Read Online Pillow Talk by Hailey North - Free Book Online Page B

took shape in the reaches of her memory but she couldn't quite place it. What was it about that nervous gesture that seemed familiar?
    "Did you go to college?" Grandfather asked the question.
    "UNLV."
    "I don't believe I know that school," Mathilde said.
    "University of Nevada at Las Vegas." It was Parker who answered, his slow, deep voice a welcome contrast to the strident tones of most of the others.
    She flashed a glance at him, grateful he hadn't disappeared and left her to face the wolf pack on her own. She had the distinct feeling he'd rather be anywhere else than in the middle of what he'd called the Great Parlor.
    "Good basketball team." Dr. Prejean stuck in, steering Teensy into the family circle.
    There was something unhealthy in the overly solicitous manner the doctor adopted toward Teensy. Meg had a feeling he made every detail of the Ponthier's lives his business and meddled far more than any doctor she'd ever known.
    At least they seemed to take the doctor's pronouncement as approval of sorts. And no one asked whether she'd graduated, Meg watched them watch her and asked herself whether she would be able to help Jules's mother in any way. She seemed to live pretty much in her own little world and the others seemed content to let Dr. Prejean handle her.
    “Well, that's high school and college ," Grandfather said. “So tell us about your parents."
    Meg hesitated.
    Kinky said, “First tell us how you and Jules met.''
    Grandfather glared at the young man. “Never could wait your turn. Neither you nor my grandson ever learned a whit of respect."
    Kinky produced his one-shouldered shrug. “Our parents never stressed that lesson."
    Mathilde said, “I find it much more likely that you closed your ears to that particular lesson."
    “Ooh, don't go grouchy on me," Kinky said. “I do know where the skeletons are buried."
    The look of disgust on Parker's face was clear. Meg wondered what Kinky meant, but she didn't really want to know. She really wanted to go home, to hold her children in her arms and breathe in their innocence.
    “Where did you meet my grandson?"
    Should she let them down gently? Meg glanced around the elegant room, at the priceless antique furnishings. Through windows that stretched from the floor almost to the high ceiling she glimpsed a broad porch and beyond that the expanse of lawns and gardens that she knew occupied the entire block. Yet for all the wealth of their surroundings, these people were miserable.
    She took a deep breath and started to answer bluntly. But then Teensy lifted her head and the look of anticipation on her face jolted Meg. The mother wanted a fairy tale ending for her son.
    "I met him"—she cast about for words she could use that we ren't too far from the truth— "at a social event."
    Parker's b row quirked upwards. She won dered how far off his forehead that brow would have traveled if she'd stated the truth as baldly as she'd been tempted. He came into the bar where I was slinging drinks.
    "A dance?" T eensy had sat forward. Prejean had to drop his arm from her shoulders when she moved abruptly.
    "A musical evening." There, that ought to satisfy her. The band had been playing when Jules had settled into the corner table, ordering round after round of bourbon and water. The group had overwhelmed the lobby bar of the casino, playing too loudly as usual. But they were good as most of the small acts in Vegas were, the talent drawn there in the hopes of striking it rich.
    "Did you dance?" Teensy asked wistfully.
    "We talk ed." And they had, for so long Moose the bar ma nager had yelled at her twice.
    He only quit yelling when Jules tossed a hundred-dollar bill at him. Then we kept on talking and then he asked me to marry him for three days for thirty thousand dollars and I did and he got himself killed and here I am. Am I nuts?
    "I think you're making her sad," Amelia Anne said.
    Meg gave her a small smile. "I'm okay," she said.
    Teensy burst into tears. "Well, I'm