Page 19 of Flirting with Forever

“There is a relation,” he said without preamble, but he’d accidentally talked over something Mary had said. “Sorry, what?”

“Nothing. I was just asking if everything was all right. What did you say?”

She wasn’t actually asking if everything was all right, he knew. She was just trying to find a polite way to ask him why the hell he was calling her.

“I said that thereisa relation between me and Maddox. He’s my little brother.”

“Oh, I didn’t know that Estrella had two sons. She’d never mentioned him before.”

“He’s not related to Estrella. We’re half brothers. Through our father.” John plummeted on because he knew how awkward some people could get when confronted with information like that. “Listen, Mary, is there any chance that you told my mother that I offered to screen her candidates for you?”

“Hmm? Oh. Yes. At the block party she apologized for your behavior on our date again, and I told her it was bygones. I explained that you were even trying to make it up to me by making sure that I was getting the cream of the crop in terms of blind dates.”

“And what was her reaction?”

“Oh, you’re worried that she was offended? No, the opposite, actually. She seemed thrilled that you’d do something so nice for me.”

“I’ll just bet she was thrilled,” John said darkly. “Mary, we’re getting played by Estrella.”

“What? What do you mean?”

“I mean that once my mother found out that I was screening your dates, she chose the three people that would probably set me off the most. My elementary school bully, a known drug dealer in our neighborhood and my problematic little brother. And then to prove a point, she setmeup on a date with the human version of a cup of weak tea.”

“Ouch. You had a date tonight?”

“Yeah.”

“It didn’t go well?”

“Mary, it’s nine fifteen on a Friday night and I’m calling you to talk about my mother.”

She laughed and it sparkled. An unexpected gem on a dark beach. “Point taken.” Mary was quiet for a second. “But why is she torturing us like this?”

“Because she’s still trying to get us together.”

“Oh.Ohhhhh.She thought you’d come riding in to my rescue once you realized who I was going to be spending my time with. That’s kind of sweet. Your mother is a romantic, John.”

“She’s a wily little trickster is what she is.”

Mary laughed that gem-on-the-beach laugh again, and John raked the back of his knuckles over the window screen. The night air was a touch cooler than inside and ambient voices from the bus stop three floors down floated up to him. He absently moved toward his cabinet and pulled out a can of Ruth’s cat food, smiling down at her when she galumphed off the table and then jammed her forehead into his ankle bones.

“So, should I tell her the jig is up?” Mary asked. “I was thinking that she was choosing men who were too young anyway. I’ve been meeting older guys on this dating app and was thinking I should put my focus there.”

John frowned, a little taken aback by that information.

I was expecting someone younger.

He pictured Mary on a date with some rich retiree in a swanky Manhattan restaurant with a wait list half a year long. He pictured a cigar in the guy’s shirt pocket and a Maserati glowing like an ember in whatever lot the valet had parked it.

“Oh. Right. Sure.” He had no idea what else to say to that. If she wanted to date older guys, that was her prerogative. He just hoped that the dumbest five words he’d ever said in his life hadn’t impacted her decision on who she was trying to date. “Well, if you wanted to tell her, you could. But I was also thinking it might be fun to make her sweat a little bit.”

“How so?” There was reticence in her voice. “I should let you know right now that I am terrible at tricking people. I can’t even stay hidden during hide-and-seek. I always get too panicky and jump out and forfeit.”

John chuckled. He could picture that very clearly. “Been playing a lot of hide-and-seek recently?”

“Actually yes. I babysit for my friend’s kid a lot. He’s way better at it than I am. Anyway. What did you have in mind for your mother?”

“You should tell her that you changed your mind about one of them. Well, not Maddox. Pick one of the other guys she suggested and tell her that you want to go out with him next weekend. Make her sweat a little bit.”

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