Going Too Far

Reckless. If she knew what was good for her, she’d completely forget the definition of that word. Whenever her family pushed a little hard, she tended to rebel in very dramatic ways—in ways that made even her outrageous friend Jena look good. Her dad pushed her, she slept with Ian Kilborn.

Oh, boy.

That was so not why she was here. She’d come to try to shrug off unwanted emotions via a dinner session with her family. She didn’t want Ian any more than he wanted her.

Oh, yeah? Try telling that to her hormones.

She heard a long, wistful sigh and realized it was her own.

Oh, great. Grimacing and sighing. She was turning into a regular hopeless wonder.

Pulling her jacket closed against the late January chill, she stepped up the winding walkway to the door, briefly knocked, then let herself in. She told herself she knocked because she didn’t want to find one or the other of her parents flagrante delicto. When she was twenty-one, she’d come home early from a party Jena had thrown. Marie shuddered at the memory of her parents going at it like randy teenagers on the foyer couch. Her mother often reminded her that it had only happened once and wasn’t likely to happen again. But Marie wasn’t taking any chances.

She peeked around the door then called out. Her mother’s voice immediately responded from the kitchen, telling her to come in.

Marie shrugged out of her jacket, then hung it up in the closet. The sweet scent of basil filled the hall, leading her back to the kitchen. She couldn’t remember a time when the house hadn’t smelled like one spice or another mixed with the pungent scent of tomato. And when her mother made bread…

She gave a mental groan as she pushed open the swinging door and moved into the airy, terra-cotta-tiled kitchen with its hanging copper pots and pans, pots of fresh herbs, strings of garlic and a table large enough to hold the entire Bertelli family, including her brothers’ wives.

“You didn’t wear the dress.”

Marie made a face. How was it her mother could tell what she was wearing without even looking? “I didn’t feel like wearing a dress.”

Francesca Bertelli was well into her fifties but the image she portrayed was that of a much younger woman, despite the strands of silver in her thick red hair. Marie rounded the cooking island to where her mother was cleaning Spanish onions in the sink and kissed her cheek. “And you consider jeans and a sweatshirt proper attire?”

“For dinner at my parents?” She smiled. “Yes.”

Her mother made her trademark sound of disapproval deep in her throat, even though her blue eyes shone with love and amusement.

“Where’s Dad?”

Francesca motioned with the knife. “In his office. He’ll be out in a minute.”

Marie reached for a piece of mozzarella, then instead took a piece of cut celery on the counter.

“Eat the cheese. You’re too skinny.”

A familiar refrain. And a refrain that Marie had long since grown used to ignoring.

She automatically went to the cupboard to the right and reached for the plates.

“What are you doing?” her mother asked.

“Setting the table.”

“It’s set.”

Marie squinted, wondering if her mother had inhaled too many onion fumes as she stared at the clear kitchen table.

“We’re eating in the dining room tonight.”

Marie’s hands froze where she still touched the plates. The dining room had been the one room in the house that should have been fully capitalized. THE DINING ROOM. The only room off-limits to her and her brothers when they were younger, and a room that was used only on holidays. She slowly withdrew her hands and closed the cupboard door. Sure, while Valentine’s Day might be around the corner, the minor observance didn’t rate on THE DINING ROOM scale.

“Mama…” she said in warning.

The last thing she needed was another unsuitable suitor to ruin a perfectly good dinner. She sighed and leaned against the counter. She’d assumed that since she’d been so late in accepting the dinner invitation that she wouldn’t have to face another one of her mother’s matchmaking attempts tonight.

She rubbed her throbbing temple. Knowing her mother, she’d probably made the trip across town to sabotage her daughter’s refrigerator.

“Get the wine from over there on the counter and open it so it can air.”

Marie turned and stared at the three bottles. She glanced back at her mother. “How many?”

“All of them.”

Uh-oh. Her mother had given up on the one-by-one approach and was going to fill the table with possible grooms from hell.

She groaned, leaving the bottles right where they were. “You know, I’m suddenly not very hungry,” she said, giving her mother a quick kiss on the cheek. “I’m going to go home.” She swiped one of the mozzarella sticks. “Tell Papa I said hi, won’t you?”

She made a beeline for the kitchen door and the hall beyond, hoping to duck out of the house before the guests of honor arrived.

She swung open the door and, for the second time that day, ran straight into the hard, broad chest of Ian Kilborn.

IAN’S PHYSICAL RESPONSE to having Marie flush up against him for the second time that day was swift and unforgiving.

“We, um, have to stop bumping into each other this way,” he said, surprised that his voice was low and gravelly.

Marie stared at him as if he’d grown another head. Well, he hadn’t actually grown one, but one was growing just beneath the material of his slacks.

She leapt back and he quickly closed his suit jacket to cover any telltale bulges.

Only both he and Marie knew the truth.

“I didn’t hear you come in,” Marie’s father said from where he stood behind Ian. “Hello, baby girl.”

Marie’s gaze shifted and so did the look in them as she skirted around him and gave her father a loud kiss on the cheek. “Hi, Papa. I just got here.” She cleared her throat as Frank Bertelli Sr. hugged her in his meaty arms, then released her. “Unfortunately I, um, can’t stay though.”

“Shame,” Ian said.

Frankie and Marie both stared at him.

Okay, so maybe he could have been a little subtler. But the truth was that he didn’t exactly intend for Marie to find out how really small the world was until some point down the road. Like maybe never.

“What’s this nonsense? Of course you’re going to stay,” Frankie said, easily wrapping his arm around his daughter’s shoulders, and then Ian’s, and maneuvering them both through the kitchen door. “Your mama made your favorite.”

Marie made a move Ian admired and wished he could emulate as she ducked right out of her father’s grasp. “I know, I know. But the truth is I’m not feeling very well right now.”

Ian eyed her. Sure, her color was high and her eyes overly bright. But he’d bet dollars to doughnuts that her physical state had nothing to do with any sort of illness. Rather her reaction was more likely due to the stimulus behind his own uncomfortable response: feeling her against him.