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“What’s going on?” Genny called.
I started toward the kitchen, saying, “His mom is here.”
Cue Duncan catching Genny, but he was better than me, clamping an arm around her belly and pulling her close, saying, “Let Hale deal with it.”
Genny looked to me. “I take it he didn’t invite her.”
I shook my head.
I wasn’t close to her, but I could swear I heard her grinding her teeth.
Okay, now what to do?
Hale said I was hostess, I needed to hostess.
In order for us all to have something else to think about while whatever was going down went down outside, I decided to offer to refresh people’s drinks.
I came up with this plan right when we heard shouted from the front, “Ungrateful! You were an ungrateful piece of shit growing up! And you’re an ungrateful piece of shit grown man! No surprise! Just like your father!”
I could feel the deep freeze in the room.
And it included me.
While frozen, I thought…this wasn’t mine.
Not really.
We were too new.
An altercation between Hale and his mother wasn’t mine.
And it fucking was.
That was why I jerked out of my freeze, dashed to the door and through it.
“What the hell?” Samantha Wheeler asked when she saw me.
“Go inside,” Hale ordered.
I ignored Hale, my total focus on his mother.
She was Genny’s age and looked ten years older (in all fairness, Genny looked fifteen years younger than she was, but still).
I guessed that was what bitterness did to you.
“You need to leave,” I told her.
“You think you can tell me what to do?” she demanded, then looked to her son. “Why does she think she can tell me what to do? Why is she evenhere?”
“Elsa, please, sweetheart, go inside,” Hale said, then he looked over my head. “Bowie, get Genny inside too.”
I didn’t look behind me.
No, I had to focus because Samantha’s face twisted in a nasty way and she spat at her son, “Sweetheart?”
“You need to go,” I repeated.
Her attention locked on me. “Thanks, but since it was you who helped decimate my relationship with my son, I think I won’t listen to you now. M’kay?”
