Page 8 of The Engagement Party

All other conversation came to a screeching halt.

“I did?” Will asked.

Ruthie waved away the confusion with a flick of her hand. “Actually, a friend’s family owns the place. We’re borrowing it for a few days.”

“It’s a hell of a landscaping job. I want to take a closer look at the rock retaining wall later.” Mitch nodded as he left the sink and wandered closer to Cassie and Alex. Cassie immediately wrapped an arm around him, pulling him in for a hug.

Sierra tried to focus on something other than Mitch’s back. Ruthie’s big round diamond seemed like a good place. “Your ring is gorgeous.”

“It belonged to Will’s grandmother.”

Since he’d been down the engagement road many times Sierra wondered if that meant the ring had had several temporary owners or that Will had more grandmothers than the average person.Sierra forced herself not to ask. She went with a nonsense response instead. “Nice.”

Ruthie’s fingers wrapped around the wineglass. She held it in a tight clench. “I’m happy you came.”

Was she, though? Her body seemed rigid. Her smile didn’t quite reach her eyes and there was... something. Sierra couldn’t put her finger on it. An underlying nervousness. The jittery way Ruthie moved around the kitchen, filling glasses and putting out snacks. She likely wanted to impress her soon-to-be-husband’s oldest friends, but it came off as more than that.

“Sierra worried I wouldn’t behave myself, so I dragged her with me,” Mitch said as he wandered back to join them and grabbed a water bottle out of the refrigerator.

Alex snorted. “We all worry about your bad behavior.”

The comment earned a middle finger from Mitch.

Cassie studied the living space and staircase that led to an open landing and a series of second-floor-bedroom doors above. “When did you two get here?”

“Yesterday afternoon.” Will refilled his wineglass. “I needed to figure out the tide schedule, so I didn’t accidentally drown all of you.”

And silence.

The words wandered a bit too close to the collective horror they all pretended to forget. Sierra ached for them but knowing she wasn’t the only one who stumbled into these verbal potholes provided some relief.

“Okay, let’s get this out of the way.” Alex held up his glass in a toast. “To Emily, who we loved and lost, and to Jake, who walked away, and we still miss him.”

“Does anyone see Jake these days?” Ruthie asked. “I was trying to find him for the wedding invitation list.”

A sudden tension choked the room. Labored chatter morphed into suffocating awkwardness.

Alex stared into his glass. “No.”

“We can talk about that later,” Will said.

“Jake prefers not to be in touch, which can be hurtful.” Cassie grabbed a handful of chips. “Maybe a new topic?”

Sierra really wanted to leave. Like, leave the island. She didn’t want to be here, trapped and surrounded by rising water, stuck with a group of people determined not to talk about the tragedy that bound them to the past.

Ruthie squeezed closer to Sierra, dropping her voice to a whisper. “Whoops.”

“Not your fault. I made the same mistake several times when talking with Mitch about this weekend. Jake apparently drifted away years ago because being with the group reminds him of what they lost.”

“They’ve all known each other for years but they still tiptoe around talking about Emily.” Ruthie shrugged. “She deserves more than that.”

Sierra silently agreed. If the saying was true about someone not being truly gone until the last person who knew them stopped talking about them, then Emily was coming dangerously close to complete extinction.

“They were young and foolish. They were celebrating and drinking that weekend, and she just disappeared.” Ruthie took a long sip of wine. “What does Mitch say about—”

Sierra watched Ruthie’s brown eyes widen as her voice cut off.

“The garage.” Ruthie set her glass down with a loud clink.

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