Until There Was You(71)

“I wouldn’t. I’d rather eat at Inferno than die, Mom. Just for the record.” Even in light of yesterday’s conversation.

Stacia set a potato pancake in front of Posey (a little over-salted, but hey. Posey wasn’t about to reject it). “I set her straight on that. It’s one thing that you had to do business with that man—and I understand it was a lot of money for you, honey, so I forgive you—but eat there? Please. Poor Gretchen, she’s so good-hearted, she just can’t imagine anyone being snide or insulting like that Dante Bellini’s been to us. Kitschy institution. I’ll give him kitschy institution. Gretchen’s just too sweet for her own good.”

One had to wonder on which planet Stacia lived. “Dinner at home sounds great, Ma,” Posey said.

“Good. Oh, you know what? I should invite Liam and that pretty daughter of his! Don’t you think he and Gretchen would make the most wonderful couple?”

Posey swallowed her bite of congealing pancake without fully chewing it. “Um…I don’t, actually.”

“Well, you’re nuts. They’d make beautiful children. Max! Get out here! Your daughter wants to see you!”

“Then she can come in here! Posey! Are your legs broken?”

“No, Dad, I’m coming.” She went into the office, where her father was scowling at the computer.

“Do you know how to upload something?” Max asked. “I wish to God computers had never been invented!”

“Sure, I can help.”

“Thanks.” He gave her a grudging smile, then patted his knee. “You’re not too big to sit on your old man’s lap, are you?” he said.

“I’m almost thirty-four, Dad,” she said.

“Fine. Stab in me in the heart, why don’t you,” he grumbled, so Posey sat, gave his cheek a smooch, and got to work. “What do you want to upload?”

“A picture of Gretchen,” he said. “Seems like we should make more fuss over her, since she’s a celebrity and all.”

“Ah.” Posey could imagine whose idea that was. She clicked through the folder to find the photo Max wanted. “So, how are renovation plans coming along?”

“Oh…she has a lot of ideas, your cousin.”

“I hope you’ll only change what you want, Dad,” Posey said. “I mean, you’re still adjusting to the new addition.” A few years ago, there’d been a small fire at the Osterhagen home (candles left untended during some geriatric amour, which Henry and Posey still could not mention without wheezing hilarity). The result was that her parents ended up renovating, which caused great upheaval. They still went to the wall where the cellar door used to be, still seemed stymied as to where it went, six years after the fact. So an entirely new restaurant…it just didn’t seem like them.

“That’s the one she wanted,” Max said, pointing, so Posey uploaded the photo to Guten Tag’s home page, and there she was, Gretchen and her impressive Teutonic cle**age.

“Hi, Mutti. Hi, Papa!” Speak of the devil.

“Hi, sweetheart,” Max said. “Posey’s just helping me with the website.”

“Oh. Hi, Posey, you look so cute today!” Gretchen flashed her blinding teeth. “Like you’re about eleven years old, sitting there on Papa’s lap. Adorable!”

“Why, thank you, Gretchen.”

Gret smiled, then gave Posey a searching look. “Hey, how’s the search for your birth parents going?”

Max bolted up from the chair, dumping Posey onto the floor, and there was a huge crash from the kitchen. A nanosecond later, Stacia loomed in the doorway, tragic confusion written all over her face. “What’s this? You’re looking for your birth parents?”

“No,” Posey said, hauling herself off the floor. “I don’t know what you’re talking about, Gret.”

“The book on how to find your birth parents? It was on the shelf in the kitchen.”

“Oh, right,” Posey said. “That book belongs to James. I keep meaning to give it back to him.”

Gretchen looked wide-eyed at Max and Stacia, then at Posey, as if desperate to keep a terrible secret. “Oh. Right. Um…Mutti, I must’ve been mistaken. I’m sure it was James’s book. Of course it is.”

“It is, Mom.” Posey glared at her cousin. “I’m not looking for anyone.”

“If you want that information,” Stacia began, her voice stentorian, “we wouldn’t resent you. It’s completely understandable.”

“I’m not looking, Mom.”

“You must want to know your roots. It would be fine. We know you love us,” Max said, sounding as if he was reciting from a pamphlet on When Your Adopted Child Wants Answers. “I’m not looking. James left his book at Irreplaceable a while ago, I brought it home and just forgot about it.”

“I’m so sorry I brought it up. Posey, really. So sorry.” Gretchen gave Posey a little wink, and Posey thought, for one deeply satisfying moment, how fun it would be to see her cousin fending off a couple dozen angry raccoons. Ever since the night at the casino, Gretchen had been more and more hostile—and clever. Nothing could be held against her, but it was malicious just the same.

“Well,” Stacia said, still staring suspiciously at Posey, “it’s time to get dressed for the parade. Come on, girls. Posey, where’s that poor Brianna? Is she coming?”