Casanova(81)

“Why? ‘Cause you aren’t getting any?”

“Ooookay!” I held my hands up and mimed pushing them apart. “If you’re gonna do that, I’m changing tables. I’m not sitting between you while you fight all night.”

“Who’s fighting? Are they hot and oily?”

Brett groaned as his Great Aunt Bel took the chair directly opposite us. “Who sat you with us? I told Mom you’d drive me crazy if she put you by us on the seating plan.”

Aunt Bel looked up and cocked her head to the side. “There’s a seating plan?”

“The card is right in front of you.”

Her glasses were hanging around her neck on a multi-colored beaded chain, and she lifted them to her eyes while bending forward and squinting at the card. “Oh. Well, that’s unfortunate.” She plucked the card from the table and flicked it at Camille. “Cammy, dear, go find where I’m supposed to be sitting and swap this.”

Camille blinked at her as she lifted the card. “Aunt Bel, you can’t just mess with the seating plan.”

“Yes, I can.”

“No, you can’t.”

“I can do what I want. That’s what happens when you get old. Nobody gets to tell you what to do.” She peered over at Brett and pointed her glasses in his direction. “Except you. You started that early.”

Brett wasn’t happy. “Seriously. Go find your own seat.”

“I’m sitting in it.”

“The right seat.”

“I’m sitting in it.”

Dear god. Coping with the Walker family was like being freshly qualified as a teacher for college students then being thrown into a glass of sugar-hyped five year olds.

“Aunt Bel,” I said, kicking Brett’s ankle under the table. “Just stay here, but behave, okay?”

“Ha! I always behave.” Her eyes glittered. “Are the hot, oily fighting men here yet?”

“I’m going to find her seat,” Camille muttered, standing up.

“There are not hot, oily fighting men,” Brett said. “She was talking about me and Camille.”

“You just can’t get the staff,” Aunt Bel tittered. “I’m going to have to have a word with your mother about the entertainment at these things.”

“Aunt Bel, if you saw hot, oily men fighting, you’d probably have a heart attack.”

“And I would die very happy.”

I looked between them both. I felt a little like I should have a scorecard and be refereeing this. The constant back and forth between them was exhausting and, honestly, a little scary. I tuned them out until Aunt Bel cackled.

“You can tell you’re a Walker, boy. You’re just like me.”

Brett froze. “God help me.”

“He can’t,” I said to my plate. “He’s too busy giving me strength.”

Aunt Bel looked at me. “Smart mouth. I like that in a girl.”

I smiled. I never would have guessed.

Camille sighed as she approached the table with a name card in hand.

“Have you told her about The Thing yet?” Aunt Bel asked Brett.

Camille spun on her heels and walked off.

That alone made something ring in the back of my head—and Brett’s reaction to her words made my curiosity gene bounce up and down like a kangaroo on crack.

He was deathly still, and judging from the immediate tension that formed in the air, his gaze was just as terrifying as his stillness.

The Thing? What was The Thing?

Aside from not knowing what it actually was, I knew one thing from his reaction: This was the secret. The one thing my boss wanted me to find out. The thing that could ruin this family.

Two weeks ago, I wanted to know it. I wanted to do just that.

Today?

I felt sick at the mention of it. At the memory of what my boss wanted with it.

And, deep down, for the first time ever, I didn’t want to know something.

I was afraid of what it was.

“No,” Brett finally said, snapping his jaw shut. “But thank you for bringing it up. I can’t tell you how much I appreciate it.”

His tone was so dry you could mop up the Atlantic Ocean with it.

“We’ve all done it once in our lives,” Aunt Bel went on, apparently oblivious to his very blatant discomfort and annoyance. “I don’t know why everyone is so worked up about it. It’s just a—”

“That’s enough, Belinda.” Henrick Walker, Brett’s grandfather, stepped up behind her. He clamped a firm hand on her shoulder, and that shut her up with a snap.

I blew out the breath I’d been holding at her words and pressed my fingers against my forehead.

“You know we don’t discuss it. What Brett tells Lani and when is his business,” he continued. “And you will not interfere with that.”

Aunt Bel said nothing. She simply pursed her lips and raised her eyebrows with the petulance of a child in time-out.

Henrick looked at Brett, his gaze gentle yet firm. “You look like you need some air.”

It was less an observation and more an idea. And by idea, I mean order. Brett needed air whether he liked it or not.

To his credit, he didn’t argue. He nodded and excused him from the table before anybody said another word.