Aria had called ahead and explained the situation to her mom—as much of the situation as she could explain, anyway. And she’d been completely clear about the fact that all she needed was a few minutes to cuddle her daughter and reassure her that everything was going to be okay. Then she wanted her family out of the firing line as fast as possible.
Her mom had apparently decided that this meant that they should all have dinner together first.
Her dad, thankfully, had ordered pizza.
But her mom objected to fast food. So Doreen, of course, was assembling what seemed like the world’s most complicated and time-consuming salad.
“I said we were in a hurry, Mom. I want you guys to be safe.”
She looked longingly at the stack of pizza boxes, which were radiating the warm, familiar smell of her standard order of pepperoni, mushroom, and green pepper. She’d had a hard day. She deserved melted cheese. Under normal circumstances, she’d love one of her mom’s elaborate, colorful dinners. But a salad wasn’t exactly comfort food, and this one wasn’t exactly fast.
“And I don’t want the firing line anywhere near you,” Doreen said. “So the least you can do is give me another hour to get to know the man who’s supposed to be protecting you.”
“Colby won’t let anything happen to me.”
Her mom viciously snapped her knife down through some celery and looked down at the cutting board with a distinctly bloodthirsty expression.
“I wish I was doing this to this Hebbert man’s neck.”
“Badass,” Aria said. “But I’d feel better with you guys further away.”
“This weasel,” Doreen said, apparently meaning Eli Hebbert, “isn’t going to be any more likely to spring out at you just because you took the time to have a proper family dinner.”
“He might! That’s how time works!”
Colby put his hand on her arm, steady and warm, and Aria abruptly remembered that she was a woman, not a cranky teenager dealing with her I-always-know-best mother.
She and her mom had gone through one or two rocky patches over the years, but they’d always come out stronger for it. She was certainly old enough—and enoug
h of a mom herself—to put together what was happening here.
Her mom had restrained all her parental worries on the phone. She’d been calm and reassuring, and she was going to be calm and reassuring for however long all this lasted. Mattie would be totally safe in her grandparents’ care.
Her mom just wanted one last hour to coddle her before she went off to do something dangerous. She had been like this right before the Arctic and Sahara trips too.
“Sorry,” Aria said softly. “I’m sure it’ll be delicious.”
“And punctual,” Colby added. “I understand your concerns, ma’am, and I want you to have the info you need to trust me. But I’m with Aria on this. I’d like to get you all out of the way.”
“It’ll be fast,” Doreen said. “And delicious. I have a lot of faults, but being a bad judge of recipes isn’t one of them.”
Her tone suggested that Aria better not even try naming any of those supposed faults.
“Hand me those blackberries for the homemade vinaigrette.”
“There’s a bottle of ranch dressing in the fridge,” Aria said, just because she knew both bottled salad dressing and ranch in particular horrified her mother.
The idea of it produced a shiver almost as notable as the one raised up by the thought of Eli Hebbert and his “dogs.”
“Oh, relax, Mom. I’m just kidding.”
“I never know with you,” her mom said darkly. “Shortcuts here, shortcuts there. Dirty dishes piled up to heaven.”
“I can wash,” Colby volunteered.
He looked like he’d be happy to have something to do. If Aria had to guess, she’d say he found her mom just the littlest bit intimidating, which was an unsurprising reaction even from a US Marshal.
Luckily for him, he had just found one of the surest ways to her mother’s approval.