Blessed (Book 2, The Watchers Trilogy; Young Adult Paranormal Romance) (3 page)

“Of course,” he took his eyes off the road for a split second to look at me. “Don’t you?”

“Yes, but I’d really like to graduate college first. Would you mind waiting that long?”

Brand smiled. “Lilly, I can wait as long as you need me to. I’m in no rush. As long as I can be with you every day in between, I really don’t care how long you want to wait to get married.”

“And are you ok with waiting to make love until then?”

“You’re worth waiting for,” he said, kissing my hand. “But do I have your permission to dream about that moment while I’m waiting?”

“Only if you share it with me every so often.”

He chuckled softly, “Deal.”

CHAPTER TWO

When we arrived at Utha Mae’s, I was surprised to see my mother come out of her trailer and greet us before we even stepped out of the car. I swear I think Cora still thinks she’s seventeen and a go-go dancer. She was wearing a tight denim mini-skirt, white halter top and three-inch blood-red stilettos. Apparently, she was trying something different with her brown hair, because it looked permed and teased into a bird’s nest on top of her head.

“Hey, sweetie,” she said, giving me a quick hug. I saw her eyes quickly take in Brand’s Porsche and Brand himself as he got out of the car.

“Hi, Brand. I’m surprised to see you here.” She looked down at me, confused. “I thought you might be bringing your new boyfriend over, sweetie.”

“New boyfriend?”

What was she talking about?

“Yeah, that man they showed on the news, big handsome guy with long black hair. They had a picture of him getting out of this red and black car at your apartment. I swear I think he looks like a Chippendale dancer I’ve seen before.”

I could feel my body start to tremble.

“What did you hear on the news?” I asked my mom as Brand came to stand by me to place a comforting hand against the small of my back.

“They said you hadn’t been missing at all. That you’d just been on vacation with that guy in Las Vegas and forgot to tell anyone. I told people you probably just needed to get out of town after all that business with the crazy girl trying to kill you. I asked Tara not to involve the police, but she wouldn’t listen to me. Who was that guy, sweetie?”

“Just a friend. He’s not my boyfriend. Brand is.”

I could tell by my mother’s expression that she had surmised that fact already.

“Well, you better go talk to Utha Mae. She was awfully upset when we didn’t know where you were last week. Come on over to my place when you get through talking to her. I’d like to ask you about something.”

Cora gave me a kiss on the cheek and went back into her trailer.

I couldn’t move. Why had my mother just accepted Malcolm’s lie so easily? It was just another piece of proof that she didn’t know me at all. It wasn’t in my character just to leave town without telling someone where I was going. I didn’t live as she had all her life, doing what she wanted whenever she wanted, no matter how selfish it was.

“Are you all right?”

The worry in Brand’s voice made me snap out of my reverie.

“Everyone’s going to think I’m some kind of floozy now,” I said, completely despondent. “How am I going to face people at school? Dr. Barry’s going to think I’m a complete flake.”

I felt like crying. Brand pulled me into his arms, instantly making me feel a little bit better - comforted and loved at least.

“Don’t worry about what other people think,” he told me. “The ones who matter the most know the truth. Don’t let the rest of the world bother you.”

“But what if Utha Mae believes it, too? I couldn’t stand it if she were disappointed in me.”

“Come on. Let’s go talk with her.”

Brand took my hand and walked me up to Utha Mae’s front door. After he knocked, we heard her tell us to come in.

She was sitting at her kitchen table, shelling purple hull peas into a glass bowl on her lap.

“Hey, child,” she said, looking up at me and smiling. “Come have a seat. I think we need to have a talk.”

Brand sat beside me, holding my hand, trying to provide me the strength I needed to talk to Utha Mae.

“Now,” she said, setting the bowl half full of peas onto the table, giving me her full attention. “Can you tell me where you’ve been this past week? ‘Cause I know that story they told on the TV isn’t true. I didn’t raise you to run wild in Sin City with a stranger.”

The relief I felt from her words untied the knot in my stomach.

“Thank you for not believing that,” I said.

“Can you tell me what’s really going on?”

“I can’t tell you everything; at least not right now. I just need you to trust me, Utha Mae.”

She leaned forward and put her hand on my knee. “Are you in trouble, baby? Can I help you somehow?”

“I am in trouble,” I said, unable to lie to her. “And there really isn’t anything you can do to help me, but I have people who can. We just need time to figure out some things. Maybe after everything is over we can talk about it, but right now I just need you to believe in me. As long as you do, I won’t worry about what anybody else thinks about me.”

“I’ll always believe in you, baby.”

I got up from my seat and hugged Utha Mae. I fought back my tears of relief. I don’t know what I would have done if Utha Mae had believed the lie Malcolm concocted for the benefit of the police, to explain my sudden disappearance. It hadn’t even occurred to me that the story would reach the news media.

“Now then,” Utha Mae said when I finally let her go. “I hope y’all came hungry ‘cause I made a ham, chicken and dumplings, and I’m gonna boil these peas up and make some biscuits, too.”

“You know I can’t pass up your chicken and dumplings,” I kissed her on the cheek, feeling lighter of heart than I had all day.

“Why don’t y’all go get your mom, baby? I bet she hasn’t eaten anything yet.”

“Ok, we’ll go get her.”

“If it’s all right,” Brand said. “I think I’ll stay here and help Ms. Jenkins finish cooking.”

“Sure,” I said heading for the door. “I’ll be back in a bit. I got the feeling Mom wanted to talk to me in private about something anyway.”

As I closed the door, I heard Brand say, “I’d like to ask you something, Ms. Jenkins.”

I made a mental note to ask what that was all about later.

When I went inside my mom’s trailer, I found her sitting on the couch in the living room, thumbing through the latest issue of
Vanity Fair
.

“Hey, Mom. What did you want to talk to me about?” I asked, sitting down beside her.

“Are you using birth control?”

The bluntness of her question caught me off-guard, but I quickly recovered. I had nothing to hide.

“Why should I? I’m still a virgin.”

“Well, you don’t have to tell me the truth.” She gave me a business card. It was for a gynecologist in Lakewood, named Dr. Laura Spencer. “She’s a good doctor.”

“I’m not lying to you, Mom. I
am
a virgin. Why’s that so hard to believe?”

“Well, honey, no one spends a week with a man like what I saw on TV and comes back a virgin.”

“Well, I’m not like some people. I know how to keep my legs together.” I tried to contain my temper, but my words couldn’t hide how I was feeling. My mom had always said my thoughts were mirrored on my face anyway. I was sure she could see what I thought about her insinuation.

“All right, maybe you still are,” she conceded, “but you’re getting older now, and I’m sure if you haven’t already had sex, it’ll be in your near future; especially if you and Brand stay together this time. Guys like him don’t stick around with a girl who isn’t giving something out.”

Never in my life had I felt like slapping my mother more than in that moment.

“You don’t know anything about Brand. He’s not like the guys you go out with. He actually
respects
me. He doesn’t mind waiting until we’re married before we make love. He’s not hanging around me because he thinks I’ll spread my legs for him whenever he wants. He actually loves me, Mom! As odd as that concept might seem to someone like you, he loves me for who I am, not for what I give him!”

I knew I was yelling by the end of my tirade, but I didn’t care. How dare she talk about Brand as if he was someone who would leave a girl just because she wouldn’t have sex with him!

“Well, I hope you’re right, sweetie,” my mother said, changing her tune quickly after my outburst. “Maybe I’ve just been looking for someone to replace your father for so long, I’ve become cynical about falling in love. I just don’t want you to get pregnant too young. It can be a hard life, especially if the father isn’t around to help out.”

My anger was deflated slightly by her words. I knew how hard she had struggled to put food on our plates and keep a roof over our heads.

“I know, Mom. I wish you could find someone to love, too. Now that I know what it really feels like, I can’t say I blame you for trying so hard to find it. You just need to start going out with a better class of men. Honestly, the guys you’ve brought home just aren’t good enough.”

“I know,” she said with a sigh. “I’ve been thinking that, too.”

“Listen, I do appreciate you trying to look after me. And I promise you, if Brand and I decide to have sex, I’ll be on birth control.”

It was either that or death anyway. At least now I knew a doctor who could help me when the time came.

I put the card in my back pocket.

“Come on,” I said, holding out my hand to my mother. “Utha Mae’s fixed lunch for us. You know you can’t pass up her chicken and dumplings any more than I can.”

When we stepped into Utha Mae’s kitchen, I heard her humming a happy tune while she cut up some bacon and tossed it into the boiling pot of peas on the stove. Brand was rolling up the last of the dough for biscuits, a bright smile lighting his handsome face.

“What’s got you two so happy?” I asked, immediately suspicious something was going on.

They both just shrugged and gave each other what looked like a conspiratorial glance.

After we ate, Utha Mae made us take the leftovers home for Will and Tara.

When we got back on the road, I pressed Brand a little harder for an answer.

“What did you and Utha Mae talk about while I was over at my mom’s?”

He just smiled and shook his head. “Nothing you need to know about yet.”

“I thought you said we weren’t going to have any more secrets between us.”

“Let me have this little one for a while. You’ll know soon enough.”

“Is it at least something good?”

“I think so,” he said, refusing to say anything else.

I decided to let it pass. If I were being honest, I had a secret of my own that I had no intention of ever telling Brand about: Malcolm’s unexpected visit while I was showering. Brand could have his little secret, and I would keep mine for as long as I could.

“I’ve got a question for you,” he said. “Where’s the most romantic place you can think of?”

“Gosh, I don’t know. Paris was nice. There were a lot of couples there who seemed to really enjoy it.”

Brand’s brow creased. “When were you in Paris?”

“Do you remember that Sunday I spent with Malcolm?”

“He took you to Paris?”

“Well, he took me to Venice first, but I told him I didn’t like the water. Then he took me to the Eiffel Tower and gave me a tour of Paris.”

“Where else did he take you?”

“He took me to see a pyramid he said he helped build. And then he took me to his house in Hawaii.”

“Is that all?” Brand asked in a tense voice.

“Yes, that’s all.”

The frown on Brand’s face almost made me laugh. I could tell he was disappointed he hadn’t been the first one to take me on a whirlwind date. I didn’t like seeing him upset, though. I took his free hand off his lap and held it tight.

“Don’t look like that. You know there’s nowhere in the world I’d rather be than with you.”

“I know, Lilly. It’s just that I wanted to be the first one who showed you those things.”

“We’ll have plenty of other firsts to share with each other,” I promised him.

He couldn’t help but smile at my subtle reminder.

“True. At least he won’t be the first one to see you with all your clothes off.”

I involuntarily tensed.

“Lilly?” I could hear the disbelief clearly in Brand’s voice, and cursed myself for being so easy to read. “He hasn’t seen you naked, has he?”

I couldn’t lie. I just couldn’t. I desperately
wanted
to. Why couldn’t I just say no and try to mean it? But I knew he would see right through a lie.

“He was in the bathroom this morning when I was about to step out of the shower.” I said it so fast I wasn’t sure if he’d heard it clearly.

Apparently he did. Brand took his hand out of mine and gripped the steering wheel so tight I thought he was going to break it in two.

“Please don’t be mad,” I begged.

He looked over at me, and I could see it was too late. He was already mad.

“I’m not mad at you. I’m mad at that overstuffed imbecile you insist on keeping as a friend.”

“Please, don’t do anything to him. He’s just a big kid sometimes. I swear he’s worse than some of the teenage boys I went to high school with, but he does care about me.”

“I’m fully aware of the fact that he cares for you, Lilly,” Brand said, trying to keep his temper under control. “But he’s not getting off the hook as easily as you want.”

“What are you going to do?”

“He won’t be hurt permanently, if that’s what you’re concerned about.”