Well Matched (Well Met #3)(30)

He’d get his chance, I reminded myself. Not with me, of course, which was fine. This was all a charade, and we weren’t planning any kind of future past the end of this weekend. It was easy to forget, here in the midst of all this family togetherness, that I didn’t really belong here. Mrs. Malone had nothing to worry about; her hypothetical grandchildren remained a possibility.





Nine





I still hadn’t answered Mrs. Malone, and to be honest I wasn’t sure how to. Torn between “that’s none of your fucking business” and being that mature fake girlfriend—a little too mature if you asked Mrs. Malone—that Mitch needed me to be. “It hasn’t been easy,” I finally said. “Raising my daughter on my own. So yes, I’m looking forward to a little me time, you know?” My smile felt as weak as my attempt at a joke.

Before she could respond Lulu was back, two longneck bottles in her hand. “Hey, Aunt Patricia. Can I steal April back? The game’s about to start, and I need to teach her how to heckle the family properly.”

“Of course.” Mrs. Malone—I was never going to call her Patricia—laid a hand on my shoulder. “It was nice to talk to you, dear.”

Her nails felt like talons through my blouse, and I had to fight to not wince. I wasn’t going to let her win. “Absolutely.”

“Come on.” Lulu led me to an empty pair of Adirondack chairs. “Sorry about that. I didn’t realize Aunt Patricia was going to swoop in on you that fast. I told Mitch I’d keep an eye on her.”

I sank into a chair, still feeling a little shaken. “She really doesn’t like me.”

“She doesn’t like anyone. I don’t think she’s ever liked any of the girls Mitch has dated. Always something wrong with all of them. Don’t hold it against him, okay?” She offered me one of the bottles. “Here you go. It’s noon somewhere, right?”

“Damn straight.” We clinked the necks of our bottles together and I settled back in the chair with my drink. I looked down, expecting a beer, but was pleasantly surprised to find a craft cider. I took a grateful swig. “Oh, that’s good.”

“Isn’t it? He said you liked cider, so I knew I had to bring some. I’d been saving this stuff for a special occasion, and I couldn’t think of a better one.”

“He said that?” I looked at the bottle of cider with fresh eyes. The residual coldness from talking to Mrs. Malone melted; it was no match for the thought of Mitch telling his favorite cousin about me.

Out in the backyard, the smaller children were finally starting to tire out from chasing around the adults. I pointed out there with my bottle. “Any of those yours?” I meant the kids but I wasn’t specific. Was her husband/wife/significant other out there with the gaggle of adults?

But Lulu shook her head. “None of ’em. Who has time? No, I’m here solo.” She didn’t elaborate about her personal life, and I didn’t ask. It wasn’t even remotely my place to pry. We sipped at our ciders and watched the adults form themselves into teams for a touch football game. It was all so . . . upper-middle-class white American. It also seemed incongruous with the ancient house we sat outside. I pictured this kind of thing happening at one of the other houses in the neighborhood—the ones that looked like they belonged in a Ralph Lauren catalog. Which reminded me . . .

“You said something last night about your grandmother being stubborn?” Lulu raised her eyebrows in response, and I continued. “I was asking about the house. This neighborhood?”

“Oh. Yeah.” She tipped her head back, finishing her cider. “This neighborhood was mostly farmland back in the day. Our great-grandparents built this house, and Grandpa was born here. Little by little, the land around them was sold off, and then about twenty years ago? Thirty? They started putting this neighborhood in. Someone came knocking for Grandma and Grandpa to sell. I think if it had been Grandpa by himself he would have caved, but Grandma loves this house.”

“As well she should.” I craned my head to look at the house, where a small patch of paint was starting to peel on the siding. The gray was actually light green up close, giving way to a yellowish color underneath. “It’s a great house. Mitch said something about secret passages?”

Lulu snorted and put her bottle on the deck beside her. “My big brother told him that when they were kids. Sent the poor guy on a wild-goose chase when he was seven. Mostly to get Mitch out of his hair. He was . . . an energetic child.”

I considered that. “He’s an energetic adult.” It wasn’t until the words were out of my mouth that I realized how they’d sound coming from a girlfriend. My face heated and I swigged the rest of my cider to cool off.

“Yeah. Not touching that.” She smirked at me, and the heat in my cheeks became flames. “Anyway. They didn’t sell, so now there’s a whole neighborhood of McMansions and this little house smack-dab in the middle.”

“Little house,” I echoed. “Uh-huh.” But I liked that. I liked people standing up for what was theirs. I liked that Mitch was cut from that kind of cloth. It made sense.

Morning bled into afternoon. Lulu foisted a second cider on me as the day went on, and the air began to smell like smoked meat, making my mouth water. There was no way to tell what the score was out in the backyard, as the rules they used didn’t seem to correlate to anything that any football league would recognize. One attempted touchdown devolved into good-natured shouting and arguing, ending with a teenager jumping on Mitch’s back in a poor attempt to take him to the ground. The attempt ended in a piggyback ride that Mitch somehow made look like a victory lap. Lulu caught my eye as we cheered for . . . someone, and we grinned at each other. Maybe it was the cider, but I liked her. I liked his family. I liked this sense of belonging. In the back of my mind I knew that this sense was only going to last the weekend. But I pushed all of those thoughts aside and concentrated on the here and now, something I didn’t do very often.