I’m practically glaring at him. “So,” I say between bites, pointing my fork at him. “Last night’s appetizer wasn’t some once in a blue moon thing for you.”

He smirks then rubs his fingers across his lips, taking on a serious face. “I like to cook when I can.”

“You should cook all the time,” my mother says. “This is very, very good.”

“And you should take that as a compliment since she barely eats my food,” I tell him, kicking him lightly under the table.

“Oh, that’s not true,” my mother chides me, but it is totally true. I do my best, but the kitchen has never been my strong suit. When it comes to Lachlan though, it’s one of his many fucking strong suits. I swear to god there is nothing he can’t do.

Why the hell did I have to meet this beast, this superman, who blows my mind in the bedroom, mows down rugby players for a living, rescues helpless animals, looks like a fucking god, and happens to cook, just before he has to leave? Why is life so damn cruel?

“Here I was thinking all you Scots knew how to make was haggis,” I tell him, pushing the heaviness out of my chest and trying to focus on what’s in front of me.

“Oh, I can make some pretty stellar haggis,” he says. “If I had more time here, I’d see what I could do.”

I manage a smile. “As much as I wish you had more time, I’m glad I’m missing out on that.”

After dinner, my mother insists on dessert and brings out the matcha green tea ice cream, something Lachlan’s never had before.

“This is gorgeous,” he says between spoonfuls.

“I grew up on the stuff,” I tell him. “Do you know my favorite thing to eat as a child was sheets and sheets of nori? You know, dried seaweed.”

“It is true,” my mom says with a gentle laugh. “I bought them for sushi, but I would always have to hide them from her. When I found the packets later, they were torn into, like some mouse had gotten into them.”

“Strange little creature,” he comments warmly, sitting back in his chair, studying me. “What else did you get up to as a child?”

“Oh, she was up to everything,” my mother says quickly. “No different than she is now. But she had four older brothers to keep her in line. Brian, Nikko, Paul, and Toshio. Kayla was our little angel. She popped up one day when her father and I never thought I could get pregnant. I never thought I would get my little girl. But here she is.”

My cheeks grow hot, and I busy myself by swirling the ice cream into green soup.

“Unfortunately,” my mom adds, “she was an absolute terror.”

I glare at her while Lachlan lets out a laugh. “Mom,” I warn her.

“Oh, she was,” she says, leaning forward toward Lachlan, her eyes shining. “Even as a little girl, she’d run away from you every chance she got. If it wasn’t for her brothers, I’m sure we would have lost her for good one day. They were good for that, being protective.”

“Yeah, but then in high school it got a bit annoying,” I remind her.

“For you,” she says in jest. “But for us, it was a godsend. She was a boy crazy little girl, you see.”

“Oh, is that so?” Lachlan asks me with large eyes, clearly enjoying this.

“Yes, very much so,” my mom says before I can neither confirm nor deny. “Every day she had a new crush from school. Billy this or Tommy that. She got in trouble once for kissing a boy and making him cry.”

I bury my face in my hands and groan.

Lachlan is laughing hard, such a nice sound, even if it’s at my expense. “What did you do, Kayla?”

I keep my face buried and don’t answer because I know my mom will.

And she does. “The teacher told me that the boy didn’t want to kiss her, so she held him down, and when he tried to run, she punched him in the stomach.”

“You might have been a natural at rugby after all,” he says between laughs.

“So,” my mom goes on, “by the time she got to high school, her brothers acted like chaperones. The poor girl couldn’t go anywhere without them knowing about it. All the boys were kept at bay.”

“Well, I don’t blame your brothers for being protective of you,” Lachlan says. “You were probably as stunning in high school as you are right now.”

Oh god. I look up, and he’s staring at me so sincerely it hurts. My face burns even more at the compliment.

“Look, you’ve made her blush,” my mother says, which isn’t helping. “You’ve gotten under her skin.”

“Okay,” I say quickly, getting to my feet. “I’m going to the bathroom. When I get back, can we all agree not to embarrass me anymore?”

“But I love watching you get embarrassed,” Lachlan practically purrs.

I give him the finger, which of course causes my mother to gasp in outrage, and I stride down the hall to the bathroom, shutting myself in. I take a long, deep breath. My heart is racing, and I don’t know why. Everything is going so well, but all it does is make me worry. There’s this space behind my heart, a little hole, and it’s slowly getting bigger.

I run a washcloth under the cold water and dab my face. I’m still blushing, much like the way I look after sex. Perhaps that’s why Lachlan wants me to be embarrassed.

When I leave the bathroom, Lachlan is sitting in the living room and my mom is trying to make some tea.

“Here, go sit down,” I tell her, taking the kettle from her hands.

She places her hand over mine. For a moment I stare at it—pale, wrinkled beautifully, speckled with age spots. My mother’s hands, hands that have seen me through my whole life, are shaking slightly. When did that start to happen? The shakes?

But I don’t ask her because she’s looking up at me adoringly.

“You shouldn’t let him leave,” she tells me quietly. Her grip on my hand strengthens, the shakes abating slightly. “He is such the man for you.”

I give her a quick smile and gently pull the kettle away from her. “I honestly don’t know him well enough to think that.” I swallow and look out at the living room where he’s watching TV. “I wish I did though.”

“Sometimes you don’t need to know someone to know them,” she says. “And when he looks at you, you can tell. He knows you.” Then she pads her way out of the kitchen to join him. I shiver, suddenly cold, and get the tea ready. We drink cups and cups of it, watching an episode of my mother’s other favorite show, NCIS, until it starts getting late, and I know Lachlan has to check on Emily.

For some reason it’s hard to say goodbye to my mom this time. Maybe because I’ve been extra emotional all night. I hug her longer than I normally do and tell her I’ll be by next week. Maybe I can drag Toshio with me.

Lachlan bends down and envelops my tiny mother in a bear hug. Every inch of me dissolves at the sight.

I have completely melted.

“Your mother is lovely,” Lachlan says to me quietly during the car ride back into the city.

“That she is,” I say, glad he was so charmed by her. And equally as glad she was so charmed by him.

“You said before that she was sick,” he says, putting his hand behind my neck and rubbing his thumb against my skin. “What’s wrong with her?”

My grip on the steering wheel tightens. “I’m not really sure.” I lick my lips, trying to remember. “It started after my father died. She was a wreck for a long time. We all were. She was severely depressed, and I guess all that pain inside started making its way outside. Some doctors say its chronic fatigue syndrome, others say it’s still depression and anxiety. She doesn’t sleep well and her blood pressure is always through the roof. Her muscles ache all the time. I don’t know what to think. But it’s been going on for years.”

And her shaking hands, well I hope that’s just because she was overexcited about Lachlan and me being there.

“Do you have good doctors here in America?” he asks.

I shake my head. “No. Well, yeah. If you can pay for them. She never worked, so she doesn’t have benefits that a lot of people her age would. But my brothers and I, we pay for it. We try and get the best for her, a whole bunch of different opinions. Honestly,” I say, eyeing him briefly. “I think she’s still suffering from a broken heart.”