It's Always Complicated (Her Billionaires Book 4) Read online

  Josie’s phone rang. Before she could say a word, she heard, “I take it Aunt Marlene and the crew arrived all safe and sound in Portland.” Her niece/cousin, Darla, spoke as if they were picking up an earlier conversation mid-stream. Darla had a tendency to do this.

  She wasn’t exactly a formal person.

  “How’d you know?”

  “Your mom’s naked tits are all over Twitter.”

  Really not formal.

  “Don’t look at the hashtag #doublemilehigh.”

  “Damn it.” Josie wasn’t even on Twitter and didn’t generally care about social media beyond protecting Laura, Mike, Dylan and the kids from the assholes who attacked their dating service, Good Things Come in Threes, but knowing that those pictures were out there still made her cringe.

  “You got to hand it to Aunt Marlene: she knows how to make an entrance.”

  “My mother was naked wearing a luggage tag on her nipple.”

  “Better than on her clit.”

  “DARLA!”

  “What? I’m just sayin’....”

  “You don’t need to say it.”

  “Someone’s got to. How in the hell do you get that image out of your head once you know it actually happened? Can you imagine a luggage tag clamped to your—”

  Click.

  Hanging up on Darla was the only way to preserve her mental health. And to stop the flood of images of luggage tags attached to—

  Bzzzz.

  Against her better judgement, Josie looked at the text.

  It was a picture of an actual luggage tag attached to a—

  CLICK.

  “Who was that?” asked Meribeth, walking into the florist’s cooler where Josie now stood, red as a beet from seeing that which could not be unseen. She was going to kill Darla the next time she saw her.

  Beat her to death with a luggage tag.

  “Um, no one important,” Josie said, plastering on a fake smile. She was here with her future mother-in-law to pick out some final flower choices for the bouquet and for Alex’s boutonniere. While this was a double wedding, with Alex and Josie marrying in one ceremony, and Laura, Mike and Dylan having their own separate wedding (minus the legalities), all five of them had already decided to throw convention out the window.

  Why not just do what each group wanted and let the wedding be a chaotic, unmatched, crazy party?

  Which pretty much described Josie’s life right now anyhow.

  Instead of worrying about her mother’s possible criminal charges, she was going to be shallow and think about her wedding dress.

  Josie would wear a white, strapless gown with simple lines and very little lace. She enjoyed the classic 1920s look, with pearls for accents and sweet amounts of flat silk hugging her body. Years of living with Alex had added some pounds to her slim frame, giving her hips and boobs. Alex loved her no matter what, but he expressed considerable appreciation for having a little more to grab these days than when they’d first met.

  She’d found herself pleased with her curvier form, though she was still tiny compared to most of her friends and family. She fit under Alex’s arm like someone had carved her to his specifications, a companion piece that clicked in beside his rib.

  And she liked it that way.

  “What about this deep shade of burgundy?” Meribeth asked, bringing over white roses with blood-red tips. “What an interesting combination!”

  She knew that the wedding was a huge deal for Meribeth, who had been an eighteen-year-old single mother to Alex, and who had married later in life in a simple ceremony with Alex’s stepfather, John. This crazy double wedding might not have been what Meribeth would have chosen for her only child, but she’d joined in the planning with gusto.

  And, to Josie’s relief, remarkable restraint. She couldn’t imagine having a mother-in-law who was a Momzilla when it came to their wedding.

  She’d just run off to Vegas and elope if that happened.

  And never, ever come back.

  Ring!

  Speaking of mothers she wished she could run away from, Josie thought as she stared glumly at her phone screen. Aunt Cathy was calling her, and that could mean only one thing.

  “What’s she done now?” Josie said into the phone after sliding the phone icon, her long, weary sigh ending with a groan. Might as well get it over with.

  “Darla didn’t tell you?” Aunt Cathy jumped right into the conversation as if this were normal. As if talking about Marlene’s crazy exploits were just like discussing which dessert to bring to a potluck.

  “Oh, she told me. Complete with pictures and everything.”

  “There are pictures?” Aunt Cathy howled. Josie heard a man’s low tones in the background, clearly trying to calm her aunt down. Must be Calvin.

  “What’s going on?” Meribeth asked. She was calm, her brows pushed together with a slight frown of worry, face so serene Josie’s whole body flushed with a kind of displaced shame. At some point, she’d have to tell Meribeth what was going on with her own mother, but couldn’t they have a few more minutes of pretending that the wedding was just a normal family affair, and that picking out which flowers to put in her future husband’s boutonniere was the highlight of the day?

  And not whether her mother’s private parts were trending on Twitter?

  Josie held up one finger to Meribeth. If only life were so simple. Pause it, recover from the emotional shock, then resume the world.

  “We got a problem. The authorities here in Portland insisted on taking her in.”

  “Damn it,” Josie muttered. She and Alex were saving for a down payment on a condo on the Fenway in Boston a quick hop to the hospitals where he worked. Was a good chunk of that savings going to be used to bail her mother out of jail after Marlene screwed two hockey players on a plane?

  Since when did her life’s vocabulary include those sentences?

  “I’m so sorry, Josie. I am. But your mom needs to get out. Calvin will sign his house as collateral for the bail bondsman, but if you could—”

  “Calvin what?” The florist’s cooler began to spin.

  “Josie!” Meribeth said sharply, her hand grasping Josie’s forearm, the warm flesh contrasting with the chilly air in the ice-cold chamber. “You’ve turned whiter than your dress. Come sit down.” The order was motherly and professional. Meribeth was a psychologist. How she managed to be both maternal and authoritative without being mean always confused Josie.

  Josie listened and walked out of the cooler, guided by her future mother-in-law, who gently pried the phone from her fingers.

  “Hello?” Meribeth said pleasantly. “This is Alex’s mother. Who am I speaking with?”

  And just like that, Meribeth made magic out of a steaming pile of manure. She spoke with Cathy, the conversation quickly shifting from a wariness on Aunt Cathy’s part to an earthy bonding over the foibles of family. Josie collected the pieces of herself that had splintered into a thousand toothpick pieces and listened as the only other person in the world who loved Alex as much as she did navigated a complex mess for her.

  For Josie.

  Why?

  An accident of fate made Josie meet Alex. Love made her stay. Fear almost ruined what had turned out to be the best relationship she could possibly have imagined having.

  And now his mother dove right into her insane, messy, vulgar chaos cloud of a mother’s drama and...was fixing it?

  Meribeth got off the phone with Cathy and said nothing to Josie, just placed a reassuring hand on her shoulder. She tapped out a number, reciting it from memory as if she’d just been given it, and her voice changed as someone answered the phone.

  Within twenty minutes, Josie learned that Meribeth was one kickass human being. Not that she didn’t already know it, but she managed to call the jail authorities, give her credentials as a clinical psychologist in Massachusetts, give background information on Marlene that Aunt Cathy must have provided her, and—

  Now Meribeth was finishing up a conversation with Aunt
Cathy in which it was clear that the jail problem with Josie’s mother was going to be far easier.

  Meribeth handed her the phone and Josie pressed it against her ear with as much enthusiasm as she had for hugging a dead raccoon.

  “Cathy?” she asked, afraid of what she was about to hear. She stared at Meribeth like she was Glinda the Good Witch. Meribeth ran her fingertips along the edges of the roses, her expression serene, as if she hadn’t just called incarceration authorities to help her future daughter-in-law’s trashy mother get out of a threesome exhibitionist mess.

  “You won the damn mother-in-law lottery for sure, Josephine,” Aunt Cathy said with a tone of disbelieving wonder tinged with bitterness. “That woman just done more to help save your mother’s ass than anyone I know. I’ll call you back in a few hours and we might not need any money from you for Marlene. I’ll let you know what happens when I know. Have fun flower shopping!”

  Click.

  There wasn’t enough wine in the world to manage the next few hours.

  Tears tightened the back of her throat, making her neck spasm. No. No, no, no. She was not going to cry now. Not in front of Meribeth, who had just untangled a giant ball of Marlene string like she was Mary Poppins with a PhD.

  No.

  Ok, yes. Damn it.

  Apparently she had no choice over the crying thing. It was happening, like it or not, so Josie curled into a little ball and let it happen. The bench she was sitting on had giant planters filled with orchids, the room moist and warm in contrast to the cooler, and as she fell apart at least she was surrounded by the delightful scents of fresh flowers.

  It could be worse. She could be crying in a jail waiting room that smelled like pine deodorizer and pee.

  Meribeth, to her surprise, said nothing. She expected the usual questions, like, Why didn’t you explain about your mother? or Has she been like this for a long time? or What is wrong with your mother?

  Maybe Alex had warned her. The trip to Ohio for Aunt Cathy’s wedding a while ago had given him a thorough taste of her relatives, and especially of her mother. Between being hit on by her and watching her try to become the adult entertainment at Calvin’s bachelor party, there really wasn’t any secret left to hide from Alex about Marlene at this point.

  Josie buried her face in her hands and inhaled deeply.

  “You’re not her, Josie,” Meribeth finally said.

  Josie jolted.

  “No.”

  And with that, Meribeth folded herself into the small space on the bench next to Josie, wrapped her arms around her, and said no more.

  Chapter Four

  Alex

  “Your mom is the Ohio equivalent of Florida Man,” Darla declared, telling Josie something she didn’t need to hear. They were at the hotel in Portland, Maine now, Darla and her guys in the room next door. The entire Ohio family was here, sprinkled throughout the hotel—her mother tranquilized by a mix of pills she carried in an old allergy-meds bottle in a giant, fake-leather bag imprinted with pink, white and black leopard patterns.

  The physician in Alex shuddered at the bottle’s appearance. Once Marlene started snoring and Alex could feel the strong, steady pulse, he was grateful.

  Asleep, Josie’s mom was harmless.

  Awake, she was a walking disaster.

  “Dare I ask?” Josie said with a sigh, giving Alex an arched eyebrow. He could tell she only had one nerve left, and Darla was twanging it like a guitar string in the hands of an unruly four-year-old. Darla was digging through a two-pound bag of warehouse club-size potato chips like she was Indiana Jones looking for the Holy Grail.

  “You don’t know what Florida Man is?” Darla marveled, her mouth crammed with food. Manners were never high on her list of cultivated priorities. Alex liked her, though. Darla was a refreshing breeze of reality in a stifling world.

  He just shrugged. Alex knew better than to get himself caught in the middle of anything between Darla and Josie. He wasn’t stupid. He had an M.D., but more importantly, he’d been with Josie now for nearly four years. In this relationship, he’d earned an honorary Ph.D. in Estrogen with a minor in Sarcasm.

  “Oh, I’ll bite,” Josie said. “What’s ‘Florida Man’?”

  Darla grinned like a Cheshire Cat. “‘Florida Man’ is a website where people talk about all the worst news stories that always seem to start with the words ‘Florida Man.’ You know, like ‘Florida Man found feeding his penis to shark tank at Sea World’ or ‘Florida Man sticks fire cracker up his nose and—”

  “And how, exactly, is my mother like ‘Florida Man’?” Josie asked, her face sour with a simmer Alex took as a warning, but that Darla misread as genuine interest.

  “We can just start a website called ‘Ohio Woman.’” Darla’s level of excitement was way too high. Alex’s suspicion meter started to send out an alert. Where were Trevor and Joe, Darla’s boyfriends? He needed to text them.

  Rescue texts came in many, many forms.

  “Mmmm hmmmm?” Josie intoned. Uh oh. He knew that tone. Set shields to maximum strength, Commander! He reached for his phone and pulled up Trevor’s number, typing fast.

  “We could put all kinds of web ads on it. You’d get that sucker picked up by Buzzfeed and Reddit and—”

  Alex could tell by the way Josie was clutching her steak knife that Darla needed to stop talking. Like, yesterday.

  “My mother is not an Internet meme,” Josie growled.

  “Uh, actually, she is.” The words came out of his own mouth as if projected, like a ventriloquist’s dummy surprised to discover it’s a real boy. He winced, the realization that Josie hadn’t seen the pictures all over social media sinking in.

  She hadn’t seen them because she’d been busy with wedding preparations, burying herself in the very same details she’d declared stupid and insipid a few days ago.

  Before.

  Before her mother became more popular, in pictures, than that poor Ermahgerd! girl.

  Reaching toward him, Josie held out her open palm. “Phone.” Hers was charging on the desk in the hotel room.

  He handed it to her. She looked at the screen.

  “‘Josie is about to kill Darla with the phone directory and a coffee stirrer,’” she read aloud.

  Damn it. He hadn’t closed the text window.

  Darla was nonplussed, munching away. “If anyone could turn those two items into lethal weapons, it’s Josie,” she agreed.

  Big, angry, brown eyes met his, attached to a little more than five feet of vibrating rage in body form. “You’re warning her boyfriends about me? She’s the one calling my mom an Internet meme! You texted Trevor because I’m angry?”

  “Look!” Darla said, shaking her head slowly, handing off her own phone, the picture of Marlene wearing a luggage tag on her nipple superimposed with words Alex couldn’t quite read, but he was pretty sure there was a strong chance the word ‘fuck’ or ‘cougar’ was one of them.

  Bang bang bang

  “DARLA!” a man’s voice shouted from the hallway.

  “HELP!” Darla screamed, potato chips flying out of her mouth. “JOSIE’S KILLING ME WITH THE FREE HOTEL PEN.”

  Bang bang bang

  Darla really, really didn’t know how close that was to being the truth. Alex got up, gave her a look that was pointless, because she thought she was hilarious, and opened the door to find blond Trevor and dark Joe standing there, red-faced and worried, looking nervously over his shoulder.

  “Darla okay?”

  “She’s just pissing Josie off,” Alex explained, giving Trevor the fist bump he offered. Joe’s frown eased.

  “And that’s different from...?” Joe asked, his tight mouth twisting into a smile. Alex gave them a once-over, surprised to see them dressed in business casual outfits, button-down shirts different colors but the pants the same dark navy. Accustomed to seeing them in ratty jeans, concert t-shirts, and flip-flops, the change in attire made Alex look down at his own body.

  Where he found
himself wearing ratty old jeans, a concert t-shirt, and flip-flops.

  “Darla,” Trevor said, walking into the room and giving Josie a half-wave. “Quit bugging Josie and Alex. They’re getting married in a couple of days. Besides, your mom’s looking for you.” He was clean-shaven and smelled like a popular men’s cologne that was familiar to Alex.

  Unease set in. Was he supposed to be more formal? Were there unspoken expectations Alex wasn’t meeting? Josie hadn’t said a word about his appearance. He’d gotten a haircut back in Boston and planned to shave and, as she ever-so-delicately put it, “manscape” himself before the wedding, a process that was far simpler than it sounded. The beard trimmer setting on his electric razor, applied to dark nether regions, produced sufficient results. It had not occurred to him that business casual was the dress code for the pre-nuptial days, however.

  In other words, Trevor and Joe were upstaging him with Josie’s Ohio family.

  “Why does Mama need me?” Darla shoved another catcher’s-mitt’s-worth of potato chips in her mouth. One look at her and Alex unclenched. Darla wore a hoodie that said, “I’m the Hot Writer They Warned You About,” with the word “Hot” buried within the longer word “psycHOTic.”

  Compared to that, he looked downright courtly.

  Trevor shrugged. “I didn’t ask. She just said to go find you.”

  Darla rolled her eyes but stood up, thankfully. Alex watched Josie watching her, the eyes following but her face slack with the kind of unexpressed rage he knew would all-too-soon be expressed, like a pressure cooker left plugged in and turned on too long. His appearance was trivial, he realized, the flash of insight hitting him.

  Josie was a nervous wreck over her mother.

  And he’d been too caught up in the final push to the wedding to realize it.

  Some message passed between him, Trevor and Joe as the guys collected Darla, who left with vague assurances of coming back to talk about bridesmaid details, the heavy metal door to the hotel room clanging shut like a prison cell door.

  Josie, like Alex, had decided not to have a best ‘person’ at the altar. He didn’t have a best friend; the closest person was his old roommate, who had recently moved to California for his medical residency. When the pre-wedding planning had taken on a life of its own, the lack of a best friend had revealed itself, insidious and disturbing. Josie had Laura and Darla. Trevor and Joe had each other. Mike and Dylan, too. There had never been time for Alex to find a friend, between pre-med studies, med school, and now the hundred-hour weeks of internship and residency.