to draw the question out so that I could understand what she clearly meant. Apparently Sacha had told her enough about me so that she’d know I sold merch. I eyed Julian but he was busy pretending to mess with his equipment. Coward.

“Yes.”

“Right now it is. I just graduated. I’m not sure what I’m doing.”

Miss Viktoriya hummed, giving me another thorough inspection. “From high school?”

“From college.”

Her ridiculously long eyelashes lowered just a fraction. “What did you study?”

Yeah, I didn’t care for her tone at all, and I felt my own eyes narrowing in her direction. “History.”

The tip of her nose rose a quarter of an inch. “What are you planning on doing with that?”

Why did I feel like I was going through the weirdest, most judgmental job interview ever? Well, if she thought I was going to cower, she had another thing coming. “I have no idea.”

“I see,” she said but it wasn’t exactly in an “I think you’re an idiot” tone, more like… curious. Actually interested. On the other hand, maybe I was imagining it.

Glancing to the side quickly, I spotted Sacha making his way back toward us. Apparently so did she because the next thing I knew, Miss Viktoriya, reigning queen of perfectly powered opera performances, took a step forward and whispered, "My boy has always known what he wants, and he dives into things head first without hesitation. Break his heart, and I will ruin your life."

She left me with those words.

“What did she say to you?” Julian finally spoke up once the opera singer was gone.

I blinked at him, still figuring out what the hell she’d meant. “I think she just threatened me.”

He didn’t look remotely surprised; he simply tipped his chin down. “Makes sense.”

---

That night, when he knocked on my door and I asked him for the password, he said, "Gaby should get a gold medal for being alive."

I laughed because I wasn't sure whether that was a good thing or not, like most things that came out of his mouth. "Anddd?"

"I have a present for you," he said following a chuckle.

"Seriously, Sassy, you don’t always have to bring something," I told him, opening the door with a smile on my face.

He grinned as he shuffled in, kicking off his shoes as he pushed a yellow bag in my direction. "I saw it when I went to dinner with my mom," he explained before I'd even opened the bag.

"You're spoiling me," I looked up at him briefly before pulling out a small white shirt with a baby kangaroo on it, the words Call Me Joey written in lime-green bubble letters. I laughed and threw my arms around Sacha a split second later, aiming for his waist. "Thank you, Sassy."

Sacha squeezed me back, wrapping his arms over the tops of my shoulders. "You're very welcome."

We stayed like that for a moment, then two moments, five moments, eight moments. One of his arms loosened around me before I felt him smooth a hand down my wet hair. "You know you don't have to buy me anything ever,” I said. "I'd let you in even if the only thing you brought was bad breath."

He laughed while rubbing that free hand smoothly over the small of my back. "I know."

"Okay."

His hand slipped an inch up the back of my shirt, fingertips brushing my bare skin at the same time his mouth dipped down to my temple. "I like that you don't expect me to buy you things, that's why I do it."

Something tugged at my brain, making me think of Ronalda and how Sacha would pull her chair out for her, and how she wanted him to sacrifice so much for her. Maybe he did things like that because she demanded it? I pushed the thought away, not wanting to think of her when it was me in this moment with this beautiful man.

"Thank you, anyway." I told him dumbly, breathlessly.

Sacha pulled away just an inch before tipping my head back. He gave me a sly, seductive smile. "You're the easiest person in the world to please,” he breathed, kissing my cheek softly.

The fact that he was kissing my cheek and I was standing there handling it as if it wasn’t a big deal was something I was going to replay later on when the moment was broken and I wasn’t living in it any longer.

"Is that a good thing?"

His smile morphed again, into one that made me think of a secret. "It's a great thing."