Page 26 of Welcome Home for Christmas
Chapter 7
“Mom? What are you doing here?”
Allison’s heart exploded like an airbag on impact, riding up her throat and making it hard to swallow.
Troy turned toward Allison, in bare-chested glory. Yes, she’d wanted him to be bare chested a moment earlier so that she could get a glimpse, but now her mother had also gotten a glimpse. Andcrap!Not only was he bare chested, but he was in his boxer shorts. Not that she would’ve expected him to sleep in jeans all night, but…
Allison pinned a smile to her face, like one of those posts that you want all of your Facebook friends to see first before they see anything else that says everything in your life is hunky-dory. The one you should never believe.
The one her mother always saw through immediately.
“I thought it’d be nice to bring you your favorite breakfast this morning.” Her mother held up a brown paper bag from the Seaside Café. Allison could almost smell the sugar on the large cinnamon roll, her favorite since childhood.
“Wow. Thanks, Mom. Um, this isn’t, um, what it looks like.” She gestured at Troy.
“It looks like you had a guest sleep over last night,” her mother said frankly. Her smile was pinched, another fake, pinned expression.
Troy, on the other hand, looked completely relaxed.
“If I had known, I’d have brought two cinnamon rolls,” her mother said pointedly.
“We can share.” Troy winked at Allison. He wasn’t helping the situation at all. Then he offered his hand to her mother. “I’m Troy Matthews. Allison’s date for your Christmas Eve party. Nice to meet you, ma’am.”
Allison wanted to die. The only thing that could be worse was if Troy was also holding her purple vibrator. “Troy came to my rescue last night. Someone tried to break into my home.”
Her mother’s expression turned sincere. “Oh, my. Are you all right?”
“I’m fine, but it was scary. I hid in the closet and texted Troy in case the intruder could hear my voice. He called nine-one-one and came right over. I guess the burglar ran off.”
“Lucky for you that you had someone to call.” She looked at Troy. “Thank you for coming to my daughter’s rescue. Who knows what could’ve happened.”
“I insisted on staying over, on the couch”—he gestured to the blanket on Allison’s sofa—“just in case the guy came back. I install home security systems on the side. I’ll be securing your daughter’s home after work today. So she can sleep soundly tonight.” He looked at Allison with those twinkly brown eyes of his.
Her insides melted into a pile of mush. Unbelievably, he’d managed to just turn a bad first impression around. From Allison’s experience, the first impression counted for everything with her mother. But maybe not this one. Now her mother was smiling; she even looked charmed by Troy.
“Excuse me. I need to go get dressed. Then I need to run home, shower, and get to work,” he said.
“Where do you work?” her mother asked.
“I’m an MP on Camp Leon,” he told her.
Her mother nodded. Allison tried to read what she was thinking. A military police officer was a noble profession. Add in saving Allison’s life last night, and Troy was a gem.
He headed down the hall to go get dressed.
Allison’s mother handed her the brown paper bag. “I didn’t realize things were so serious between you two. You only just told me about him a couple of days ago.”
Allison shook her head. “They’re not. Troy was just here to keep me safe. He slept on the couch.”
Her mother lowered her voice. “Allison, you’ve always jumped into things blindly. You know I want you to start dating again. You haven’t seen anyone since that last beau of yours, James. I want you to find someone who makes you truly happy. But please, take things slow this time, okay?”
“Really, Mom. I just can’t win with you. You either think I need counseling because I’m not dating, or you’re unhappy because I am dating. I’m fine. And I’m not jumping into anything blindly.” Except a pretend relationship.
Her mother nodded, but she didn’t look convinced. Which ticked Allison off a little. She wasn’t a child anymore. She didn’t need her mother’s permission to have men stay the night with her. She didn’t need her mother’s permission to go slow or fast, or race to the altar and get married to the guy, if she wanted to.
Troy strolled back into the room, dressed in his jeans and T-shirt. He grabbed his truck keys and walked toward Allison. Her heart kicked into gear. There was something about the way he was looking at her that suddenly made her nervous.What was he doing?
“See you tonight, baby,” he said, a mile-long grin on his mouth. He wrapped an arm around her waist and pulled her to him before she could think or say anything. Then he pressed his lips to hers, just for a moment, and kissed her. His lips were warm, inviting, and for a moment she forgot that her mother was in the room. She forgot that she was Allison Carmichael and wasn’t interested in kissing a strong, attractive man right now. That she was happily single.
