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Nick set a plate full of pancakes on the table and grabbed a slice of bacon. “I ask her the same thing.”
Elise closed the magazine and grabbed her son’s hand before he stuck his fork in the newest stack of pancakes on the table. “If either of you bothered to read it, you’d know Today Magazine isn’t a tabloid like The Star Insider, and it doesn’t just publish celebrity pieces. Besides, it has great crossword puzzles every week.”
Before his nephew made a second attempt for more food, Aaron took three pancakes and added them to the bacon on his plate. Then he pointed his fork toward the magazine. “Could’ve fooled me.”
A photo of a gorgeous blonde he’d seen on countless covers while standing in the checkout line at the supermarket occupied much of the magazine cover. Below the too-perfect face—no doubt the publication removed any imperfections prior to publication—was the headline “Caught In The Act.” Then, in the bottom left corner, there was a smaller picture of a man and—he assumed—the same blonde woman kissing. At the same time, a picture of another woman and who he guessed was the same dark-haired dude as in the left-hand picture occupied the bottom right corner. And while there was also a photo in the top right of a Connecticut high school student who’d started a program that helped the less fortunate get prom dresses, the main headline, unfortunately, overshadowed it. Even without opening the magazine, he assumed he’d find more photos of the blonde with the dark-haired man and a story about how the guy had been caught cheating on the brunette with the blonde. After all, it seemed to be the norm among celebrities.
“The story about Juliette Belmont isn’t the only one in there.” Elise added another pancake to her plate and poured maple syrup over it.
“Let me guess, she’s an actress and got caught with a married man?”
Elise shook her head, her expression asking what rock he’d been living under. “A model and President Sherbrooke’s niece.”
And those two facts make her so much more important than everyone else. If he’d been about twenty years younger, he would’ve rolled his eyes. Instead, he stuffed a forkful of food in his mouth.
“When are we leaving?” Mason asked.
He’d promised to take his nephew to the science museum today. Since Mason lived more than a thousand miles away, he didn’t spend as much time as he’d like with him. A day at the museum would give him a chance to spoil his nephew while giving his older sister and her husband some time alone. It seemed like a win-win for everyone.
“Let your uncle at least eat his breakfast,” Elise said. “And while he does, why don’t you go upstairs and work on cleaning your room.”
He’d seen his nephew’s room. It’d take some effort and maybe some heavy machinery before it even resembled moderately neat.
As expected, Mason frowned. “But, Mom—”
His sister’s eyebrows inched up, and she blinked a few times. Aaron remembered their mom doing the same thing when she was about to deliver a statement they weren’t going to like. “If you’d rather stay home today and work on your room, that’s fine with me.”
Mason gulped down the rest of his milk and pushed back his chair. “I’ll go work on it now.”
Aaron suppressed a grin. “Don’t worry. I’ll come and get you as soon as I’m done, buddy.” Picking up his empty coffee cup, he stood. “You should get the kid a bulldozer to clean his room. Does it even have a floor?” He hadn’t known where to step when he went in the other day. Clothes, books, and various pieces of sports equipment covered whatever parts of the floor that weren’t occupied by furniture. “Do you want more coffee?”
With a nod, Elise handed him her cup. “Believe it or not, I helped him clean it a few weekends ago.”
If Elise said she’d helped Mason, he’d take her word for it, because it looked like the room hadn’t been touched in years.
“What do you two plan to do while we’re gone?”
“A round of golf and then we have dinner reservations.” Nick put another stack of pancakes on the table and took the seat across from his wife. “We haven’t golfed together since the fall.”
The cell phone next to his sister’s plate chimed. As a certified midwife, the woman was never far from her phone.
Accepting her coffee, she picked up the device and glanced at the text message. “Mom said someone called yesterday and rented all five cottages for the next three months.”
Although his mom closed up the majority of the cottages around the lake after the second weekend in October and didn’t open them again
until the first weekend in May, she always kept five open. Some years people rented them out every weekend during ski season, and other years the cottages remained empty for weeks on end. During the summer, it wasn’t unusual for a group of relatives to rent out cottages so they could vacation together, but never this time of year. And as far as he could remember, no one had ever rented out a cottage for such a long period of time. But he knew his mom wouldn’t complain, because the agreement would guarantee extra revenue.
“Mom must be happy. Did she say how many people she is expecting?”
Two of the larger cottages still open each accommodated up to six people, assuming two people slept in each bedroom and two people slept on the pull-out sofa. The other three cottages available in the winter each had one bedroom and a sleeper sofa.
“One,” Elise answered.
“One person needs five houses? Who’s staying there, the Queen of England?” Nick asked.
His brother-in-law made an excellent point. If an individual had rented out all the available cottages, they either didn’t want any neighbors or they considered themselves superior to the rest of society.
“What do you think I’m asking her now?” Elise didn’t look up as she typed out a new message. When she finished, she set the device down and reached for her fork. “But whoever it is, Mom expects them tomorrow.”
