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“What do you care if I approve or not?” There wasn’t a hint of anger in his words—in fact, there was encouragement more than anything. “You have to do you,Lilac.”
“Thisisme,” said Lilac. She dared to look back at Gavin and he didn’t seem angry or shocked or anything. This was why he was her bestfriend.
“Then you go be you,” said Gavin. He smiled. “And clear me some room on Frankie’s couch because the second I have some free time, I want to work on my tan alongsideyou.”
Lilac bopped his nose with one French-manicured finger. “You can sunbathe with me, but I’m going to slather you with sunscreen,” she said. “Melanoma,remember?”
Gavin laughed. “You think I’m going to be on a sunny, Florida beach and letyouslather sunscreen on me?” Shaking his head, he grinned deviously. “I’m going to bump into my true love there and ever-so-innocently askhimfor help reaching my back, thank you verymuch.”
Lilac chuckled and wiped her eyes, realizing tears had started to form there. “All right,” she said. “But he better have a hot, single father who’ll lather me uptoo.”
“No thank you and ew,” said Gavin, shaking his head. “You and your daddyissues…”
“Don’t call my taste in men that!” Lilac shuddered. “Especially when I’m going to see Daddy today.” She paused. “Okay, don’t say anything about me sayingDaddy,” she added, knowing full well how calling her dad “Daddy” creeped Gavin out. But she couldn’t help it. Daddy had always been “Daddy” toher.
They stared at one another, a silent showdown, each waiting for the other to comment further. Then they both laughed. Leave it to Gavin to boost Lilac’s mood, to help her shove those doubts all the way deep down where theybelonged.
Chapter Two
It may have beenfive o’clock somewhere, but here, it was ten in the morning and Lilac’s entire family was drinking.If I don’t get past airport security soon,thought Lilac,I might not make my flight.Despite the fact that she and practically her entire family had arrived hours in advance. Her mom and daddy had insisted they make a day of it. They were off to the Caribbean themselves, an impromptu trip born from her mom’s envy of Lilac heading for a sunnier clime. Her mom’s parents had to catch a flight home to Rochester. Her daddy’s parents lived in the same town as her parents during the summer months and New Mexico during winter. So they weren’t going anywhere, but they’d tagged along, too, and now the seven of them sat around a rather cramped table in a restaurant at the Hilton connected to one of O’Hare’s terminals. They’d finished eating ages ago, but everyone cradled a drink they kept nursing at the rate of one sip per half hour. Lilac had already downed hers ages ago and had refused a refill, her nerves a bit on edge. This was agoodthing, damn it, but she always did get nervous even before good thingshappened.
“Cheer up, princess.” Her daddy raised an eyebrow as he lifted his shot glass to his lips. “You look like you’re on your way to a funeral, not a themepark.”
“Rodney!” Lilac’s mom shook her head as she stirred her martini for the dozenthtime.
“What?” asked Papa William, laughing. “Afraid the next time we’re all together like this we’ll be missing one familymember?”
“That’s not funny,” snapped Lilac’s mom, but she was fighting to keep a smile from cracking her lips. “Besides, you’re hardly an old man. You’ve got timeyet.”
“Oh, so it’s my number that’s up next, is it?” Papa William raised his shot glass in the air. “I’d better drink to that. To us oldpeople.”
“You’ll drink to anything,” said Nana Abigail, her pearl bracelet slipping down her arm as she moved to fan herself with the dessert menu. “And I’d appreciate you not calling us ‘old,’ dear, despite appearances.” She reached into her purse, bringing out a compact to touch up her already-perfect lipstick. Nana Abigail was like a supermodel—if supermodels were allowed to get white hair andwrinkles.
“If I recall, Lilac always got nervous before traveling,” said Grandpa Matthew, who took up more than his fair share of the small table with both forearms laid out in front of him. The shock of white arm hair against his tanned skin marred by the scars from melanoma surgeries urged Lilac to rifle through her carry-on to make sure she’d packed her SPF50.
“There she goes,” said Grandma Violet, as if everyone was in on some joke. “Checking to make sure she remembered everything. Honey, you’ve done that already. Four times since we satdown.”
Lilac clutched her bottle of sunscreen, feeling her palm go clammy, and let it go as a feeling of relief washed over her. “I just want to make sure,” she said. “I don’t know when I’ll be able to get back here, so I don’t want to leave anything importantbehind.”
“Your mother or I can always send you anything you’ve forgotten,” said herdaddy.
As if they’re ever home. Her daddy had inherited a sizable fortune from his grandfather at the age of twenty-one, as had Aunt Frankie. Technically, her daddy considered himself a stock trader or something, but Lilac knew he hadn’t worked an 8-5 in her lifetime. Her family had had a successful business once—long ago. But her grandpa had retired decades early and sold the company to someone more interested in running it. Someone who probably didn’t have quite as big of an investment fund to fall backon.
Lilac also had one somewhere, funds overseen by her daddy, who had his accountant handle Lilac’s taxes. But she wasn’t going to while away her days doing nothing. Her daddy hadn’t seen the irony in insisting she not do as he did, that she not just lounge around Spain for a few more years. To be fair, he never stayed put in one place long enough to need more than a touristvisa.
“I know,” said Lilac, bringing out her phone, “but you might not be home for a whileyet.”
“Not at the table,” said Nana Abigail, snapping her compact shut. Lilac noticed it wasn’t from the cosmetics company that had been responsible for the Mahoney fortune. That stuff was probably too cheap for hergrandma.
“Yes, Nana,” said Lilac, slipping the phone back into the front of her bag. She’d just wanted to check the time—and she supposed she did have enough time left. Her leg bounced under thetable.
“Excuse me,” said Lilac. “I’m going to thebathroom.”
“Say you’re ‘powdering your nose,’ dear girl,” said Grandma Violet. “I swear you’re not even in Daisy Francesca’s house yet and she’s already rubbing her crassness all overyou.”
Lilac plastered a faltering smile on her face and headed around the bar. Instead of turning toward the restaurant bathrooms, though, she stopped, looking toward the terminal entrance.Just for a few minutes, she thought, digging her phone out of herpurse.
Gavin was busy moving to his temporary apartment—it was Memorial Day, so he didn’t have to work yet. Brielle was probably not that busy and Pembroke… Who the hell knew what she was doing? But did she really want to reach out to either of them right now? She didn’t need to hear any of Brielle’s lectures and when had she ever solo-textedPembroke?
