Chapter Seventeen

Chapter Seventeen

They finally made it to a kitchen about an hour later. Anthony had been insistent on taking a shower, and that she join him. It hadn’t taken him much to get her into the tub with him.

“Stop smiling,” she said as she dropped the takeout menus on the breakfast bar.

“You say that like it’s a crime to smile.”

She shook her head. “It’s the way you do it.”

“How do I do it?”

She pursed her lips and studied him. He wasn’t a man that usually had an issue with attention from women, but things were different with Lalani. Her interest always had the ability to make him feel like a fumbling thirteen-year-old. He had to fight the urge to shift in the chair.

The moment he saw her mouth curve upward, he knew she was fucking with him. With a growl, he rose out of the chair and grabbed her. She squealed as he pulled her back down on his lap.

He gave her a loud smacking kiss. “And, I’m smiling because I just had amazing shower sex with one of the sexiest women who has ever walked the streets of Honolulu.”

She patted his cheek. “Nice save, Santini.”

“So, what do you want to eat tonight?”

She picked up a couple of menus and started to look through them. She hummed as she studied them. She was always humming in some way. He had noticed it from the moment he had met her. It wasn’t something that stood out, but even if she wasn’t singing, there was a way about her that was always musical. He knew it came from her training in dance, but part of it was the woman. Now, he noticed it more and more often. It was a happy sound that never failed to make his heart dance a little.

“Big City Diner or The Fat Greek?”

“Got any Thai?”

She nodded and picked up a menu from Phuket Thai. “I’ll take some Pad Thai, extra spicy,” he said without looking at it.

“Fair enough.”

She dropped the other menus on the table and opened the Thai one. He was happy to watch her. He pushed some of her hair back over her shoulder, then found himself toying with the ends of it again. He was becoming obsessed with her hair. With her. He’d come to the realization that his need for her wasn’t going away, not any time soon. She had been sneaking into his thoughts from the day he’d met her. Now, he couldn’t go more than a few minutes before she came to mind. Anthony wasn’t sure how he felt about it, but at the moment, he didn’t even want to think what it meant.

“Do you want any appetizers?” she asked, breaking into his thoughts.

“I thought we already had those.”

She snorted and grabbed her phone off the table. She apparently had the number programmed into her phone. She ordered his Pad Thai, and some Thai basil for herself.

“So,” he asked, still toying with the ends of her hair, “you order a lot of take out?”

She shrugged. “It’s habit. Unless I have plans with my dad, I tend to grab something or order in a few times a week. I do like to cook, but sometimes it seems like a waste of time to cook only for myself.”

“Yeah, I know that feeling. Before moving into the guest house, I did that a lot.”

“New York spoiled me. I don’t know if I could live anywhere there wasn’t a decent delivery service, at least right now. It’s one of the reasons I was happy my uncle offered up his apartment. I definitely couldn’t afford something like this, not with the money I put into the studio.”

“So, when is the recital?”

“A week from tonight.”

He detected something beneath the surface. It was there in the way her spine had stiffened slightly and the tone of her voice.

“What’s wrong?”

“Nothing.”

“Bullshit. Something has you worried.”

She shrugged. “It’s my first recital.”

“It can’t be your first recital.”

“I mean as a teacher. It’s the first time I have done this.”

“And you’re worried about it?”

She nodded. “It is more about me as a teacher, what I can inspire.”

“You’re not worried about their abilities.”

“No. It isn’t about how they perform. It is about if they enjoy performing. That is the most important thing.”

He blinked at the passion behind the statement. He agreed with her, but he definitely didn’t expect it to come from an accomplished ballerina like Lalani.

“Where did that philosophy come from?”

“What kind of a question is that?”

“A normal kind.”

She rolled her eyes. “It’s from my mother. She always believed that I should enjoy what I was doing. So, she never forced me into dance. That was all me. She never discouraged me, but she always let me know that it wasn’t the beginning and end of who I was.”

He nodded. “I just assumed that you would be more strict about your students.”

“I expect them to dance, but I also don’t expect them to live the life of a dancer. Teaching isn’t about having a prima in every class. It’s about teaching the things I love about dance. The music, the love of the actual dancing is more important than talent. You can have all the talent in the world but never truly be happy because you hate what you are doing. I saw it all the time in New York. People who did it as if it were an every day, run of the mill job.”

“And so, this recital is free to the public?” he asked before he realized what he had just asked. The moment he did, he understood what it meant. This was a piece of her that he wanted to see, a glimpse into another facet of one of the most intriguing women he had ever met. It also meant he was about to expose her to his family in a way he had not expected.

She smiled. “Yes, but I’m sure I can talk to someone about getting you a ticket.”

He chuckled. “What about three?”

“Alana already has her tickets.”

“I was talking about for my folks. They’re going to be in town.”

She blinked. “What?”

“My parents. They’re coming in Wednesday night.”

“Your parents are going to be here?” she asked, her voice turning a bit shrill.

“Yeah.”

“How long have you known about that?”

“Just a few hours. Mom called, said she wanted to get some Jon time in.”

She nodded. “Can’t blame her there.”

“Is there something wrong?”

“Why would there be anything wrong?”

“Because you’ve gone pale.”

She gave him a look that would have terrified an ordinary man. Thank God he was a Santini.

“I don’t do pale.”

Oh, someone was really bothered by meeting his parents. It seemed odd because she seemed to have such a good relationship with her father. “I just don’t know why you are freaking about my parents coming.”

“Mothers have a certain thing about their sons—especially their oldest.”

“My father will be here too, you know.”

She jumped up off his lap. “I don’t do the parent thing. Not really.”

She started to pace.

“Hey, why are you freaking out?”

“I am not freaking out. I am…concerned.”

Concerned wasn’t a word he would use for her reaction. She looked panicked. Waves of terror wafted off her as she continued to walk back and forth.

“You don’t have to worry about my mother.”

She slanted him a look and kept pacing.

“What was that look for?”

“You are her first born, and I am sleeping with you,” she practically screeched.

With a crocked grin, he said, “I’m pretty sure Mom knows I’m not a virgin.”

She stopped and put her hands on her hips. “Anthony, you know what I mean. You’re at an age where your mother looks at every woman as a potential daughter-in-law.”

Well, that much was true. From the time he had graduated from college, his mother had been hinting at marriage. It was a family trait. It wasn’t overt or even intrusive, and all of them knew it was done out of love. Of course, if he told Lalani that right now, she might have a full-blown panic attack.

“Listen, Mom has three of us married and two grandbabies on the way. She might have been a little pushy before, but now, she’s calmed down.”

He said a prayer for forgiveness.

“Calmed down?”

“Yeah. Two babies that are going to be born less than six weeks apart, are keeping her happy.”

He made a mental note to talk to his mother and, more importantly, to his father. Anthony needed his father to keep everything calm.

She sighed. “I just don’t do well with moms.”

“Your mother liked you.”

She chuckled. “Yeah, and we would gang up on my father.”

“I can only imagine what it was like living in a house as a minority.”

“He handled it pretty well, considering he was a Marine.”

Diverting her was the important thing. “So, why do you say you don’t do well with moms?”

She shrugged and sat down on the barstool next to his. “I just never met mothers of the men I was dating. Well, not many.”

Something in the back of his memory slinked forward. He remembered Marco saying something about a bad breakup.

“Why not?”

“Like I said, no dating in high school, so by the time I started really dating, men were on their own. Most of them were dancers living far from home.”

He reached out and started to play with the ends of her hair again. He was definitely becoming obsessed with her hair. It was so soft, with just a bit of curl at the ends. She claimed it would get frizzy when she let it go, but he would probably like it just as much. Feeling it slide against his flesh when they were in bed together was going to go down as one of his favorite memories.

“No serious relationships?”

“One.”

“One serious relationship, and the mother had something to do with it going wrong?”

“Not really.”

He hated that she was keeping things from him. It gnawed at his gut that there was something so personal she didn’t feel comfortable sharing it with him.

“I’m just going to keep bugging you until you tell me.”

“You are going to bug me. That’s rich. You’ve not told me one damned thing about your past dating experience.”

He held his hands out and said, “Ask away. I’m an open book.”

“Okay, have you ever been engaged?”

He shook his head. “Been close once, but that was before she realized being the girlfriend of a Marine who deployed constantly wasn’t that much fun. I think she realized that being a wife would be even worse.”

She snorted. “Wimp.”

“That’s what my mother said.”

She didn’t smile like he wanted her to. For some reason, he had a need to make her happy. It was as if his happiness suddenly depended on it. He shoved that uneasy thought aside.

“Got any other questions?” he asked.

She crossed her arms and studied him again. “Why did you get out?”

“Sick of it. I loved it when I got in. Loved my job, loved the difference I made. Then things started to change. Moving up in rank changed things, changed the way I could work. Soon, it wasn’t that much fun anymore and then, I started to dread going to work.”

“And NCIS?”

He smiled. “My friend JT had talked to me about it. He was in the same situation, and he wanted out. He’d already interviewed and I followed suit.”

“JT? Isn’t he married to your sister?”

He frowned. “Yeah, I’m trying to get used to that.”

She chuckled. “How long have they been together?”

“A few months. So, this one big relationship?” he asked.

She opened her mouth and the buzzer sounded. “Oh, hey, our food. Could you buzz him up?”

He nodded.

“I need to go wash up.” She grabbed her purse, but he shook his head.

“I’ll take care of dinner.”

She frowned and he shook his head. “I’ll get dinner, and you can handle breakfast.”

“You got it.”

She hurried out of the room. He buzzed the delivery guy into the building and grabbed his wallet. He would have to deal with her past relationships at some point. Then, maybe he could find out why she freaked out the way she did and why it mattered so much to him.