Deliciously Obedient (9 page)

Mike
.

Self-sabotage
was never fun. Just as she shifted into a world of acceptance, and
just as she and Jeremy were forging a new level of their
relationship, Mike had to come along and interrupt, inserting himself
where he wasn’t wanted.

Or
was he?

Wanted,
that is.

“
Hello?”
Pete waved a hand in front of her face. “Earth to Oblivious Woman.”
He and Jeremy stared at her expectantly.

“
How
about Wonder Woman?” Jeremy kissed the top of her head and she
stretched out, careful to keep her cold feet under the blanket. Damn,
the man was so tall. No part of her was left without a piece of him
to keep her warm.

Except
for her feet.

In
bed, naked, she could slip them between his thighs, always yielding
the expected yelp of surprise, then yielding so much more…

Rein
it in, Lydia.
Dad’s perplexed look made her libido disappear.

“
Awkward
Family Photos Man!” she blurted out.

“
Good
one,” Pete muttered. “See? You two are good at this.”

“
I
am not performing,” Lydia said flatly.

“
Why
not?” Jeremy caught her eye, the question friendly and curious. He
actually cared. Really seemed to want to know. Her
relationship—whatever you called it—with Mike had been so
charged, so clipped and constrained by so many rules and distractions
that she’d never been given the opportunity to just hang out like
this. Getting to know Mike was an exercise in corporate politics, in
violating the norm, in making up rules and breaking them.

Jeremy?
With Jeremy it just flowed. He was a sport for coming here and being
awesome and tolerating all her family’s quirks.

So
far.

It
hadn’t been quite twenty-four hours. Give it time. “Fish and
houseguests—both start to smell after three days,” her mother
always said. Which was odd for a woman who ran a campground, and
Lydia told her so.

“
Paying
guests are different from houseguests, Lydia,” Sandy had sniffed.
“Besides, family isn’t the same. Family is always welcome. But
that doesn’t mean they don’t turn rotten after a while.”

Was
Jeremy morphing from houseguest to family before her eyes?

What
about her heart?

“
I’ll
tell you why Lydia doesn’t want to perform,” Miles said, walking
into the Charles’ living room and plunking down in a leather
recliner. “It goes all the way back to, what—’95? ’96?”

“
Shut
up,” she barked at him, the old, uncomfortable feeling at the
memory stirring inside her.

“
Good
thing we didn’t have YouTube back then,” Miles added, his voice
with just enough edge to make her widen her eyes and give him a death
glare.
Don’t you dare
, that look said.

Don’t
you fucking dare.

Jeremy
cleared his throat and stood, peeling his awesome warmth off of her,
leaving her cold and, now, on guard with Miles and her dad. “Want a
drink? I’m getting more water, and…”

Both
men looked at him with neutral eyes.

“
Anyone?”

“
I’m
good,” the three said in unison. Jeremy nodded and walked out of
the room.

“
He’s
nice,” Pete whispered.

“
I’ll
rip your balls off,” Lydia started, eyes glued to Miles.

“
Lydia!”
her dad barked.

“
Miles
is threatening to tell my talent show story!” she whined, hearing
her nine-year-old self emerging.

“
It’s
a cute story,” Pete said in a nostalgic voice, eyes softening,
chest starting to buck with muted laughter. Lydia hoped they’d see
reason and not say a word to Jeremy, who returned with a full glass
of water and inserted himself right back on the couch. Curling up
against him, she shot her dad and Miles daggers.

Don’t
you dare.

“
I
want to hear about Lydia’s talent,” Jeremy said.

“
You
know my talents,” she stage-whispered in his ear.

All
three men turned a lovely shade of pink, her dad looking a bit
sickly. Miles snickered, and Jeremy stared straight ahead, eyebrows
raised.

“
Until
you set the cat’s tail on fire, you were doing so well,” Pete
blurted out.

“
Dad!”

“
And
then it ran up that tree. You’re lucky Madge was here, because if
she hadn’t thrown that rock with such precision—”

“
Madge?”
Jeremy asked.

“
Grandma
has perfect aim,” Lydia said in a dead voice.

“—
the
cat would never have fallen out. But then it ran for the outhouse and
fell in—”

“
And
started the outhouse fire,” Miles added.

“
Five
fire departments!” Pete exclaimed. “You don’t see that out here
in rural Maine! We had some trucks come from nearly two hours away.”

“
Fire
was still burning when they got here,” Miles crowed. “We were
allowed to stay up all night that night. And that was the first time
I ever saw Mom get drunk.”

Lydia
buried her head under the blanket as Jeremy pivoted between the two
men, seeming to take it all in. Her old nickname “Lydia Chlamydia”
was not nearly as bad as this.

“
We
learned not to store propane tanks that close to outhouses,” Pete
said.

“
Yeah,
not when you have a kid who twirls flaming batons, Dad,” Miles
said.

“
And
some of the fire departments now have the Lydia Protocol,” Pete
explained to Jeremy.

He
gave her a squeeze as she refused to come out from under the blanket.
“The Lydia Protocol?” Jeremy asked politely.

Miles’
voice shifted to that of an announcer, a grandiose sound that made
Lydia want to punch him in the neck. “Never assume that a fire
extinguisher and two buckets of water on stage is enough to mitigate
the possible fire that can result from letting a child twirl a
flaming baton.”

“
You
were really good, honey,” Pete said, his face sympathetic, though
his eyes danced with mirth.

“
I
hate you all,” she muttered.

“
You’re
good at setting things on fire,” Jeremy said, poking his head under
the blanket.

“
Including
a large volume of shit,” Miles chimed in.

“
Maybe
I should set
you
on fire, then.”

And
with that, Miles took off, calling back over his shoulder as Lydia
poked her head out. “Hide the cat if Lydia’s in the talent show!”

“
You
thinking of twirling again?” Sandy had walked into the room just as
Miles left. She carried a pile of receipts and a cup of coffee. Her
face was neutral. Decidedly too neutral.

“
Only
if Miles in nearby and wearing a tail.”

Sandy
made a sour face. “He’s just teasing you.”

“
You
all tease me.”

“
I’d
tease you, too, with that story,” Jeremy said.

She
whacked his ribs. “Traitor!”

“
It
was funny in a horrible kind of way. Except the entire campground
smelled like burning…feces,” Sandy said, halting herself from
using an expletive. “For a very long time. And the poor cat.” She
shook her head sadly.

“
What
happened to the cat?” Jeremy asked. Lydia cringed.

“
Well,”
Sandy said slowly, her eyes cutting between Lydia and Jeremy, “After
it fell in the outhouse and set the shit, er…feces on fire, it
scrambled out and ran to the ocean. My mom found it the next day,
bruised in the eye from the rock she’d thrown at it, tail burnt
down like a wizard’s wand, and the vet we took her to didn’t even
charge us for treating her. Said it was the best story he’d heard
in his thirty-year career.”

Jeremy
looked at Lydia, then Sandy.

“
I
have a question.”

“
What?”
Lydia whined.

“
Was
the cat’s name Lucky?”

Both
women groaned. “Actually, yes,” Sandy said, laughing.

And
that was the moment when Lydia realized she’d fallen a little bit
in love with him.

More
than a little bit.

Mike
crouched down on a fallen log at the very end of a long trail on the
side across from the campground, waiting for something.

He
didn’t know what.

A
ten mile hike, walking at the fastest clip he could push himself to
achieve, had only made his hamstrings scream, and left him sweaty and
dehydrated. The rotting log looked safe enough, and as it was on the
edge of the trail, he decided to sit and contemplate for a bit.

Driving
his body hard was old hat to him.

Driving
his mind to stop thinking about the implications of Lydia’s
homecoming was all too fresh and novel.

And
then there was Jeremy…

Once
Lydia and Jeremy saw him, the entire charade would be over. Outed
again
. When the hell did he become some sort of man in
disguise, like a spy with really low stakes? Being part of
Meet
the Hidden Boss
had seemed so strategic, a tactic that was
supposed to pay off—and pay off big.

Instead,
it shattered his world and nearly destroyed Lydia’s. The only
person who had come out remotely ahead in this crazy game was Diane,
who was supposedly in talks with FX to have her own reality TV show.

Everyone
else was walking wounded.

Maybe
not Lydia, though. Her enjoyment with Jeremy was evident. She seemed
happy enough. Back home in the fold with her wonderful, nurturing
parents, getting to know Jeremy, getting over Mike…maybe that was
exactly how he should leave it.

Everything
in him screamed
no
.

Leaving
wasn’t in his nature. Walking away wasn’t what he did. The past
month or two of his life was the exception—not the rule. The rule
in Michael Bournham’s life was to pick a goal and achieve it.

Losing
Lydia had been soul crushing—not only because he’d lost someone
he’d come to love, but simply because he’d lost.