Finder's Keeper (3 page)

“Have you heard from Mark lately?” Chase asked to distract Brody from his mission, naming one of their frat brothers who had recently hit it huge with his tech company.

Brody must have felt he’d satisfied Molly’s commands because he went with the topic change—even though he was better than just about anyone at seeing through Chase’s verbal acrobatics.

The rest of the meal was as pleasant as overcooked pasta could be.

Brody grabbed the check when it came and frowned. “This isn’t our bill.”

Chase took it from him and pretended to confirm that it was, indeed, the wrong bill before catching the waitress’s eye and waving her over. Tammy, as her nametag identified her, was mid-thirties and would have been pretty in a wholesome, vulnerable way if she hadn’t looked like she was about to toss her cookies in his lap.

He smiled his most charming, put-the-room-at-ease smile and tipped the black folder in her direction. “We seem to have gotten switched up.”

Her face flushed and tears gathered in her eyes. “Oh my gosh, I’m so sorry. Here let me fix it.”

Chase made sure his hand brushed hers as he handed the check back to her, opening up the part of his brain where his secret weapon had lived since he was a pimply-faced adolescent. Psychic Detectives R Us.

Through the brush of skin, information crowded into his brain, carrying with it the vague taste of malted milk. The usual murky jumble of intangibles were there—fear, insecurity, self-recrimination, worry—and piercing through that foggy mess, the single sharp desire to find the missing child support check. Something inside Chase jolted, like a steel wire snapping taut and vibrating hard, and he saw the check, folded twice and wedged inside the lining of a black purse.

Then her hand pulled away and the images vanished, leaving only his own thoughts occupying his brain. She darted away from the table, walking with the unhurried speed of a practiced service professional.

Chase pulled out his wallet and yanked at the lining until it tore. When Tammy returned, gushing apologies, he made sure he was bitching loudly to Brody about needing a new one—
everything keeps getting caught in the damn lining and I can never find it. Piece of crap wallet.

Her expression filled with a sharp hope and she nearly threw the bill at him in her haste to get to the break room where she’d shoved her worn, busted-lining purse in a locker.

Brody watched her hustle away and turned back to Chase with one brow arched. “I don’t know why you can’t just find a winning lottery ticket and solve all your financial problems.”

“First I would have to
lose
a winning lottery ticket. And it doesn’t work when I do it on myself. You know that.”

Brody grunted the affirmative. “Sucks that you can’t do it for yourself. You were the only guy in the frat who could never find his keys after a bender.”

“Or his car. Or the Dean’s daughter’s underwear,” Chase commented, remembering some of the more entertaining finds from his college years.

Before he dropped out. Before his life went to shit on one sunny winter afternoon.

“If you don’t want to see the guys on Sunday, we could do something different. Molly has a friend she thought you’d like to meet.”

Chase’s stomach revolted and he nearly spewed mushy pasta all over the plastic tablecloth. He’d dated in the last six years. Or, at least, he’d hooked up. But the thought of Molly—Katie’s best friend, sorority sister and would-have-been-maid-of-honor—setting him up with a friend of hers activated his upchuck reflex. It felt so damn
wrong
.

“I’m seeing someone,” he lied, rushing the words out. “Cute chick.” The brunette flashed in his mind. Miss Prim’s prissy mouth and wire-rimmed glasses gave him the inspiration to work the lie. “She’s really serious and uh,”
prissy…sexy…
“brunette.”

Brody’s eyebrows flew up. “Serious? That doesn’t sound like your type.”

“What can I say? She intrigues me.”

Brody smiled, his relief so obvious it bordered on patronizing. Sometime in the last six years Chase had crossed the line where reactions to good news changed from be-happy-for-me into be-grateful-you-don’t-have-to-feel-quite-so-much-pity-for-me. “I’m glad you’ve met someone, man. That’s awesome. She sounds like just what you need to keep you grounded.”

“Yeah,” Chase agreed.

Just what he needed. A made-up girlfriend to keep his friends off his back about the way he was wasting his life. The idea had merit. Now he just needed a girl to play the part.

Chapter Three

Houston, We Have a Problem

“Why did I let you talk me into that? How could you have possibly imagined I would be anything but a complete failure at speed-dating?”

Escaping the restaurant, Mia had shut herself in the cozy interior of her car with an immense sense of relief and a driving desire to murder her sister
.
When in doubt, blame Gina.
She’d turned the ignition, fired up her Bluetooth and dialed Gina before burning rubber out of the parking lot.

“You liked the idea,” Gina reminded her as she sped away from the scene of the crime. “You kept saying how efficient it was.”

“Next time I think something is a good idea, remind me of this moment.”

“It can’t have been that bad.”

“The last two hours are ample proof that it can, in fact, be that bad.”

She’d wanted to like them. Really she had. And not just because she was on a clock to fall in love.

The problem came down to the dichotomy between theory and practice. In theory, speed-dating had seemed brilliantly efficient, as meeting a man was a necessary step toward her ultimate goal of getting married and procreating. In practice, she’d rather have been at her lab. Or anywhere else.

“There wasn’t
anyone
you hit it off with?” Gina coaxed. “Maybe a certain zoning permit guy named Ben?”

The pieces fell solidly into place. “Oh my God. Tell me you didn’t talk me into going speed-dating just so you can get a zoning exemption for your addition.”

“Do you know how strict they are about handing out those exemptions?”

“Gina! I can’t believe you tried to pimp me out for a building permit.”

Gina laughed lightly, unoffended. Her kid sister was sunshine and light. Not much dampened her spirits. “Hey, he might have been your true love
and
he could get me an exemption. Two birds, one stone. I was being efficient. You like efficient.”

“After tonight, efficiency and I aren’t on the best terms anymore.” She recalled the way Twelve had tucked his head down like a turtle retreating into his shell whenever she asked him a question. “You seriously thought Ben was my perfect match?”

“He was kind of cute. In a nerdy, Zoning Avenger way. Wielding the Rubber Stamp of Doom. Besides, you’re boring. He’s boring. To use a math analogy so I know you’ll understand, I thought it was like two negatives making a positive.”

“I think I’d rather you just told me you were punking me, at least then one of us would have gotten some enjoyment out of the evening.”

Gina snorted. “I’m surprised you even know what punking is. That’s pretty pop culture for you, sis.”

“Hey. I’m not totally out of touch with pop culture.”

“Ha.”

“The research assistants talk about stuff like that. I pick it up. And could you please stop telling people I’m a rocket scientist? Neurobiology, Gina.”

“I think I said astrophysics. The organizer chick seemed really impressed.”

“I don’t think impressed is the word I would use. She put ‘Ask me about Astronomy!’ on my nametag and apparently the average male doesn’t know that there is a distinction between astronomy and astrology. They kept asking me about my sign.”

“Oh, Mia.” Gina gave a soft, groaning laugh. “Do you even know your sign?”

It should have been funny, but Mia wasn’t laughing. It was hard to find the humor in being a total dating failure. “Apparently I look like a Virgo.”

“What does that even mean?”

“How am I supposed to know? I also got two requests to play doctor and was told I’m a total
guidette
—and no, I do not want to know what that means.”

“Oh Lord. So…the whole thing was a bust, huh?”

Mia stopped at the light for the turnpike entrance. “I think you can kiss your zoning exemption goodbye.”

“Well, crap.”

“I’m touched by this continued evidence of your priorities.”

“I’m not worried about you finding love. You have the watch. Love is coming for you like a freight train, baby. But the family doesn’t have any magic doodads to bypass zoning regulations. Unless Nonna’s been holding out on us.”

The light changed and Mia’s hands tightened on the steering wheel as she took the entrance to the turnpike. “That damn watch.”

“Hey, don’t damn the watch.” She could practically hear Gina making the sign of the cross. “I’m disgustingly happy, thanks to that little piece of gold. Or I will be as soon as we get that permit.” A thin mewling cry echoed in the background. “Oh crud, that’s Marley. Hang on.”

Gina dropped the phone and Mia strained to pick out the sounds of her niece being picked up, cuddled and soothed. Would Gina press her face to the baby’s downy head and inhale her sweet baby-powder scent?

An ache of envy throbbed in Mia’s chest.

She’d never seen herself as a Mommy type. She was self-centered and impatient with people and their idiosyncrasies. She was also too fixated on her work and spent far too many hours in her lab to be a good parent, and she wasn’t going to do it half-assed.

Compounded to that was the fact that she didn’t really
like
children. She’d always found them mildly annoying. They were noisy and messy and that was before they hit puberty and became obnoxious hazards to society. She couldn’t imagine the rewards of being a parent could possibly compensate for years of headaches and sleep deprivation.

She’d always figured her work would be her legacy and she was fine with that. Happy.

Then, two months ago, Marley Renee Villapiano made her entrance into the world and everything had changed. The first second Mia had laid eyes on her niece, her heart had swallowed that tiny precious bundle whole, swelling up to make room for a love so big and fierce it had dwarfed every other emotion in her experience.

Suddenly patience wasn’t a problem. Putting Marley’s needs first wasn’t an issue. Taking time off work to babysit—even an entire weekend without visiting the lab—wasn’t even an irritation. Her sweet girl was one miracle after another, watching her grow and change an endless source of fascination and pride.

Suddenly Mia, who had never thought of biological clocks as something that pertained to her, started hearing a distinct ticking. She wanted one of her own, the intensity of that desire startling. And unnerving.

Her cousins foisting their kids on her had never had the same effect. Her brothers had dodged the marriage watch to date and her older sister Teresa hadn’t been able to conceive yet, so it was Gina, the baby of the family, whose baby shattered her preconceived notions about parenthood.

Diapers, sleepless nights, even puberty—in that moment of blinding clarity when she held Marley for the first time, she understood why it was all worth it. And at thirty-four, she was already running short of viable eggs.

She could easily have gone the artificial insemination route—if she didn’t mind giving her grandmother a heart attack—but she wanted the husband. The family like the one she’d grown up in. The human experience.

She just didn’t want to take the time away from her career to get all those things.

“Okay, I’m back.” Gina gave a breathless huff into the phone. “What were we talking about?”

“Who cares? How’s my favorite person on the planet?”

“She’s getting fat.”

“She is not!” Mia protested, indignant on her niece’s behalf.

“Well, she eats constantly. Tony calls her Chunky Monkey. Daddy’s gonna give you a complex, isn’t he, sweet girl? Yes, he is.” Gina cooed before returning her voice to a normal octave. “Do you have a date for the Christening?”

“I wasn’t aware baptisms were couples-only.”

“They are for the woman with the watch.”

“Gina,” Mia warned.

“I know, I know, you hate talking about it, but hear me out. This is for your own good.”

“Of course it is,” Mia grumbled. “Have you considered the fact that I
have
found my true love? That it’s my work? That maybe not everyone is cut out to be the perfect wife and mommy?” She spoke the words knowing they were a lie. The coward’s way. But if she admitted she wanted that life and couldn’t get it…

Being misunderstood by her family was one thing, but she refused to be pathetic. Pitied. Better if they thought she rejected their lifestyle than she’d failed to find what they’d all tripped into so easily. Mia didn’t accept failure, especially in herself.

“I’m not talking about you finding true love. Like I said, I’m not worried on that front.” There was absolute confidence in Gina’s tone. Not even a sliver of doubt even though the clock was winding down on Mia’s year with the watch. “What I’m talking about is self-preservation. You need a date for the Christening, so it
looks
like you’re making progress with the watch. Otherwise Mama and Nonna and all the aunties are going to pester you without mercy—and you’ll be double-booked on blind dates every night for the next three weeks before we’re halfway through the ceremony.”

“God, you’re right.” She cringed. Why hadn’t she checked the yes box next to Thirteen? He’d liked her, even if she had been channeling the blonde when they’d met.

“Do you have any male research assistants you could pass off as a date?”

“Only Rajit. And Mom knows he’s married.” Her latest batch of bright young scientific minds were predominantly giggly young women—which wasn’t terribly surprising, given her research centered on the scientific effects of emotion on the brain. Thank God the girls were also brilliant. She could put up with twittering and simpering as long as it came with competence.

“Could Rajit and his wife be estranged?”