Chapter 18 – Hidden Talent

Hunter was amazed at how little he knew about Evie. It was almost as if he had only scratched the surface in the year that he had known her. He knew about her predilection for crappy horror films, Bruce Campbell and peanut butter, but he was surprised to find out that Evie could sing. He had discovered this interesting fact last night at the party they had been to.

Her friend and former employer had invited them to celebrate the opening of his own business. During the course of the evening, a group had gathered in the karaoke part of the club and were playing a weird game of trivia. If you answered the question wrong, you either had to down a shot or perform a dare that was requested by the person asking the question. Evie had answered Philip's question wrong and at his request, chose to get up and sing rather than drink a shot. The catch was that Philip picked the song, which turned out to be Wham's "Wake Me Up Before You Go-Go", much to Evie's chagrin.

Being the good sport that she was, she did get up and sing it. Hunter was pleasantly surprised that she sang it well. He didn't even know she could carry a tune. She alternated between flipping Philip off and bopping around the stage. Her antics set the group laughing and the rest of the evening, Evie was mercilessly teased about being the secret third member of Wham.

He lay next to her in bed, watching the morning sun creep across her face. He reached over and brushed a few strands of red hair back from her face. The gentle touch caused her to open her eyes.

"Morning," Hunter whispered.

Evie rolled over to look at the clock. 8:30am.  She groaned and rolled back to face Hunter. "What's so good about it?" she grumbled.

He chuckled softly as he got out of bed. Her eyes followed him and she smiled in appreciation at the sight of his naked backside as he disappeared into the bathroom to shower. She stayed in bed for a few more minutes, contemplating what she needed to do today before her parents and sister arrived. She knew she had lingered too long when Hunter came back into her room in a towel.

"You better get moving," he quipped.

"Yeah, yeah, yeah..." Evie muttered.

He stalked to the edge of the bed, grabbed the blankets and whipped them off her. She shrieked in protest and tried to pull them back up. He threw them on the floor and stood there looking at her.

"You look good without anything on. Too bad your family is coming by today," he said with a smirk.

"Too bad for you, you mean," she responded.

He laughed as he removed the towel and proceeded to pull some clean clothes on. Evie let him sitting on the bed, pulling on a shirt as she went to take her own shower and get dressed. She put on a green leaf print short sundress and a matching green hoodie, put her slip on sneakers on and went in search of Hunter. She found him in the living room contemplating her CD's.

"What are you looking for?"

"Just something to listen to," he answered as he crouched down to look at the next shelf.

Evie shrugged and went into the kitchen to fix something to eat. As her toast popped out of the toaster, she heard a familiar song coming from the living room. She groaned as she realized what it was. The same damn song she had sung last night.

"Hunter! Turn that off!"

He poked his head around the door and grinned. "C'mon Evie," he said as he imitated her moves and then laughed and ducked as she threw a piece of toast at him. He disappeared and after a minute, the music shut off.

"Where the hell did you get that from?" she asked him when he came back in the kitchen.

"Philip gave it to me before we left. He thought you might want a souvenir from last night."

Evie rolled her eyes. "Remind me to kill him later." She stuffed the toast into her mouth as she put the peanut butter away.

Hunter helped himself to breakfast and watched as Evie made up a list of things at the kitchen table. "What's that for?"

She kept writing as she answered him. "A few things I need to pick up at the store on the corner. They're coming for lunch and what we have left isn't enough for seven people."

"Wait, seven people? I thought it was just your parents and your sister."

"My sister is bringing her two boys, Colin and Jacob. They love wrestling and were dying to meet you."

"How old are they?"

"They're ten," she replied. "They're twins, but they're fraternal so it's fairly easy to tell them apart."

Hunter nodded in response as he finished up his food. "Anything you want me to do while you're gone?"

"Make sure all your stuff is in the other bedroom. All I need is my parents asking me a bunch of questions if they see your clothes in my room." She chuckled. "As old as I am, they still tend to lecture on occasion."

**********************

Evie kept watch at the living room window while Hunter flipped through the channels on TV. She was perched on the end of the sofa absentmindedly nibbling on a fingernail. Hunter shut the TV off and dropped the remote on the coffee table.

"Nervous?" he asked.

"I should be asking you that."

He watched her for a minute more then reached over and pulled her down onto his lap. "Maybe this will help," he said softly and then kissed her.

She melted into the kiss, running her hands over his shoulders and clasping them behind his neck. He tightened his grip on her waist as he parted her lips with his tongue. The sound of car doors slamming disturbed the quiet and they separated.

Evie quickly stood up and glanced out the window. "They're here." She adjusted her dress and went to the back door to let her family in. Hunter heard the clatter of feet as he walked into the kitchen.

He came face to face with Evie's family. She was hugging her mother as two boys followed Evie's sister into the kitchen. She broke away from her mother to hug her dad. He waited patiently until she was finished. She finally turned to him.

"Hunter, this is my mom Lillian, my dad David and my sister Lauren," she said as she gestured to each of them in turn.

David and Lillian Mackenzie looked a bit older that his parents. Her sister looked almost like Evie except she had short brown hair instead of Evie's red-gold color. It looked like they both had inherited their father's green eyes.

Hunter smiled and shook their hands. "Glad to meet you all."

Evie stood behind the two young boys with dark hair, a hand on each of their shoulders. "And these two are Colin and Jacob. Guys, I think you know who this is."

He shook hands with the boys and they smiled shyly. "I hear you two like wrestling."

They nodded in unison, still too shy to say anything. Their mother nudged them. "What's the matter with you two? All the way over here you couldn't stop talking about meeting Hunter and now you can't say anything?" She shook her head as she looked up at Hunter. "Don't mind them. You probably won't be able to shut them up later. My husband Gavin was disappointed he was going to be out of town this weekend. He really wanted to meet you."

"Maybe next time we're in Chicago, we can arrange that," said Hunter.

Eventually, everyone ended up in the patch of yard behind the building. Evie's father started up the grill, talking to Hunter as Evie, Lauren and their mother got the hamburgers and hot dogs ready for cooking. Lauren filled Evie in on what had been going on since they last talked. Lillian took a plateful of meat down to the yard.

  As soon as she had left, Lauren nudged her sister.  "So sister dear, what's the story with you and Hunter?"

"Not much really."

Lauren's eyes grew wide.  "Not much? What the hell is that supposed to mean?"

Evie looked down at the cucumber she was slicing. "Exactly what it means," she replied evasively.

Her sister snorted in derision. "Oh come on! With the way you've been talking about him?"

Evie tried bluffing. "What do you mean?"

"Give me some credit Evie. I'm your sister for goodness sake." Lauren smiled. "I know how you act around guys you're interested in. I grew up with you, remember?"

"Is it that obvious?"

"To me it is."

A nervous laugh escaped Evie. "Give me a break Lauren!"

"Okay, I'll shut up. But I'm watching you," Lauren warned.

They took everything down into the yard and set it on the little table next to the grill. Evie was relieved to see that her father and Hunter were getting along. He was asking Hunter questions about his job and if Evie had been behaving herself. "Are you keeping her in line?"

Hunter laughed. "I think it's more the other way around. She's been keeping me in line."

Evie caught his remark as she came up to give her dad a plate for the food. "And out of jail," she muttered out of the side of her mouth. Hunter gently elbowed her in the ribs.

"What was that?" her dad asked.

"Just that he's a troublemaker," she replied as she handed her father the plate for the cooked burgers.

Her father winked at her. "You're sure he's the troublemaker?"

Evie just smiled as she rejoined her mother and sister in setting up chairs. They all sat down to eat as soon as the food was ready. Evie's two nephews finally got over their awe of Hunter and now chattered away, asking him a thousand questions. Hunter finally got to hear a couple stories about Evie . He laughed as Lauren filled him in on a certain night the two of them had gone out.

"This was after she had moved back home. We had gone to a bar, you know, just a girl's night out sort of thing. And this guy kept hitting on her. He wouldn't leave her alone. She told him several times to stop bothering her, but either he was too stupid or drunk to pay attention."

Hunter leaned forward. "So what happened?"

"Well this guy grabbed her backside and she whipped around and punched him square in the face. Of course he got mad and started swinging at her. She knocked him over and was on top of him so fast he didn't know what hit him." Lauren laughed. "The bouncers had to pry her off of him. By that time he had pretty much passed out, so they had his buddy take him home. They were laughing so hard that they had a difficult time telling Evie she had to leave. Ends up they bought us a round of drinks before they very politely kicked us out."

"Yeah, but what you don't know was one of them called me up a few days later. He felt bad that they had to tell us to leave and offered to take me out to dinner to make up for it," Evie said with a grin.

"Hey! How come I wasn't invited?" Lauren pouted.

"You're married, goofy," Evie replied. "Besides, he told me he like red heads anyway." She stuck her tongue out at Lauren.

"Damn red heads," her sister muttered good-naturedly.

The rest of the afternoon was passed in conversation. After the food had been eaten and everything had been taken back up to Evie's kitchen, her mom and dad stated that they had to leave. They were meeting some friends from out of town for dinner. Hugs were exchanged and they shook Hunter's hand again, telling him they were glad to finally meet him.

When they left, Hunter took Colin and Jacob into the living room to watch a little TV while Evie and Lauren cleaned up.

"So are you going to tell me what's going on or not?" Lauren asked as she wrapped up the leftovers.

"Lauren..." Evie began, but she was cut off.

"No, I'm serious. I've seen the looks you two were giving each other when you thought no one was watching."

Evie nervously chewed on her bottom lip, wondering if she should tell her sister what had been going on. Lauren had already practically guessed there was something between her and Hunter. "Okay. But it goes no further than here."

Her sister laughed. "So there is something going on! You are such a sneak Evelyn."

"Lauren, knock it off," Evie protested. "Or I won't tell you anything at all."

The laughter subsided and Evie proceeded to fill her sister in on what had transpired since last Christmas. She gave her the brief version, not telling her that they had become intimately involved. Only that they had become aware that they had feelings for each other.

When she was finished. Lauren was quiet for a couple minutes. "So where are you guys going with this?" she finally asked.

Evie dropped the last of the silverware in the dishwasher. "I don't know yet. I mean, I wouldn't mind a more serious relationship with him, but I'm not sure about that at this point." She looked down at the ground. "Right now it's pretty much a 'wait and see' kind of thing."

"Well don't wait too long. He might get snatched up by someone else." She shot a sidelong glance at her sister. "Shoot, if I wasn't married…"

Evie rolled her eyes. "Oh cut it out Lauren." She giggled. "Besides, you'd love him and leave him."

"True. Except for Gavin, I was never one for long relationships." She twisted a bag of chips closed. "Lemme ask you this. Does it feel right with Hunter?"

"What do you mean?"

"Being with him. Does it feel right?"

A silence fell between them as Evie considered the question, then- "Yeah. I don't know why, but it does."

**************************

  A/N: Thanks for the reviews! I hope you all enjoyed a little glimpse into Evie's family life. Just a bit of normalcy before the chaos ensues!