These Games We Play

chapter fifty three : daddy issues

The biggest indoor space at Heights Country Day was called the Commons. It was part lounge, part meeting space, and tonight it had been transformed. Gold curtains lined the sides of the room. The furniture had been replaced with dozens of circular tables covered with silk tablecloths in a deep midnight purple. Emily’s favourite colour. Near the front of the room, two enormous pictures sat on golden easels. One was an architect’s sketch of the new chapel. The other was a photograph of Emily Laughlin.

I tried not to stare at it—and failed. Emily’s hair was strawberry blond, with just enough of a natural wave to make her look a little unpredictable. Her skin was unbearably clear, her eyes all-knowing. She wasn’t as beautiful as Rebecca, but there was something about the way she smiled.… I couldn’t help thinking that maybe it was a good thing that Jameson and Grayson weren’t here. They’d loved her, both of them. Maybe they still do.

Beside me, Xander bumped his shoulder into mine. Alisa had given him strict orders to stay close to me, just like she’d reluctantly assigned Nash as Pip’s escort tonight. Part of the damage control we were supposed to do was conveying that I was on good terms with the Hawthorne family—easier said than done, given that Xander and Nash weren’t the only Hawthorne’s in attendance. Lia had already wondered off the go talk to some of her friends in her biology classes. Cam was still with me her arm firmly in mine.

On the far side of the room, I caught sight of Zara and Constantine, mingling.

“We need to work the room,” Alisa murmured directly into the back of my head. She began herding Xander and me toward a string quartet, and that was the exact moment when I spotted Skye Hawthorne. She was laughing freely, surrounded by admirers—some male, some female.

“The couple on the left are Christine Terry and her husband, Michael,” Alisa murmured. “Third-generation oil money. Not people you want as enemies.” I translated that to mean: not people we want laughing with Skye.

“I’ll introduce you,” Alisa told me.

“Help me,” I muttered to Cam.

“I would,” she whispered, “but there’s a waiter who just walked by, and he’s carrying shrimp!”

Ten seconds later, I was shaking hands with Christine Terry.

“Skye here was telling us you’re not much of a football fan,” her husband declared, jovial and loud. “Any chance you feel like parting with the Lone Stars?”

“You’ll have to forgive my husband,” Christine told me. “I keep telling him there’s a time and a place for business.”

“And a time and place for football!” Michael boomed.

“Evangeline’s not looking to part with any assets at the moment,” Alisa said evenly. “I don’t know what could have given anyone that idea.”

By anyone, she meant Skye, but the boys’ murderous mother was a Hawthorne to her bones—and thoroughly undaunted. “Darling Evangeline here is a Libra,” Skye cooed. “Ambivalent, people-pleasing, and cerebral. We can all read between those lines.” She paused, then extended a hand to her right.

“Isn’t that right, Peter?” She couldn’t have timed his appearance better if she’d tried. Peter wrapped an arm around Skye’s waist. I was going to throw up. She’d dressed the deadbeat in an expensive tailored suit. Looking at him, I tried to remind myself that he was nothing to me.

But when he smiled, I still felt seven years old and about three inches tall. I tightened my grip on Xander, but he stepped away from me suddenly.

About a dozen yards away, I saw the Laughlin’s. Mr. and Mrs. Laughlin looked distinctly uncomfortable in formal wear. Rebecca was standing beside them, and next to her was a woman in her forties or fifties who looked eerily like Emily would have if she’d lived to grow older. As I watched, the woman—who I could only assume was the girls’ mother—downed a large glass of wine in one gulp. Rebecca’s eyes met Xander’s, and a second later, he was gone, leaving me to his mother’s mercies.