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“Don’t mind me, I’m having a pity party.” Isobel forced another smile.
“It’s going to be okay,” Agnes said as she wrapped an arm around Isobel.
“Jack’s angry with me.”
“Jack is a teenager. He’s angry with everybody.” They headed down the rest of the stairs together.
“I’ve made a mess of his life. His dad didn’t even want to meet him, and then I married Rob thinking he’d make a good father for Jack. How could I have been so dumb? Why am I such a terrible judge of character?”
Her other two sisters jumped up to hug her when she entered the kitchen. For a moment, the comfort of being in the middle of them all made her burden lighten. Without these three amazing women, she wouldn’t have survived.
“We’re all terrible judges of character.” Donna stroked Isobel’s hair. “It’s the Sinclair curse. We’re genetically incapable of telling a good man from a bad one.”
“It’s why the rest of us are single,” Mairi agreed. “We know if we pick someone, he’ll likely be a dickhead. You were the only one brave enough to try.”
“Dumb enough,” Isobel corrected.
“We were all fooled by Robert.” Agnes tugged Isobel out of the group hug and guided her into a chair. “We all thought he was a great guy. None of us saw the slightest indication that he was a gambler.”
“He had a good job,” Donna agreed as she placed a huge wedge of chocolate cake in front of Isobel. “He’d had it for years. We thought he was stable.”
“Plus, let’s be honest,” Mairi said as she sat down beside Isobel. “He wasn’t that good looking, and we all thought he’d be more dependable because of it.”
The sisters stared at her in stunned silence.
“What?” Mairi said around a mouthful of cake.
“We didn’t think that,” Donna said. “Did we?” She looked at Agnes and Isobel, who shook their heads.
“No, we didn’t,” Agnes said. “Why would we think the fact he was skinny and had bad hair meant he was stable and honest?”
“Because he had to work harder to be popular. Because he should have been grateful he landed someone as gorgeous as Isobel and treated her fabulously because of it. Because he had no muscle mass and wasn’t able to fight off anybody who came after him. You’d think the inability to defend himself would mean he wouldn’t get into trouble in the first place.” Mairi sat back with a triumphant smile, as though she made perfect sense.
“I worry about you,” Agnes said. “You don’t think like normal people.”
“Like you would know what normal is,” Mairi scoffed, before digging back into her cake.
“Robert wasn’t bad looking and he wasn’t skinny. He was lanky,” Isobel felt the need to point out. “He was handsome in a kind of geeky way. The way that guy who owns Facebook is handsome.”
“He is not handsome,” Donna said.
“Yes, he is. He’s handsome, but not hot or sexy. There’s a difference, trust me. I know. Jack’s father was hot. Robert was handsome in an understated way.” And Callum was sexy as hell. But she kept that last part to herself.
“Have you had your eyes tested lately?” Mairi asked with such seriousness that the rest of them burst out laughing.
“Callum McKay is hot and sexy,” Agnes said with a sneaky smile at Isobel. “Isn’t he? How on earth are you going to keep your hands off him for a whole night?”
“Oh!” Mairi sat up straight. “I nearly forgot. Jack said Isobel already had sex with Callum.”
“What?” Agnes said. “I was kidding about keeping your hands off him. Isobel?”
Isobel squirmed in her seat. “Jack didn’t say that,” she said as firmly as she could.
“That’s right,” Mairi said as her thumbs flew over her phone, “he said you could be pregnant. That Callum was shouting about you carrying his child.” She shrugged. “I guess the sex part was implied.”
Isobel glared at her youngest sister, but it was wasted on her.
“You slept with the outlaw?” Donna screeched. “When?”
