And yet her parents were still hoping she’d find a way to fix it.
As she listened to the conversation around her, it was impossible not to make comparisons. Whereas Alec’s parents’ interference was clearly driven by love and concern for him, her parents just thought she was a screw-up.
Not once had they asked how she was.
And neither had Richard.
She stabbed her fork into a slice of ham.
She wanted to pretend that their relationship had meant something, but it was hard to pretend when the cold hard truth was pressed in your face.
She was relieved to be here, away from it all.
Alec’s sister took the chair on the other side of him and his parents, uncle and grandmother sat opposite. They questioned him in detail, wanting to know everything he’d done since they’d last seen him.
“My street cred has rocketed since your series on the Amazon aired. My friends watched it.” Liv slipped food to the dogs under the table. “Gloria thinks you’re hot. I’m supposed to introduce you.”
“Well, of course he would be hot.” Alec’s grandmother spoke in a loud voice. “The Amazon is a jungle and jungles are hot.”
Liv grinned and put a dollop of butter in the center of her baked potato. “Not that sort of hot, Granny. Sexy hot. They think our Alec has a luscious bod.”
Skylar kept her eyes on her plate.
She still had a clear image of that body, streaming with water, powerfully erect.
Next to her, Alec was still.
Nelson nudged her knee with his nose and she lowered her hand to his silky head, only to find Alec’s hand already there. For a few pulsing seconds she was tangled up with long, strong fingers and then she snatched her hand away, knocking her fork onto the floor along with the slice of ham.
Nelson wolfed it down and sat gazing hopefully up at her.
“You’d think he was starving.” Oblivious to the tension, Alec’s mother rose to her feet and fetched Sky a clean fork. Then she tried to tempt the dogs out of the kitchen. “This is your fault, Olivia. How many times do I need to tell you not to feed the dogs at the table? They’ll never leave us alone.”
“We don’t want them to leave us alone. They’re part of the family. They should be part of the celebration. I’m making Nelson a tinsel collar for tonight and I’ve hung his stocking next to the fire.”
Her mother gave up trying to assert control and sat down again. “For the next few days, let’s try to pretend we’re a normal family, otherwise Sky won’t want to visit us again.”
Alec put his fork down. “Mum—”
“I was being polite, Alec, that’s all. So Skylar, Alec tells us you’re very talented.”
He’d said that?
Remembering how he’d been careful not to say a single word in praise of her, Sky turned her head to look at him, but he was busy trying to stop a very superior looking cat from torturing the overexcited dogs.
“You need to leave her alone.” He pulled Church back. “She is going to unsheathe those claws and take a swipe at you.”
Skylar wondered if that was what his ex-wife had done.
Something had to be responsible for the fact he was so guarded and she doubted it was his upbringing. His family was frank and open.
Alec’s father helped himself to more ham. “Tell us about your work, Skylar.”
She knew they were being polite and she described what she did in a few short sentences.
“So you’ve built a career out of your passion?”
“Obviously it’s not a very traditional path, and—”