Page 323 of His Virgin Romance Series

GABBY

“Where on earth is your brother?” Mom asked, looking towards the door.

“Maybe his shift ran a bit late?” I wondered out loud.

I had sent Seth a message about half an hour ago but still no news. I decided to give him a call to just check in, but he hadn’t picked up.

“Let’s give him another fifteen minutes and if he’s not here by then, we’ll start eating,” Mom said, putting the fried chicken on the table.”

“All right,” I said distractedly.

“So… how are things going with your new roommate?” Mom asked.

“Oh… uh… good.” I nodded.

“You don’t sound too sure,” Mom said, wrinkling her brows at me.

“It’s not that,” I said. “We get along great…”

Mom was looking at me carefully. “You don’t really like to talk much about him, do you?”

“Um… that’s not true.”

“Please, I barely know his name.”

“It’s… Dave,” I said, remembering the name I had told Seth.

I was forced to stick with that name now… at least until I was certain where Miles and I were headed. I felt like I needed a couple more weeks to work things out in my head and when I did, then I could come clean with Seth and Mom about who Miles really was. Not that Mom would care as much, but I didn’t want to have to ask her to lie to Seth on my behalf.

“And… what does he do?”

“Uh… he’s a painter,” I said, choosing to tell her the career he wished to pursue.

“Really?” Mom said, sounding intrigued.

“Yeah.” I nodded, thinking of the painting he had done of me. “And he’s really good, Ma. He’s actually going to be exhibited in one of the local galleries in town soon.”

“Wow… does that kind of thing bring in a lot of money?”

“Mom.”

“What?”

“I can’t ask him that,” I said. It’s not polite.”

“I thought you said the two of you got along well.”

I shook my head at her, and Mom gave a deep sigh. “Maybe that was my mistake… my first mistake in life,” she said.

“What was?”

“Not marrying a rich man,” Mom said. “Let that be a lesson to you, Zo… find a guy with money. It’ll save you a lot of worry in your life, and your children won’t have to scrape and scrounge their entire lives.”

“We work hard, Mom,” I said.

“Exactly.” She nodded. “Sometimes I think the both of you work so hard that you don’t have a life because of it.”

“Really?”

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