“The bride is supposed to put on the wedding, and I might come up a bit short.”
They both knew she wouldn’t be “borrowing” any money, but Rico would step up to the plate. He always did. Heck, he’d never been able to deny his mom anything.
Ever since his father died, it had been just the two of them—well, other than a progression of stepfathers who for some reason or another swung in and out of their lives as if they where traveling through a revolving door. Each one had offered a lonely mother and child the promise and hope of a family and then provided them everything but.
He glanced at Frank’s picture, picked it up. Okay, so that one hadn’t hurt them on purpose, but his unexpected death had left them alone and hurting just the same.
“All right,” he told his mom. “I’ll spring for the wedding if you’ll try and keep it small.”
They both knew Rico wasn’t a cheapskate. He could well afford a fancy wingding. But he wasn’t into dog-and-pony shows.
“Oh, honey,” she said, her voice getting all soft and mushy. “You’re so good to me.”
“Yeah? Well, you’ve been pretty good to me, too.”
They’d been through a lot together—more than their share of pain and struggles. There was a time when they’d both had to work to keep a roof over their heads, and Rico hadn’t even hit his teen years.
“I love you.”
“Me, too,” he told her. But the words weren’t necessary. She knew he loved her unconditionally even if she frustrated the hell out of him at times.
“Are you sure about this?” he asked again.
“Absolutely.”
Dead silence.
Then he blew out a sigh and reeled in his ever-present cynicism the best he could. “Okay. Then I’m happy for you.” Well, not exactly happy. Resigned, he supposed.
But that didn’t mean he wouldn’t do a little background check on Prince Charming, D.D.S.
He picked up a pen. “What did you say this guy’s name was?”
“Daniel Osterhout.”
“Spell it.”
“You’re not writing that down, are you?”
“Humor me.”
“You’re not going to have one of your investigators dig into his background, are you?”
“Of course not.” Rico wasn’t about to pass this job on to anyone else.
She spelled out the name.
“Is that German?”
“On his father’s side.”
“So where did you meet him?”
“I found a coupon in the Dollarsaver offering a free dental exam and X-rays to new patients at his office in Westlake, so I called and made an appointment. I know you don’t believe in this sort of thing, but it was love at first sight.”
In a dental chair? How romantic.
Open your mouth and say “aah.”
Aah…ooh, baby.
“Nope, I’m a skeptic when it comes to stuff like that, Mom. But I’m glad you’re happy.” He just hoped she’d stay that way.
As an adolescent, he’d pinned his hopes on each man she’d brought into their lives. And after weathering each disappointment, he’d become tough and callused when it came to buying into the fairy tale of love. But he’d managed to survive, to become strong.
His mom, on the other hand, had been a slow learner. And he was afraid that one more failed marriage, either through death, divorce or abandonment, would do her in rather than toughen her up.
“Daniel and I would like to take you out to dinner this weekend,” she said.
Garcia and Associates, with offices in New York, Chicago and L.A., hadn’t become a booming company without its owner working long, hard hours and pouring his blood, sweat and tears into the place. Rico couldn’t just take off on a personal jaunt for the hell of it.
Okay, due to the agency’s success, that wasn’t entirely true anymore.
“I don’t know if I can get away,” he lied, hoping that if he dragged his feet, her budding romance would blow over before he had to meet the guy.
“Oh, come on, honey. You put in too many hours as it is. Besides, you’ve hired some new investigators, like that man you call Cowboy. So surely you can drive up here for a day.”
He glanced at his calendar. Once he gave Suzette a call, he’d have some free time this weekend. “All right. I’ll come down on Saturday afternoon. We can have dinner, I’ll meet your dental soul mate, then I’ll head back to the city.”
“You can also stay the night in my spare room. I’ll make homemade biscuits and sausage gravy in the morning.”
“Nothing like twisting my arm. The last woman I was seeing tried to get me on a health kick—tofu, wheat germ and a bunch of other crap—so I’m ready to bolt.”
“You’re between ladies right now?”
Warning bells went off. There was no way he wanted his mother fixing him up with anyone. No way. She thought the perfect woman for him was someone a lot like herself, someone with her head in the clouds and her eye on true love forever.
And for some dumb reason, she couldn’t get it in her mind that he’d quit believing in pipe dreams like marriage a long time ago. And not just because of his mother’s marital history.
He had a friend, Mac McGuire, whose wife had tried to force him to give up being a cop, who’d tried to make him move to the suburbs and trade in his police cruiser for a minivan. They’d even had a kid together, which had only made things worse.
And then fate, as it was prone to do, threw Mac a nasty curve. He and his wife divorced, his son was later killed in a traffic accident and the resulting grief led to some heavy drinking, a misconduct charge at work….
Nope, he wouldn’t set himself up for something like that.
“Listen,” he told his mom. “I’m not looking for a date, if that’s what you’ve got on your mind. But I’ll come up and have dinner with you on Saturday. And if the biscuits-and-gravy deal is still on, I’ll spend the night.”
“I’m so glad. And by the way…”
Uh-oh. Rico instinctively braced himself.
“I have a good friend who needs a private investigator. And I thought…”
“You thought that I’d do it as a favor to you.”
“You’ll
