The Fiancée

by Kate White

  I went back to the wine bar twice, hoping he’d be there, but no such luck. Two weeks later, though, I spotted him in the audience at the tiny theater where I was performing in the play I’d mentioned to him. I was so stunned by the sight, I almost dropped a line, but managed to keep it together. And when I left the theater, he was waiting outside and invited me for a late pasta dinner.

  That night I discovered there was even more to like than the blue eyes and hawk nose: his wit, his thoughtfulness, his straightforward style, his passion for his work, and his evident devotion to his toddler son. To say nothing of the fact that he’d remembered the name of the play I was in, tracked down a ticket, and actually showed up.

  Yes, it was clear he was still a little shell-shocked from his divorce and struggling at moments with being a single dad, but after meeting Henry and seeing how sweet Gabe was with him, I was smitten. And so when he went down on one knee with a big grin six months later, right here in this spot, I didn’t hesitate to say yes.

  The sudden sound of a branch cracking in the woods startles me, and I spin around. Probably just a deer or groundhog rooting around the undergrowth, I decide, but it’s time for me to get back anyway. I retrace my steps to the house, concentrating on the minty smell of the ornamental grasses, the swish of my boots through the meadows, and the sight of two bluebirds darting above the flowers. When I reach the start of the trellis-covered path, I notice Nick up ahead, walking in my direction.

  He spots me at the same moment and lifts his hand in a wave, which I return. Where’s Hannah? I wonder, snidely. Maybe she’s busy coming up with fresh, toady ways to preserve her standing as everyone’s favorite houseguest.

  By the time I near the middle of the path, I realize that it’s actually Marcus coming toward me. I’ve made this mistake in the past since the twins look so much alike.

  “Morning,” he calls out as he closes the gap between us.

  “Hi there. Just doing a walkabout?”

  “Sort of. I heard something fairly noisy prowling around outside my window last night, and I figured it was a raccoon or a fox, but my father got an email from a neighbor on the road this morning saying he’d spotted a coywolf in the area. I thought I’d have a look around.”

  “A coywolf? Is that a real animal?”

  “It’s an eastern coyote. They’ve bred with gray wolves over time, so they’re a little larger, more the size of a German shepherd.”

  “Yikes. Do they attack humans?”

  “Not unless provoked, but we should all keep an eye out. And be extra careful with the dogs.”

  “Good to know. Are you really thinking you might come across one now?”

  “No, fortunately coyotes aren’t usually out in the daytime. I’m just on the lookout for any signs one’s been around.”

  Ever since he was a little kid, Marcus has apparently been a nut about nature. Claire once told me that while the other three boys were devoting their summers out here to tennis, swimming, and Wiffle ball, Marcus would be memorizing the names of tree species, hunting for owl pellets, and identifying animal droppings—earning him the name Scat Man from Nick.

  “Let me know what you find, will you?” I say. “How’s your weekend going anyway?”

  I’m trying to make the question sound casual, but I’m curious if he’d ever admit how he feels about Nick dating Hannah. Because of the wine business, I’ve spent more time with Marcus than my other brothers-in-law, and sometimes with me he’ll lower the cards he so often plays close to the vest.

  “It’s okay. Yours?”

  “Good. You excited to be here with the whole gang?”

  “Yup.”

  Well, I guess he’s not going to cough up much today. As I observe him, something crystallizes for me. Though he and his twin have similar features, on Marcus they come together in a less compelling way than they do on Nick, almost like a piece of fabric faded by the sun. Nick’s jaw is a little stronger, his eyes more vivid, his hair more golden, or maybe you just think that because of the sheer force of his personality.

  “Sorry to hear Keira can’t stay for the full week,” I say.

  “Yeah, you know, new job stuff. And it’s probably for the best. Unlike you, she always finds these vacations a bit overwhelming.”

  I smile. “It’s a lot of people in one place, and she didn’t grow up in a big family.”

  “No, I mean more the whole country estate thing. The decor, the gardens, the fancy-pants lettuces for dinner, the guest suites with sheets that cost as much as a used car.”

  I get it. The Keatons aren’t billionaires, but they’ve clearly got plenty of millions, and their apartment in New York and their estate here are both spectacular. They also have a winter home in Palm Beach, a small but stunning house landscaped with saw grasses, cactus, and a gorgeous selection of palms. There’s an incredible easy, natural feel to all three places, and to the way the Keatons live, which is a trick in itself. Not everyone with big bucks is able to pull it off.

  “Well, you guys have only been together a couple of years. The more she visits here, the more comfortable she’ll be.”

  He shrugs. “I hope you’re right. I should get moving, Summer. Lunch is in less than an hour.”

  “See you then.”

  As I head back to the house, I find myself mulling over Marcus’s comment about how Keira feels being here. This spread certainly bears no resemblance to what I experienced growing up. My father has a small accounting firm and my mom’s a social worker, and we were brought up in a comfortable ranch-style house with a cute backyard in West Hartford, Connecticut, but we certainly didn’t have a full-time housekeeper or landscapers, bartenders, and cooks around.

  And yet I’ve never felt ill at ease with Gabe’s parents. The first time I met them was at their sprawling Park Avenue apartment, which they’d gutted in the center to make it feel like a loft, wowing you the moment you open the door. But both Ash and Claire were warm and welcoming, seemingly eager to put me at ease with wine and appetizers on their terrace. As I commented on how much I liked the artichoke dip, his mother told a funny story about how once, as a young hostess, she served whole artichokes without realizing they needed to be steamed first. Everything about their world had the potential to be intimidating, but somehow I managed to find it enchanting instead, like I’d been cast in a play that involved performing on an enthralling stage set.

  I return to the cottage, where I exchange my hiking boots for sandals, and then make my way to the main house. I can hear someone splashing in the pool, but Gabe, Henry, Blake, Nick, and Hannah are all sitting under the pergola, playing cards. Sidling up to the table, I see they’re still in swimsuits, though Hannah’s got a flowy vermillion cover-up over hers. She’s wearing makeup, too, applied in that artful way that probably makes even smart guys stupidly think she’s totally barefaced, sporting that natural look they claim to love.

  “Summer,” Henry calls out, “come play B.S. with us, okay?”

  Henry knows it’s really called Bullshit, but Gabe won’t let him use that word in mixed company.

  “You’re not in the middle of a game?” I ask.

  “No, we just finished a hand,” Gabe says. “Can I deal you in?”

  “Sure,” I respond and slip into an empty spot next to my husband.

  “I hear you’ve been working on your play this morning,” Blake says to me. “You’re making the rest of us look like slackers.”

  “Blake, you couldn’t look like a slacker if you tried,” Nick says good-naturedly.

  “Well, my goal for my forties is to tap into my inner lazy guy. Lots of golf and long walks.”

  “Just so you know, I squeezed in a walk myself this morning,” I say, feeling a twinge of guilt over abandoning my play.

  After an adroit shuffle, Gabe delivers everyone a hand. The goal of the game is to end up with no cards, and the action moves around the table, starting with the number two and requiring players to place a card or cards facedown in sequence while annou
ncing what they’ve played—such as “four threes” and “one four.” You’re supposed to put down something, which means you have to fib at certain points if you don’t have a card with the right denomination or face, and you can even lie and add more cards to the pile than you’re admitting. If someone suspects you’re bluffing, he can call out “B.S.,” which obligates you to turn over the cards you played. If they’re indeed what you claimed, the person who called B.S. must add the entire discard pile to his or her hand. If you were lying, though, you inherit the entire pile.

  “I should warn you,” Nick says to Hannah once all the cards have been dealt. “Summer could play on the B.S. pro circuit.”

  “There’s a pro circuit, Uncle Nick?” Henry exclaims.

  “Yeah, I’m pretty sure,” Nick tells him. “Maybe the two of us could join it one day. Head out to Vegas for the winter.”

  “Nick, stop,” Gabe says, smiling. “He’s going to think you’re serious.”

  I take a minute to order the cards I’m holding. It’s a good hand, not a great one, but that’s okay. As Nick says, I’m a wiz at this game. That’s because, thanks to years of drama training, I excel at bluffing as well as spotting other people’s tells.

  With six players, the game takes a while, and I keep a fairly low profile throughout, mostly observing. At one point I notice that Gabe seems close to winning, but Henry correctly calls “B.S.” and Gabe is forced to swoop up a fistful of cards.

  “Oh, Henry, you’re ruthless,” Hannah says with a laugh, though she’s already nailed Blake, Nick, and Gabe for bluffing.

  “You gotta do what you gotta do,” Henry replies.

  I can’t tell if Hannah’s actually having fun or just pretending to. She’s across the table from me and seems to be mostly focused on the massage Nick is giving the back of her neck. At one point I catch her awarding him an intense I-can’t-wait-to-get-you-between-the-sheets-later stare that makes me want to gag.

  But after a while, I realize the flirty stuff is a diversion. She’s holding her hand discreetly, but I can tell she’s down to a tiny number of cards, possibly only one, and her turn is coming up. The discard pile, at this point, happens to be enormous.

  When the play reaches Hannah, she sits up a bit straighter with her hands in her lap. She pulls up a card from the hand she’s holding, lowers her eyes, and tosses it quickly onto the pile. Too quickly.

  “One jack,” she says carefully. Too carefully. As she glances up again, her gaze meets mine and I detect a smidgen of nerves.

  “B.S.,” I declare, surprising myself with how loud it comes out.

  Hannah purses her full lips and gives a little shrug. She reaches out with a perfectly manicured hand and slowly flips over the card.

  It’s a fucking jack.

  “Oh, no, Summer,” Henry exclaims, as I gather up the cards. “You’re gonna need both hands to hold all those.”

  “But now I won’t have to bother with any bicep curls today,” I say, plastering a grin on my face.

  It turns out Hannah still has a card or possibly two in her hand and the game continues. When it’s her turn again, she lays down what I now realize is her final card and announces, “One two.”

  “B.S.,” Blake says quickly.

  After she proves him wrong, she raises two empty hands and says, “All done.”

  “Oh my god. Bravo!” Nick exclaims.

  I smile and congratulate her on her win, but inside I’m stewing. She was playing me the entire time, trying to prove which of us is the best actress.

  Mercifully, Bonnie and her pink-haired helper emerge from the house at that exact moment, carrying trays of sandwiches and wraps and setting them on the sideboard. They return a minute later with bowls of pickles, olives, and homemade coleslaw. Claire appears, too, and announces that lunch is totally casual today and we should sit anywhere we want.

  Claire, Blake, Wendy, Nick, and Hannah end up in a circle of white Adirondack chairs on the lawn, with both dogs at their feet. After grabbing a chicken wrap, I head as far away as I can get, to the umbrella table on the pool deck where Ash is sitting with Gabe and Henry.

  “Summer,” Ash says, “I’ve posted the badminton teams and times on the wall in the kitchen. I’ve partnered you with Nick.”

  “Excellent,” I say. “I’m looking forward to it.”

  Gabe suggests Henry tell his grandfather about the Hawking book he’s currently reading, and as my stepson launches into a mini-dissertation, I see that Marcus and Keira have finally shown up and settled into lounge chairs by the pool. Things seem fine between them, but I can’t forget the way Marcus stared at Hannah last night, as if he hadn’t really let go of her.

  Eventually Bonnie appears on the pool deck and passes around a platter of chocolate chip cookies the size of hubcaps, but I excuse myself to go change into my swimsuit. Ash follows me up to the patio, confessing that he’s in search of another sandwich.

  And suddenly there’s Hannah again, filling a glass with sparkling water at the sideboard, with Ginger and Bella glued to her side, tails wagging. Aren’t dogs supposed to emit a low growl in the presence of a sociopath, rather than trying to mount a leg, the way Bella appears eager to do? But these dogs seem totally won over by Hannah, like everyone else. And yet I know something’s off with her. And she knows I know. That’s why she worked so hard to show me up in the card game.

  “Hannah,” Ash says, still studying the offerings on the sideboard, “I just mentioned to Summer that the badminton teams and times are posted in the kitchen, so take a look. I hope you’re not going to mind having me as a partner.”

  “Not at all,” she says with a smile. “In fact, I’m honored.”

  “I need to warn you, though. We have several family members, Nick being one of them, who play the game as a killer sport. Isn’t that right, Summer?”

  “True,” I say, “but what fun would it be without a few broken bones?”

  Hannah laughs, but she doesn’t take her attention off Ash. “Forewarned is forearmed.”

  “Have you two ladies had a chance to chat yet?” Ash asks, a fresh sandwich in his hand.

  “A bit, yes,” Hannah replies.

  “I’m sure you must know some of the same people,” he says. “Though Hannah, you’re mostly doing film at the moment, right? Summer’s been focusing on theater lately, getting her play ready for a festival.”

  “Oh, Hannah does theater, too,” I say, glancing in her direction and forcing her to meet my gaze. There’s a flicker of surprise in her eyes, as if I’ve caught her off guard, and this time I don’t think she’s acting.

  “Oh really, in New York?” Ash inquires.

  “Now and then,” she says. “Schedule permitting.”

  I let my eyes slide briefly toward the pool deck, making sure Gabe is still down there and out of earshot.

  “We were actually even once in the same showcase,” I tell Ash before looking back at Hannah. “By the way, I double-checked, and you were definitely involved. The Lilac Theater on West Thirteenth Street. Are you sure you don’t remember? It was two years ago this October.”

  She hesitates, and I can almost hear the wheels of her brain spinning.

  “The Lilac Theater, of course,” she says after a couple of beats. “I was in a showcase there.”

  “Maybe I confused you somehow when we spoke about it last night,” I say, trying to keep my tone neutral.

  “Just a little,” Hannah says. “But no harm done. You thought I was in a play about a woman who had amnesia. But it was actually about a scientist who turns a cat into a woman and then falls hopelessly in love with her.”

  That’s exactly what I told her last night, and she knows it. Her lips curve up in the tiniest of smiles, and I realize she’s not just lying now. She’s trying to gaslight me.

  5

  I take a long, slow breath as I try to drum up the right response. I can’t have Ash picking up on any tension between us, but I also don’t want Hannah to think I’m unnerved by he
r ruse.

  “Well, whatever,” I say, with a little wave of my hand. “We’ll catch up more later. I need to grab my bathing suit.”

  I leave without giving her a chance to respond, but the second I start up the path, I kick myself for having gotten into that exchange in the first place. What’s the point in trying to show someone like Hannah that I’m wise to her? It’s hardly going to chase her off the property, and any obvious game playing could make my in-laws think less of me. What’s the old expression? Never wrestle with a pig. You both get dirty and the pig enjoys it.

  The smartest strategy is for me to cut her a wide berth and pray that Nick sees through her soon enough.

  A rustling stirs me from my thoughts, and I glance up to see Claire emerging from the glade of cloud boxwoods. She’s dressed today in a casual, salmon-colored tunic dress that she’s belted around the waist and paired with the sneakers she always wears for gardening. A camera dangles from her neck.

  “Is everything all right, darling?”

  Clearly, I’m wearing my consternation on my face.

  “Um, yes, fine. I was just trying to remember something.”

  “Have you had a nice day so far?” she asks, stepping closer. Even in bright daylight, her skin looks creamy and naturally youthful, like she’s in her fifties rather than early seventies.

  “Absolutely. Before lunch I took a walk down to the stream, which was heavenly—though I hear I should be keeping an eye out for coyotes.”

  “That’s what our neighbor says. Frankly, I’ve been more concerned about hunters this year. Even though our property’s posted, we’ve spotted them sneaking through our woods.”