“Hi, Mom…”

Holy fuck. He’d answered a video call from his mother when we were naked in bed together. I was going to kill him.

“Don’t you ‘hi Mom’ me. I just had to find out from my hairdresser that you have a new girlfriend. Do you know how that feels? To be the last one to know what’s happening in your son’s life?”

Apparently I wouldn’t need to kill him because she was going to get the job done with guilt first. Her Southern drawl was delightful and she looked exactly like I would’ve pictured, a beautiful woman with white blonde hair piled atop her head, she was regal in her anger.

He tried defending himself first. “It’s not like I told your hairdresser…”

“I had to call your brothers to see if it was true and they didn’t know either.”

He glanced over at me and I mouthed, “Brothers?” and wiggled my eyebrows suggestively at him.

He raised an eyebrow of his own as though saying, You’ve asked for it. Too late I realized what he was going to do.

“I’m sorry you found out that way. It’s true, though. Do you want to meet her?”

Death would be far too merciful.

“Of course I wanna meet her. Is she there?”

“Yeah, hang on. Let me just get her.”

Motherfucker. I needed clothes! I jumped from the bed and considered hiding, but spotted his black tee shirt on the floor and pulled it on, tucking my hair behind my ears and swiping under my eyes to check for smudged eyeliner.

He held up his fingers and counted down like we were going on air before turning the phone to face me. I waved like an idiot.

“Mom, this is Elena. Elena, this is my mom.”

“It’s a pleasure to meet you, Elena. And I do have a name besides Mom. I’m Linda.”

I could immediately tell this was not a woman you crossed, but she was so delicately beautiful that many people probably discounted her.

“Is my eldest mindin’ his manners?” The affection she felt for Alex was clear in her voice.

“For the most part…I try to keep him in line.”

“Hey! I have been a perfect gentlem—”

“See that you do. I worked too hard raising him right to have that celebrity garbage go to his head.”

I nodded in amused agreement, looking at Alex significantly.

He turned the phone back around. “Okay, Mom, now you’ve got your answer and you’ve met her. We have to go!”

“Will she be at the house later?”

He grinned that filthy grin. “I’ll see what I can do. Love you. Bye!”

He looked at me appraisingly, sweeping his eyes down to where his shirt ended and my thighs began.

“Stop looking at me like that after you just sprung your mother on me. Not cool, Mr. Chase.”

“Make me.” He prowled across the bed, his intentions clear.

I sprinted from the bedroom, giggling hysterically as he ran naked to chase me around the living room. It seemed he didn’t only pull the juvenile side of me out when it came to fighting with him. He released that childish joy in me too.