“Hello, Mrs. Mason,” Cody said as kindly as he could manage while trying to extract himself from her grip. “You outdid yourself with the decorations.”
She waved her very tan hand, complete with Day-Glo green nails, flippantly. “That was all my husband. He wanted everything to be just right for Donna. Thinks he can impress her.”
Donna’s father dipped his head shyly. For a moment, he looked like a very tall version of Kyle, with his hair masking his round face. Once upon a time, she thought, her father had been very handsome. Life had kicked him hard enough that she forgot it now and then. “I just wanted it to look good.”
Liz rolled her heavily made-up eyes. “Robert, she’s never gonna think it looks good. She goes to those fancy restaurants all the time. The kind where they charge you a hundred bucks to park your ass.”
“That’s not true,” Donna broke in. “I am really looking forward to this. I brought wine and cookies. I didn’t know how many were going to be here, so I got two bottles of wine and a few dozen cookies.”
“Oh,” her mother said, her hand still lashed around Cody’s wrist. “Well, I guess that will have to do.”
“It’ll be fine,” Robert said firmly, giving his wife a sidelong glance. Donna wondered if he noted the way she was holding on to Cody too. “Why don’t you go see about the steaks?”
Liz huffed once, loudly. “Well, it’s heavy. How about Cody helps me?”
Cody gave his arm another tug, this one hard enough that Liz had to let go unless she wanted to look like a complete idiot. “Unless there is something that Donna needs me to do?”
It was well played, Donna thought. He had, without being blunt about it, said that he would do what Donna wanted first and everything else second. It was all polite enough to keep her mother from making a scene.
“I’ll go help my mom with the steaks if you wanna get the rest of the stuff out of the car.”
“Well,” he said with a grin, “it is my car.”
“Fine,” her mother said, clearly not happy. She swirled away in a flutter of teal fabric and sparkles, tromping inside. Donna suddenly realized where Kyle might be getting his dramatic exits from.
It wasn’t the first time her mother had been inappropriate toward one of Donna’s friends, and Donna was pretty sure it wasn’t going to be the last time. Liz Mason loved attention, in any way that she could get it.
The house had been cleaned up. The smell of Lysol and Windex clung to every available surface. Some of the party goers had crowded inside, taking up the sofa and dining chairs. No one sat in the La-Z-Boy. It made Donna smile to know that everyone was aware of which chair was off-limits.
She recognized some of the faces. Mr. and Mrs. Peterson from two doors down—they owned a bakery on the edge of town. Donna wondered if they had brought cookies too. The Petersons made excellent cookies. Old Man Phillips, who had been living in his trailer since he’d returned from the war with a bad leg and half of his hearing, was parked on the sofa, a beer in his gnarled and age-spotted hands. He was currently regaling the group with the story of the tank. She’d heard it before.
“It was hot as hell, let me tell you. Hot and wet at the same time. Not like home, no sir!” He waved his beer in an arc toward the whole of Nevada. “And that whole night, the whole time, I tell ya, we were under attack. So, rain was coming down from above, and shots were coming from two different directions, and not a one of us had slept in two nights. I was tired, loopy kind of tired, so I climbed into our tank and I just… drove right out into that ugly rain-covered jungle and blasted the sniper who had us pinned down.”
His laugh was as loud as a storm and crackled like brittle paper.
Next to him was Will Arnold, who had been to Iraq and thought that made him a hero. Sure, there were plenty of great soldiers who had done incredible things. Will wasn’t one of them. The moment that Old Man Phillips stopped talking, he immediately began talking about the time where he had to stack garbage to lure dogs in with. It was a less great story.
There was Mandy Taylor who had four kids, and, if Donna was judging right, would have another in a few months. She was leaning against the edge of the couch with child number three perched on her hip. The other was dangled on Mr. Peterson’s knee.
“Can I get you anything, Mr. Phillips?” Mandy asked, her voice as gentle and sweet as a spring. Donna had known Mandy way back when. She was a few years younger, and therefore not a friend, but Donna had always thought of her as good-hearted.
“Another beer, sweetheart,” he said, passing over an empty. Mandy turned and Donna reevaluated just how soon that new baby was coming. She immediately stepped further into the trailer.
“How about you let me?” Donna stepped in and took the beer bottle. “Have a seat. Seriously.”
“Donna?” Mandy asked, her eyes going wide. “Is that you?”
Donna felt all the eyes in the room turn toward her. Curiosity, amusement, and flat-out contempt shined out at her. Most of the contempt was coming from her own mother. It was familiar, and not. It could have been worse.
“Hey, everyone.” Donna gave a wave before depositing the bottle into a container. “Yes, it’s me.”
“Well,” Mandy said, moving forward and giving Donna a warm hug. “You look fantastic. You always did.”
“Thank you, so do you.”
Mandy put a hand over her swollen belly. “Well, at least there is more of me.”
Liz cleared her throat, and Donna tried to hold in a sigh. Mandy squeezed her wrist just enough to get Donna’s attention and gave her a knowing smirk. “It’s okay,” she mouthed. Donna gave her a little nod.
“What can I do to help, Mom?”
Her mother chopped her hand toward the large standing pantry that was tacked on to the end of the counter space. “Get the Solo cups and paper plates. You can take them outside to your father. Or you can get the ice out of the freezer. You didn’t bring more ice, did you?”
“Well, no,” Donna said, reaching for the pantry, “but I wasn’t asked.”
Her mother made a noise somewhere between a snort and a scoff and pulled a box out of the freezer. “You can walk in here with your brand-new man, and wearing your fancy watch, and can’t even bring ice.”
“Jesus, Mom.” Donna tugged the plastic flatware and matching cups out of the cabinet and placed them on the counter. “What is your problem?”
Her mother slapped down a box; whatever was inside rattled ominously. For a long moment, no one, not even Liz Mason, said anything. The tension was thick and uncomfortable as a woolen blanket. Even Old Man Phillips was keeping his mouth shut.
“You want to know?” Her mother’s voice was quiet and hard as ice.
“Yeah, I do.” Donna didn’t want to do this right now, and she certainly didn’t want to do this here. Family arguments were private, unless you were Liz Mason. In her world, every dramatic thing was meant to be done in full view of everyone. It wasn’t worth having an argument unless it meant people would be talking about it for weeks. “I deserve to.”
“Come with me.”
Donna blinked as her mother strutted out of the kitchen and into the bedroom that she and Donna’s father shared. This was different. Once upon a time her mother had thrown a hissy fit over her father buying the wrong soda in the middle of the road so that everyone would hear it. The very idea that Liz was going somewhere semiprivate to have this discussion was the only thing that had her following the path her mother had blazed rather than storming out.
Her mother’s bedroom was the least decorated part of the double-wide, probably because few people came in there. The rest of the house had cheap dollar-store dust catchers and needlepoint pillows. Here the bedspread was plain, the curtains were simple, and there were two dressers, both of which probably belonged to Liz. Her mother was sitting in a small wooden chair stuffed into the farthest corner, tapping a cigarette expertly out of a pack.
Now Donna knew there was trouble. Not just dramatics, but real hone
st-to-God trouble. Her mother did not smoke inside the house. Even when it was raining pellets, Liz Mason would throw on a jacket and hoof it out to the carport to smoke out there. She was very particular about making sure nothing might stain any of her little treasures.
With the practiced motion of a lifelong smoker, Liz popped the cigarette between her lips, tugged a lighter from between her breasts, and turned the tip of the cigarette a bright cherry with just a few quick puffs of her lips. The movements accentuated the lines she’d done her best to hide.
Donna didn’t need to be asked to close the door. She just pushed it closed and stood there, waiting for her mother to drop whatever bomb had brought them in here.
“I don’t hate you,” her mother said. She took a long drag and blew out a perfect ring of smoke. It hung in the air for just a moment before folding in on itself and becoming a cloud of misty gray. “I know we don’t have a lovey relationship. It’s… well, part of it’s me.”
Donna resisted the urge to pinch herself and make sure she hadn’t slipped into a coma somewhere between the kitchen and here. “What?”
Her mother scoffed again, shaking her head and flicking the cigarette ash into a Solo cup that Donna hadn’t realized was there. She dragged her Day-Glo nails through her peroxide hair, and before it had fallen back into place she went on. “I mean it, Donna. I don’t hate you. You were my very first baby. I don’t know that anything shakes up your world quite like that. I mean, there I was, barely twenty years old and fine as hell and swollen tits… and there you were. Tiny as could be with these big damn eyes that just took in the whole world like you couldn’t wait to win it over.”
“Were you scared?” Donna asked.
“Terrified. I wasn’t ready for you, and I didn’t always know how to handle everything that happened. I probably should never have been a mother.”
It was the listless giving up in her voice that had Donna sitting down on the edge of her parents’ bed. “Mom,” she started, but she couldn’t figure out how to end it. The word just hung in the air with the same cloud as her mother’s accumulating cigarette smoke.
“You were the most independent child. Do you know that? Ornery too. Right from the start. You wouldn’t wear socks. You just pulled them off the moment my back was turned and would toss them anywhere. Threw one right on the stove once.”
“I did not.”
Her mother laughed. It was a bright shock of sound that bubbled up from the place where memories lived. “Oh, you very well did. You were sitting in your high chair with this great big smile on your face while I was screeching for your dad to put it out. Singed off my eyebrows.”
“Oh, my God.” Donna shook her head.
“It was an adventure. It wasn’t easy, I’ll never say that it was easy. You had this I-can-do-it-myself attitude that you were never willing to give up on. I remember this one time I was sleeping in—you had just celebrated your third birthday—and I woke up when something smashed in the living room. I was so scared. I thought someone had broken in. I picked up your daddy’s baseball bat and went out to the kitchen, and there you were. You’d tugged out one of the living room chairs and crawled up on the counter and were trying to make yourself some cinnamon toast. That was your favorite.”
“Still is,” Donna admitted, warmed by the memory. “I don’t eat it as often now.”
Her mother shook her head and waved her hand dismissively. “I didn’t bring you here for platitudes, Donna. I brought you in here to give you what little motherly advice I have left in me.”
Donna felt a slithering weight in her belly. This definitely was not a good situation. The very idea of her mom handing out advice was so foreign that Donna was rendered completely speechless.
“You are a good woman, Donna. I know I give you a hard time and that I probably don’t tell you all the things you need to hear. I know you left here for your own reasons, and you don’t have to tell me what they are. I’m sure I was part of the reason. I screwed up with you, and now I’ve screwed up with Kyle. I’m not an idiot… I see it.”
“Mom, I’m sorry.” Donna didn’t know what else to say. She had always thought that her mother hadn’t even realized what was going on in the house, and especially not in her children’s lives.
“I don’t want your damn apology,” Liz said without any real heat. “Just listen. I know that I screwed up where you and your brother are concerned, but just hear me out. Cody is not for you.”
“I’m sorry… what?”
“Don’t jump to conclusions here. I know what I’m talking about. Cody is fine if what you want is a little bit of action with a pretty body. He is pretty from the top of that Native black hair to the bottom of his cowboy boots. I don’t blame you for the time you are spending with him. Thirty years ago, I would have done the same.”
The sick feeling in Donna’s belly began to heat up. There was something incredibly uncomfortable about the idea that her mother was supporting her sexual relationship with Cody. She shifted on the bed and drew her legs up toward her chest.
“Mom…”
“How do you manage to run a business empire like you do if you have such a bad habit of interrupting people?”
“It’s hardly an empire,” Donna defended.
“Your business alone is worth over a million bucks annually, daughter of mine. If that’s not an empire, then it’s close enough. It’s more than those fancy spray-tan boys who use their daddy’s money to make a company. You built it with your own two hands from the very beginning, and that means something more. You are a driven woman, and I can respect that. It’s my opinion that you are just going to get better.”
It was the closest thing to a compliment that Donna had ever received from her mother. “Thank you,” she said. She even meant it.
“You’re welcome. Now, let me be clear here. I don’t know a whole lot about building a business empire, but I know that you can’t do it if the guy you are lugging around with you has a criminal record and sports a patch from a motorcycle club. So, go ahead and use him, but don’t keep him. After this crap with Kyle is squared away, cut him loose.”
The fact that Donna had planned on doing just that made her feel a little sick inside. She and her mother had come to the same conclusion. Kyle was not for her. He was for someone else, some pretty barista model or one of the many girls that followed around the White Tigers’ club. They were two very different people. Right?
He came from a small town and no money. Donna knew that. They both had wild backgrounds and dreams. Not so different there either. It was their views on the world at large that really separated them. He didn’t see a reason for the law, but Donna did. Maybe her mother had a point. God, Donna never thought that those words would happen.
“I… I don’t know what to say,” Donna finally managed.
“Don’t gotta say shit.” Her mother took another long drag on the cigarette and blew out a series of rings. “Just take the advice for what it is. Do what you do, help Kyle, go back to your job somewhere else. Whatever. It’s all up to you.” She blew out a last bit of smoke and then shoved the last of the stick into the bottom of her cup. “It’s always been up to you, Donna, ever since you were a kid.”
Chapter Fifteen
Donna
It was nearly midnight when Cody dropped Kyle and Donna back off at their temporary apartment. Kyle carried five Tupperware containers filled with leftovers inside. Donna was on her way after him when Cody gripped her hand.
“Hey. Can we talk?”
She had every intention of saying no until she looked into his face. Her mother had described him as pretty. He was that, and so much more. The moon shone down on him, turning his skin into burnished gold and casting silver shadows across his face. The dark fall of his hair was nearly hidden against the backdrop of night. It should have looked strange, but all it did was remind her how well the rest of him fit together. The soft lips, the cheekbones that could have chipped ice, the gimlet glitter of his eyes. He was,
as far as Donna was concerned, perfect.
And yet, in spite of that, her mother’s unexpected advice was swimming around in her head like bad wine. Donna knew that they weren’t right for each other. They belonged in completely different worlds, but with him staring down at her like that, she couldn’t do anything but nod. “Yeah, all right.”
She had expected for him to just start talking. He didn’t. His fingers drifted down the inside of her wrist to stroke along her palm until their fingers linked together. They drifted toward the pool at the center of the apartment complex, thought it was closed. There was even a sign slung across the little gate to inform them of that. It didn’t matter. Cody hopped over the fence with that panther-like grace he had, then helped her to do the same.
“What’s wrong?” he asked as he tugged off his boots and rolled up the ends of his pants. He slid his feet into the water, disrupting the perfect smoothness of the water. “You barely talked to me after we got to the barbecue.”
BARE SKIN: A Dark Bad Boy Romance Page 44
