Her own aunt and uncle were known for much worse. “Don’t worry.”
Jojo sighed. “I don’t know why Mom invited them, but this is her big party and nobody wanted to censor her guest list.”
“Thirty-five years is quite something to celebrate.”
“Yes.” The cement pathway ended, dropping them into the soft sand of the wide Dragonfly Beach. With silent consensus, they continued on, Buster gamely leading the way, delighted in only the way of dogs about any adventure.
Jojo sent Lilly a sidelong glance. “You know about Simon.”
“Yes.” She nodded. “I’m so sorry.”
“Thank you.” Jojo halted and turned her face to the horizon. When the wind blew back her hair, Lilly could see the resemblance to her brother. “Mom struggled more than any of us, but she seems to be vastly improved. The new puppy proves it.”
“Oh?”
“Simon had a dog—”
“Not in the car?” Lilly clutched her throat.
“No, no. But he came to live with my parents after the…crash.” Jojo dashed a finger under one eye, as if she felt a tear. “He lived a long life and went to the great Dog Park in the Sky a couple of years ago. That seemed to set Mom back again…she retreated from everything and everyone.”
“Oh, wow,” Lilly murmured, unsure what to say.
“But she started to rouse from her funk last year. And when they brought Buster home…well, it was proof Mom was ready to take a chance and love again.”
“I’m so glad.” Lilly thought the dog even more adorable now. “I really like your mother.”
The other woman nodded. “I was worried my recent divorce might hinder the progress she’s made, but she’s doing okay.”
Lilly nodded. “I’m sorry to hear about the end of your marriage, too.”
Jojo shrugged a shoulder as if trying to dislodge an uncomfortable weight. “It was my own fault. Completely spontaneous decision on my part to marry the guy. He was upfront about being after a green card.”
“Oh.”
“I know. The stupidity leaves one speechless, yes?”
“When did you marry?”
“Four-and-a-half years ago.”
The timing wasn’t lost on Lilly. Six months after losing her brother, Jojo Thatcher had made an impulsive move.
“He’s French. A chef, actually,” Jojo added. “Does that make it any better?”
“I don’t know,” Lilly said. “Do you like escargot?”
Jojo released a bark of laughter. “Actually, no. But the omelets, the beef bourguignon, and this amazing leek soup he could whip up on an instant was to die for.”
On a nostalgic sigh, she continued on. “Maybe if he’d been better in bed I would have made a more determined go of it.”
“Oh,” Lilly said.
“Yeah.” Jojo shook her head. “Not only selfish, but he made love like he was starring in a porn movie. Always insisting on his good side…which was on his back so I did all the work.”
Lilly snickered, then quickly smothered the sound. “Sorry.”
“If you can’t laugh…” Jojo said with a small smile.
“I admire you,” Lilly said then, smiling at the other woman. Like all the Thatchers, she had a personal charm that was hard to resist. “Your attitude’s great.”
“God, no. Ever since I signed the papers, I wish I could stop listening to my conscience and take up smoking. My attitude goes with a pack-a-day habit.”
“Cynical?” Lilly said. “World-weary?”
“Exactly.” Then she took a long, assessing look at Lilly. “But let’s talk about you.”
“I don’t smoke. I never had a husband. I’ve been witness to a bad marriage and I never once found anything funny in it.” She paused. “Though maybe I should.”
“What’s going on between you and my brother?”
If she didn’t have to look at the other woman, she could get through this one without giving a thing away, she told herself. One foot in front of the other, she restarted their walk up the beach, her focus on the sand dunes in the distance. “We met because he was the best man and I was the maid of honor at a wedding. The wedding didn’t happen.”
“I heard about that.”
“My friend Audra, the bride, and I are staying at the resort to give her a chance to recover.”
“Oh, boy,” Jojo said. “Did she fall for that Heartbreak Hotel myth or something?”
Without admitting to anything—especially not that it had been her idea—Lilly just shrugged. “I don’t think she’s found any miracle cure yet.”
“Certainly not,” Jojo scoffed, then grimaced, sending Lilly a guilty look. “Please don’t let my dark outlook influence you. And I should say for the record, my brother is a really great guy.”
Uncomfortable, Lilly waved a hand, trying to communicate the recommendation was wholly unnecessary. “I—”
“Do you have any siblings?”
“No.” She thought of Frank, a petty bully at his best. “I was raised with a cousin, but…no.”
“Alec attended every one of Barbie’s funerals I ever organized, after Simon declared them lost causes post-surgery.”
It made Lilly smile again.
“Well, except for that time Simon pronounced Ken hadn’t survived an appendectomy. Alec said he refused to even pretend-mourn for a guy who came into the world without a dick.”
Lilly started to laugh.
“Simon said that’s why he hadn’t attempted any heroic measures to save the doll. Dick-less, he informed us, meant an automatic do not resuscitate.”
It took long moments for Lilly’s laughter to die back. “He sounds wonderful,” she finally managed to say. “They both do—Alec is. I like him.”
“That didn’t hurt so bad, did it?” Jojo said mildly. “I got the impression that Alec likes you too. Very much.”
“Oh, probably not that,” Lilly protested. They’d reached the dunes and when Buster attacked the nearest one, they trudged up in the wake of his leaps and bounds. “We’re just, um, acquaintances. Not even friends really.”
How many times had she trotted that out?
“After we leave the resort,” she continued, resolute to keep to her story. “We’ll never even see…” They’d reached the top of the dune and Lilly’s voiced trailed off as they came to a halt, both of them staring at the tableau below.
“It’s a bridal shoot,” Jojo said, explaining the obvious.
A couple of photographers were set up on the sand, with assistants ready with light reflectors and something else that was more like an umbrella. At the heart of their attention was a bride and groom. He wore a dark suit, tie gone, white shirt unbuttoned at the throat. His feet were bare and his pants were rolled to mid-calf.
She had on dreamy layers of gauzy white that caught the ocean breeze which also kicked up the gown’s hem to reveal anklets of freshwater pearls and tiny starfish. Matching circlets were on her wrists and another had been weaved into her sun-kissed hair that rippled past her shoulders.
“Maybe it’s for a fashion spread,” Lilly said, a lump gathering in her throat.
“No.” Jojo braced herself on the mound of fine grains, her feet wide apart as she continued to gaze down on the couple. “They look so young,” she said, a winsome note in her voice that Lilly suspected the other woman would hate if she detected it. “I was never that young.”
Maybe so, Lilly thought, at least not after her big brother died.
“What makes you think this isn’t for advertising?” she asked.
“That,” Jojo said, pointing as the groom swept up the bride in an artless embrace and held her overhead, her hands on his shoulders. She laughed, the happy sound carrying on the breeze, and as the man slid her down his body there was a sensual romanticism in their molded bodies that made Lilly’s throat close up completely and an ache of yearning fill her chest, in all the space not occupied by her barbed heart.
“Some people get that,” she heard he
rself say. Audra. She fiercely believed that there were people deserving of that kind of happiness and her best friend was one of them.
“Intellectually, I agree,” Jojo said. “Though it won’t be me.”
Or me, Lilly agreed.
Then she heard the echo of Alec’s voice, something he’d said the night before. That’s just plain sad.
It was her own inner voice that continued the conversation. I’m beginning to think it’s just plain sad for me, too.
In the lobby of the small movie theater at the resort, Alec loitered by the entrance, glancing at his watch and then sliding his phone from his pocket to check for messages. Nothing.
The smell of popcorn and the gurgle of a soda machine didn’t distract him, nor did the extended family members who drifted through the doors and into the theater itself. That took a sharp elbow. Frowning, he glanced over to see his second cousin, Kane Hathaway, watching him, an amused expression on his face.
“You look like an expectant father,” he said. “All you need is some pacing and a pocketful of cigars.”
“Mom and Dad’s movie is scheduled to start in less than half an hour.”
“Yeah, I heard. Rumor is, they got some Hollywood guy to produce it.”
Alec snorted. “Kind of. An intern at one of the studios runs a side business of converting old photographs and video to digital. They had him compile thirty-five years of old and more recent memories into an hour, adding a soundtrack too. We’ll be cursing Mom for having to watch it every holiday for the next thirty-five years.”
Kane grinned. “We’ve got a champagne bar set up inside the theater itself. Maybe a little bubbly will cause it to go down easier.”
“I hope I don’t need it. She promised there’s no nudity.”
“Of you guys when you were babies?” Kane said, still smiling.
He sent his cousin a look. “Of her and Dad on their Kauai camping honeymoon.”
“Oh.” Kane sobered, then brightened again. “But she did promise.”
“She also promised that she’d never read Jojo’s diary. Until she was outed when my sister’s bad ninth-grade poetry convinced Mom her darling fourteen-year-old daughter had lost her virginity.”
Kane chuckled. “I vaguely remember hearing about that. Jojo ran away from your house to stay at ours with Jessie for a few days she was so mad.”
“I’ve never found out what Mom had to do to get back into Jojo’s good graces.”
“Speaking of Jojo, is she here?” Kane asked, glancing around. “I know she checked in this morning but I haven’t had a chance to say hello yet.”
Reflexively, Alec glanced at his watch, checked his phone. “She took Buster for a walk this morning, brought him back, and no one’s seen or heard from her since.”
Kane grimaced. “Are you worried? I know it’s only been a few months since the divorce. Should she be alone?”
“She’s with Lilly. At least that’s what Dad thinks. They were together when they brought the puppy back.”
“Lilly. I saw you in the pool with her last night. What’s going on between you two? It looked…like you were getting to know each other really well.”
Alec shoved his hands in his pockets, rocked back on his heels. “I don’t have a fuck’s idea what I’m doing with her,” he admitted. “Maybe I’m just trying to work her out of my system.”
His second cousin nodded, as if considering the wisdom of that. “Could happen,” he mused.
“Not if I don’t know where the hell she is,” Alec said, temper spiking. He yanked out his phone and checked the screen again.
“You tried to call—”
“Both her and Jojo. No response. Not to texts, either.”
“I’m sure they’ll show up,” Kane said. “I can alert the front desk to let us know if they come through the lobby.”
“No. Jojo would hate that. And they will turn up. Lilly won’t leave her friend Audra for too long.”
“The bride-that-wasn’t.”
“Yeah.”
“I haven’t seen her around the grounds.”
This time it was Alec who grimaced. “I don’t think she’s left their bungalow once since arriving.”
“So much for our newfound reputation. We can only hope she’s not tarnishing the hotel’s glowing image as healer of broken hearts via her social media accounts.”
“Is that a real concern?”
“Hell, no, at least not to me. I’ve never liked that schmaltzy PR angle, even though we didn’t start it. Great-Great-Grandfather Hathaway wouldn’t approve either. Did you know he was married five times?”
“Sounds to me like he had more faith in romance than most men. You, for certain.”
Kane frowned. “I don’t think—”
Peals of laughter interrupted the rest of his sentence.
“The prodigal daughters have returned,” he said, turning toward two women traipsing into the lobby, arms entwined and looking as thick as thieves.
“Returned drunk,” Alec said, crossing his arms over his chest and giving the pair a critical eye.
“We are not drunk,” Jojo claimed as she approached, shaking a naughty finger at him. “We are giddy with…with new friendship.”
“How many toasts did the new friends make?”
They glanced at each other, shrugged. Lilly’s inky-blue gaze came back to his, her face betraying a becoming, though guilty, flush. “Um, we didn’t count.”
“And we didn’t drive either,” Jojo crowed. “We hired our own driver for the afternoon. Redondo.”
“Reynaldo,” Lilly corrected.
Wide-eyed, Jojo stared at her new buddy. “Are you sure?”
“Yes, I’m good with names.”
Jojo’s mouth stretched into a goofy smile. “You are such a Becky,” she said, then directed her attention to Alec. “The girl’s a Becky! You should jump on it! Beckys are special!”
He winced at the volume of her voice. “Do I want to know what she’s talking about?” he said to Kane under his breath.
“I think I can translate,” the other man offered. “She fills up our text string with her collection of odd slang. A ‘Becky’ is the best kind of girlfriend a man could imagine. We’re all supposed to be on the lookout for a Becky.”
“Alec doesn’t want a girlfriend,” Lilly said to his sister. “Remember?”
“Oh, yeah. But men say shit like that all the time. My ex said he didn’t want a girlfriend because he already had a wife, but he had one on the side anyway.” She started laughing. “I called her Side Dish.”
“How original.” Alec grabbed his sister by the arm and pulled her closer. “Do I need to administer a field sobriety test before you go into the theater for Mom and Dad’s little lovefest on film?”
Jojo stilled. “Oh. Yeah.” She drew up her hand and breathed against her palm, then blinked, likely due to the heavy alcohol fumes bouncing back at her. “Uh-oh.”
Lilly sidled close to Alec and spoke just for his ears. “I think she’s a little on edge to be around so much happy family on the heels of her divorce.”
He grimaced. “I don’t think I can give her a pass on skipping it. Mom and Dad want us both to be there. Kane too.”
“I’ll get coffees from the cart in the lobby and bring them back.” Lilly’s “giddiness” seemed to be quickly evaporating. “Jojo will be sobering up in no time.”
“Would you do that?” Glancing at his wrist, his watch told him they should be hustling into the theater.
“Of course.”
“We’ll be up front. I’ll save you the seat next to mine.”
“Oh. It’s family time. A family thing. I don’t belong—”
“You belong next to me,” Alec said firmly, ignoring Kane’s speculative glance and Lilly’s wary gaze. “Tonight, you belong next to me.”
“Great way to work her out of your system,” his second cousin said, with a hearty slap on Alec’s back as they made their way to the front of the theater. “Get her right
there close and personal.”
“Fuck you,” Alec muttered, then busied himself pouring his sister into one of the plush chairs just as the lights in the room dimmed.
Lilly arrived as the opening credits rolled. He drew her down beside him as the song “Total Eclipse of the Heart” swelled from the speakers and passed off one of the coffees she carried to Jojo. Then the audience burst into mingled laughter, hoots, and applause, as a much younger Miranda and Vic appeared center screen. During college, Alec guessed, with his dad needing a haircut and his mom wearing an embroidered shirt that looked like something suited for a character in Heidi, one of the books he’d been forced to read as a kid.
The image dissolved into a bit of old video, slightly grainy, but recognizable as his mom and dad during their wedding rehearsal. He looked completely pleased with himself. She, carrying a “bouquet” of what had to be a mish-mash of ribbons from gift boxes, ran down the aisle and into her gonna-be groom’s arms.
Another round of applause from the attendees in the theater.
The film chronicled Vic and Miranda’s early lives—from driving up in a ratty truck to their first apartment, to random shots from a variety of get-togethers they’d hosted pre-kids. His parents had always loved to entertain. Photos of poker parties, Halloween parties, and one strange event where his dad was wearing a huge sombrero appeared on the screen.
“Cinco de Mayo, 1984,” someone in the audience yelled. “We made margaritas with that really cheap tequila.”
A collective groan sounded from the older generation in the room. “Sexto de Mayo, 1984,” a man two rows back commented. “Worst hangover I ever had.”
Grinning, Alec glanced over at Lilly. She was smiling too, and when she looked his way, he didn’t think twice about taking her hand.
It felt good, her small fingers in his, and even better when the Thatcher kids began appearing in the movie of his parents’ marriage.
On his other side, Jojo sucked in a quick breath at the first appearance of baby Simon. But God, then they were all laughing because their brother had the most uncooperative hair on any infant of all time. It stood straight up at the crown, and the filmmaker had chosen to display the many times and many ways in which his parents attempted to tame it for the camera.
Our Last First Kiss KOBO Page 14
