Unclaimed (14 page)

“So the biker?” my father asked again not one to be redirected.
  Apparently we were going to start with Lincoln, not school.  I tried not to laugh.

“Lincoln is not a biker,” I attempted to explain even t
hough I knew it was pointless.  I thought about telling him he was a tattoo artist but that wasn’t going to help anything.  The less they knew about him the better.  “But we have been dating for a few months now.”  I took a drink.

“Is he cheap?” my mother asked and I about spewed my coffee all over
the table.  I knew my face was bright red.  I could not believe my mother just asked me that.  Oh my God.  My mother thought I was paying a man for sex.  Oh my God.  I didn’t know what to make of that.  I was appalled and horrified at the same time and yet I found it slightly comical.

“I’m
not paying him,” I explained.  “We are dating.  In a relationship.”

“But he’s covered in
tattoos,” my father exclaimed.  He was okay with the idea that I was paying him for sex but not dating him because of his tattoos.  I had the strangest parents.

“I’m a
ware of that,” I snapped back.  My father just raised an eyebrow at me.  I never talked back to my parents or snapped at them.  It was pointless.  It got me nowhere.  They could never see my side of anything.  So why did I think this was going to be any different.

“Are you serious about this boy?” my mother
asked suddenly very concerned.  She put her hand over her heart like she was moments away from an anxiety attack.  She probably had pills in her purse for that too.  She was okay with it when she thought I was paying him but not as an actual relationship.  That made absolutely no sense.

“Very,” I said. 
I saw no reason to lie to them.  Not telling them because I hadn’t spoken to them was one thing but I wasn’t ashamed of Lincoln.  I wasn’t going to hide him from them or lie to them.  I would have told them about Lincoln eventually but it wasn’t like they were really even a part of my life so it didn’t matter.  The only way they were ever going to approve of any guy I dated was if they picked him out for me.

“Then we should get to know him,” my father said
and I about fell out my chair.  I had not been expecting that in the next hundred years.  “Invite him to dinner tonight.”

I just nodded dumbfounded.

“So what is this?” Apparently we were done talking about Lincoln.  He slid the announcement across the table to me.

“It’s my graduation announcement for the college of Liberal studies at Sac State,” I explained eve
n though he already knew that.  Who had sent them this?

“You go to Sac State?” my father said Sac State like it left a bad taste in his mouth.

I nodded.  He shook his head in disbelief.

“What will our friends think? 
What will they say,” my mother gasped.  Image was everything to her.  Shouldn’t they be proud that I was graduating from college even if it wasn’t Ivy League?  My father completely ignored her.

“
We can fix this,” he started.  “I’m sure with the right donation we can get you transferred to a more prestigious school and get you back on track.”  He wasn’t really talking to me.  He was more talking to himself trying to figure out the quickest solution to get me back on track and save them the embarrassment of a daughter who went to a state school and worked as a teacher.  God Forbid.

I did
n’t know why they wanted me to be a doctor anyway.  They planned to marry me off to some billionaire and let me live a life as a trophy wife just like my mother.

“No,” I exclaimed. 
I could hear the panic in my voice.  Both my parents jumped.  “I don’t want to switch schools.  I’m almost done.”  I was not starting over.  I wouldn’t do it.  I wasn’t going to start over so I could suffer through years of school for a career I was going to be miserable in.

“But teaching Prudence, really?”

“Really.  I love it.  I’m good at it,” I tried to explain.  Aren’t parents supposed to encourage their children do what makes them happy?  Not force them to live a life they don’t want?

My father’s phone rang. 
He held up his hand to stop me before I tried to explain more.  “Hello,” he said as he stood up and left the room for more privacy.  I could see him pacing in the living room.  Mom didn’t even try to talk to me.  I looked over and my mother was chugging back her coffee like we were at a kegger.  I couldn’t help the eye roll.  These were my parents.

“Ruby,” my father said as he stepped into the room snapping at her like she
was a dog.  My mother shot up.  “Let’s go.  Prudence, I’ll have my secretary make dinner reservations and call you.  Invite your… friend.”  I didn’t miss how he struggled to add the last part.  At least they didn’t call him a biker again.

“Yeah,” I sa
id still sitting at the table.  My father had already turned to leave, phone to his ear again, my mother right on his heels.  I listened as the door opened and then shut behind them.  I relaxed into the chair I was sitting in glad they were gone.  Apparently his phone call was more important than his wayward daughter.  Never had I been more thankful that my father’s work was more important to him than I was in my entire life.

Chapter 12

Lincoln

I worried about Pru all day.  I considered calling her more than once.  I checked my phone countless times just in case she called me.  She hadn’t.  I was tempted to call her but didn’t.  I needed to hear her voice.  I needed to know she was okay.  I didn’t think her parents would physically harm her but I knew they could emotionally beat her down from all the stories she told me.  Her stories made me thankful for my mother.

She said to call when I got off so that’s what I was going to do a
nd stress out in the meantime.  More than once I almost cleared my day so that I would be off and call her.

I was off, finally, and headed out the front door of the shop w
ithout even a backward glance.  Before Pru I was here all the time.  Dirty Ink was my life.  Now it had been bumped down on my list of priorities.  Never thought that would happen.

I pulled out my phone and was calling before I was
even out of the shop.  I needed to know that she wasn’t curled up on the floor in tears or being dragged off to medical school or something equally horrible.

“Hello,” she sai
d when she answered her phone.  It wasn’t her normal playful hello.  I could hear the stress in her voice.  It made me want to beat her parents just for making her stress.  Pru was a beautiful, wonderful woman who deserved their love.  They should be proud that she’s graduating college to become a teacher with a degree and early for that matter.  The credential program was supposed to take at least a year if not a year and a half beyond your four-year degree and she had finished both in only four years.  It was an accomplishment, even if she wasn’t going to be a doctor.

“Hey my lovely,”
I teased, “You survived.”  I was trying to ease my building anger and cheer her up at the same time.

“Barely. 
I was saved by a work call but it’s not over yet.  They’ve invited us to dinner.  They made reservations at the club.  Dad’s secretary called an hour ago.  You up for it?”

Not really. 
I imagined dinner with her parents would be horrible.

“Sure,” I’d do anything for her even attend dinner where I was pretty sure that I wa
s going to be the main course.  I met her parents for all of thirty seconds and I could see the judgment in their eyes.  They didn’t think I was worthy of their daughter but I’d go for her.  “I need to go home and change first.”

“Okay, I’ll h
ead your way since I’m ready.”  I could tell by her voice that she was glad I was going with her, some of the tension eased out of her a little but I knew she was looking forward to this dinner about as much as I was.  I had heard the stories and I knew her parents weren’t exactly my kind of people or maybe it was that I wasn’t really their kind of people.

“Alright, you okay?” I asked. 
I had made it home already and was just letting myself in.

“I will be when they leave tomorrow.”

I laughed.  I understood that.  Things could go back to the way they were only hours ago.  Just Pru and me.

“Love you,
” I said.  Now that it was out there I loved telling her I loved her.  It was great.

“You too.” And then we hung up.

Dinner was going to be awful but I’d suffer through it for Pru.  I’d give up anything, do anything, for my girl.

I was out of the shower standing in front of my closet in my boxer trying to figure out what on
e wears to dinner at the club.  I had never been to a country club before and had no idea what the dress code was.  I was sure my usual jeans and t-shirt where not an option leaving my selection extremely limited.

The
re was a knock on my front door.  No one else was home, so I made my way down in just my boxers where I found Pru.  She looked amazing as always.  Her long brown locks were pulled up into some swoopy, messy, yet orderly bun to the side.  She was wearing a simple tan, flowy, tank dress that had a little ruffle thing over the chest.  It was loose fitting but cinched at the waist.  Her outlandish jewelry was missing, replaced by simple diamond stud earring that I recognized from the first night I brought her home and nothing else but a white cardigan sweater in hand.  But she still looked like Pru.  Big, brown eyes, ivory skin, innocent looking freckles, complete with heels.

I opened the door.  She was tense. 
I could see the stress all over her face.  That didn’t fare well for me.  I didn’t like her stressed and what did it mean if a few hours with her parents could work her up so much.  I needed her to relax a little so I greeted her with a kiss and took my time.

“Hey
Lovely,” I said while my lips were still pressed against hers.  She leaned her tiny frame into me and kissed me back deeper than the little peck I intended.  I couldn’t resist.  I pulled her up against me and devoured her mouth.  Her entire body relaxed in my arms.

When we finally pulled
away we were both breathless.  I seriously just wanted to drag her upstairs to my bed and blow her parents off but I didn’t even try.  What kind of impression would that make?  Flaking on the dinner even if they didn’t know it was because I was ravishing their daughter.

After dinner was an entirely different story.

“You look nice,” I said as I held her.

“So do you,” she said as she stepped back to eye me in just my plaid blue boxers.
  Her dainty, little finger reached out and traced the edge of the waistband as she bit down on the outside of her lower lip.  I wanted to replace her teeth with mine.  It was becoming hard to remember why I needed to go dinner and couldn’t just drag her up to bed.  “Although, I don’t know if that would be my first choice wardrobe option to sit down to dinner with my parents,” she teased.

“Too much skin, huh?” I asked trying to pretend to be serious and keep my lust under control
.  She looked up at me and smiled.  There was my girl.  I knew she was hidden under those stress lines and frown.

“Way too much. 
My mother might have a heart attack, or have problems keeping her hands to herself,” she teased.  Eww, that was just wrong in so many ways.

“Come on,” I said as I tugged on her
hand and started up to my room.  “Help me find some club attire,” I said with mock snobbiness and she laughed.

Twenty minut
es later we were out the door.  I was clad in a pair of tan slacks, and a black, long sleeve button up shirt, tucked in, and the only pair of dress shoes I owned.

She drove us to the club on the outskirts of Rosevi
lle and pulled up to the valet.  We almost never took her car when we went out but we thought it was probably a better idea to show up in a silver BMW verses a white El Camino with racing strips.

We got out and she gripped m
y hand like it was a lifeline.  I pulled her to the side before we entered and brought her hand up to my lips and gently kissed it while I looked into her big, brown eyes.  She bit the side of her bottom lip and my stomach tightened.  I loved when she did that.  She was perfect, even when she was looking all cute and nervous.

“Pru, it’s just dinner,
” I tried to lighten the mood.  I could tell she was stressed beyond stress.  I had never seen Pru like this before.

“With my parents,” she said in hushed tones as her eyes darted around the restaurant nervously.

“I think I can handle them,” I teased.

“You don’t know my parents,” she was serio
usly worried about this dinner.  Maybe I needed to be more concerned.

“Look, I’ll be right h
ere with you the entire time.”  That’s why I was here.  Right?  Moral support and the dreaded meeting of the parents.  “We can leave whenever you’re ready,” I said trying to sooth her.  I meant it.  I wanted to be out of here like yesterday.  I felt so out of place with the valet and crystal chandeliers.

“Okay, just dinner and then we make a break fo
r it,” she nodded in agreement.  “No deserts or after dinner coffee or drinks or anything,” she nodded I think more to herself then me.  We were a team.  We’d make it through this together.  How bad could it really be?

“Okay,” I said and looped her arm through mine and we wal
ked over to the hostess stand.  I was trying to stay strong and keep my own nerves to myself.  Pru was already a nervous mess.  She didn’t need to worry about me too.  I had never seen her this worried before.  One of us had to stay strong and tonight that had to be me.  I was going to be the calm, rational one.  Her rock.  I was more than happy to do this for her but less than thrilled that her parents were the reason that I was having to do this.  Her parents shouldn’t be the cause of such stress in her life.

The hostess showed us to the table where her parents wer
e already seated.  Her father was busy looking at his phone and her mother was staring off into space, her eyes already a little glazed over.  Was she drunk?  Already?

I pulled
Pru’s chair out for her, helping her guide it in before taking my own seat.  At least I could show her parents I treated their daughter well, even if I didn’t fall into the right income bracket or have a cookie cutter image.  The hostess handed us two menus and turned on her heels and headed back to her station but I didn’t miss the look of disapproval she flashed me before she left.  I was used to those looks.  I got them a lot.  I had piercings and tattoos.  They went hand in hand.  I didn’t care.  Pru didn’t seem to care.  She actually seemed to love them.  She was always paying extra attention to them, but her parents cared.

“Prudence,” her father said as a greeting when he finally looked up from his phone a few min
utes after we had been seated.  It had been quiet up until then.  Pru didn’t speak so neither did I.  I was following her lead.

“Father, Mother,” she said. 
So formal.  I could never imagine calling my mom, Mother.  “This is Lincoln O’Neil.  My boyfriend,” she said as she introduced me again.  Her mother smiled at me and winked her glazed over eye.  What did that mean?  Her father just scowled at me but both shook the hand I offered.

“Yes, the young man leaving my daughter
’s apartment this morning,” her father sneered at me.  I held my tongue.  It took all of my control not to snap at him or make some witty comment about how moments before I had been leaving her bed or fucking her on the bathroom counter.  I kept that to myself.  I was sleeping with his daughter after all. I guess having it tossed in your face like that could be hard to deal with.

I didn’t have to say anything because h
e turned his attention to Pru.  Maybe silence was going to be my best option for the evening.

“I’m think
ing Stanford or maybe Harvard.  You have the grades, the means, and connections for either school.”

What was he talking abo
ut?  Stanford?  Harvard?  She was graduating in a few weeks.  She had a teaching job all lined up, here, in Sac.  Master programs maybe?  I ran my fingers through my hair for the first time since we sat down.  Why hadn’t she mentioned going on to get her masters to me?

“They both have excellent medical programs.”

No.  Did he think he was going to send her away for more schooling?  If Pru wanted to keep going to school I was fine with that.  Whatever made her happy but she needed to go to school here, by me.  And it needed to be her choice.  He was not going to take her away from me.

Pru hate
d science.  She was going to teach.  She didn’t want to be a doctor.  He was not going to send her to the other side of the country.  My throat suddenly got tight. I was on the verge of a panic attack over one comment.  I was starting to understand her pre dinner jitters a little better now.  Her parents were vicious.

This was going to be a long dinner.

Pru didn’t say anything just made a non-committal noise.  “Hmmm,” like it was all very interesting.  She was smiling and it was pleasant but fake.  I realized this was a smile she had practiced for years.  One I never actually saw before.

I was starting to freak-out. 
I just got her I couldn’t lose her.  Was she planning to leave me?  Since when?  She loved teaching.  She had no intention of going to medical school.  What happened when I left her this morning?

I wanted to question her.  Get some answers. 
To just jump up in the middle of the stupid country club dining room and drag her out all caveman like screaming mine.  Her parents needed to go back to wherever they came from and stop interfering.  We were fine before they got here, perfectly happy.  They were ruining everything.  They were going to take my fairy away from me.

“Medicine is just a more res
pectable career then teaching.  Teaching’s just so, so… common,” he finally finished.

“I don’t think there is a
nything common about teaching.  It’s hard work and takes a wonderful person to do it,” I said before I could hold my tongue.  So much for staying quiet through dinner.  I suddenly felt the urge to defend Pru, to fight for her.

“And you don’t think that being a doctor is hard work or requires you to be a wonderful person?” her father asked throwing my words back at me like I was an idiot.