Wild Forces: A Friends to Lovers Romance (O-Town Book 2) by Karen Renee (summer reads .TXT) 📕

I hesitated. “Do you really think that’s necessary?”

She paused. “Do you really think lunch is asking that much of you?”

“I suppose not. Brock has today off. I’ll ask if he wants to tag along.”

She paused again, but it was shorter than the last one. “If he has time, that would be great. However, if you’re leery of spending time alone with me, I understand that too. Should Brock have other plans, I can call your father.”

I didn’t like that she’d figured me out, but I wouldn’t call my father to hold my hand for something like this.

“No, that’s all right. I’ll see if Brock’s free, seeing as my questions might be pertinent to him too.”

“Good. Would you like to meet at Lazy Moon? I hear you’ve yet to meet a pizza you don’t like, and it’s close to your apartment.”

My father had ingrained good manners into me and both my brothers, so her meeting me for lunch went against the grain. That forced me to say, “No. I’ll be by to pick you up, with or without Brock.”

TURNED OUT, I SHOULD’VE let Pauline meet us at the restaurant. Brock came along, which meant we had to take his car in order to pick her up because I couldn’t take three people in my S-10. That hadn’t occurred to me when we spoke.

As Brock turned into the parking lot for Pauline’s practice, I asked, “What are you going to call her? Pauline or are you actually gonna call her ‘Mom?’”

He parked the car and gave me a hard look. “I don’t know, Gabe. But ‘egg-donor’ is damn sure out, so you better be nice.”

I rolled my eyes. “Yeah, yeah. I haven’t called her that in over a month and a half. Just thought I’d find out what you intend to call her. Anyway, I’ll go tell her we’re here.”

As I walked up the sidewalk, I noticed my mother walking my way. She wore a sky-blue pantsuit with a floral print scarf tied intricately around her neck. I smiled and aimed my thumb behind me. “Hey. Brock’s car is right over here.”

I opened the passenger door for her, and a small smile hit her face. “Your father trained you well.”

I smiled before climbing in the back.

While we waited on our pizza, Pauline put a napkin in her lap and shot a feeble smile at me and Brock. “I’m glad you were both able to meet.” She looked at Brock. “Gabe has some questions about the money, and we thought you should be here, too.”

“Yeah, he mentioned that,” Brock said, sipping his water.

“There’s no need for a lawyer. The money was left to me. I can make a trip to the bank and have the funds wired to you. What you will need is an accountant because such a large sum of money drastically impacts your taxes.”

“Or we could wait until we’re ready for that kind of tax blow,” Brock put in.

She nodded reluctantly. “You could, but Brock, I’m not letting you put this off. The money will do far more good for you boys than it will me. And by no means am I gifting it to you three in order to get into your lives.”

Brock arched a brow at her, which surprised me since he’d told me to be nice.

“I mean it, Brock. Do I want to be part of your lives? Yes. Am I using the money to do that? Not even a little.”

“Really?” he asked.

I shot him a look. “Maybe you should follow your advice to me,” I muttered.

“Why’d you leave? No. Why didn’t you fight harder to get back in with us?”

I sat back because those were questions I wanted answers to, also.

She sighed. “There isn’t enough time for me to get into all of it, but your father is a force of his own.”

“Lame,” Brock said.

Her face set in a way that mirrored our older brother, Cary. “No. You think your father wouldn’t lay his life down for you, you’re crazy. And believe me, he was dead-set that I would not cause a rift between you three. Or really, set Gabe against you and Cary. As he put it, he’d endured enough turmoil in his house, and it would be a cold day in hell before he let me force that on him again.”

Brock’s eyes slid to me.

I nodded at her. “That does sound like something Dad would say.”

“Right. The compromise was that I came to every event any of you were at. I watched you all grow up from afar.”

“You didn’t watch him grow up,” Brock said, jerking his head at me.

Pain flashed across her face. “You’re right. Let me rephrase. I watched all three of you go from young men to becoming men.”

An uncomfortable feeling took root in my chest, and I shifted in my chair. I glanced at Pauline and her remorse was written all over her face. After seeing her like that, my bitterness took a direct hit.

The server arrived with our pizza. Since I could feel the tension rolling off my brother, I dished up slices for all of us.

Pauline stared at her plate for a moment before she looked up. “Believe it or not, leaving you three was the hardest thing I’ve ever done, but I know I did the only thing I could do. It may not have been right, but none of us became statistics because of my mental illness.”

Brock stopped cutting into his pizza. “That why you became a psychologist?”

“To an extent, yes. I had an uncle who taught psychology. When I left, he found me the help I needed. It took a very long time, but after a while I resumed college classes. And since I spent so much time with various professionals, it seemed the right thing for me to study.”

Normally, Brock kept the peace in our family, so him grilling our mother wasn’t sitting well with me.

Shooting for levity, I said, “So, I could be a quarter-of-a-millionaire as soon as