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As she listened to her aunt and mother chat about charities and garden clubs and Nonni and Poppa, she realized again that it was always her father saying things for her mother. As if he was her voice.
She closed her eyes, bringing those times to mind, her father saying she should stay with her mother and keep her company while he and Matthew did their bonding thing. As if he was trying to save her mother’s feelings, just like he’d told that lie about Matthew to save Bron’s feelings, or the so-called fabrication about the wedding and how it would save her mother’s feelings. And the lie about Smithfield and Vine, which was supposed to save her from making the biggest mistake of her life.
It was always her father saying the things she’d blamed her mother for.
She opened her eyes again. Words came unbidden to her lips, and she let them out. “I’m sorry for the way I turned down the trip you’d planned, Mother. I was angry about something else, and I took it out on you.”
Her mother gaped, but Aunt Teresa’s smile brimmed with approval.
“It’s okay, honey,” her mother murmured, as if a louder voice would ruin the mood. “I understand. About the wedding, I mean. But I would never stop you from being a bridesmaid. And I’m happy that you’re friends with Bron.”
Sienna tried to detect an ulterior motive, even a lie. But the only look on her mother’s face was hope.
Maybe it was her father’s recent lies. Maybe it was the way he’d sabotaged her interview in order to get what he wanted. Maybe it was the yearning in her mother’s eyes. Whatever it was, Sienna did the most spontaneous thing of her entire life. “I’ve got a lot of vacation time saved up.” She shrugged as her two mothers stared at her. “I think I can swing it. When did you say you wanted to go?”
Her mother’s voice was quiet with surprise and awe. “The middle of June.”
Sienna pulled out her phone and checked her calendar. “That’s over two months away, certainly enough notice for the company to handle my absence.”
She didn’t have accounts anyone else couldn’t handle easily, but she’d give her clients advance notice. If one of them needed her, she was only a phone call away. Hopefully the market wouldn’t crash while she was gone. “I’m sure I can handle it, but I’ll confirm with my boss.”
Her mother clapped her hands, her mouth an O of delight. “That would be wonderful. I’d love for you to come.”
Sienna stopped short of making a promise she might have to break. “I’ll do my best to make it work.”
If her mother’s goal was to fix the relationship, then Sienna could give her a chance.
* * *
“She’s so serious,”Angela said after Sienna returned to work. “I wish she could lighten up a bit.”
Teresa snorted a laugh. “She’s just like you. When did you ever lighten up?”
Angela flattened her lips, flared her nostrils, and crossed her eyes in an attempt to lighten up. “Point taken. I hate that she’s so unhappy with her job. Although I’m not sure she’d be any happier at Smithfield and Vine.”
“She just wants to build a life that your ex-husband doesn’t have a hand in.”
Angela let out a long sigh, wrapping her hands around the warmth of her coffee cup. “Did she tell you how he tried to use my hurt feelings to boot her out of the wedding?”
“The bridesmaid thing?”
Angela nodded. “He had the nerve to tell her I’d called him—” She put her hand to her chest in affront. “—and that I’d said I was uncomfortable with her being in the wedding.”
Teresa gaped. “Asshole. How do you know all this?”
“His fiancée came to see me. She wanted to change my mind. Sienna didn’t tell you?”
Teresa put her hand flat on the table. “I don’t like to reveal what Sienna confides to me.” She eyed Angela as if afraid of her reaction, but Angela was well aware her daughter preferred talking to her aunt over her own mother. “I’m going to tell you anyway. Because I think he’s escalating.”
There was a hitch in her heart rate as if she’d suddenly developed an arrhythmia. “What did he do this time?”
“Sienna asked him to call Smithfield and put in a good word for her.”
“Oh God,” Angela muttered.
“And instead—” Teresa’s voice seethed with outrage. “—he told Smithfield that she didn’t think the job was the right fit for her.”
Angela covered a gasp. “What the hell was he thinking?”
