27
“You’re fidgeting.”
“No, I’m not.”
“Uh, yeah, Low.” Chase chuckles. “You are.”
“I’m nervous.”
Linc’s arms wrap around me from behind, his warm, solid body enclosing mine as his breath fans over the back of my neck. “You have nothing to be nervous about, baby.”
He’s right. I know he’s right.
But my stomach is still in knots, my heart tapping out an erratic rhythm as we stand outside the Fox Hill Correctional Center waiting for Mom to be released.
A new wave of nerves hits me at the thought, and I wrap my arms over Lincoln’s, holding him closer to me as we stare at the entrance to the prison. The guys all offered to come with me to pick her up—even Chase, who was just released from the hospital and is still a little pale and tired looking. I worried a little about him overexerting himself, but I could see in his eyes how much he wanted to come, so I didn’t put up a fight.
And now they’re all here.
About to meet my mom.
That’s one of the reasons for the nerves wreaking havoc on my internal organs right now.
The other is an unreasonable fear that someone will stop her before she can step out into the sunny, crisp air as a free woman. That Detective Dunagan will call and say it was all a mistake, it wasn’t Iris’s DNA they found on that car in the warehouse on Chapel. That a paternity test hasn’t revealed her unborn child to be the offspring of Judge Alexander Hollowell.
But all those things are true, and with Hollowell no longer manipulating things behind the scenes or paying off dirty cops to plant evidence, the truth has finally come to light.
I shift in Linc’s arms, and River leans down to plant a kiss on my lips. “We’re here for you, Low. No matter what.”
His words are soft, and I close my eyes and nod as he pulls away. They know Mom knows about them, but I can tell the guys are a little nervous too.
Or maybe “nervous” isn’t the right word.
Protective.
They want my mom to be okay with us, not for their own sakes, but for mine. They know how much I love her, how close the two of us are, and they want her blessing for my sake. Although I would never break up with them just because my mom didn’t approve, I so, so badly want her to be okay with this. To understand it.
Despite the boys’ affectionate teasing, I can’t stop fidgeting as we wait for several more minutes.
But the moment Mom steps through the door, every bit of my nervousness is forgotten.
She’s wearing the dress she had on at the Black’s cocktail party the night she was arrested, and although it’s a little incongruous on a Wednesday afternoon, it’s such a fucking relief not to see her in orange that I almost burst into tears.
Linc’s arms release me, and before I even give my legs the command to move, I’m walking toward her, then I’m running, and she’s running toward me. We practically knock each other over when we collide, but I don’t fucking care because it’s my mom, and I’m hugging her, I’m finally hugging her after way too long.
She’s laughing and crying at the same time, and I can feel her body shaking against mine. I pet her hair and press my face into the crook of her neck, breathing in her soft scent.
Mom.
She’s back.
She’s free.
We keep almost letting go and then clinging to each other again, and when she finally pulls back, she cups my face in her hands, her cheeks flushed and stained with tears.
“Let me look at you,” she whispers.
Even though we just saw each other a few days ago, I know what she means.
This is the first time in months we’ve seen each other without a plexiglass partition separating us, and it’s like a fucking veil has been lifted. I can see the little flecks of amber that dapple her brown irises, can see the small laugh lines around her eyes, the flyaway strands of dark hair that frame her face.
She’s beautiful.
And when I tell her so, she throws back her head and laughs. Then she wraps her arm around my waist, securing me tightly against her, and turns toward the two waiting cars and the four boys gathered around them.
“Come on. Let’s go say hello to your fellas.”
Mom’s step is light, and I feel a sort of manic, exuberant energy radiating from her that makes me think she could run all the way back to the Black’s house without even breaking a sweat right now, as if just being outside the prison walls has given her a massive shot of adrenaline.
Maybe some people would hold on to their bitterness and anger after the kind of shit she’s been through. But that’s never really been Mom’s style. She looks forward, not back, and even though she has ups and downs, she always come back to hope in the end.
Lincoln, River, Dax, and Chase all step forward as we approach. They’re grinning, all of them happy to see me so happy, and when we reach them, I disentangle from my mom and stand between her and them to make the introductions.
“I think you’ve all met before, and I know you know Linc, Mom. But these are the—the guys I’ve been seeing.”
I curse myself for the little hiccup in my voice. Generally speaking, I don’t give a shit if people look at us strangely when we’re all out together, trying to figure out which guy I’m with before slowly realizing I haven’t picked just one of them. But I do care what my mom thinks.
“Of course I remember Lincoln.” Mom smiles at him, then shifts her gaze to the others. “And it’s nice to officially meet the rest of you. I’ve heard a lot about you.”
That’s true. Mom and I have had several long talks in the aftermath of Hollowell’s death. Finally free to tell her everything without fear of reprisal,
