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“Well, uh, wow, this is awkward, isn’t it? Where are my manners? Please—” Tiffany waved toward the chairs “—have a seat. Can I…offer you something to drink?”
“Naw. We just had a soda downtown,” Katie said as Tiffany set Christina onto the floor and the little girl barreled out of the room. The sound of small footsteps scurrying up the stairs reached Bliss’s ears. Katie made an idle gesture with one hand. “I thought it was time we all got together.”
“I’ve been thinking about it, too,” Tiffany admitted, her cheeks flushing slightly. She fiddled with the chain on her watch. “I know I should have said something the other day when you, Bliss, came looking for Mason, but…well, you took me by surprise and I didn’t know what to say. Then, as the days passed, I decided I didn’t have to do anything until I was ready.”
“Or someone forced your hand,” Katie said with a shrug.
Tiffany nodded and splayed her fingers in front of her. “Look, I believe in telling it like it is, so to speak, and I’ve got to tell you straight-out that I don’t like what’s happening.”
“You’re not the only one.” Bliss was so uncomfortable she wanted to climb out of her skin and disappear. Instead, she sat on one of the cushions in the window seat overlooking a side yard filled with heavy-blossomed roses and a rusting swing set.
Katie plopped onto the couch. “Have you made any decisions yet?” she asked Tiffany as she ran a finger around the stitching on one arm. “About the wedding? You know that Dad—or John, or whatever it is I’m supposed to call him—really wants you to come to the ceremony.”
“I got the invitation. And he called. But I don’t think so. You know, just because he’s had a change of heart, or some kind of personal epiphany or whatever it is, I can’t just forget all the years that I didn’t know of him.” She wasn’t smiling and looked as if her mind was cast in concrete. Bliss suspected that no one pushed Tiffany Santini around.
Katie was just as stubborn. “I can’t make up your mind for you, but—”
“No buts about it. I’m not going. And you’re right—you can’t make up my mind for me.”
Amen, Bliss thought, but Katie, forever the steamroller, plunged forward. “Don’t you think it would be a good idea if we all tried, if possible, to bury the hatchet, so to speak?”
Tiffany lifted an already-arched brow. “Why?”
“Family unity. Solidarity. All that stuff.”
Bliss’s stomach tensed.
“Solidarity,” Tiffany repeated with a little cough. “Family unity. That’s rich.” With determination flashing in her dark eyes, she settled onto the ottoman of one of the overstuffed chairs. “Let’s understand each other. You want to go, Katie, because, after all, your mother and father are finally getting married. And Bliss—” she turned those wary eyes in her middle sister’s direction “—it makes sense for you.”
“But
not you?” Bliss asked, trying not to appear as nervous as she felt.
“No, not me, and I don’t think I really have to explain myself.”
“Why don’t you try,” Katie suggested.
A flash of anger flitted through the eldest’s eyes. “Okay, if that’s what you want. It’s been hard for me, okay? And all this nearly killed Mom. She lied at first, told me my dad was dead. I guess that way she thought I wouldn’t feel so abnormal, but the truth of the matter was that I was born illegitimate, unwanted by a father who preferred another woman over my mother.”
“No!” Bliss gasped. “Dad didn’t know Mom until after—”
“Doesn’t matter.” Tiffany held out her hands to cut off Bliss’s protest. “Katie asked and I just answered truthfully. I think there’ve been enough lies as it is.”
Bliss gulped. It was time to leave. Past time. Obviously, Tiffany didn’t have any of Katie’s need for family unity.
But Tiffany wasn’t finished. “I know what the local story is. My grandmother filled me in. It goes something like my mother didn’t love John Cawthorne, didn’t want to marry him. Nor did he want her. I was the result of a fling.” She rolled her eyes and shook her head. “Anyway, for all my mom’s tough words, I learned later from my grandmother that it about killed her when he married a rich woman from San Francisco, a woman of breeding, so to speak, and then you came along and were treated like a princess.”
Heat soared up Bliss’s cheeks and for a second, hot tears touched the back of her eyelids.
“I wasn’t going to say anything,” Tiffany added, as if she could see the pain ripping through her half sister. “But you two asked. The way I see it is that my mother struggled to raise me, and she taught me never to depend upon a man—any man. She never married, refused to even date much and was of the opinion that most men were rats or even worse. When things got tight, there was Grandma to depend upon.”
“Aunt Octavia,” Katie clarified. “She’s not everyone’s aunt but everyone calls her that, and she is Tiffany’s grandmother.”
“Yep, and she somehow helped keep my mother sane, I swear, during those…well, the rough years.”
Bliss rubbed her sweating palms on her pants. “You mean when Dad married Mom?”
“Yeah. But I thought it was because my dad had died.” Tiffany nodded and plucked at the fringe on the cushion of the ottoman. “Anyway, she got over it—at least I thought she did. Then, when I married Philip, she nearly didn’t come to the wedding. He was older, and Mom was certain he was a father figure to me, the only father I’d ever known. She read all sorts of self-help books and told me that I was mixing up love and security and—oh, well, it doesn’t matter. I’m sure you didn’t come here to hear my life story, so put away the violins and handkerchiefs. I’m not really bitter, just not interested in the prospect of dealing with a dad I’ve never known.”
