Page 107 of Mr. Naughty List

“I need to leave.”

“Aaron—”

“No, Mom. I’m done with this conversation. I’m going.” He jerked open the apartment door. “And Iwillbe tendering my resignation. So you should probably spend the rest of your winter break starting a hunt for a new teacher. Because I’m not interested in remaining at Pineview.”

“What?” She gawked at him like he’d grown another head. “That’s absurd. How will you pay your bills? How will you live, Aaron?”

“Now you care?”

“I have always cared. I love you. I’m your mother.”

“Don’t give me that now. I don’t owe you my plans.”

“I’m yourmother.”

Aaron thought of Betsy and her evident and easy love for RJ, how she’d effortlessly accepted the situation with Carter, and the way she’d embraced Aaron too. He thought of his own father’s reaction to RJ when Aaron brought him to the farm the first time, and the holiday sweetness of the night before, spent in the loving embrace of his extended family. All of them so much more welcoming than his own mother.

“You’re my mother? Act like it.”

Aaron left then. He didn’t look back.

When he reached the car his mother had texted him:What about the casserole dish?

Keep it.

Chapter Twenty-Nine

RJ didn’t knowwhat Helen Shock’s problem was, but he wouldn’t mind shaking the woman until she stopped being such a horrible person.

“Is she religious? Is that it?” he asked, holding Aaron as the little spoon, his chest pressed to Aaron’s back, their bodies fitted together. Jeans against jeans, T-shirt to button-up cotton shirt. As close as they could be.

Aaron shook his head.

“What did your father see in her?” RJ was determined to solve the puzzle.

Aaron shrugged. “I think she must have been different once? He said she grew more ambitious after their marriage, less satisfied. But we don’t usually talk about her. He moved on with his life without her.”

“Maybe she’ll come around,” RJ said. “Not today, but someday.”

Aaron shrugged. “I told her I was resigning.”

RJ’s heart skipped. “Good thing you’ve already been looking for jobs.”

Aaron snuggled back against him and said a little timidly, “I think I’m going to travel first. I have some savings. Nothing much, but enough that I could go to a few places. See a few things. You know, before I have to commit to some sort of career again.”

The implication hung in the air between them. RJ wasn’t misreading it, was he? He decided he had nothing to lose by checking to see.

“Have you ever thought about going to Finland in winter?” RJ whispered against Aaron’s hair. “The northern lights are stunning.”

Aaron turned around in RJ’s arms so they were facing each other. His eyes still gleamed, but the active crying had stopped. “Is that where you’re heading?”

“I don’t know actually. I haven’t given my agent the okay to book me on a new tour.” RJ touched the places Aaron’s dimples should be. “Would you like that? Would you want to come with me?”

“Could I?” Aaron whispered it, like he wasn’t sure he was allowed.

RJ’s heart soared. He’d never imagined, never thought… “Yeah, of course. We don’t always stay in nice places,” he babbled. “Hotels, I mean. It can be a little rough.”

“I can do rough.”