Page 26 of Our Little Secret

But she’d had to lie to her daughter and her husband to keep her secret.

Despite her bravado with Gideon during the attack, she wanted to keep the truth from them. So far, so good, she thought as she walked into the bedroom she shared with Neal and plopped down at the end of the bed. “I’m glad you’re okay.” He eyed the scrape on her cheek and, to her surprise, leaned down and kissed it.

“Oh! Ick!” Marilee said.

They hadn’t heard her, but there she was, just on the other side of the open bedroom door. In pajamas, her hair pulled back in a loose bun, she physically recoiled. “Are you like a vampire?” she asked her father.

Neal laughed. “It was just a little kiss.”

“But . . . gross!” Her face was a mask of revulsion.

Even Brooke chuckled at her exaggerated response. Neal’s phone beeped in his pocket. He pulled it out, glanced at the screen, then back at his wife. “You’re sure you’re okay?”

“Fine,” Brooke assured him, though again, she was hiding the truth. She was anything but fine.

“Okay.” He took the call. “Neal Harmon.” Passing Marilee still lingering in the doorway, he headed downstairs.

“A vampire?” Brooke teased, pushing herself up to rest against the headboard. “Really?”

Marilee lifted a shoulder and hesitated.

“What’s up?” Brooke asked.

For once Marilee seemed nervous. She bit at her lower lip, played with the end of her ponytail.

“Something wrong?”

“No.”

“Then out with it.” Brooke patted the edge of the mattress, indicating her daughter should join her on the bed.

Marilee didn’t budge. “Uh—I was asked to go to the dance this weekend,” she said in a rush and a blush crawled up the back of her neck to tinge her cheeks. “Tomorrow night.”

Marilee was embarrassed?

Unusual.

Marilee was alternately combative, arrogant, determined, or a combination of all three. Sometimes she could be pensive but rarely abashed.

“So, of course you can go. Who asked you?”

“Nick.”

“Nick Paszek? As in Tammi’s older brother?” Brooke asked. Tamara Paszek was one of Marilee’s friends, a girl she’d known from junior high, and Brooke wasn’t familiar with any other kid named Nick.

“Yeah.”

“Isn’t he . . . what, nineteen?”

Marilee let out a disgusted breath. “He’s a senior.”

“Who is old for his class.” Brooke remembered the kid, who had dropped Tammi off when the girls had a school project together. Tall. Good-looking. Almost a man. “And you’re not quite fifteen. Young for your class.”

“So?” Marilee’s lips tightened defiantly. “Are you saying no?’”

“I thought we agreed that you couldn’t officially date until you were fifteen.”

“Ooh, Mom, that’s like forever. And you always say that I’m wiser than my years.”

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