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“She’s told me plenty about you. I understand you’re on the events committee at the country club?”
My mom preened. Now that her children had left home, her life revolved around tennis, yoga, and long, lazy lunches. She did volunteer work too, but in private, she bitched about single mothers and homeless people and their poor life choices.
“That’s right. The Independence Day cookout was a great success, and now we’re working on the Labor Day picnic and the charity golf tournament. Stu, you are playing, aren’t you?”
“Wouldn’t miss it for the world, Janice.”
Don’t talk about golf, don’t talk about golf… Surreptitiously, I tapped at my phone and called Stu from an anonymised number. Because he liked to feel important, he never turned off his phone at the dinner table, and as I’d hoped, he stepped away.
“Hello? Hello?” He checked the screen. “Hello? Huh. Nobody there. Must’ve been a wrong number.”
Buckley’s phone rang next, but that wasn’t me. No, it appeared to be a business call, and he began talking about profit margins as he strode out of the room. Fortunately, the waitstaff chose that moment to return with dessert, and conversation was forgotten as everyone dug into chocolate mousse served with a caramel tuile.
“Did you learn to cook yet, Aggie?” Clarice asked.
“Well, I haven’t starved.”
She gave a not-so-ladylike laugh. By my count, she’d just started her fourth glass of wine, and I hoped someone had remembered to bring Tylenol. She wasn’t having mine. I needed it for myself. Of note: Odette had drunk one glass of champagne and then switched to water.
“Kellan, when Aggie was twelve, she tried to bake a cake for the church picnic, but she got the salt and sugar mixed up. You should have seen the pastor’s face.”
Hawk gave another shrug. “Good thing I know how to cook.”
Mom, Odette, and Clarice exchanged puzzled glances.
“You make dinner?” Odette asked. “Don’t you spend any evenings with Aggie?”
“Yes, but I don’t expect her to run around after me.”
That much was true, but I sincerely hoped he didn’t elaborate.
“Maybe I’ll take a cooking class someday,” I said. “Who wants more wine?”
Clarice shook her head. “I need to put the girls to bed.”
Buckley never did come back, and it didn’t take long for the rest of my family—Odette excluded—to drink enough that they wouldn’t miss us. If I’d stayed in my hometown, I’d undoubtedly have turned into an alcoholic myself, so I could quite understand why they turned to liquor. If any weekend called for inebriation, it was this one, especially when Odette began gushing both tears and her love for Stu at ten in the evening. At least her vision was blurry enough that she didn’t notice when we exited stage left.
“Aggie?” Hawk asked as we speed-walked along the hallway. “You’re not an Aggie.”
“Mom says ‘Agatha’ is too much of a mouthful.”
“Didn’t she choose the name?”
“Yup.” As we got farther from the dining room, I felt myself relax. “Thanks for not throat-punching anyone. You were surprisingly…”
“Civilised?”
“I was going to say surprisingly good at being a fake boyfriend.”
“As I said, I’ve done a lot of undercover work.” He paused to kiss the top of my head before he held open the door to the stairs. “Investigative work too, and you could be right about your little sis being knocked up.”
“You think? I figured the hot sauce might be a pregnancy craving, but then she drank a glass of champagne. And Odette might be a pain in everyone’s ass, but she isn’t irresponsible.”
“She poured the champagne on the potted plant next to her. And when she thought nobody was looking, she sprinkled that sauce on the chocolate mousse too. Looks as if you’re gonna be an auntie again.”
“Holy crap.”
“Don’t forget to ask Bradley to pick out a christening gift.”
