Page 131 of Say Yes to the Death

Claire glanced back for the first time. Luke was gaping at her with an open mouth. Jack was standing, gun drawn, and Tanya stood next to him with her hand on his arm.

“Jack. You know the rule. No guns at dinner,” she hissed.

It was possibly the first sensible thing Tanya had said the entire evening.

George high-tailed it out the front door and slammed it behind him. Silence rang in his wake.

“Who wants cake?” Claire asked after a moment, lifting the lid on a meticulously decorated chocolate cake. The sooner everyone ate cake, the sooner they would get the hell out of her house.

As much as she hated to admit it, the weird vegan cake was pretty good. Maybe she really did like nutritional yeast.

Tanya cleared the dessert plates and left Claire with a hefty, cling-wrapped chunk of cake. Luke washed the dishes and Jack dried. They exchanged a few words about the upcoming football season. For such a strange collection of people, it was eerily normal.

Claire served coffee, and the four of them sat around the table for another few minutes.

“Claire?” Tanya asked.

“Yes?” Good lord, what now?

“Thank you so much for having us over. I know it can’t have been easy for you. You must feel like I took your father away and disrupted your entire life.”

Claire shrugged. “It was a long time ago.”

Tanya reached over and touched her hand. Her hands were soft, like unbaked dough. Claire cringed but didn’t withdraw.

“I don’t regret the life your father and I created together. But I regret the way it started.”

Yep, a child born of adultery while half of the couple was still legally married to someone else was not exactly a recipe for a classic fairytale romance.

“And most of all,” Tanya continued, “I regret not being able to be in your and Charlie’s life while you were growing up. Do you think she would ever agree to meet with me?”

Claire exhaled. Charlie was a badass publicist who did not have time to suffer fools. She had written her father off the day he had walked out the door. “Maybe. Someday.”

Tanya smiled and withdrew her hand. “Jack? We should get going. It’s a flower moon tonight.”

“We should do this again sometime,” Jack said, awkwardly sticking his hand out to Claire.

“Sure,” she said, shaking his hand. What a tempting offer.

“Did you have any questions for the procedure tomorrow?”

Oh, hell. Tomorrow she was going to the prison to grill Barney. She had purposely put it out of her mind, but time was running out. She needed a plan.

“I’m good, thanks,” she said to Jack.

“Oh, Claire,” Tanya strode over to the bar, where Claire had abandoned the diffuser and bottles of oils. “If you’re feeling nauseated, just lift the cap off the peppermint oil and take a deep breath. It’ll fix you right up. And if you find yourself having anxiety or trouble sleeping, just run a nice hot bath and add a few drops of the lavender oil.”

Great. Then she could sleepwalk in the streets of West Haven while smelling like an apothecary.

“Thank you both. Take care,” Claire said as she opened her front door.

The moment they left, she collapsed on the floor. Rosie sprinted over and licked her cheek. Luke came to lie beside Claire and sat down a glass of water with a straw.

“Thank you,” Claire said, sipping noisily. Was this blossoming headache from the stress or the alcohol? “That could have gone worse.”

He smiled and rolled onto his side, propped his head in one hand. “I will always cherish the memory of you sweeping my brother’s legs.”

“Shit, he’s not going to sue me, is he? I’m already in the middle of trying to low-key blackmail my way out of a lawsuit. It’s not a good time to add another. And then there’s the fact that I flung a trash can lid at a cult member’s face on live television.” Good lord. How many lawsuits could one person have? Maybe she really did have a violent streak.

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