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I scowl at him, but he doesn’t pay me any attention.
“Not at the moment. Why, are you in the market?” she teases.
“Are you three going to go on like this through the entire dinner?” my grandmother asks, fanning her face. “I feel faint already.”
“Believe me, Maren,” Rhett says, grinning from ear to ear. “I’d take you up on the offer in an instant if I didn’t think Nicky would lop my head off with that butter knife.”
To his credit, I am gripping it a tad too hard. I drop it back on the table as a gesture of goodwill. See? I won’t kill you, Rhett. At least not in front of my grandmother.
“I ask because I heard you and Barrett Knox went out on a date last week,” he continues. “I was curious to hear your side of it.”
“Why does it sound like you’ve already heard his side?” Maren wonders, sounding coy.
Rhett laughs and leans back in his chair, trying to dig himself out of the hole he’s put himself in. “Yeah, well, Barrett isn’t one to keep quiet about a pretty girl.” He holds his hands out quickly, to nip in the bud the line of thinking we were all heading down. “Not that he’s been spreading intimate details or anything. As I hear it, the two of you just went to get a drink before Tori’s garden party.”
What the hell? Why am I just now hearing about this?
“That’s absurd,” I interject. “Barrett’s too young for her.”
“We’re the same age,” she points out with an amused smile.
That can’t be possible.
“Yeah, well, let’s just say you’re a lot more mature than he is. I worry for any woman who seriously considers dating him.”
“That’s rude. I had a good time.”
“I agree with Maren, Nicky,” my grandmother adds. “I think you judge Barrett too harshly. Sure, he has a bit of growing up to do, but I was here, watching, when he picked Maren up, and he was very gallant about it. Reminds me of when boys used to come here to take your mother out.”
“You allowed her to go out with him?”
“I didn’t just allow it—I encouraged it. Since when do you have an issue with Barrett anyway?”
Since this moment apparently.
Maren turns to Rhett. “Now you have me curious. What else has Barrett been saying about me?”
“Oh, you know, just the telltale signs of new love. He thinks you’re the prettiest woman he’s ever laid eyes on, yada-yada.”
She laughs as if it’s absurd.
It’s not.
I could use a drink, something a little stronger than this wine.
“And what about Barrett? Do you find him handsome?” my grandmother asks.
“Of course. What’s not to like?”
“I prefer blondes myself,” Rhett adds, no doubt referring to himself.
She laughs and shakes her head. “You know, actually, Nicholas,” she says, turning to me, “if you and I hadn’t gotten off to such a rocky start, I think I would have found you very handsome.”
“He looks just like his grandfather,” my grandmother says with a proud smile.
“But now?” I ask, forgetting we have an audience.
She shrugs. “It doesn’t matter.”
Bullshit.
I’ve never wanted to draw the truth out of someone more. I want to touch her chin and turn her head toward me and look into her eyes for signs of denial.
It does matter.
Salmon tartare is served as the first course, and my grandmother tries to steer the conversation toward upcoming restoration work at Rosethorn. She doesn’t succeed.
“Nicholas broke a lot of hearts when we were growing up,” Rhett tells Maren, continuing the game they’re playing at my expense. “He’s a tough nut to crack, but that didn’t stop girls from trying. In fact, they only tried harder.”
“That doesn’t surprise me at all,” Maren says, as if she has me completely pegged. “I’m sure he loved it. Did he take them out on his sailboat? Woo them on the open seas?”
“Only a few girls were that lucky.”
“Lucky?” Maren teases.
I toss my napkin onto the table and screech my chair back to stand. “Maren, could I speak with you out in the hall?”
I’m already yanking her chair back, so she doesn’t really have a choice in the matter.
I almost expect my grandmother to speak up in protest, but she must recognize something in my expression because she stays perfectly silent as I step out into the narrow side hall, opposite the grand entry on the other side of the dining room. It’s dimly lit compared to the rest of the house, a small passage we rarely use.
Maren follows a beat after me with her head held high, fury reigning in her eyes.
My heart races in my chest and the overwhelming urge to reprimand her and leave her there in the hall feeling like a petulant child fades once she and I stand eye to eye.
“Am I in trouble?” she asks, cocking one delicate brow.
