At the Stroke of Midnight (Naughty Princess Club 1)

“Hey, Mom!” Anastasia shouts from behind PJ out in the front yard. “He’s got a nice butt. I totally approve of this date!”

“IT’S NOT A DATE!” I yell after her, narrowing my eyes at PJ when he laughs. “Oh, laugh it up. Enjoy this moment now, because in about fifteen minutes, you’re going to understand the phrase What fresh hell is this? when you experience going to the mall with a teenage girl. They want everything and they hate everything equally. There will be a lot of crying, cursing, angst, misery, and possibly bloodshed.”

He laughs again, rolling his eyes as I move past him and out the door, letting him pull it closed and lock it behind us with the keys I hand him. “I’m pretty sure Anastasia won’t be doing any of those things,” he says.

“I wasn’t talking about her,” I tell him sweetly, patting his chest as his smile falters. “May the odds be ever in your favor.”

Chapter 18: Pablo Jessabelle

“So, what does PJ stand for?”

“Would you believe me if I told you it literally just stands for PJ?”

I’ve asked him this same question several times throughout all of our texting conversations, but he never answers me, and it’s starting to bug me. Why is it such a secret?

“No. No I would not believe you if you told me that. No one names their child with initials. They always stand for something,” I argue, wondering if it stands for something really horrible.

What if his name’s Percival Jabulani?

Or Puck Jazzy?

Oh my God, maybe PJ stands for Ping Jethro.

How exactly does one sound sexy when shouting the name Ping Jethro during the throes of passion? And why in the hell am I even thinking about shouting his name, whatever it is, in the throes of anything?!

“What about this dress? And don’t say yes just because you think I like it. Do you like it?” PJ asks, putting an end to his name discussion, holding up a peach-colored wrap dress.

I nod, and he gives me a wink as he adds the dress to the pile of clothes I’m already holding in my arms. I quickly do the math in my head and I can feel my skin break out into a cold sweat. I can’t afford all of this. I can’t even afford the buy-one-get-one bin of socks that are sitting by the register. I probably should have protested as soon as PJ told Anastasia his plan was to take me to the mall and update my wardrobe, but I was too busy panicking about my daughter meeting him and all the questions that would follow.

Fortunately, the car ride wasn’t filled with questions about PJ and me and what we were doing together. It was just the quiet peace of a teenage girl wearing earbuds in the backseat, not paying any attention to the way I stared at PJ’s arm’s flexing as he shifted gears, or turned the steering wheel, or ran his hand through his hair while we made small talk. I almost wished she’d pulled those earplugs out and given us the third degree. Then I would have had something to focus on other than the way my heart beat faster at the way he glanced over at me and smiled when I said something that amused him; or how I had to keep crossing and uncrossing my legs because I was trapped in a small, enclosed space with this man and couldn’t escape the smell of his cologne, which did all sorts of unexpected things to my body.

And now here we are, alone at the mall together, since Anastasia all but ran away from us to meet her friend as soon as we walked in the door. And I don’t know how to tell PJ that we need to put all this stuff back.

It’s one thing to blurt out all of your money problems under the haze of too much wine after the sun had gone down and you only had a small fire and streetlamps to see by. There’s no way I’m discussing this with him while I’m sober, in the bright light of day, under the glare of florescent lighting in Forever 21. And it’s my own fault I’m stuck in the hell on earth that is Forever 21. PJ insisted we go to the high-end department store on the other side of the mall, and I panicked. I told him I read a story about how they test all the dye for their fabrics on animals and “Oh my God, PJ! Just think of the kittens! Pink kittens and blue kittens and green kittens! Those poor defenseless animals! I will never step foot in that store again until they do right by the kittens.”

It wasn’t my finest moment. Don’t judge me. But what was I supposed to do? I knew Forever 21 had the lowest price tags out of any store in this mall, so, here we are. And here is where I will die.