Page 61 of Puck Love

“Van, what the fuck, dude?” Emmettsays.

“Oh, honey, I am so sorry. I didn’t know you had aguest.”

“And I didn’t know you were coming over until this afternoon, Mom,” Vansays.

“It is the afternoon,darling.”

“Hi,” I say sheepishly. I cover myself with more of the smallblanket.

“Hello,” Van’s mother says.Oh lord, she’s beaming. Van doesn’t seem the least bit concerned that we’re in a state of undress and simply rises to his feet, buck naked. He offers me a hand up and I take it, careful to keep the blanket wrapped tightly around all of my lady bits. He might be used to parading around a locker room as naked as the day he was born, but that’s not the Stella Hartway.

“Hi, I’mSt—”

“Yes, I know who you are, dear.” The grin that she was so obviously fighting ekes across her face, and I want to die. How humiliating—being introduced to his mother in my birthday suit just a few hours after making love on every flat surface in his house. “I have every record you’ve evermade.”

“Oh, wow. That’s . . . um . . . thankyou.”

“Been to every concert you’ve performed in the area, too. Emmett wasn’t the only fan in the family. I wasn’t aware Van was a fan, either. He usually doesn’t pay anything any mind, unless it’s hockey-related.”

“I seethat.”

“Well, I suppose he’s a country music fan now,too.”

“Mom,” Van warns, but I smile. “Stella, this is my mum,Nora.”

“Van, be a dear and go and put some clotheson.”

“Yes,Mom.”

“We’ll just be in the kitchen. I’ll makelunch.”

“No!” Van and I say at the sametime.

“It’s kind of a mess in there,Mom.”

“Oh, relax. It’s nothing your brother and I can’thandle.”

“Mom,” Emmettwhines.

“Besides, I’m sure you two have worked up an appetite, and you can’t have country music royalty in your house and not feed her, Son. That’s just bad manners, and I raised you better thanthat.”

I smile awkwardly at Van’s mother before she leaves the room with Emmett dragging his heels behind her. I turn to Van and say in a whispered hiss, “You didn’t want to tell me your mother wascoming?”

“I didn’t want you to freak out the way you arenow.”

“Oh, because being completely naked is so muchbetter?”

“You know you’re pretty cute when you’re mad, snuggle bunny.” Van smooths his hand over my cheek, and I beat himaway.

“I am not cute. I’m a fierce lioness, and you are in big trouble,mister.”

He rolls his eyes and pulls me in for another kiss. I melt against him, and wrap my blanket around us both. His hands go under my ass, and he lifts me off the ground. I squeal, but he doesn’t set me down so I have no choice but to wrap my legs around him. The blanket falls away, and he goes streaking through the house with me wrapped around him like a spider monkey. He attempts to climb the stairs while his mother and brother pretend not to notice the shenanigans going on aroundthem.

“Put me down,” Idemand.

“Never,” he says, walking the long hall to his room, where he enters and shuts the door behind him with his foot. We collapse on the bed and he climbs on top of me, wedging himself between mythighs.

“Van, your mother isdownstairs.”