Rock Bottom Girl(101)

“Jake Weston and Marley Cicero,” Jake said with a straight face when I appeared to be incapable of speech. Where did one even find a camo tux?

Jeeves looked down his nose at the clipboard in his gloved hands. “Yes, of course. Welcome, Mr. Weston, Ms. Cicero.”

Jake pushed me inside, and my heels clicked on the marble floors. We were in a two-story foyer-like room. Jeeves was pointing out the coat check closet, an actual walk-in closet just off the front door with an actual attendant standing behind an actual Dutch door. I turned to roll my eyes at Jake and gasped when I realized the entire wall above the front door was decked out with dead animals. I’d forgotten Travis was a hunter. I wondered if there were any animals left in the Pennsylvania forests.

A server in a camo vest and black pants paused to offer us wine from his tray. “Boone’s Farm. There’s a fountain in the conservatory.”

I took a plastic glass and stared at Jake. “Did he just say there’s a Boone’s Farm fountain in the conservatory?”

“Yes. Yes, he did. But Mars, you’re missing the best part.”

He took me by the shoulders and turned me around.

Looming above us, was the largest family portrait I’d ever seen. Amie Jo, Travis, and the boys—all dressed in white, Amie Jo wearing a tiara—were immortalized in oil paints and accented by the largest gilt frame in the world. It had to be at least twelve feet high.

“Holy shit,” I murmured.

He clunked his plastic glass to mine. “Oh, baby, you ain’t seen nothing yet.”

We checked our coats with the perky attendant, and I let Jake lead me further into the house, past the gold leaf, curved staircase. There was a formal living room with white leather furniture and more gold leaf. The walls were painted a fishy salmon. The art was a collection of pink and blue abstracts. There were more floating Greek columns and thick draperies over the windows. It was like 1980s wealthy Miami had thrown up in here.

There were a handful of guests here dressed to the nines, laughing and drinking.

“Just think. This could have been your life,” Jake teased.

I shuddered. Sure, money would be nice. But I couldn’t imagine myself relaxing on the weekends in a place like this. Not with that many dead animals on the wall. The formal dining room was across the hall. It was crowded with party guests who were vying for the wedding reception-worthy spread on the glossy table long enough to seat at least twenty-guests. There was a large stuffed boar in the corner poised to charge.

Mrs. Gurgevich, looking fancy in a black sequined kimono, was loading her plate with deviled eggs and sushi. Floyd was behind her, juggling two plates overflowing with food and a beer. “Yo! Cicero! Weston!”

I held up my wine in a toast to him.

Floyd bobbled a meatball, and it rolled off the plate onto the thick white rug under the table.

“Oooooh!” the crowd crowed. Out of nowhere a very tiny thing with perky ears and perfectly trimmed white facial fur bounded into the room.

“What the hell is that?” I asked.

“That’s Burberry,” Jake said.

Burberry pounced on the meatball.

“He’s a designer dog,” Lois, the school secretary, said. “I heard Amie Jo bought him from a breeder for $7,000.”

“He doesn’t bark,” Belinda Carlisle added. “It’s bred out of him.”

Burberry licked his neatly trimmed chops with a tiny pink tongue before happily trotting out of the room.

“That was a dog? I’ve seen dust bunnies bigger than that,” I commented.

Jake squeezed my shoulder.

I liked how he delivered casual physical contact reliably. He didn’t make a show of keeping his sexy hands to himself. And being “handled” by him made me feel like he was constantly reminding me that he was here.

“Let’s get in line for the food, then we’ll find the bar and the DJ.”

“There’s a DJ?” I asked.

He held up a finger, and I listened. Over the buzz of excited party people, I could hear the steady thump of music.

We loaded up plates with pasta, cheese, sushi, and delectable skewers of meat that the server promised no one we knew had killed and went in search of the bar. If I was going to spend an evening in the Hostetter estate, I required liquor. And lots of it.

Jake led the way down into the hallway and past the massive kitchen teeming with catering staff.

We found the bar in a room that had a baby grand piano and a wall of bookcases. Amie Jo never struck me as a reader, and I got the feeling that the books—all spines facing in—were just decoration.

Unfortunately, we also found our hosts.

Amie Jo was dressed in a gold cocktail dress with a neckline that showed her belly button. There was no way those gravity-defying boobs were real. No friggin’ way.

She had a gold star stuck to the skin at the corner of her eye, and her extensions were waist-length now. Travis was dutifully handsome in slacks and a button-down. I felt like I was staring at Small-Town Party Barbie and Ken. They were blindingly attractive together. It looked as though Amie Jo had survived her slide through shit and come out smelling like a rich rose.

“You ready to greet our hosts?” Jake asked.

“Would it be rude if I waited until I had more than Boone’s Farm swimming through my system first?”

His eyes lit up with a devilish light that I’d come to recognize as a promise of trouble.