My Faire Lady (The Extra Series Book 6)

by Megan Walker

  “Not really, though,” Audra says. “All I do is show people to a room and tell them to wait.”

  Gabby nods. “You have no idea how much of my job consists of exactly that. Not at the Ren faire, because we only have one room, but still.”

  “Ah, okay,” Audra says. “I can get really good deals on sunglasses.”

  “Hey!” Gabby says, sounding increasingly manic, like she’s desperate to keep this conversation going, since Sean and I are being no help. “Weren’t we just talking about sunglasses?” she asks me.

  “No,” I say.

  “Really?” Gabby’s eyes implore me to lie for her, but next I’ll have to explain what we were saying about sunglasses, and, if it’s possible, I’m an even worse liar than Gabby.

  “Sorry,” I say. “I don’t remember that.”

  “Fine,” Gabby says. “Maybe it was someone else I was talking to about sunglasses.”

  I have strong doubts about this. We all stare at each other, and I have regrets that I wasn’t more supportive of Gabby’s efforts to keep the conversation going.

  Sean clears his throat, obviously also regretting his choices. “So,” he says. “The reason we’re here is we have an announcement.”

  Audra smiles at him, and my stomach sinks as I realize what this announcement undoubtedly is.

  “Audra and I are engaged,” Sean says, and Audra squeals and shows Gabby a ring that I realize only now she was hiding by twisting it around to the inside of her hand.

  There’s this long pause, and I’m about to open my mouth to congratulate him, when Sean beats me to it.

  “You’re supposed to say congratulations.”

  “I was about to,” I tell him.

  “Congratulations!” Gabby says, and flings herself a bit too enthusiastically at Audra and hugs her, then does the same to Sean.

  There was a time when seeing her hug Sean might have bothered me. I know Gabby was interested in Sean before we got together—even if just as a proxy for me, which I set her up for. But I also know she’s long since over it. I’m just still pissed at him that he humiliated her by taking a call from his girlfriend in the middle of their last date—and lying to all of us in the process.

  I still haven’t said congratulations, and Sean’s glare tells me he notices. If I do it now, it’ll seem empty.

  Audra reaches into her large purse and pulls out a bottle of wine. “We brought wine!” she says. “We should have a toast.”

  I go to the cabinet and find some mismatched wine glasses, which Sean silently judges. Sean pours, and it’s not until I finally see Gabby giving me increasingly frantic looks that I realize the problem.

  She’s pregnant, and she’s not supposed to be drinking. Shit.

  I know this is bound to end in disaster, being that it’s me and Gabby, but I make a motion at her like she should pretend to drink the wine. Surely bringing the glass to her lips a couple of times won’t hurt anything, and it’s a lie that should be fairly easy to pass off.

  Gabby looks increasingly uncomfortable. Sean pours four glasses and the rest of us all pick one up.

  “I’m not thirsty!” Gabby announces.

  “Will seems to think you are,” Sean says. I guess my frantic gestures weren’t as surreptitious as I’d hoped.

  “Um,” Gabby says, squirming. “Will is just worried about my drinking problem.”

  That is too much. “You don’t have a drinking problem!” I say, and then rub at my forehead, where I feel a stress headache forming.

  There’s another long pause in which we all stare at each other. I sigh. Sean is my brother, and even if I’m not keen on discussing this with him at the moment, he’s going to learn about it eventually. “Gabby is pregnant,” I say.

  The long pause continues.

  “You don’t have to say congratulations,” I add.

  “Do you want us to?” Sean asks.

  “No,” I tell him. I turn to Gabby. “I was trying to tell you to pretend to drink it.”

  Gabby makes an obvious drinking gesture with her hand. “I thought you were telling me to just drink it!”

  “I’m going to go get the meat,” Sean says, and he strides out like he can’t stand marinating in our dysfunction anymore.

  Audra takes a drink of her wine, even though we still haven’t had that toast. I do the same, with an apologetic look at Gabby, who unfortunately has to stay sober through this. Gabby starts pulling plates and silverware out—all of which are also mismatched, since Sarah took all her dishware with her, and Gabby acquired all of hers from yard sales before we met.

  Sean is going to judge that, too, no doubt. But the truth is, it doesn’t bother me that our dishware doesn’t match. It doesn’t bother me that our wine glasses are all different sizes and shapes, because we’ve broken the matches to nearly all of them.

  This is my life, and I like it, and Sean can take his judgment and shove it up his ass.

  Sean comes back with a plate covered in hot dogs and also steaks, which look mouth-wateringly good, and, knowing Sean, probably are. He also has a Tupperware container of salad and some rolls. We all sit down around the table and dish up, the three of us finishing our wine glasses and pouring seconds. Meanwhile, I’m stressing about how to actually congratulate them and have that toast without making it obvious I’m just trying to make up for how badly things went before.

  But Sean speaks first. “So,” he says to me. “Are you planning on getting a job? My company has some openings.”

  I can feel Gabby bristling next to me before I even look at her. I don’t need her to turn this down for me. “You know I don’t know anything about construction.”

  “Yeah, sure,” Sean says, cutting into his steak. “But we’ve got entry-level stuff. Or office work.”

  Actually, that doesn’t sound like a half-bad place to start. Not that I want to learn construction, particularly, but if I was working in an office doing billing or answering phones, I might be able to fit in some writing time when things were slow.

  Not that I can fit it in now, with my endless, empty days.

  “Really?” I say.

  “Yeah,” Sean says. “I could probably even manage to find you something where you don’t ever need to see me.”

  “Would that be necessary?”

  Sean shrugs. He won’t meet my eyes. “It doesn’t seem like you want to.”

  I can hear the hurt in his voice, and it cuts deep. I’m being a crappy brother, and I know it. And yeah, I should never have set him up with Gabby in the first place. But he was a seriously shitty brother when he cheated on Audra with Gabby. It would have been one thing if he’d only had dinner with her, but he kissed her pretty damn enthusiastically right in front of me, which was pretty douchey to all three of us.

  “Will doesn’t need a job,” Gabby says in a low voice. “Because writing is his job.”

  I take a deep breath. I thought we’d agreed that I need to find something, but I can see why Gabby would take exception to Sean’s tone.

  “Sure, sure,” Sean says, waving a hand at her. “I get that the writing thing is something you enjoy, but at some point you’re going to have to man up and get a real job, right? And with a baby coming—”

  “Excuse me?” Gabby says, and I close my eyes. Sean is right, but he’s being more than a little condescending, and I don’t appreciate that any more than Gabby does. “Did you just tell Will to man up?”

  “I just meant, like, to take care of his family,” Sean says.

  Audra is sitting back in her chair and staring at all of us like we’re a bunch of crazy people, which we basically are.

  “He takes care of us just fine,” Gabby says. “Thank you very much. He needs to have time to write. That’s just how it works for writers, and it’s important.”

  Oh, god. Let us not get into a conversation with
Sean about what I do with my time. “But we have discussed that I do need to get a job,” I say.

  Gabby shakes her head. “Right. But maybe something part-time.”

  “Seriously?” Sean says. “You’re living here and having a kid and you’re going to work part-time?”

  “I think we should talk about something else,” I say, mostly to get them to stop arguing with each other, because Sean is right and being a dick and Gabby is wrong and incredibly sweet and supportive and I don’t know how to tell either of them that without hurting everyone, especially Gabby.

  There’s some blessed silence while we chew on our food. Okay, it’s incredibly awkward silence, punctuated by the occasional scrape of a fork against a plate.

  “Have you told Mom and Dad yet?” Sean asks.

  Good lord. “I haven’t even thought about it, actually.”

  Sean sighs. “I just think we all need to try to do better. Like, as a family.”

  I put down my fork, though I’ve only taken a single bite of the food. Really? As a family? Neither Sean or I have ever had a close relationship with our parents, so it’s rich of him to lecture me about that now. “What, so now you and Mom and Dad are all buddies?”

  “I see them more than you do,” Sean says.

  “Have you told them you’re engaged?”

  Sean shakes his head. “That’s what I’m saying, though. I just think we could all try.”

  This is about to be the conversation with Josh all over again. I wish everyone who isn’t Gabby would just leave us alone and let us figure things out on our own. “You know what, Sean?” I say. “I don’t think you’re in any position to lecture me about trying.”

  “That’s not fair,” Audra cuts in. “Sean is trying.” She sounds alarmingly like Gabby standing up for me, and I realize it’s the first time I’ve really been sure that she cares about my brother. “He loves you, and he’s so loyal to the people he loves.”

  I laugh before I can think about the Pandora’s box I’m about to open. Sean has clearly never been honest with Audra about what happened between him and Gabby. Last I heard, Audra was spreading the news that Gabby had been obsessed with Sean and thrown herself at him, even though she knew he had a girlfriend. Which I suppose makes me the second choice.

  “What?” Audra asks.

  Both Gabby and Sean are staring at me, and Sean looks decidedly guilty. I’ve spent three years avoiding situations where this would come up, but at this point, I’m tired of it. Sean is right. We could all try. And I’m going to start right now by trying to tell Sean how I really feel.

  “Are you so loyal, Sean?” I ask. “Is that right?”

  Sean pushes his chair back from the table. “Forget it. We should go.”

  “Yeah,” I say. “Of course you want to go now that you think we’re going to talk about the truth.”

  “The truth?” Audra looks back and forth between me and Sean. “What are you talking about?”

  I know I should stop talking and let them leave. But I’m so damn tired of secrets, so tired of not saying things that are true. “I’m talking about Sean’s loyalty,” I say. “I’m talking about the fact that he made out with Gabby twice while he was dating you.”

  “I didn’t do that,” Sean snaps.

  “Gabby?” I ask. “Did he do that?”

  Gabby looks like she’s been cornered by a man-eating tiger. “Ummmm,” she says.

  Audra narrows her eyes at Sean. “You told me you didn’t kiss her.”

  “I did, once,” Sean says. “But we were broken up at the time.”

  “Really,” I say. “Only once?”

  “Fine, there was that one kiss on the second date,” Sean says. “But that was just to convince Will I was single.” I roll my eyes at his attempt to minimize his cheating and prove his honesty by admitting he was only doing it to lie to me. “And it was like a sisterly thing.”

  Oh, no it was not. “There was tongue,” I say.

  “Only a little tongue!” Sean shouts.

  “Oh my god,” Audra yells at him, standing up from the table. “You said it was basically a glorified friends thing. You said you only dated her to get Will off your back and you weren’t into her at all!”

  Sean sputters, and I can practically see him backing himself into a corner. I shouldn’t give him the final push, but I’m so sick of him pretending that I’m at fault for the way things are between us. “Is that right, Sean?” I ask. “You weren’t into her at all?”

  Sean seems to be incapable of forming a sentence. When he finally does, he says, “It was three years ago!”

  “Yeah,” I say. “But we’re all expected to lie for you forever, just because you can’t be honest with your fiancée.”

  Audra steps away from the table. “I’m leaving,” she says, and she stalks out.

  “Thanks,” Sean says, glaring at me. “Fine. Yes. On that first date, when Audra and I were broken up, I thought Gabby was awesome. I wanted to kiss her. But I was in love with Audra and then we got back together and the second date was just for show. I didn’t want to have to hear it from you about getting back together with Audra, so I played it up.”

  “You were using her,” I say.

  “Yeah, I was,” Sean says. He turns to Gabby. “And I’m sorry, Gabby. I’m sorry I did that.”

  “It’s okay,” Gabby says. “I’m over it.”

  I think she legitimately is, and maybe I should be, too, but I’m not. Probably because the issues with Sean and me go way deeper than just that one date.

  “And I’m sorry, Will,” Sean says. “I’m sorry that our relationship had been so fucked up that I felt like I needed to lie to you. I’m not blaming you. I was a dick about Sarah, too, and I shouldn’t have been. We should have just let each other be with the people we wanted to be with.”

  I open my mouth, but I don’t know what to say. I don’t think I’ve ever heard Sean sincerely apologize like that.

  “And for the record, I have never cheated on Audra. That kiss on that second date was the only thing I’ve done that could be considered cheating, and yeah, I should have told her about it, but I knew it would only hurt her. So I’m going to go try to convince her of that, and hope I can salvage my relationship with the woman I love.”

  He gets up from the table, and I’m stewing in a huge vat of guilt. I shouldn’t have started that fight. I definitely shouldn’t have said those things in front of Audra. I ruined Sean’s engagement announcement, and all because of my own stupid issues. Issues I am now realizing that I am not even a little ready to talk to Gabby about, since telling her about the fight with Josh will only demonstrate that I am the problem in all of my relationships.

  Including—maybe especially—in my relationship with her.

  “Congratulations,” I say, far, far too late.

  “Thanks,” Sean says dryly. “Let me know if you still want that job.”

  “Really?” I say. It doesn’t sound like he’s being sarcastic

  Sean gives me a weary look. “Yeah. Because we’re family, right?”

  I think he’s actually asking, like he thinks maybe I don’t even consider him my brother anymore.

  That cuts me to the core. “Yes,” I say.

  And then Sean leaves, slamming the door behind him.

  Sixteen

  Gabby

  After Sean storms out, Will drops his head into his hands and my heart sinks even lower than it already had during that entire calamity. Which puts it somewhere around my ankles now, I think.

  “I can see why you didn’t want to get together with them,” I finally manage.

  “Yeah,” Will says, his hands still covering his face. “I knew that was going to happen.”

  I somehow doubt he knew all that was going to happen. That whole thing was an unmitigated disaster that had to have been even b
eyond Will’s creative imagination. But he did know it was going to go badly. He’s told me that pretty much every time the possibility of hanging out with Sean and Audra has come up, and I saw it on his face today when they showed up with plates of food.

  I reach over and touch his arm gently. “You know I’m totally over what happened with Sean.” And I am. The budding feelings I might have had for him—feelings that were really only me trying to not have feelings for the engaged-at-the-time Will—were long gone before Will and I even got together. Even the anger I had at Sean for using me like that is something I haven’t felt for years.

  But clearly it’s not something Will is over. Which makes sense—there’s a lot more history there, and a lot more hurt.

  “I shouldn’t care anymore,” he says. “But I’m still so pissed at him for lying to me back then.” Will sighs and drops his hands. “I used to be the most upset about him using you, and probably I should still be more mad about that on your behalf. You know, defending your honor and all that.”

  He sounds like he feels terrible that after three years he’s not ready to strangle his brother for going on a date with me under false pretenses. I squeeze his arm and smile. “I’m glad you’re not still as mad about that. Because my honor has been over it for a very long time.”

  Will takes my hand in his and leans back in his chair. “I should be over all of it. And able to talk to my brother without being an asshole.”

  “You were not the asshole in that conversation.” My anger flares at thinking of Sean telling Will to “man up.” Like he has any idea of how hard Will works and all that he’s going through—

  “Maybe not the only one,” Will says, cutting into round two of my internal rant. “But I could have handled that way better. I mean, the guy got engaged, and I couldn’t keep my mouth shut and just let them be happy.”

  I shrug. “We did keep our mouths shut for a long time, and I think you were right—it’s not fair that we need to keep this lie for him. Especially if he’s actually going to marry her.”

  Will gives me a skeptical but amused look. “Even you can’t be defending how I went about that. I saw the look on your face. You wanted to crawl under the table and disappear.”