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I grind my teeth and step through, locking the door so Wes will have to either beg Grandma to let him in or walk around to the front. I turn and flip him the bird like a child. Okay, not like a child. I hope children don’t go around flying the bird. I hope my kid doesn’t. Right. I have to tell everyone that there’s going to be a child soon.
Holy floating cakes.
That’s coming real fast.
“I heard the doorbell twice while you were out there,” Grandma says. “She finishes chopping carrots and sets them neatly on the overflowing tray and looks back up at me. “There. Done. Right on time, I’d say. Want to help me carry it in?”
“You told Wes about my cactus incident. I’m never going to live it down.” She shrugs and smiles right in the face of my humiliated indignation. “How could you do it?” She just keeps smiling at me and picks up the veggie tray. “I locked him out,” I huff. “Don’t let him back in.”
“Oh, Daniel, that’s rough on your poor brother. Grab that meat and cheese there, will you?”
“Grandma…”
“What?” She blinks innocently at me again. “let’s go meet this wonderful new family of yours.”
“How do you know that they’re my new family?”
“Why else would you be having a meet and greet after only one disastrous date if it wasn’t important? You either know you’re going to spend a good long time with that wonderful girl, or you’ve accidentally done something you shouldn’t have. Got married secretly in Vegas or slipped one past the old goalie. And since you haven’t been to Vegas lately…”
“Grandma!” I see black at the edges of my eyes, and when I start swaying I shove the meat and cheese tray back onto the island countertop.
She just grins at me. “Breathe, Daniel, breathe. Everything is going to be fine. Besides. I’ve always wanted to great-grandchildren, and Helen could stand more of them. She’s already one upped me and has another on the way, so I’m glad you’re seeing fit to get things in gear.”
“Holy moly, please tell me that you- that you- that you didn’t even breathe a hint of your suspicions to Wes about this.”
“He’s going to find out right away, but no. When he asked why I was smiling like a loon, I told him that it was because you got your wee wee pricked because you were humping your plants again. That threw him off the scent, then I told him to be on his best behaviour or I’d drown him in the pool out there.”
“He had best be getting wet soon then,” I grouse, my nerves coming up from my stomach and landing square in my throat to nearly strangle me.
“I hope everyone’s here,” Grandma coos, roundly excited now that her theory is confirmed, and my god, how did she know in the first place? She has a sixth sense for things like this, I swear. “I can’t wait to see Helen again. We do make a pair, I warn you, but I promise I’ll also be on my best behaviour. I won’t even mention the curse until you do.”
“Grandma! What curse! How did you know about the curse? When did you know? Did you know those earrings were cursed when I asked you who it belonged to? Did you both set this whole thing up?”
Grandma just waggles her brows at me from behind the heaping veggie tray in her hands. “How could we ever have done that?” she asks in her sweetest, sugary tone. “Now, let your brother in, and here’s Leandra, coming in looking like a vision. My, she does certainly take your breath away, doesn’t she?”
Grandma. Saved by Leandra. Who is indeed coming into the kitchen at that moment. In a golden, shimmery dress, her hair nearly the same shade curling around and spilling down her shoulders in thick waves of yellow silk, towering in six inch heels, cursed sapphires winking in her eyes, her makeup immaculate, her scarlet lips turned up in an effortless smile, she doesn’t so much steal my breath as capture every bit of me all at once. Just like that night I first saw her at the ball. Except this time, without a mask on, I can fully bask in all her wondrous beauty.
Grandma scuttles out of the kitchen carrying the tray.
“I thought I better come in here to debrief before we go out there. Everyone’s here. My mom, my aunt, my granny, my brothers and cousins, my sister-in-law and all my sisters-to-be. They’re all here. I’m so nervous I could throw up.”
“Me too.”
“Oh!” Leandra jumps, then sets her hand on her pounding heart. “Shit. I thought there was someone trying to break in.”
I turn around and sigh at the form plastered up against the patio door. “No. That’s just my brother. I locked him out for being an asshole.”
