Page 71 of The Sweetest Return
Dre recovered first, reaching the table with a smile for his family before his eyes returned to me. “You sitting with us?”
“Your mother kidnapped me.”
“I figured.”
“She didn’t even let me finish the objection.”
“You wasted your breath trying.”
Mrs. Jones looked at her son. “I can hear you.”
“I know.”
He leaned down to kiss her cheek, then clasped his father’s hand and pulled him into a brief hug. Something inside me softened watching him. Dre had always loved his parents openly. Fame had not changed that. Money hadn’t either.
When he took the chair beside me, his shoulder brushed mine.
The contact was brief.
My body still took it personally.
“You look beautiful,” he said quietly.
Beautiful carried more charge than good ever could.
I looked down at the place setting because apparently I needed assistance acting normal. “Thank you.”
“You welcome.”
I glanced at him.
He smiled.
“Don’t start,” I said.
“I ain’t do nothing.”
“You look very pleased with yourself.”
“I’m sitting beside a beautiful woman in a tux. Life decent.”
I laughed despite myself, and dinner started before he could make it worse.
For a while, the table moved easily around us. Mrs. Jones asked how I was settling into Pittsburgh, and Mr. Jones listened closely while I explained Saint Aurelia, his questions practical in a way that told me he understood business from the ground up.
Danielle told me her daughter had developed opinions about lip gloss, then asked if I remembered all those afternoons she used to sit between my knees while I braided her hair, talking about how she wanted to wear makeup but Mrs. Jones wasn’t having it.
Across the room, Camille had somehow ended up at the bar with Malcolm, her face angled toward his while she looked annoyed enough for old history to be sitting nearby with a drink of its own.
Beside me, Dre leaned closer. “You saw that too?”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“Liar.”
I smiled into my water.
The program began before either of us could make more trouble.
