“Whatever you read, it was probably out of a general search, right? Of course I got those reports when I interviewed him for the blog, and I really thought it was true. But then, after dating Adrien for a while…it still took Samuel explaining it to me for it to make sense.”
Her mom’s frown deepened. “What happened with Adrien? He didn’t hurt you or anything, did he?”
Camila winced at the question. There was no way she could tell her mom the truth of all that happened. She would worry. And maybe, try to find Adrien herself so she could beat his face in with a bat or something. She didn’t even doubt that her mom would do it.
“The thing is,” she said, deflecting the question. “Every report out there is on Samuel Kane. I was surprised he even had a twin brother, remember? There’s pretty much nothing on Adrien. But after spending time with him and seeing how he treated other people…if it was before that and Samuel told me, I might not have believed him, but it was definitely all his brother. Samuel is very protective of his family, so when he gets the blame for Adrien’s actions, he doesn’t do anything. From what I’ve seen, I think he’s been forced to cover for him to create less drama for their family.”
The expression on her mom’s face was skeptical. “Really?”
She sounded unsure, but Camila didn’t blame her. As she just said, if she hadn't experienced Adrien for herself, she might not have believed it, either. But she knew better now.
“Did I tell you that his parents passed away and he has a younger sister that he’s also taking care of?” Camila said. “She’s…a bit fragile. I’m sure he’s doing it more for her than to keep his brother out of trouble. There’s no news out there about her, either, which means she must be pretty sheltered. Imagine if the media started going after her then, though.”
Her mom looked reluctant, but also like she was willing to believe this, and Camila sighed out in relief. Hopefully, her mom wouldn’t give her grief about dating Samuel.
“Can I meet him soon?”
Camila had gone back to eating happily, and the question was so sudden and outrageous, that she choked. She poured herself a glass of water as she coughed, then looked at her mom with wide eyes.
“Mom?” she said, her voice coming out a bit hoarse. “I technically haven’t even started dating this man. Could you please not try to scare him off?”
Her mom scowled. “Excuse me? And why on earth would I scare him off? With your track record with men, of course I’d be worried about you and want to meet the man you’re seeing. Can't I?”
Camila opened her mouth to say that no, she could not, but the words got stuck in her throat at her mom’s scowl. Slowly, she closed her mouth and slumped her shoulders. She couldn’t say no to her mom in the end.
Dammit.
She didn’t say anything, but her mom continued eating, like she knew she’d already won. Dinner resumed with awkwardness, on Camila’s part, at least, as she wondered how she was going to bring this up with Samuel when she saw him.