Red’s heavy arm dropped across Piper’s shoulders. “Mom. This is a surprise. I very obviously did not know you were coming.”
The woman was trim and polished, dressed in a coordinating outfit of wine-colored wool that set off her sleek white bob nicely. She was also sporting a scowl that could probably turn unwary innocents to stone. Piper guessed that explained where Red had gotten his from.
Mrs. MacLellan’s eyes ran quickly over Piper, then just as rapidly dismissed her. “Yes, I see that,” she commented.
“This is my friend Piper. Piper, my mother, Gina MacLellan.”
Piper gripped the back of Red’s shirt and stuck out a hand, “It’s a pleasure to meet you.”
Mrs. MacLellan smiled thinly and looked like she might be concerned about contamination.
Piper continued nervously, “You must be so proud of Red. He’s so smart and—” she stumbled. Sexy? Commanding? “—accomplished.” Yes, that was an adjective fit to use on his mother.
Red snorted under his breath and muttered, “Seriously?”
Piper pinched his back. “And his work with PKM’s foundation must make you proud, too. He’s changing so many lives,” she enthused. She took a deep breath, preparing to elaborate, when the other woman held up a hand to cut her off.
“As is expected of him. Naturally, he has many other responsibilities, too—to the company, to the community, and to his family as well. Padraig must carefully balance his obligations if we expect him to remain successful.”
“Naturally,” Piper agreed. She was beginning to see why Red had felt the need to warn her.
His mother continued, “Padraig surrounds himself with excellent advisors, of course. That way, if one part of his life upsets the balance and other areas begin to suffer, those advisors can steer him back on course. It works very well.”
Red murmured, “What the fuck?”
Piper opened her mouth to attempt some response to that Machiavellian spiel, but Red squeezed her shoulder, willing her into silence.
“Well, that was very…instructive,” he drawled. “I can only assume you include yourself on that list of advisors. Otherwise, why make the effort to explain it to Piper within two seconds of meeting her?” He released Piper and began to advance on the other woman. “Or, maybe you only meant to warn her that you won’t let her take over my life. Was that it?”
“Padraig, don’t be silly,” Gina huffed.
Red had a hand on his mother’s back and was steering her firmly toward the door. “Regardless, Piper and I have plans for the evening. So, if there was nothing else…?”
His mother sputtered in indignation, but when Red snatched her purse off the console in the foyer and handed it to her, she accepted it regally. In moments, he had the front door flung wide, his mother hustled over the threshold, and was pressing the elevator’s call button.
“Do you need me to walk you downstairs?” he asked. “Or is Dad waiting for you?”
“Well, yes, he is. But I—” she attempted.
“Oh, one more thing.”
Piper crept closer, curious about what he’d say.
“What?”
“My key, Mom.” Red held out his hand, unwavering and insistent.
“Red.” Gina’s manicured hand dug lazily around inside her gold leather satchel. “I don’t know why you’re being like this.” She darted a quick, scathing look over his shoulder that said she had a pretty good idea, though, then dropped her angry gaze back to the interior of her purse.
“I’m sure you can figure it out if you think hard enough. Stop stalling,” Red grumbled.
“Honestly. You’re being ridiculous. What if there was an emergency or you got locked out?”
Red plunged his large hand into his mother’s bag and efficiently withdrew her keychain, then worked his house key off the silver ring a moment later. Mrs. MacLellan stood there red-faced, watching him in consternation.
Fury was rolling off the woman like heat waves rising from a summer street. Piper moved further back into Red’s apartment, stepping behind the open door and out of sight of his mother.
As first impressions went, she didn’t think this had been the slam-dunk she would’ve wanted. For either of them.
The elevator, like so much else in the world, obeyed Red’s command quickly. When Piper heard the metal door clang open, she risked a peek.
Red ushered his mother into the cage, waved farewell, and stepped back toward his apartment before she could even finish her goodbye.
Piper briefly met the woman’s eyes—the woman’s glare—through the accordion-style gate, and then the elevator car began its slow descent. Red came in and swung his door shut without any apparent guilt or mercy.
For lack of a better option, Piper inquired weakly, “We have plans?”
“We do now,” he retorted.
RED BROUGHT HER to a tiny dumpling house a few blocks away and launched his campaign over dinner. Red had obviously been ruminating on Piper’s house situation all day—long enough to think up all kinds of logical reasons why he should be allowed to take care of things.
But honestly—they’d only known each other a few weeks. He might think that made it okay for him to stick his nose and his wallet into her business, but Piper did not.
Red was as tenacious as a dog with a bone, though. Exasperatingly so.
He explained to her, patiently and calmly, “Listen, I clearly have an excess of money. I might even have a bit of influence. If I can take some things off your plate with the judicious application of either of those things, of course I want to.”
“Why of course?” Piper prodded. “I’m perfectly capable of handling what has to get done. I told you that. By pushing your offer, you’re implying that you don’t think I’m up to it.”
“I’m not implying that at all,” he argued. “I just want to help.”
“But why?”
Red sighed, his equanimity faltering in the face of her stubbornness. “Piper, you have to understand—before I met you, I may as well have been on autopilot. I was walking around New York living this two-dimensional, black-and-white life. But meeting you changed that. You brought in life, and air. And…” he set down his chopsticks and threw up his hands. “…if you would just let me take care of some of this stuff for you in return, I’d really, really appreciate it.”
“Okay, Sleeping Beauty, look—you know I don’t expect payment for accidentally being the one to rip you out of your flat and boring stupor, right?” Piper rolled her eyes.
Red smirked. “What if I paid in kisses?”
“Well…” Damn, he had her there. Red was an excellent kisser. “Maybe a kiss.”
“Maybe two. And then let me take care of those pipes for you. Please?”
“You think I don’t want to? That I’m not tempted?” Piper demanded. “Believe me, letting someone else take care of this stuff sounds awesome. But you told me yourself that women hit on you for your money all the time. So, if I let you do this and it makes you think for even one minute that it’s why I care about you, then I’m going to keep turning you down, Red.”
His protest was immediate. “I don’t think that about you, at all. I won’t think that.”
“What about other people, then? What about your mother, or the other authors at Trident? The minute they find out you’re fixing up my house, people are going to talk. They’re going to call me a gold digger and say I’m sleeping my way to the top.”
Red snarled, “No. They will think that I am taking good care of my woman.”
“Don’t be naïve,” Piper scoffed.
“You let me buy you shoes.” Like that made any sense.
“I didn’t let you do anything! You steamrolled me!” Piper cried. The cooks behind the counter peered at her through the haze of steam rising from their woks, and she lowered her voice. “Besides, shoes are way different than renovating a freaking house.”
Red reached for her hands. “Piper, why do you care what anyone else thinks, anyway?
”
“Because once they start saying it often enough, once you start hearing it often enough, maybe you do start believing it. Maybe you will decide they’re right and that I only like you for your spending power.”
Red scratched his chin. “Just to clarify—who is ‘they’ again?”
Piper pressed her lips together. She didn’t need to dignify that—it was completely beside the point.
“If I lost everything tomorrow, would you still want me?” he wondered. There was just the tiniest hint of uncertainty in his voice.
Piper’s whole being went soft at the rare glimpse of vulnerability. “You know I would. Don’t be silly.”
He snorted. “Christ. Knowing you, you’d probably want me more.”
“Probably. You would certainly be less complicated.”
“True.” Red leaned across the table and planted a lingering, salty kiss on her lips. “And I would want you,” he murmured. “No matter what.”
“Why thank you. But let’s hope it doesn’t come to that.”
“Piper, just so you know…I think I’m going to want you permanently someday.”
Piper’s breath snagged suddenly and uncomfortably in her lungs. Red forestalled her impending panic with a placating hand.
“Not yet,” he said. “I get that’s it’s way too soon to say shit like that. But I hope, when the time does come, that you’ll trust me enough to choose me.”
“God, Red,” was all she could say.
He barreled on, dogged and determined. “Even if you don’t, I still want to do this thing for you. Let me.”
“I’ll think about it,” Piper finally sighed, sitting back. She looked him over and shook her head at his triumphant expression. “You’re very persistent, you know that?”
“It might have been mentioned a time or two,” he grinned. “But I don’t see how that’s relevant.”
Piper nibbled on her last dumpling while she decided whether to bring up the other large elephant in the room.
Red wasn’t fooled in the least. “Go ahead,” he prodded, crossing his arms sedately across his chest and stretching one long leg out beside her chair. “Say it.”
“About your mother,” she began.
He chuckled, good-natured despite his earlier frustration with the woman. Because he was in such a good mood, Piper elected to skip over why his mom would barge into his home uninvited, why she would come out swinging with a person she’d only just met, and why she’d be so territorial about her grown-ass son.
Piper went for the low-hanging fruit, instead.
“So…does your mom always call you Padraig, or only when she’s pissed?”
Red squeezed his eyes closed and groaned, a drawn-out and deeply-felt sound of suffering.
Piper pressed on. “How’d you get saddled with an unusual name like that, anyway? Why not name you Patrick? Or—I don’t know—Bob?”
“Bob?” His eyes popped open in disbelief.
“Okay, maybe not Bob.”
Red laughed, explaining, “It’s a family name. You’ll be happy to hear that both my dad and my grandfather are Padraigs, too.” He rose and took her hand. They wandered out into the cool night air, where a knot of people stood listening to a lanky boy drumming on an overturned bucket for tips. Red took her hand and headed back toward his building.
“Jesus. On top of everything else, you’re a third, too?” Piper sputtered.
“No! God, no. That would be insane.”
“More insane than three Padraigs in a row?”
“Well, we all have different middle names,” he clarified. “Grandpa was James, Dad is Michael, and I’m Keith. Plus, my grandfather went by Paddy and my father usually goes by Pat. I can’t imagine how I got stuck with Red, though.”
On the stone steps of his building, Piper turned to run her fingers reverently through his soft auburn waves. “Such a mystery,” she said.
Red leaned into her touch and nearly purred.
“Your grandpa was the one who started PKM, right? Did he name the company after you? Or did you just change the name when you took over?”
“He named it after me. I was the first grandkid.” Red led her inside, then leaned a shoulder against the wall of mailboxes while they waited for the elevator. “It’s a good thing I went into the family business, though, right? Might’ve gotten awkward if I’d gone off to be a rock star or something.”
“Oh, I don’t know,” Piper mused. “He could’ve just told people PKM stood for something else.”
He arched a brow. “Like what?”
“How about…People Keep Meowing?”
He flashed a devilish grin and backed her into the empty elevator. “I think I like Please Kiss Me better.”
“Aw. That’s sweet. Better than your initials, even.”
“Can you refrain from pointing that out to all the people I’m trying to terrify into submission, please?” He took Piper into his arms and ruffled her hair while they soared upward. “As it turns out, sweet is not actually very good for business.”
“It is if you’re a bakery,” she retorted.
“Anyway. There’s a picture of the big event. You want to see it?”
“Are you kidding? Of course, I want to see it.”
Red let her into his loft. Then he sauntered over to a long mahogany sideboard, rifled through a drawer, and produced a photo. Piper gazed down at the black-and-white publicity shot of two smiling men in suits, a laughing baby held high between them.
Red pointed, “I’m the handsome devil in the footie pajamas.”
“Oh, look at you,” she breathed, taking in his flushed round cheeks and big baby eyes. “You should probably wear that outfit to all your meetings. No one would deny you a thing.”
He chuckled. “I’ll look into. Sizing could be an issue, though.”
“Only if you’re a quitter.” Piper squinted at the older men, noting the similarities to Red in both their faces and stances. “Is your grandfather still alive?”
“No, we lost him a few years back, unfortunately.”
“But you still have your Dad?”
“Yes. He is quite alive and very much enjoying his retirement. He’s made an art form out of delivering vague, yet benevolent, advice. And he manages to escort my mother to every charity event in town without strangling her, so that’s something.”
Red tucked the photo back in its drawer, then drew Piper over to the hard, white sofa.
“Tell me something about you, now,” he said settling down. “How’d you snag a name like ‘Piper Mae’?”
“God only knows,” she said. “I sound like a hillbilly, don’t I?”
“I like it. It’s cute.”
Piper groaned.
“Okay, then tell me how you came by a pen name so different from your real name?”
This time her smile came easily. “It sounds like something right out of Romance Marketing, doesn’t it?”
“Yes. It’s not?”
“Nope. It’s my grandma’s middle name and maiden name. Too perfect to pass up, right?”
“I’ll say. I hope she at least lived long enough to enjoy the notoriety.”
“Are you kidding? She’s 92 and the most popular woman in her retirement community. I think she milks the name thing every chance she gets, too. Look.” Piper got up to retrieve her phone and scroll through her photos, finally brandishing the one she wanted: her glamorous, pint-sized grandma, in large black sunglasses and a gold scarf with six-inch fringe.
“Oh, man. She looks tiny.”
“Only in stature.”
“What’s her first name?”
“Teresa. I almost used that, too, but my mom put her foot down. I guess she wanted to make sure Grandma could stay anonymous if the kissing book thing went south for me.”
“Little did she know,” he said.
Piper shrugged.
“Does she live near you?” Red looked up and met her eyes. “Maybe I could meet her.”
“She’s in Florida
,” she explained. “If you want to meet her, you’ll have to bring your appetite, your swim trunks, and a whole lot of sunscreen.”
“Done and done.”
SIXTEEN
RED’S ROCK-SOLID PLAN the next day accounted for many things—the crisp autumn weather, the changing leaves in the park, and his girlfriend’s healthy morning appetite. His meticulous planning was utterly useless, however, in the face of Piper’s unwavering ability to do the unexpected. Consequently, Red’s Sunday had really gone from bad to worse.
They’d checked Piper out of her hotel first thing, then moved her stuff to his place. She was completely on board with the brunch plan and the subsequent walk in the park, and even suggested a trip to Chelsea Market once they were done. But then Piper had gotten a surprise call in the car, and before Red knew it, she was apologizing profusely and making different plans.
Some author friend of hers had heard she was in town. So, Red had to fix an understanding smile on his mug and pack Piper off to enjoy a museum with someone else, in place of spending her last day together as he’d planned. Piper was supposed to fly back home the next morning.
Instead of wallowing, Red shopped for their last dinner at the bodega down the street. He threw in a load of laundry, and while he waited for the cycle to finish, he stewed about that horrible run-in they’d had with his mother.
He had to call six locksmiths before he found one that would come out immediately. The asshole took one look around Red’s place and informed him that he’d be charging triple time for the weekend work—but that annoyance barely registered once the work was done.
It was the bitter fight with his mother afterward that made the real impression. She’d tried to barge in again and been incensed to discover that Red had changed the locks on her so quickly. His mom had truly lost her mind, then—it made her nastiness with Piper look like a fucking tea party.
Tough shit. Dropping in unannounced on your thirty-six-year-old son was a move better left to the soap operas on TV. Red just wished she hadn’t been so quick to blame it all on Piper.
Nevertheless, shutting her down had been easy. It was way harder to shed his pissy mood after it was all over. Even though Piper checked in occasionally, it was usually to tell Red that she was staying out with her friend longer.
The Titan Was Tall (Triple Threat Book 1) Page 17
