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“Easily,” Jake answered, “if the woman is as nasty as you say, then I say we end that and get her out of your business.”
“I’m not sure this will work. Spencer is pretty pissed.”
“I’ll call ahead to everyone. We’ll be ready, so bring the woman, and let’s teach her that it’s rude to drop in on your son and play games when he’s just trying to lie to you to get you out of his life.” Jake eyed me, “Listen, Nat, she’s likely here to prove you both aren’t married, so let her come around all of us. We’ll play the fake marriage thing up for you guys and kill all her sneaky investigations.”
“I hate this shit,” I exhaled. “Fine. Make sure everyone knows we were married in a tiny little chapel just after Easter, and that’s it.”
“You don’t want to enhance that shit a little?”
“No,” I said. “Keep it simple, and she won’t catch anyone lying. I want her uncomfortable and completely out of her element. Spencer does not want her here, and as a good wife and the good friends you all are, we’ll get her to leave town as quickly as she showed up.” I ran my hand through my hair, “I just hope Spencer will go along with this.”
“Tell him it was my idea for Jim’s birthday present.”
I shook my head.
Jake chuckled, turning to leave. “Spencer will understand without me ever telling him what our plans are. Trust me, he’ll be indebted to my ass for a long time after this.”
“And if it doesn’t work?” I said uneasily.
“If it doesn’t work, I have no idea how you’ll get that woman out of your lives. Now, see you on the yacht in a few,” he turned and waved as he hopped down the steps, leaving me standing there, tapping my teeth with my nail.
I stood there watching Jake walk away, wondering if this was the worst, childish idea in the world. What a fucking ambush this woman delivered, and yet, I felt we could own this shit—and her—by allowing our friends to play this whole fake marriage game with us.
If it worked, she’d be out of here, and we wouldn’t have to worry about this shit anymore. God, who did shit like this?
I turned and walked back into the house. I heard Spencer speaking in a low voice to his mother and her annoying as fuck tone, talking back in response to him.
“Spencer,” I said with a fake smile. “I need to speak with you alone for a moment.”
Spencer rose, and Mommy Dearest carried a look of curiosity.
“I’m sure whatever you have to say can be spoken in my presence,” she started. “My feelings aren’t easily wounded.”
“Allow me to remind you that you’re in our home and not yours,” I spoke before Spencer could open his mouth. “And in our home, we discuss private matters in private.”
“I know this matter is regarding my presence here.”
“Stop,” Spencer cut in before the catfight broke out. “Allow me a moment to discuss your rude, uninvited arrival with my wife. Unfortunately, she had no idea that her future mother-in-law would be this intrusive in our lives, and I sure as hell had no idea you would behave this way myself.”
“Oh, good grief,” she said, sipping her wine. “Go speak to each other in another room, and I’ll wait out here as the reasonable person I am.”
“Indeed, Heidi,” Spencer said, his hand reaching my lower back, guiding me to the stairs to the master suite, “you are quite the reasonable person.”
When we reached the top of the staircase, we turned and walked into the bedroom. “Okay,” I said once the door was shut tight, “Jake wants your mom to join us on the yacht this weekend.”
“Jake is out of his goddamn mind. No,” Spencer said. “I don’t want Heidi being here to destroy your weekend, so I plan to stay behind with her.”
“Well, if you have to stay behind with Heidi, that means she’s still destroying my weekend.”
Spencer ran his hand through his hair and exhaled, “Nat, please, just go with our friends and enjoy yourself. Don’t make this harder than it already fucking is.”
“That is a hell of a fucking thing to say to me,” I said. “No, you’re going with me. We’re enjoying this with our friends. It will be harder to do this separately than together. And we’ll even have our friends help to drive home our little marriage lie. She’s only here to catch you and me in this lie, I presume?”
“You presume correctly,” he said. “My mother has never done something this insane, showing up on me like this. Of course, it’s only because she’s trying to catch me doing something. Or not doing something.”
“What point does it serve to her if she does? This all seems so above and beyond to me. Will she get all your money if she finds out you’ve been lying to her or something? Is there some clause in the family will that forbids lying?”
He smirked. “No, she’s just trying to get you to run as far as you can from me. Seriously, she wants me settled down with a woman she can use to manipulate to have access to my money and steal the personal freedoms I fought for to keep her out of my life.”
