Chapter Sixteen
Driving over to Becky’s house, Foster was having serious second thoughts.
He couldn’t believe he was doing this. He couldn’t believe he was subjecting the perfectly nice Becky to his horrendous family. His horrendous extended family. His mother’s judgment would be bad enough, but when she got together with his aunts . . . he was suddenly nervous that Becky wouldn’t make it out alive.
“What am I doing?” he asked Starr, who was curled up on the front seat.
Then he remembered that Madison had promised to create a diversion if the heat got too much for Becky. He should probably be concerned about what Madison’s idea of a harmless diversion was. And, come to think of it, she hadn’t said harmless.
Still, she’d smiled when he’d told her Becky was coming. So that was something.
He pulled up to the shabby-looking apartment complex. This was where she lived? It wasn’t terrible—it seemed safe enough—but it was just . . . blah. He’d pictured her living in a quirky, subdivided Victorian or a charming duplex with that white picket fence she was so obsessed about. This looked like crummy student housing. Not her at all.
“What do you think, Starr? It’s not too late to turn around.” Starr lifted her head, then stood and walked in a circle and settled down facing away from him.
Just when he was starting to question whether he had the right address—he did, he was sure of it, he was just caught off-guard by the unexpected blandness—there was movement on the outdoor stairwell. She emerged, and he was momentarily distracted by her heels and the way they made her legs look . . . long enough to wrap around him. Which was a totally inappropriate thought. This was a fake date. Besides, he already knew her legs wrapped around him.
“This isn’t a real date,” he told Starr, who ignored him. “It’s a favor. It’s returning a favor.”
Before he could fully convince himself to quit looking at her legs like that, she was opening the car door and handing him something and kissing Starr while he was distracted by her legs climbing into the passenger seat.
“Hi,” she said brightly, and he realized she was actually excited about this. She wasn’t kidding when she’d said she’d never had a real Thanksgiving. Nobody with firsthand experience of Thanksgiving was this excited about it. Well, he was glad he’d be able to ruin one more illusion for her. It’d be a favor he could do for her.
She buckled her seat belt and Starr settled in her lap as if it were the most natural thing in the world. He wanted to start driving, but he was still holding whatever she’d handed him when she got in.
“Is this a pie?”
She blushed, although he didn’t know why. What was embarrassing about pie? It smelled delicious.
“You know my parents have this catered, right?” He was pretty sure he’d told her that. In an effort to ruin more illusions. No wonder she didn’t want to date him.
“I know, but it’s not polite to show up empty-handed.”
“I brought wine.” He pointed to his trunk, where the case of wine his mother had asked him to bring was. Not that she could see it.
“Well, most of the wine I drink has a twist off top, so I didn’t trust myself to choose something your parents would like.”
His parents wouldn’t like anything she brought, but that wasn’t her fault. And he certainly wasn’t going to tell her that.
“Anyway, it’s Thanksgiving, and I just felt like baking was appropriate.”
He didn’t say anything to that. If she wanted to bake, he’d let her bake.
“It smells really good. What kind of pie is it?”
“Sweet potato.”
“Sweet potato?”
“Mm-hmm.”
“Sweet potato pie?”
“Yes.”
“Is it dessert?”
“Have you never heard of sweet potato pie?” She seemed very pleased by that fact.
“Sure I have,” he lied. “I’ve just never eaten it before.”
“Oh, good. So you’ll have nothing to compare it to.”
He handed her the mysterious sweet potato pie. Starr sat up to sniff it, then curled back up on Becky’s lap.
“Are you OK?” he asked her. “Do you want me to put Starr in the back?”
“No!” She cleared her throat. “No, she’s fine. Her haircut looks good.”
“It’s grown in a little. She looks a lot less like an exotic rodent now.”
“Don’t you listen to him,” she said to Starr. “You’re a beauty queen, no matter what.”
Once she figured out how to balance Starr and a pie—the answer was to put the pie on the floor between her feet and keep Starr just where she was—she didn’t know what to say. Foster, too, was silent for most of the drive. She imagined he was fuming over the fact that he’d let on that he didn’t know something. Not that he’d admitted he didn’t know what sweet potato pie was, but she had a feeling the chances of Foster admitting he had any sort of shortcoming . . . well, her parents would throw a big ol’ traditional Thanksgiving before that happened.
Well, at least he was pretty to look at.
She could admit that without attaching any deeper feelings to it. Actually, pretty wasn’t the right word. Even without the beard, even all clean and polished in his suit—would she ever see him out of a suit again?—pretty wasn’t the right word. She wasn’t sure what the right word was. Maybe it was because she knew what his face looked like when he was turned on, how his eyes became dark and laser-focused, how his skin flushed when she touched him . . . She should probably stop thinking about how to describe how attractive he was.
She was so absorbed in his jawline that she didn’t notice him pulling up to the giant house in tony Greenwood Village. The warm lighting of the entry porch illuminated an impressive stone arch . . . and she knew this wasn’t going to be a normal Thanksgiving.
She punched Foster in the arm.
“Hey! What was that for?”
“You promised me a normal Thanksgiving.”
“It will be!” He looked confused as he rubbed his arm. Which she thought was a little dramatic. She hadn’t hit him that hard. She was balancing a pie between her feet and a dog on her lap.
“This isn’t the house of a normal family.”
He looked through the windshield, as if he’d never noticed that his parents lived in a friggin’ mansion.
“It’ll be normal. The caterers make all the traditional foods, there’re too many people in the house, obnoxious kids running around, people making passive-aggressive comments . . . all the good stuff.”
“All the good stuff,” she said skeptically. Too many people? In this house? She didn’t think there were that many people in the whole city of Denver.
“All the good stuff and a sweet potato pie.” He reached toward her, and for a second she thought he was going to kiss her. But this was a fake date, so there would be no kissing—which was definitely what she wanted—and, besides, he was just leaning in to scoop his dog off her lap.
She carefully retrieved her pie and followed him out of the car and up to the front door.
“We’re here!” he shouted to the empty foyer. She was taking in the fresh flowers and the marble table (marble!), when sliding wooden doors parted to reveal a chaotic mix of people—not too many but noisy—and a woman appeared.
“Foster! Hello, love. Oh, and you brought your dog.”
“Hi, Mom.” Foster pressed a kiss to his mother’s cheek and Becky tried not to stare. Foster’s mother was . . . she was fabulous. She was tall and tan and wearing a simple sheath dress that looked like it cost more than Becky’s rent. Add to that the pearl accessories that sparkled with hidden diamonds and Becky knew she was way outclassed.
Ha. Normal.
“Mom, this is Becky. Becky, this is my mother, Lydia.”
“I brought a pie,” Becky said, as if Mrs. Deacon couldn’t see the pie-shaped dish she was holding.
“Oh, you didn’t have to—” Mrs. Deacon looked a little alarmed. “Foster, did you tell her—”
“I told her she didn’t have to bring anything. She insisted.”
“Oh,” said Mrs. Deacon. “Wasn’t that kind?”
“It’s sweet potato.”
“Wonderful! You know, I had the most delicious sweet potato pie on a girls’ trip to Savannah.”
“It’s a family recipe.”
“Oh. That sounds delightful.”
“Someone else’s family. Not mine. My family doesn’t eat pie.”
“Oh. Well. Thank you. That was . . . Foster, where have you been keeping this delightful woman?”
Foster put his arm around her. But before he could deploy their complicated backstory—which, come to think of it, they hadn’t come up with—Lydia turned on her heel and disappeared with the pie.
“You’re doing great,” he whispered into Becky’s ear.
“I don’t think she liked the pie,” she whispered back.
“She was just surprised. You’re fine.” And it was the most natural thing in the world for him to pull her a little closer and kiss her on the temple, and it was the most natural thing in the world for her to lean in to him and accept his comfort.
“Son.”
Becky would have jumped away from Foster if he hadn’t been holding her so tightly. But it wasn’t like they were caught making out. And they could totally be caught making out and it wouldn’t be a big deal. She was his date.
Not that they’d be making out.
Just that they could.
Oh God, she was nervous.
Foster let go of her long enough to shake the hand of the man who approached him. He was big and barrel-chested, and if Becky was at all curious about what Foster would look like as an older man, there it was, standing in front of her, making a displeased face at Starr.
Good thing she wasn’t curious about that.
“Dad. Good to see you. This is Becky.”
“Becky, Foster’s told us so much about you.”
“He has?”
Mr. Deacon cleared his throat. “Please. Call me Andrew.”
“Nice to meet you, Andrew.”
“And is this your little dog?”
“No, Dad. It’s mine. I adopted her. Didn’t Madison tell you?”
“Starr is here!”
Madison came charging down the wide, winding staircase and skidded to a stop in front of them. She was dressed pretty much the opposite of her mother: torn jeans, too-big sweater, and big, fluffy socks.
“Starr, my baby, I missed you so much!” She scooped the dog from her brother’s arms and received all Starr’s grateful kisses.
“Madison, does your mother know you’re wearing that to dinner?”
“Yup,” she said, and even Becky could tell she was lying.
“Hey, sis.”
“Yeah, hi, Foster. Becky! You really came!”
Becky was dislodged from Foster and enveloped in a hug that encompassed Starr as well.
“I brought a pie,” she told Maddie, because a teenage girl definitely cared that she was following proper rules of etiquette.
Maddie’s eyes lit up. “What did Mom say to that?” she asked Foster.
“She didn’t say anything. She loved it.”
Maddie snorted. Andrew told Foster he’d “see him for cigars”—whatever that meant—and disappeared back into the room of chaos.
“Is there something wrong with bringing pie?” Becky was sure pie was a totally normal part of Thanksgiving, but the way Madison was acting was causing her to second-guess. How could everything she’d ever read or seen been wrong on that point?
“No, there’s nothing wrong with pie,” Foster assured her.
“Not for normal people. Mom has a very specific menu.” Maddie stuck her nose in the air. “Carefully curated. She’ll be pissed.”
“Pissed? Foster! Why didn’t you tell me not to bring pie?”
“How could I tell you not to bring pie when I didn’t know you were bringing pie? Besides, Maddie’s exaggerating. It’ll be fine.”
She raised her eyebrow at him. Foster had a funny idea of fine.
“Come on,” he said, wrapping his arm around her shoulders and leading her into the fray. “Offending the hostess for something you didn’t do on purpose is a totally normal part of a Deacon family Thanksgiving. Now let’s see what else you’ve been missing.”