Page 113 of Family Bonds: Alana & Brennan
“My friend Polly is here and Polly’s mother. They are staying for lunch too.”
“That’s nice,” she said. She looked at Brennan and saw his flush. “Daddy asked me to stop and get cupcakes because he forgot to do it.”
“We’re getting cupcakes,” Becca yelled. “Polly and Ilovecupcakes.”
She looked at the other little girl playing with Becca’s dollhouse in the playroom off the foyer. Celia and Brennan were in the living room on the other side from the girls.
The two of them talking about Alana’s existence most likely hadn’t come up.
She was going to cut him some slack.
As long as it’d been since she’d swum in the dating pool, she would have seen the signs that Brennan wasn’t interested. And it wasn’t as if Celia asked for a second date.
“I love cupcakes too. I’ve got six of them.”
“One for everyone,” Becca said, counting them all in the room.
“That’s right,” she said.
Brennan stood up and walked toward her, took the box out of her hand and leaned in to give her a kiss. “Thanks for picking these up for me.”
He was playing along with the ruse that she’d thought up this morning.
She didn’t want to pop in and sit there like she was jealous and monitoring the situation. That would have been awkward all around for everyone.
This was better, and she could sneak back out if it worked that way.
“I didn’t know you were dating someone,” Celia said, standing up. “I’m Polly’s mom, Celia. Brennan and I just went on a date not that long ago.”
Oh yeah. She knew women like this.
Starting trouble. It didn’t even have to be the lengthy once over she got.
She came in jeans and sneakers, a cotton shirt under her jacket. She wasn’t here to impress anyone and wouldn’t lower herself to put on tight jeans and a shirt that might fit Becca better.
Just like Celia was wearing.
“We’ve been dating less than a month,” she said. This didn’t put a time limit on it but was after the babysitting gig. Not a lie in the least. She didn’t want Brennan to be thought of as a player.
“Oh,” Celia said. “How did you two meet?”
“We work together,” Alana said. Might as well be a bitch and put it out there because she could see that Celia didn’t look as if she was going to back down or back away. If there was one thing she knew on this island, the Bond name had people stepping back. “I moved from Boston a year ago when my cousin Kelsey Raymond said they had an opening on the island. Since I’ve been here most of my life with my extended family, I thought I’d try.”
Couldn’t get much clearer than that.
“You’re a Bond?”
“That’s not my last name. I’ll go put these in the kitchen.”
Brennan came into the kitchen before she could pull the cupcakes out. “Celia just left. She said she’ll be back at one.”
“She didn’t have to leave because of me,” she said. “I was actually going to leave. That’s why I didn’t take my jacket off.”
“She said she hadn’t planned on staying, that she had a bunch of things to do, but only wanted to chat for a few minutes before she left Polly.”
“Do you believe her?”
“No,” he said. “Every time I opened my mouth to bring your name up, she interrupted me. She was going on and on about Christmas and problems with her ex, then the way gifts were purchased. I swear all she did was vent.”
