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they had different approaches when it came to the cuisine of their homeland. Riley’s dad was a purist and rarely made it through a meal without muttering, “If my mother caught me eating this foreign slop, she’d die all over again.”
    Erin, on the other hand, fancied herself a bit of a fusion cook.
    Hence the tacos with potatoes. Last week it had been pasta carbonara. With potatoes. The week before that, she’d put corned beef in stir-fry.
    “Always an adventure,” Kate muttered under her breath before grabbing her beer and escaping to the living room, where the guys were watching soccer.
    “I like the new cupboards,” Riley said, gesturing at the dark-wood cabinetry her mother had finally convinced her father that they needed to install. It was one of the few things that had changed in the Park Slope house Riley’d been born and raised in, and she liked it that way. She liked the way everybody had a favorite chair around the kitchen table that fit their butt just right. Liked the way they all knew not to wear socks without shoes in the kitchen because the boards were getting rough and tended to snag them. She even liked her mother’s affinity for cheap watercolors, and the way the weepy landscapes covered every possible wall.
    It wasn’t fancy. But it was
home
.
    “How’s work?” her mother asked, carefully spooning a carton of sour cream into a bowl. Riley’s mother wasn’t above convenience, but she drew the line at setting a plastic carton on the dinner table. Everything store-bought was promptly transferred to a “real dish.”
    “Work?” Riley asked, feeling her eyebrows creep up to her hairline. Her mother rarely asked about Riley’s job.
    Probably because she
hated
Riley’s job.
    Riley couldn’t blame her. She doubted there were very many mothers out there who would be excited that their baby girl’s career involved reviewing dildos.
    Particularly conservative Irish-Catholic mothers.
    “Work’s … um …”
Awful? Stressful? Ruining my life?
    It had been two days since Camille had dropped her little bomb about the fiftieth-anniversary issue, and even though Riley wouldn’t need to turn in a draft for the stupid semicentennial issue for at least another month, it was all she’d been able to think about.
    “Work’s fine.”
    “Mmm …” Her mother sucked a glob of sour cream off her thumb and wandered over to the side table, where they stacked mail and bills and magazines. “Here it is.”
    Shit
.
    It
was the most recent
Stiletto
article. The one in which Riley’s BDSM headline was sandwiched between “Over-the-Knee Boots Are Back!” and “Rich Autumn Makeup That
Anyone
Can Pull Off.”
    “What about it?” Riley asked nervously.
    “Have you tried this stuff you’re talking about?”
    Riley nearly spit out the water she’d just sipped. And here she’d thought she and her parents had a good thing going with the don’t-ask-don’t-tell routine.
    She knew that her mother collected every issue out of loyalty to her middle daughter. Maybe even read an article from time to time. But to actually
talk
about it?
    There were vicious stomach bugs that were more pleasant.
    Not to mention, this really,
really
wasn’t good timing.
    “Ma! Come on!”
    “Don’t
Ma
me. My friends’ daughters talk with them about sex.”
    Your friends’ daughters are probably actually having sex
.
    “Do you talk to Kate and Megan about it?” Riley asked, referring to her two sisters.
    “Yes.”
    “You do?” Riley nearly fell off the ancient bar stool. What sort of craziness was this?“Why am I never included in this girl talk?”
    Her mother set the magazine aside and began grating some cheese. “Well, dear … you
are
a tiny bit of a prude.”
    Riley’s jaw dropped. She pointed at the headline. “Did you read that? I talked about
spanking
.”
    There.
That
should rile her mother.
    But Erin merely lifted a slim shoulder and tucked a stray red hair back into her bun. “Yes, yes, the