Suddenly in Love (Lake Haven#1) by Julia London Read Free Book Online Page B

impulsive shopping sprees. Sometimes he wondered if his mother understood how hard it was to come by the sums of money he routinely paid out on her behalf. Brennan was generous with his mother, and he didn’t begrudge her a cent of it. She’d provided for him when there was no support from an absent father, managing to keep a roof over their head and food on the table while working two jobs, then adding a third job to pay for his guitar and music theory lessons when he’d developed an interest as a boy. So yeah, he was happy to do his part for her now. He just wished she had a healthier respect for the money she blew through.
    “And besides, you were here, sweetie. You would have kept her from making off with the awful fixtures in this house, right?”
    Don’t engage . “I’m not the best babysitter of workers. And didn’t we agree you wouldn’t start that project until the end of summer? You agreed to give me time and space for a few weeks, Mom.”
    “Well,” she said, her voice lilting. “ You agreed. I didn’t. Not really.”
    “What are you talking about? You said—”
    “I can’t live in a house that looks like this. I mean, my God, there’s a Buddha in the sunroom that has plaid wallpaper ! Who does that? The interior of this house is a train wreck, and I can’t live like this.”
    Brennan groaned. He ran his hands over his face and scrubbed his forehead with his fingers. His skin felt gritty to him. “I get it, Mom, the house needs to be redone. I’m all for it—but I need a break. I need a break ,” he said again, and abruptly slammed his fist down on the kitchen table, startling his mother and himself. “From you, from work, from music, from renovations, from strange women in the kitchen when all I want is a cup of coffee! So just . . . just lay off of it for now, will you? Will you do that for me?”
    His mother looked slightly wounded. “Here’s the thing, Bren,” she said, speaking coolly, formally. “You’ve had your break. You’ve been here a month and all you’ve done is buy yourself a new car and sleep and drink. Am I supposed to tiptoe around you forever? Am I supposed to pretend your manager isn’t calling every other day? What made you lose your way? Is it Jenna?”
    “Jenna?” Brennan struggled to keep from exploding. He wanted to put his fist through a wall, rip the fridge out of its cubby and hurl it across the room. His anger—undefined, always simmering-below-the-surface anger—was mixing toxically with the beer. “I’m not asking you to pretend or to tiptoe or to psychoanalyze me, I’m asking you not to renovate right now .”
    “It’s not going to bother you,” she insisted.
    She was trying to manipulate him, but she was no match for the many people in his life who had sought to manipulate him. Managers, producers, bandmates. “Do you want me to leave? Is that what you want? Because I will.”
    “Don’t be so touchy,” she said. “Why would I want you to leave? You’re my son, I love you, I love having you near me, and God knows that I haven’t seen much of you in years. And you obviously need your mother now more than ever. I don’t like how you sleep all day and go on benders,” she said, gesturing at the empty beer bottles on the kitchen bar. “I don’t like how you ignore phone calls that must be important, and I don’t like the way you are hiding from the world. That’s not you, Brennan. You’re the strongest, most determined, smartest, most gifted person I have ever known. But look at you!”
    “I am hiding!” he shouted. “I am hiding from managers and bands and paparazzi and everything else. Jesus, I’m thirty-three years old—do I really need to explain myself to you?”
    “Hey!” she said hotly. “Watch how you speak to me. I am your mother and I am worried about you. I earned that right when I gave birth to you.”
    Brennan sighed. It was like talking to a rock. “Yeah, well the only thing wrong with me today is that I’m