“She’s an accountant at PricewaterhouseCoopers. She met my dad when they were both undergrads at the University of Minnesota. She managed to finish her degree, and even get her master’s, despite the half-assed support from my dad with regard to childcare.”
He noticed the way she froze in the process of hanging the snowflake on the tree and felt a pain of mixed irritation and regret.
“It’s just the truth, Angeline. I’m not making stuff up to justify sleeping with my dad’s girlfriend.”
She turned toward him slowly. “Your father must have been very young himself.”
“He was,” he replied neutrally. It was Christmas Eve, and he was trying his damnedest to coax Angeline Kastakis to him. Complaining snidely about his dad wasn’t going to do that.
But at the same time, it wasn’t in Alex’s nature to lie.
He poured a glass of wine and stepped across the room to hand it to her. “It’s not a situation most college kids would want, having a kid at age twenty. I don’t envy my parents that. I respect my mother more than I can say for the life she and my grandparents gave me. I’m proud as hell of her for the fact that she didn’t get her bachelor’s until she was in her mid-twenties and that I attended her graduation ceremony when she got her master’s degree when I was fourteen years old. My dad was already up for partner at Hanks, Ellsworth and Leibiz at the time, after completing law school at Vanderbilt. Right on schedule, of course.”
She took a thoughtful sip of her wine and set it on an end table. “I guess you wouldn’t be one of those men who claim that women choose to leave the workforce when they’re pregnant, and therefore choose to fall behind men.”
He tried to smile, but suspected his grin looked more like a grimace.
“Despite the fact that those same guys are the ones getting women pregnant, and insisting they be the one to leave work? No. Maybe I’m an ass in a lot of other ways, but not in that one. It was one of the things that made me sick about corporate America. If a woman gets pregnant, one gender typically pays…and one only.”
She studied him intently when he turned. “There’s so much, isn’t there, Alex?”
“So much what?”
“So much…so much history, so much hurt between you and your dad. I’m an idiot for throwing myself into the middle of it.”
“What did I tell you?” he growled. He set his glass down and stalked toward her.
“That…that Mitchell Carradine has nothing to do with us?” she whispered, her breath falling warm and soft against his thumb as he held her chin.
He nodded. He found he couldn’t speak while restraining himself from pillaging her opened lips, drowning himself in a flavor he’d only just learned, but suddenly thirsted for almost constantly.
She swallowed heavily. “I’m not doing this because of what Mitchell Carradine is or isn’t, Alex.”
He waited, his breath straining in his lungs.
“I’m doing this because of you. But it’s not as clear to me as it is you. Do you think you could cut me just an ounce of slack for having to swim around in all the Oedipal murkiness because of my decision?”
“Screw Oedipus. Freud was a fraud. You want me, don’t you?”
Her solemn nod made his need swell.
“Then what’s the problem?”
“Aside from the fact that I’m going to have to tell your father I slept with his son?” she asked, a wry smile tilting lips that Alex couldn’t help but notice were still swollen from his kisses…not to mention his plunging cock.
He tried to ignore the flash of tingling heat in his cock, but it was difficult. He didn’t stop her from turning away and resuming decorating. He picked up an ornament and began to help her.
“It’s a mess and you know it, Alex.”
He paused with his arm outstretched toward a high bough. “Mitchell’s not in a position to do anything to damage you
r reputation with Littleton, is he? Old man Littleton and him never did get along all that well, despite both being name partners.”
“Mitchell wouldn’t do anything to hurt me professionally because of this, Alex!”
He shrugged, trying to hide his doubt. “Maybe you’re right. Mitch can be a prince among men—and women, of course—when it suits his purpose.”
He noticed her dazed, confused expression and felt guilty. She was right. This must be a hell of a situation for her. He felt bad about it, but he refused to apologize for making love to her. Might as well say he was sorry for needing to breathe.