Miss Behave (The Anderson Family Series Book 1)

by Traci Highland

  “Yeah, I’ve seen them.” I turn off the water and the cat hisses and bounds out of the room.

  “Should we call the police?” She asks and I shrug, my throat dry.

  “It can’t hurt.”

  I pick up the phone, cat sitting on my ankles, and call the local police. “Hi, this is Piper Anderson over on Bee Pond Rd. I’d like to file a report of a suspicious vehicle driving by the house.”

  “Do you know the people in the vehicle?” The gruff, I-haven’t-slept-in-a-week kind of voice says on the other end of the line.

  “No.”

  “Have the people in the vehicle threatened you in any way?”

  I stare at Gen, who shakes her head. “No, they haven’t.”

  “Have they trespassed onto your property at any time?”

  “No.”

  “Ma’am, it’s not a crime to drive down the street. What I need you to do is to get their license number, a physical description of the people in the car, and take down a record of day and time of each sighting. That way, if they ever do threaten you or trespass, we have an established history. But until they do something other than drive, there is nothing we can do.”

  I thank him and hang up, then turn to Gen, “Well, that’s that.”

  Work. I should be writing. Or editing. Or researching. Or, you know, something. Instead, I’m staring at the screen, reading about how to get cats to stop peeing on carpets and checking my phone for updates about Ted.

  I down my second cup of coffee and turn my focus to something that’s really been bugging me: where exactly dad has been running off to every weekend. I’m sure if I poke around a bit I can find out. He’s staying in my house, right? So it’s not like I’m snooping, not really.

  Mom’s warning about being careful around Dad has been on constant replay in the back of my mind, so it’s best if I just find out what he’s up to and put my sense of unease to rest once and for all.

  The Google search of dad turns up nothing except a series of features he’s done for National Geographic and the Smithsonian.

  Gen walks by and places a small blue envelope on my desk. It has my name on the front but has no return address.

  The card inside has a nineteen-fifties style picture of Wonder Woman on the front as she zooms off to rescue some unfortunate soul. The inside has a little note:

  Save me from a dull lunch? I’m not sure why you ran off on Friday, but whatever it is, it will sound better over a quesadilla. Can you meet me at Felipe’s at one?

  -Hunter

  My insides go all soft and mushy and this is ridiculous. I pull out my phone and text him.

  You know, you could have just texted me.

  I hit send and wait. Why didn’t he call me back on Sunday? Now he just expects me to go to lunch with him like we didn’t do the suck face and then ditch thing.

  My phone buzzes:

  Cards are more romantic.

  The room spins. Romantic? Oh my-

  The phone buzzes again.

  That and I dropped my phone in the toilet Sunday (long story- involves a dog) and I wasn’t able to get a new one until this morning.

  Oh. Well, I guess that explains the lack of returned texts.

  I text back:

  Why didn’t you just stick the phone in a bag of rice?

  He buzzes:

  Does that really work? I thought that was a myth.

  I reply:

  Yes, it really works.

  He texts back:

  My mother is dating and I need a drink. Are you having lunch with me or not?

  A thrill rushes through to the tips of my fingers as I type:

  Do you want me to?

  He responds:

  Yes, that’s why I asked.

  Wam pow zing goes my heart. I type:

  OK.

  He responds:

  That’s a bit less enthusiasm than I hoped for, but okay…

  I type:

  Yes, Hunter. I would love to. See you at one.

  Oh my God, that she-beast of a mother of his is actually dating someone? What kind of self-deprecating loser would fall into that bear trap?

  Wait, is this a date? Oh my wow, I hope it’s a date. Lunch is perfect, not too formal, not really like a date-date but sort of like a-

  No. This can’t be a date. Neon lights flash behind my eyes. Boss. Not a date. Keep your panties on. Just work.

  “What’s with you and the phone, girl? Don’t you have a profile of some honors student due at noon?” Gen places an iced coffee on my desk and fake-glowers.

  “Yes.”

  I click through to check my office email, sipping the coffee.

  Oh! I have an email from the Chicago Sentinel. I take a steadying breath and then open it and my eyes skim the words, processing the information as I go. An interview. With me. For the job.

  I spit my coffee out on my desk and leap from the chair. Oh my gosh! I text my whole crew the news, including Dad, hoping he’ll be proud.

  The interview is next Thursday by Skype.

  My phone buzzes with all the congratulatory texts and I almost forget all about the honors student profile I’m supposed to write.

  I grab my fact sheet on the kid and write up the puff piece, fitting in a photograph of the kid as well as an image of the high school along with the cut and credit lines. I upload it all and then run off to the bathroom to give my make-up a post-coffee update.

  Felipe’s isn’t far, so I pull on my new leather gloves and peacoat and decide to just walk the six blocks. Mom texted to say that Ted is doing well and should be released in a few days. I give him a quick call to tell him that I love him and hum as I walk down the street. It’s a beautiful crisp day, full of soft fall sunshine and a crystalline sky, might as well sneak a quick walk in while I can.

  My boots clack on the sidewalk as I pass the antique stores and coffee shops and clothes boutiques that surround the town green. The center stage of the green is crawling with school kids having a picnic with their teacher, and the sound of laughter mingles with the scents of burning leaves and roasting peanuts from the candy shop across the way.

  I’ll miss Pendleton Falls, when it’s time to go. The realization slows my pace as I click my way down the street lined with jewel-toned trees. Hunter stands in front of Felipe’s in a blazer and a dark green scarf that brings out his eyes. He swipes his hair out of his forehead when he sees me and his face blossoms into this amazing smile that sucks my breath away.

  “You look great.” He opens his arms and hugs me, pulling me in for a kiss on the cheek. The touch of his soft lips and slight stubble combine with his dark, earthy scent and I melt. Melt, I tell you. I stare into his eyes and want to say something but all I can do is stare. Stare like a fish. Blub, blub, blub.

  He gallantly chooses not to notice my momentary lapse in conscious thought and he ushers me inside.

  Felipe’s is one of those small-town staples. An old Victorian storefront updated using reclaimed barn wood and antique iron fixtures. The menu is local and hearty with a mash-up of old-New England favorites and modern Mexican. It sounds odd until you try it, but trust me, the Shepherd’s Pie with black beans and corn posole is not to be missed.

  We sit and take off our coats. The host, Aaron, gets our drink order and we look at each other over the top of the menu. “It’s funny,” I say. “Gennifer and I come here for lunch a lot and I don’t think we’ve ever run into you here.”

  “No, I typically have them deliver lunch to the office. I hate to have to stop what I’m doing just to eat.”

  “Really? I practically run away from my desk when it’s lunchtime.”

  He laughs. “I think it’s just that I’m lazy. Putting everything back in a way that would let me pick up where I left off takes too much effort.”

  “Sounds more workaholic than lazy, if you ask me.”

  “You say tomato…” He grins and asks, “White okay for lunch?”

  “White?”

  “Wine, Piper. I’m ta
king you out to lunch, and since I am drowning out the thought of my mother involved in another sure-to-be-disastrous relationship, I think we should have some wine.”

  “Wine is great, just don’t tell my boss.” I tease, gently kicking his foot under the table.

  “That jerk?” His grin is hot, wild and wide and lethal. “Never.” He motions to the waitress and orders a bottle, asking me if the vintage he picks sounds good, like he thinks I would actually know the difference between a thirty dollar bottle of wine and the stuff that comes in a box.

  She brings back the wine and she pours him a bit to try, he tastes it, nods, and has her pour us both a glass before resting the wine in a cooler by the side of the table. I take a sip. Wow, is that good. It’s fruity and clean and tastes like summer. “That’s amazing.”

  “It’s one of my favorites.” He rubs my foot with his beneath the table and sparks shoot up my leg and my breath catch. Our eyes meet and the look in his eyes promises all kinds of things. Naughty, fabulous, unspeakable things. I swallow and grab my fork.

  Which is bad, because I have no food.

  Dropping the fork, I grab the base of the wine glass, and his foot slides up the side of my boot.

  Hot, so hot, oh my, what is he doing? I don’t think I’ve ever done the footsie thing before. Thank goodness for tablecloths. Long, drape-y tablecloths that can hide the fact that we’re acting like a couple of teenagers.

  Unfortunately, the tablecloth doesn’t do anything to stifle the heat rising up my neck from beneath my sweater. Sipping the wine again, I sneak a peek up at his face and the dark hair and green eyes and chiseled jaw make me sweat. The kind of mad hotness that Hunter has should only be allowed in movie stars and other men that are completely unlikely to sit across a table from us girls in the real world.

  Seriously. I’m supposed to concentrate while looking at that?

  The menu, Piper, look at the menu. Not the eyes. Not the full, delicious lips, and definitely not the neck, the neck that slopes down and comes to that little spot at the base, that little spot that looks so soft and so luscious, the spot that I bet would tremble if I kissed it-

  “Piper?” Hunter’s eyes are narrowed with concern.

  Hold on, did I miss-

  “Do you want to hear our specials again or are you ready to order?” The waitress smiles at me but I see the confusion in her eyes. Every time I come into Felipe’s I order as soon as I put in my drink request, because, well, when you go to the same restaurant every Wednesday for six months, you sort of know the menu by heart.

  So the fact that I am rendered speechless by a swoony neck and tight ass is as unacceptable as it is mortifying.

  The waitress’s round, hedgehog-like face buckles in with worry and I say, “Oh my gosh, Gladys, I’m sorry. No, no need for the specials. I’ll have the tortellini.” But that has garlic pesto. Garlic equals stinky girl equals bad for dates, even iffy dates. “No, wait!”

  She turns, eyebrows up. Hunter blinks.

  “I changed my mind, I’ll have the salmon.”

  The salmon is served with some sort of fruit sauce and has no garlic, to sabotage whatever on earth this is.

  Lunch. This is lunch.

  With a hot friend.

  Who is also my boss.

  Who is crazy hot.

  And rubbing my foot again.

  I am going to melt dead away.

  He orders steak and we talk. We don’t talk kissing, or working, but TV shows and movies.

  “So, I hear your column about the game Friday night was a big hit. Got something like three hundred comments. Also that piece about the New Canaan Cassanova was golden. Do you really think that there is a man going around the tri-state area romancing women out of their money?” Hunter says and Gladys brings us our salads.

  “Yes, I do. The police seem to think that they are all isolated incidents but there are too many coincidences to not make a connection between the cases. And that’s only the cases reported to the police.”

  “You sound excited.” He teases, gently knocking my foot to the side beneath the tablecloth. Swoon, sigh, purr.

  “Yup. Pretty old-school, huh?”

  “Very old-school, but you’re missing the bigger picture, here, Piper.”

  “Really, what is that?”

  “That you have a gift. Whether its writing about sports or investigative pieces, you’re really quite good at this.”

  I shrug, the heat from his compliment sitting low and hot in my belly. “Yeah, but it’s not like it’s real. I mean, it’s not like it’s really something important, you know? It’s not a war, not some life and death kind of reporting, it’s just for fun.”

  “Sure, but people need stories like yours. People need things to help ground them when all of the life and death things are happening. I’d say it’s a pretty important calling.”

  “Says the man who designs gold bracelets.”

  “That doesn’t make what I’m saying any less true.”

  I sigh, looking down at my salad. “It’s just, have you ever set these expectations for yourself that you know you’ll regret not measuring up to? No one ever looks at me with the crazy hair and the-“

  “Unicorn fetish?”

  “I’m trying to be serious, here.”

  “I’m sorry, go on.”

  “It’s just everyone has always underestimated me. I felt like I was constantly having to prove not just that I was good enough to make it to the top of the class, but that I deserved a spot in the room.”

  “I fear for the man who writes you off.”

  “You should.” I take a sip of my wine.

  “All I was trying to say is that your sports reporting is also outstanding, and that you seem to have a real passion for it.”

  “Thank you.”

  He holds up his glass is a salute.

  His eyes widen and he chokes out a cough.

  "Are you okay?" I ask, reaching across the table towards him.

  He pats his chest and attempts to play it cool, but something has clearly just upset him. I turn around in my chair to see what it is he is looking at.

  Dear sweet Lord, it’s his mother. That nasty she-beast is just outside the entrance. My fingertips go numb.

  She walks into the restaurant the way she enters every room, like a jewel-studded peacock, full of herself and all of her radiant glory and that sneery, peacock eye.

  I comb my fingers through the base of my curls and my hands automatically move to straighten my skirt.

  Her smile sits rather uncomfortably in the lines of her jaw, like a lone piece of blue sky in a sea of storm clouds. Her dress shimmers even in the indoor lighting as it falls perfectly over her slim frame and she holds her head in her trademark position of superiority. I think she’s had it chiseled from pure granite, cold an unyielding, but still beautiful.

  Hunter looks down at the table. "I'm so sorry, I had no idea she’d be coming here for lunch."

  "Maybe if we sit quietly and look down at our plates she won't notice us." Wait, I remember Betty once telling me that even if a guy doesn't speak well of his mother, that you should never ever join in or agree. Because when it comes to a girl or his mama, the girl is always going to lose. It's just nature's way or something.

  His mother is standing at the hostess station now. Her back turned, talking to the man behind her. I can't make him out, but he definitely seems to have her attention for the time being. We don't have a long to figure out how to avoid interacting with her highness, though, as no hostess in their right mind would leave that woman waiting for long.

  "She’s going to give you a hard time, Piper. And that's not at all what I wanted for this lunch. Just the opposite, in fact."

  "What was it that you wanted to get from this lunch, exactly?"

  “I wanted to convince you to have dinner with me on Friday. And to apologize for not returning your text on Sunday. I should have found a way to have contacted you. Borrowed a phone or something. It was unacceptable and I wa
nted you to know that it wouldn't happen again."

  My girl parts curl up and swoon. It’s his eyes, those stupid, sincere eyes, they make me lap up every word like some overeager puppy. "Oh."

  Hunter holds out his hands to motion for the waitress, but it's too late. Gladys approaches the table just as the hostess pulls two menus from the stand and leads Hunter's mother and the man into the restaurant.

  And directly into our path.

  “Down, let’s look down, now,” I grab Hunter’s hand across the table and squeeze it as we both hold our eyes on our plates.

  This is silly. His hand wrapped tight around mine, I bite my lower lip as his mother approaches. She’s at twenty feet. Hunter takes a deep breath. Ten feet. My lower lip pinches under my teeth. Oh my gosh I’m going to laugh. I’m going to lose it and burst into-

  “Piper!”

  I look up. “Dad?”

  There, right there in front of me, is my father. Smiling and jovial and holding the hand of Hunter’s mother.

  “What are you doing?” I shriek, rising up out of my chair.

  “He’s your father?” The look on Hunter’s face is what I would best describe as stunned, but not like good-stunned, more like aghast-stunned.

  “What do you mean what am I doing?” Dad drops the hand of the she-beast and pulls me into a hug, sending my napkin off my lap and coasting to the floor. “I’m having lunch, Babygirl. Oh, sweetheart, have you met Samantha? Bunny, this is my daughter, Piper.”

  Bunny? Tell me he didn’t just call her Bunny!

  I’m going to be sick.

  She-beast’s face blanches, the exact same way that her son’s blanches, and at the exact same time.

  Horror all-round, it seems. She shakes it off and holds out her hand, “Yes, how sweet. I believe we’ve met before. You’re just darling, aren’t you?”

  She says darling the way some people say excrement, but Dad remains pleasantly oblivious to the tension in the room and beams as I give her hand a squeeze. “Yes,” I say, because really, what else am I going to say. Hey, she-beast, unhand my father, doesn’t seem terribly polite, given the circumstances.

  Hunter nods at his mother, and she snaps, “This is a working lunch, I assume, Hunter.”