Honest Betrayal by Dara Girard

But he would. He just had to figure out how.
    Then again he wasn’t sure he wanted to. He didn’t like what he was feeling. He didn’t like not being able to concentrate. Not being in control of his emotions. His emotions were what had lead him to his ill-fated marriage in the first place. He couldn’t afford to be careless again.
    He jumped when Miles patted him on the shoulder. “You’re in phase two.”
    “Phase two?”
    “Lust.”
    Hunter shrugged off Miles’ hand, annoyed. “Go away.”
    As Hunter drove to Diane Garrett’s house, Miles’ words echoed in his mind. He barely listened to Brenna as she gave him instructions for the evening. She continued to worry, although he’d tried to convince her not to. Everything would be fine. He’d met plenty of mothers in his lifetime and had impressed them all. He knew they were going to enjoy a very painless evening.
    Brenna suddenly gasped.
    Hunter turned to her alarmed. “What is it?”
    Her voice held a note of panic. “Did I tell you I have five uncles, four aunts and four cousins?”
    “No. Why?”
    She stared at a house with cars spilling out of the drive way. “Because they’re all here.”

CHAPTER SIX

    “We have to go inside, Brenna,” Hunter said as they circled the block for the fifth time.
    “I know, but you need to know enough to prepare yourself.”
    “I am prepared. Besides I doubt that I will remember anything you have just said.”
    “Of course you will. You’re a smart guy.”
    He sent her an amused glance. “Back handed compliments are not going to convince me to drive around again.” He parked in front of a mid-size brick house and shut off the car. “Just follow my lead.”
    Brenna closed the door and stared at him as he headed up the drive. “Follow your lead? This is my family.”
    “That’s why you’re panicking.”
    “I’m not panicking. I just know we’re headed for disaster.” She stopped and turned. “Perhaps we could call from the car and say we’re stuck in traffic.”
    He grabbed her arm. “No, they already saw us.”
    Before he could explain how he knew that, the front door swung open. Diane greeted them with a big smile.
    ***
    Brenna sat paralyzed next to Hunter in the dining room as various family members introduced themselves to him and commented on how long it had been since they’d seen her. Brenna felt the same stage fright that had ripped through her at age nine. She’d been forced to do a speech in front of her class about her favorite animal—her mouth hadn’t worked then either.
    Hunter on the other hand seemed completely at ease. She still couldn’t understand how a man who never smiled could look so cordial. She was grateful for his talent because she knew he was being studied. Especially by her Aunt Vanessa, whose sharp gaze could make an eagle blush. She was a woman Brenna held in abject awe. A woman who would never let anyone forget what a beauty she had been in her youth and all the lovers she had in the past. She spoke of Uncle Henry as ‘my husband’ as though he had no other existence outside that post.
    Then there was Aunt Gwen who tried to make her small eyes bigger by drawing in her eyebrows a shade too dark and with a high arch. She only succeeded in always looking surprised. Aunt Patience, Aunt Carol and Uncle Walter—always referred to in that order since they regularly appeared as a threesome—offered bright smiles. Two of the three were married, though no one was quite sure which pair. The ladies peppered Hunter with questions while Uncles Jerome, Evan and Bruce stayed quiet trying to give the appearance of distrust although it was obvious they were impressed. Brenna’s stomach twisted when one uncle smiled at her. She fought back a wave of nausea.
    Her cousins Susanna and Judy, both only a few years older and conveniently married, came without their husbands. They didn’t want to be distracted as they assessed Brenna’s new man. Susanna, the less subtle of the two, openly