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“Hard to tell,” Shane said.
Joey was staring out at the landscape whipping by. “I got you out of here when I sent you to school. I should have kept you away.”
“Don’t worry about it, Uncle Joey,” Shane said, thinking about Agnes in her kitchen. “I’ve been in a lot worse places.”
“Maybe you better go,” Joey said.
Shane shot him a glance. “Not until this is straightened out.”
“Shane, there could be pros out there. The Don’s guys. They could be gunning for you now, too.”
And there’s my last question. “Why would they be doing that?”
Joey looked away. “Figuring you were with me. You know.”
Another lie, Shane thought, and began to wonder if there was anybody he could trust.
“Maybe you better just stick close to Agnes,” Joey said.
“That’s my plan,” Shane said.
Agnes sat on the swing on the finished screened-in back porch with a bottle of wine, a splitting headache, her laptop, and a pad of paper, trying to finish her latest To Do List and write her column while the Chicks sang softly in the background. It was hard concentrating with all the distractions, not the least of which had been Robbie Hammond coming back to the house to ask, “Was that Maria Fortunato?” with an expression on his face that said that whatever happened that summer they’d dated had had a major impact on him. “Yes, and she’s getting married Saturday,” Agnes had said firmly, and he’d gone away, leaving Agnes feeling a little guilty, but not much. Back to work.
The Chicks were singing “The Long Way Around,” which seemed appropriate since the To Do List was getting the house painted, getting the bridge reinforced, finding an air conditioner on sale somewhere that also had really lax credit terms, ordering the cake supplies, and hunting Maisie Shuttle down to make her cough up a thousand daisies. The column was about the life-or-death importance of a cake that could hold up pounds of fondant and still taste like heaven when the guests chowed down, and Agnes loathed every boring word of it. She was trying to shoehorn in some insightful facts about the history of wedding cakes, but they were even worse?—
“I can’t believe you bought this fuckin’ dump.”
Agnes looked up and saw a vision of petite southern loveliness— Southern Jersey, in this case—standing in the porch doorway: glossy brown ringlets framing big brown eyes, sharp features, and a wide red mouth, over a body built for a tube top and capri pants.
“LL?” Agnes felt tears spring to her eyes. “Oh, God, I’ve missed you!”
She got up from the swing, letting her laptop slide onto the cushions, and threw her arms around her best friend, knocking her glasses sideways in the process. Lisa Livia said, “Oh, honey, I’ve missed you, too,” and hugged Agnes tight for a minute. Then she let go, shoved her own oversized sunglasses farther back on her head like a headband, looked up, and said, “Agnes, you dumbass, you are so screwed.”
“Why?” Agnes straightened her glasses. “Did the bridge collapse?”
Lisa Livia threw her huge white patent leather bag on the old metal table and sat down on the swing, shoving the laptop back over to Agnes’s side as she turned down the CD player. “No. What the hell is this doing out here?”
“I’m writing my column. Did you know that the Romans used to break the wedding cake over the bride’s head?”
“No, but I’m not surprised. Italian men are hell on women. Pay attention here, I’ve been on that tub, the Brenda Belle, going through my mother’s stuff.”
“She’s been living there ever since she sold me Two Rivers.” Agnes sat next to her and poured her a glass of wine. “I don’t know why she hasn’t bought herself a nice condo. I am so glad to see you. You missed the meeting with her and Evie Keyes.”
“That was my plan.” Lisa Livia crossed her killer legs, took the wine and sipped it, nodded, and then drank a good slug of it. “I know why she hasn’t bought herself a condo; she thinks she’s coming back here, and she’s trying to screw up my kid’s wedding to do it.”
“What?” Agnes said, looking at her over the wine bottle. “That’s crazy. Why would she come back here? Why would she hurt Maria’s wedding? That’s her big social coup, that’s her in!”
“Because, as I have been telling you for years, she’s a fucking nutcase.” Lisa Livia settled into the swing. “Ever since Maria’s been down here, Brenda’s been at her about Palmer, how much he’s like his dad, who married pretty little Evie Beale when she was just eighteen and has spent the rest of his life drinking and screwing everything in sight.”
Agnes blinked at her. “Palmer is like his father? That’s ridiculous, Palmer is Evie’s baby, Palmer wouldn’t say boo to a goose, let alone proposition one. I still don’t know how he got Maria into bed.” She hesitated for a minute. “Actually, I’m not sure he ...”
“Yeah, he did,” Lisa Livia said. “I asked because I didn’t want her marrying him because he was sweet and rich and then getting bored in the first week. She said the sex was great and I should stop making assumptions and she was very happy. Now she’s not so sure, because Brenda’s planted this idea that he’s going to turn out like his father.”
“Why would she do that?” Agnes said, mystified.
“Because she’s trying to stop the wedding. This morning when I got into town, I waited until Brenda left the yacht, and then I went aboard and starting going through her stuff to see what she was up to.” Lisa Livia looked at Agnes over her wineglass, her big brown eyes huge. “She’s swindling you.”
“What?” Agnes frowned. “No. Not Brenda. I mean, I mean she’s being difficult, but I think that’s just because she’s having to deal with these people who have shut her out all these years. You should have seen her face when?—”
